Cyberdrome (18 page)

“My shields and
weapons are completely drained,” Alek said.

“As are mine,”
Javid replied.

“This is a
Sentinel base, right?” Alek asked. “You said there were no Raptors inside, so
we should be safe here.”

“We have entered
through an illegal backdoor,” Javid replied. “Sentinel bases have numerous
safeguards to prevent unauthorized entry. We must assume that these safeguards
will still be operational.”

“Are you telling
me that the base itself will be attacking us? Don’t you have some sort of access
code or something to shut off the defenses?”

“Access codes
can be downloaded from a captured Sentinel. Therefore, we have none. The ground
level of this facility is actually a complicated series of interlocking mazes,
designed to make it impossible to enter without knowing the exact route to the
central hub. Navigational memory is more difficult to extract than simple
access codes.”

“But you know
the route. You’re a Sentinel.”

“I know the
correct route from the main entrance to the hub. As I have stated, we have entered
through a backdoor. We will have to be on our guard.”

“And we will do
this without weapons or shields.”

“Now you are
sounding like a Sentinel,” Javid said, missing the point completely.

They began
moving slowly. The hallway was just wide enough for both Tracers to travel side
by side. Within a minute, they encountered their first defensive routine. It
was a small silver pod, floating in the middle of the hallway up ahead of them.

“Attraction
bomb,” Javid said. “It pulls all programs toward it and traps them there.” He
paused. “This is curious—I have scanned it and it appears deactivated, or
perhaps malfunctioning. We should, however, remain cautious.”

They moved
slowly up to the pod, staying as far to the sides as possible. As soon as they
neared it, they sped up and passed it quickly. It showed no sign of activity. A
short time later, they encountered another defensive routine. Javid explained
that it was a cell with a large memory block over it that dropped when you
passed under it, smashing you to bits. Javid called it a decision gate, but
Alek saw it as a simple trash compactor. Luckily for them, it wasn’t functioning
either.

After an hour of
finding more traps that were either damaged or already sprung, Alek began to
relax. Obviously, something had rendered all of the base’s defenses harmless
long ago. Most likely, it was the shock wave from his Panspermia bomb—the same
wave that had apparently deleted all the Sentinels.

The hallways
eventually grew narrower, forcing them to continue in single file with Javid
leading the way. At one point Alek rounded a corner and found Javid’s ship
sitting at the entrance of a room the size of a soccer field. He moved up
beside Javid and saw what looked like large metallic eggs filling the space. On
the far side of the room, a tall double-sided pyramid that seemed to be
balanced on four glowing legs moved slowly over the eggs. Below it, beams of
energy struck the tops of the eggs it passed over, making them glow.

Javid turned and
headed down a side hallway. Alek followed him and in a few minutes, they
entered a much smaller room. Javid headed straight for a raised platform on the
far side. “This regenerator is still operational,” Javid said as he brought his
ship onto the platform and then powered down his ship. As soon as his Tracer
touched down, the pad began to glow.

Alek pulled his
Tracer up behind Javid’s ship. He had a flashback of being a kid and having to
wait in line to get hydrogen for his parents’ automobile. “What were those
things in the other room?” Alek asked. “They looked like eggs.”

“They were
Raptor seed programs,” Javid said.

“What was that
thing hovering above them?”

“A Replicator.
Sentinels use them to create new Tracers and other devices. It appears that the
Raptors are now using this one to copy themselves.”

Before he could
ask what that meant, Javid powered up his Tracer. The red shield generators on
the side of his ship glowed brightly.

“Fully charged,”
Javid said as he moved his ship off the pad. “Your turn.”

Alek moved on top
of the pad and powered down his ship. He watched his Tracer recharging itself
with an odd sense of satisfaction. He had always bonded in a strange way to his
automobiles. A girlfriend had once commented that he loved his first car, an
old battery-powered four-wheeler, more than he loved her. Perhaps she was
right—he had kept the car for several years, but he couldn’t even remember the
girl’s name.

When his display
showed that all systems were at maximum capacity, Alek powered up his Tracer
and moved off the pad. He looked around and realized he was alone in the room.
His scanner showed no other ships in range.

“I’m finished,
Javid. Where are you?”

There was no
answer. Since it appeared that he could boost just about every system in the
Tracer by transferring power to it from other systems, he mentally played
around with the system controls until he figured out how to boost the range of
his scanner. There was Javid’s ship—about five hundred meters back the
direction they had come. His Tracer seemed to be moving toward him at high
speed. A few seconds later, Javid’s Tracer flew into the room, followed by four
other Tracers.

Javid’s face
reappeared on his communications panel. “Prepare to leave, Alek.”

“Who are they?”
he asked, referring to the other ships.

“I replicated
four new Tracers as payment to the KaNanee,” Javid replied flatly. “I am activating
your Tracer’s remote pilot. These ships will now follow you wherever you go.
Take them and leave immediately.”

Alek saw a new
“remote pilot” display appear on his dashboard as the four Tracers moved into
position behind his ship. He was about to ask why Javid wasn’t going to tow
them, when an alarm went off in the room and bars of light along the walls
began flashing red. He looked down and saw a massive shock wave on his scanner,
approaching their position. “What the hell did you do?” he asked.

Javid’s face
looked calm. “After I made the copies, I placed an ESD beneath the Replicator.
Its deletion set off a cascade deletion of the Raptor eggs.”

The shock wave was
enormous and steadily approaching. It seemed to be deleting everything in its
path, including the base itself. “Are you trying to get us killed?”

“It is the duty
of every Sentinel to protect the system. The use of our Replicator by these
programs is a clear violation of security. I could not allow it to continue
operation.”

“What the hell
do we do now?” Alek yelled. “You cut off our only escape route. How do you plan
to get us out of here?”

“Tracer hangar
number seven is at the end of the next corridor,” Javid said. “If you use Recon
mode you should be able to outrun the blast and escape through the hangar
doors.”

“All right, I’ll
follow you.” The shock wave was almost on them now.

“My ship was
damaged during the attack on the Replicator,” Javid replied. “My
reconfiguration routine is offline and there is no time to repair it. I cannot
outrun the blast, Alek. You are on your own now.”

He should’ve
realized that Javid would do this. He was a Sentinel—a program. His own life
meant nothing to him. The shock wave was almost on them, and Alek realized that
they were both out of time
.

NINE

I
n a flash of
insight, Alek gunned his ship toward the corridor as he ordered his remote
pilot control to release one of the drones and lock onto Javid’s ship. He
switched to Recon Mode just as the shock wave smashed into the room.

He flew back in
his seat as his Tracer screamed down the corridor. He could imagine the blast
wave right behind him, but he was too busy trying to steer his Tracer down the
twisting corridor to look back.

Finally, he shot
out of one of the hangar doors, past the stunned Raptor guards, and rocketed
across the ground. When he finally dropped back to Explorer Mode and slowed his
ship to a stop, he was relieved to see Javid’s ship floating next to three of
the copied Tracers.

“That
was…unexpected,” Javid said.

“I decided that
you were worth more than an extra drone,” Alek admitted. “I think the KaNanee
will understand.”

After what
seemed like several minutes, Javid finally spoke. “That was a decision well
made, Alek. You are proving yourself to be an excellent Gray Sentinel.”

“You know, I’ve
been meaning to ask you something. I understand that Sentinels are color-coded
to identify their rank or job. Your skin is blue because you’re some sort of
squadron leader. So, what does a Gray Sentinel do?”

Javid regarded
him in the monitor for a few moments before answering. “Gray Sentinels are not
part of the system when it is working properly. They are brought in to make
decisions when no one else can. They are brought in to find solutions to
problems that others have given up on.”

That answer
surprised Alek. He was a good problem solver, maybe better than most, but he
was certainly no Gray Sentinel. He was just an average guy dealing the best he
could with the crap that life seemed to be throwing at him.

He glanced down
at his scanner and saw a hundred red dots approaching them from the direction
of the damaged Base. “We have company,” he said aloud. “You don’t think they’re
a little pissed at you for destroying their eggs, do you?”

“We need to
concentrate on our tactics now,” Javid replied. “I will deal with them while
you take the Tracers back to the KaNanee.”

The red dots
were getting closer. “If I’m reading this scanner correctly, the place we were
supposed to meet the KaNanee is on the other side of the base,” Alek said. “Besides,
you can’t take on all of those Raptors by yourself.”

“Sentinels were
designed to complete missions. I have been operating without a mission plan for
a long time now. I have nothing left to do but delete as many of the enemy as I
can. I must protect the system at all costs. That is my duty.”

“Damn it, Javid,
you’re adaptive. You have gone far beyond your programming to survive this long
without help. Don’t give up on me now.”

“I have no
mission.”

Alek had another
insight. “I do.”

Javid narrowed
his eyes. “Explain.”

Alek looked at
the scanner. He didn’t really have time for explanations, but he needed the Sentinel’s
help to find Maya and the others. “I know how to protect the system,” he
blurted out. “I mean the entire system, all of Cyberdrome. That’s my mission
and I can’t do it without you.”

Javid’s face stared
at him through the display. “The two of us cannot complete such a mission,” he
finally said. “We would need help.”

He decided to
continue his lie. It had worked to get him this far. “You were correct in believing
that I am one of the next generation of Sentinels. What you don’t know is that
there are five more of my kind out there somewhere. If we can locate them, we
can help them restore Cyberdrome to its original state.”

The Sentinels
eyes lit up. “That is truly a worthwhile mission, Alek. Tell me more.”