The Unseen (5 page)

Another soldier pointed a strange megaphone-looking device in her direction, and a wave of blue light washed over her again. The noise it made was distinctive, and the drone that had just saved Kari fell to the ground lifelessly.
No mind chip, no more drones, and no escape plan. Great.

The soldier jumped for her, reaching out with armored hands from behind the helmet that masked the soldier’s face completely. The soldier was an inch too slow; Kari had already started sprinting due east.

Kari let Lars down to the ground as she ran away from her house. She was already having a hard time breathing, but she kept pushing herself forward, desperate to make it to freedom.
I’ve been a prisoner of the state before, and it’s not an experience that I want to repeat. Whoever hacked my printer better have a good reason for me to run in this direction.

Kari screamed as two soldiers popped out of the bushes. Their heavy electronic armor made them look like demons emerging from a cloud of smoke. Their technological camouflage blended in perfectly with their surroundings, so that Kari couldn’t seem them until she was within arm’s reach.

“Hands up!” one of the soldiers yelled at her. They both raised their energy guns and pointed them at her, freezing her in place. Lars growled at them while hiding between her feet.
Good boy, you’ll scare them away for sure.
Kari put her hands in the air and tried to look around inconspicuously for a way out of this mess. She didn’t find anything promising, but did manage to see the soldier who had been chasing her come jogging up from behind.

“Kari Tahe, you’re under arrest. Come peacefully, and you’ll be given a fair trial,” the soldier said from behind her helmet. The soldier’s mask muffled her voice in a way that made her sound inhuman.
Since when is a fair trial dependent on anything?

“OK,” Kari said. “What about my dog?”
I hope this next prison has a better food printer.

The soldier started to respond but stopped before Kari could make out what she was saying; the gun she had pointed at Kari started to melt in her hands. It held its shape stubbornly for a moment before it started to crumble into streams of black dust.
The soldier dropped the gun exactly how Kari dropped a piece of clothing when a spider was on it. Kari also backed away from the gun; its dusty remains started to form tiny mounds on the ground. The other soldier in front of her dropped her gun as it started to disintegrate as well.

I’ve seen enough.
Kari pushed forward and raced out between the two distracted soldiers before they could stop her. She whistled to Lars, who scampered after her. He caught up quickly, since running in sweats and slippers through the brush wasn’t ideal. She heard shouts and footsteps behind her, closing in fast. Kari knew she couldn’t outrun them for long with their mechanically supplemented strides, but it didn’t stop her from giving the chase everything she had.

A hand pulled back on her shoulder, sending Kari spinning around and falling into the dirt, scraping her hands against the small rocks on the ground.
A soldier reached down to grab her, but before the soldier could make contact, a ball of energy collided with soldier’s chest. The blast sent Kari’s would-be jailor flying backward into the darkness, and Kari shielded her eyes from the bright light. A blur of movement leaped over her head and went running past where the soldier had just been.

The bushes nearby rustled as more blurs raced past her toward the house.
Cheetahs! I don’t know or care whose they are—I’m just glad that they’re here!
The mechanical robots that resembled their organic namesake were common in the enforcement and security industries. They were fast, agile, and equipped with enough firepower to be used on a battlefield. Kari climbed to her feet, carefully this time, as the scrapes and bruises from the evening were starting to slow her down.

A long, dark cheetah with red-lighted accents strolled up next to her. It had two large energy cannons mounted on its back, as well as some other attachments she didn’t recognize. It was unlike any cheetah Kari had ever seen. It was slick and intimidating, and had a stylistic flair that was captivating. The mechanical catlike robot trotted in front of her, leading her east over the landscape. Lars walked by Kari’s side, as far away from the cheetah as possible, while still remaining close to Kari.
I don’t trust it either, boy, but it’s all we’ve got right now.

The moon appeared from behind a cloud, which made Kari’s life a little easier. The sounds of a skirmish rang out over the otherwise lonely acres that belonged to Kari. It was comforting to hear that the fighting was happening farther away with every footstep, despite the fact that Kari didn’t know where she was going.

Ten minutes later and without further incident, she stumbled out onto the broken asphalt road.
An auto-auto with red accents, which matched the escort of stylized cheetahs that surrounded it, waited for her. The door slid open, and the cheetahs parted, allowing Kari a clear path to get inside. She paused.
This could be a trap
. Kari stooped over and picked up Lars, who was panting beside her sweaty feet.
But then again, this could be anything.
Kari stepped forward and climbed into the waiting vehicle.

It has to be some sort of electromagnetic pulse. But, somehow, localized and controlled from the little megaphone-gun-looking thing.
No other explanation made sense. EMP bombs were common on the battlefield; they were bombs that would explode and knock out all of the electrical devices within a radius of a mile or so. But she had never seen anything like the guns she saw tonight.

Where the Middle States had obtained such technology without her knowing it even existed was baffling. She hadn’t seen any news or reports about tech like that being used on the battlefields, and she didn’t think there were any freelance hackers left for hire. The formerly vibrant community had gone disturbingly silent in the past few weeks. It was one of the many things that Kari had been hoping to have more time to look into.

Maybe the government people actually developed something on their own. No, that seems like too much of a stretch. Probably one of the big defense companies had a breakthrough. But if they had, it would have been publicized and marketed to get a big stock market reaction.
It didn’t add up.
Lars stood on her lap and turned around a few times before settling back down in the same exact position. Kari opened her eyes and looked down at him with an internal chuckle.
Strange little dog.

Kari looked around the interior of the mysterious auto-auto that had rescued her. The dim red light still pulsated along the thin tracks on the wall, making it look like the car had a heart somewhere that was pumping LED blood through its veins.
The accommodations inside the vehicle were impressive; the seats were all padded with new synthetic leather, and a minibar was well stocked with treats and beverages. It felt kind of old school to offer a bar rather than a printer that could just make something for you, but the traditional approach to service was fitting.

There hadn’t been any more clues in the car about whom the vehicle belonged to or where they were heading, except for another message printed into an impossibly thin sheet of graphium.

“Make yourself comfortable. It’ll be a while. —The Unseen”

The message didn’t sound like Henderson or anyone of his type, but that hadn’t kept her from spending the start of the ride staring out the tinted windows, trying her hardest to make sure they weren’t headed east toward the border. From what she could tell, they were headed northwest, which was a direction that she had no specific qualms about.

Overall, the drive was physically comfortable despite being mentally unsettling. The blue EMP blasts had knocked out the processing unit behind her ear, which meant that her mental commands from her mind chip had no computer to answer them. That meant no Internet, no networks, no hacking the vehicle she was in, and it meant feeling defenseless.

It was a feeling that would have bothered her more if she hadn’t dealt with the lack of a functioning mind chip when she was in prison. Lars was tired, but she didn’t think she’d be able to ever sleep again. She was left with nothing else to do besides to try to relax and process the dramatic events of the evening.

Localized EMP blasts made sense to Kari. She knew there were a few puzzle pieces missing, but it was a plausible explanation. The evaporating weapon was a whole other story.
Did I see that correctly? Or was the mind chip messing with my vision or something as a result of the electromagnetic fields that were flying around?

Whatever had had caused the gun to fall apart had surprised her attackers as much as it had surprised her. And it had happened at a very fortunate time—fortunate enough that it wasn’t just an accident or an overload. Something had caused it to happen, of that she was sure.

Maybe those modified cheetahs had some sort of special attack?
It didn’t feel like the right answer, so Kari continued searching for an explanation. Her mind worked through possibilities that made her long for a functioning processing unit so she could step into a simulation to explore the concepts more thoroughly. She leaned back in her chair and resigned herself to thinking through things the old-fashioned way.

They hacked the weapons and caused them to self-destruct!
Kari opened her eyes, as the answer had come to her while she was asleep. It had taken a while, but eventually she had dozed off. Apparently, her mind had kept working on the problem and had decided to alert her to the fact that it had finally come to an answer that it was satisfied with.

That or this car ride just got a whole lot rougher.
The auto-auto shook noticeably now as it continued forward at a slower pace. Either they were driving over a street that had been heavily damaged or they had left the paved road. The vibrations bothered Lars and caused him to sniff around the seats suspiciously.

I’ve never heard of hacking weapons before, but it might make sense
. Everything had more and more software in it these days, so it might be possible. She hadn’t thought anyone would be able to hack her personal 3D printers either, but whoever saved her had accomplished that as well.
If someone did hack those weapons, it means I’m certain of two things: Whoever saved me is a legendary hacker, and whoever saved me vastly overestimated how long I can hold my pee.

Kari squirmed in her seat as she felt the auto-auto slow to a bumpy stop.
We’re here!
Lars started barking, and Kari tried to quiet the little dog.
I really need to train him better.
The door to
Kari’s right slid open, and pale early morning light seeped into the car. Lars jumped out of the exit and disappeared from sight before she could stop him.

Kari followed him outside, stepping cautiously onto soft gravel that shifted under her feet. She squinted and tried to make out her surroundings. There were mountains all around and lots of pine trees.
The air here was fresh and crisp, with a little bit of a cool bite. The sun hadn’t made it over the looming mountains, but it was growing lighter by the second.

A silhouette of a man, not far away from her, stooped down and picked up Lars, who had been sniffing at the man’s feet. A stranger picking up her dog made her feel uncomfortable, and she started forward to get some answers.

“Good boy, good boy!” the man said, but as Kari got closer, she began to realize that the man was more of a boy, or at least a man who hadn’t grown enough to come off as imposing.

“There you go,” he said, setting Lars down on the gravel and allowing him to run back to Kari. Giant glass windows belonging to an impressive cabin came into focus as Kari stooped over to pick Lars up, a few feet from the mysterious figure.

“Kari Tahe, I can’t tell you how happy I am to finally see you here.” His voice backed that statement up, as it was filled with excitement. It was low, but youthful, and there was something about it that made her release her anxiety. “Or should I call you Freelancer?”

Kari placed her foot deep into the loose gravel and froze a few feet away from the handsome young man who had just addressed her by her real name and her hacker handle. He smiled at her brightly and extended his hand. Kari studied him for a second; he had light brown skin, dark hair, and eager eyes. He seemed good-natured enough, and it seemed like he had chosen to call her by her name and handle out of respect and not as a threat.
Kari wasn’t sure why, but she immediately trusted him. She reached out and shook his hand back. His grip was firm, and his hands were warm. It felt nice.

“Here—come with me.” He led her forward as he turned toward the massive cabin that was coming into view. Kari hadn’t noticed how big it was before, but now that it was in front of her, she couldn’t believe she could have missed such an impressive structure nestled in among the trees.

“I don’t usually go places with strangers,” Kari said, picking her words carefully.

“Good thing we’re not strangers.”

“Am I supposed to know you?” Every step they took closer to the cabin revealed more of its impressiveness. There were trees growing from decks and on the solar-paneled roof. There was a huge balcony, where Kari thought she could see a group of people doing yoga. A giant window was suddenly illuminated as someone turned on the light for the first time that day.
Where are we?

“Of course—I’m Joseth Arroyo, but you know me as Oedipus.”

Kari tripped over herself and barely managed to keep herself from falling onto the stone pathway leading to the mountain mansion. “Wait, you’re
the
Oedipus?”

“And this is Valhalla, the home of the Unseen.”

It was the most beautiful thing Kari had ever seen. The bottom floor of the Unseen’s mansion was filled to the brim with the most advanced 3D printers on the planet—hundreds of them, each filled to the brim with world-class materials ready to print whatever the mind could imagine.
They had several printers large enough that they were capable of printing entire auto-autos at once, which explained the stylized vehicle that had carried her here that night.