The Significant (82 page)

      
Isa knew she was breaking apart.

      
But she could only sit and feel her seams
rip open as pain tore through her.
 

      
Two nights after the operators were found
dead, Isa, who had been mandated to stay away from the Syndicate Building while
the final inspections were completed, was called down to the level where
Colonel Amori had been staying.

      
She tried to ignore the shaking of her
body as she stood in the elevator while it descended. She contemplated not
responding to Colonel Amori’s request, but she did not want him in her home
again when he came to retrieve her. Therefore, she obeyed, going to him, feeling
half-asleep and on the verge of collapse.

      
She walked into his room, trying not to
think of the horrors in the adjacent room. She looked around, unable to find
the Colonel, so she walked further back into the apartment, finding him in the
bedroom, staring intently at the computer screen as he sat at the desk next to
the tousled bed. He did not even turn to acknowledge her.

      
“You’ve been moving a lot slower lately,”
he stated simply.

      
Isa did not respond.

      
“At least the evacuation has kept your
Bronze Elites from doing anything stupid, but tomorrow will be the real test,
won’t it? Back to work again?”

      
“What do you want?” Isa asked tiredly.

      
Colonel Amori stood and turned to her.

      
“I almost have all her codes in place to
completely weaponized her. Now, not only will she be able to establish
“credible” threats, but she’ll be able to neutralize them.”

      
“Venus was not created to be a weapon,”
Isa said. “You’ve destroyed her.”

      
“You and I have a very different
definition of a weapon,” Colonel Amori said. “She was already a weapon. Just
because she couldn’t immediately take human life does not mean she was not a
weapon
.” He stopped in front of the
Elite, smiling darkly. “But I can’t weaponize, or shut her down properly, if I
don’t have her source coding.” His smile widened. “Which you have.”

      
Isa stared at him impassively and he
chuckled.

      
“I’ve been patient with you. But now, I
want those codes.”

      
“I refuse.”

      
“I didn’t give you the option to refuse,”
he said darkly, his eyes turning dangerous. “Or do I need to remind you that I
hold the life of your Elites, your caretaker, and all of Anon in my hands?”

      
“You do not need to remind me,” Isa said
tiredly.

      
“Then you will give me those codes now.”

      
“No.”

      
“I will destroy your Syndicate,” he
warned.

      
“Go ahead,” Isa said, shaking her head.
“You’ve already done most of the damage as it is.”

      
“Oh, what’s this? Giving up? Or is this
some play for dominance?”

      
“You can destroy the Syndicate, Anon, the
Elite Academy, but I refuse to be aid to you as you morph the artificial
intelligence on this planet to be a weapon with which to terrorize the system.
Now, you’re not only destroying my planet, but the rest of the system, whether
the planets are in the Alliance or not.” Isa shook her head. “I will not allow
you to become the tyrant of the Altereye System.”

      
“This is an interesting change of
character,” Colonel Amori noted. “I was not expecting this reaction.” He looked
her over. “You know I can take them by force.”

      
“Try it.”

      
He lunged forward, grabbing her by her
neck and throwing her onto the bed. She tried to roll off the bed, but he
grabbed her and yanked her back, climbing on top of her and pinning her down,
one hand around her throat. Her arms flailed wildly, trying to hit or scratch
him, but he backed away, laughing darkly.

      
“You think I don’t have power over you?”
he asked. His other hand went down and angrily ripped open her uniform,
pressing sharply on the area where he knew the processor was, where he could
copy Venus’ source codes that were stored within the Golden Elite’s body. “You
think I couldn’t take what I wanted from you?”

      
Isa kicked her legs, but her body was
weak from starvation, lack of sleep, and stress. She felt her struggle being
easily overpowered and fear began to consume her.

      
“Remember,” he said darkly, moving his
hand to reach between her legs, angrily grabbing her, “I own you.
All of you
. And I will take what I
want.”

      
Isa’s hand to the desk next to the bed
and found the magnifying lamp used in manufacturing and programming. Her hand
closed around the lamp and she brought it, with all her strength, into Colonel
Amori’s head. The glass shattered, some going into his eye and causing him to
yelp and reel backwards. He tried to brace himself on the bed, but his hand
went into the glass shards that were still attached to the top of the metal
frame

      
Isa’s arm swung back sharply and slashed
the Gihoric rule across the neck and chest, slicing into his skin and causing
blood to soak the front of his shirt. He gasped and rolled away.

      
“You
bitch
!”
he bellowed. “I’ll kill you!”

      
Isa was immediately after him, lifting
the sharp broken base of the lamp into the air before angrily plunging it into
his side. He yelled and contorted, rolling away once more and onto the hard
floor, landing on the open wound and letting out a cry of pain.

      
Isa leapt on him, raising the broken base
of the lamp and repeatedly stabbing his chest and torso. She could not feel the
blood that splattered onto her face and neck. Her body was moving as if on
instinct, destroying the one who had been torturing her.

      
When her weak hand released the base of
the lamp, her fist still continued the motion, slamming into the corpse of the
Gihron leader, breaking few ribs.

      
Finally, Isa stopped, her body shuddering
violently as she collapsed on the floor, barely finding the strength in her
limbs to remain upright next to the body.

      
She turned her eyes onto her hands,
seeing the blood that soaked her skin, dripping down her arms and staining the
ripped front of her uniform. Slowly, she lifted her hands to her face and bent
forward, her body shaking. She did not care about the blood. She covered her
face with her hands, the silence of the room ringing in her ears.

      
The following day Isa returned to the
Syndicate, but her head was low and her body was shaking uncontrollably. She
had spent the entire night angrily washing her body over and over again, trying
to get rid of the blood under her fingernails and in her hair. She then burned
her clothes on the balcony, watching the flames intensely, every muscle tense.

      
Then, she paced around her bedroom for
five hours before she was expected at work.

      
But even as she dressed and prepared to
go to the Syndicate, she felt no more ready to handle seeing the other Elites.

      
Isa had no idea how she was going to tell
anyone about what happened. There was a part of her that believed she had not
killed Colonel Amori, only angered him further to the point where he would flip
the switch on the black handle and send all the Elites after her to kill her,
forcing her to kill them to save her own life.

      
She could hardly remember dismantling and
destroying the handle the previous night before tearing the room apart to find
the second trigger for destroying Anon. She was not sure if it had been a
dream, or if she had, in fact, destroyed both triggers.

      
With her entire body in a high state of
stress, she felt as though she was about to break.

      
She managed to get past the control room
without anyone seeing and stopping her, but as she was climbing the stairs,
refusing to stand still long enough to use the elevator, she caught Remus on
the floor below hers.

      
“Isa,” he said quietly, surprised to see
her. She jumped, her eyes wide and frantic as she stared at him. “Are…what is
it?”

      
“Nothing,” she said quickly. She turned
to walk up the stairs, but Remus called her attention again.

      
“Isa,” he said. She stopped, her
shoulders tense as she debated with herself about turning around to talk to him
or if she should just run up to her office. She felt as if her world was spinning
very fast around her, about ready to collapse into chaos. “I have the reports
on what they found for the building.”

      
“Oh?”

      
“Do you want to see them?”

      
Isa turned around slowly. That was when
Remus noticed that Isa’s body was rocking back and forth shallowly, her
breathing short. He stepped back, nervous.

      
“Why don’t you come here into the hall
and look?” he suggested.

      
Slowly, Isa walked to him, her steps
short and her exhales shaking as she stepped closer. Remus watched her move,
terrified.

      
“Are you…do you need to go to the
hospital?”

      
“No, no, I’m fine,” Isa blurted.

      
“You’re clearly not.”

      
“I said I’m fine. Just…just tell me what
you want to tell me and then let me go.”

      
Remus blinked, the words frightening him.

      
“I’m not holding you here, Isa,” he said
slowly. “You can leave if you really want. You’re starting to scare me. What’s
going on?”

      
“Nothing is going on,” Isa said darkly.
“Just, tell me. Okay? I need…”

      
“What do you need?”

      
“…I don’t know,” Isa whispered, her voice
breaking. “This needs to be over.”

      
“What needs to be over?”

      
“…everything…” Isa’s voice choked and her
body began shaking so violently Remus was about to call an EMU for the Golden
Elite. Isa could feel the Colonel watching her. She knew he was waiting for the
moment to activate the microbionic cells and send the Elites after her. She
could feel the anticipation building and it was choking her.

      
“Isa,” Remus hissed. “Isa, look at me.”

      
“…I can’t do this…”

      
Her legs began giving out from under her
and Remus grabbed her arm, pulling her up, his hands gripping her shoulders,
trying to keep her standing.

      
But Isa was sure that Colonel Amori had
activated the cells.

      
“Let go of me!” she screamed, shoving at
him weakly and falling to the ground when Remus released her in surprise. She
clamored to her feet, turning to run to the stairs, but her legs gave out at
the top and she pitched forward, tumbling down the staircase, her left arm
slamming against the railing and snapping instantly. She came to an abrupt
halt, face down, on the landing.

      
“Isa!” Remus cried, descending the stairs
after her. The commotion was heard by the other Elites, and they quickly went
to the staircase.

      
Isa saw Remus rushing after her and her
fear tripled. She forced herself to her feet again and struggled down the next
flight of stairs to the next level. She darted onto the walkway but stopped
instantly when she saw the gathering of Elites coming to inspect the noise. She
let out a pained sound and sank to her knees in the middle of the walkway,
looking around frantically as the faces of her Syndicate came closer, their
eyes showing their fear and concern, their fast actions terrifying her.

      
Isa glanced over her shoulder, cradling
her broken arm, and saw the control room through the glass railing.

      
In a terrified daze, Isa moved her legs
under her just as the other Elites reached for her and she pushed all of her
bodyweight into the glass panel, her body falling with the shattered glass to
the floor below, connecting with the computers in the center platform of the
control room with an audible crunch.

      
Her world went black.