My brain is trying to pop. Like a shook up can of coke. I can see but I can’t focus. I gone all tense like a dead boy. It’s a noise. Noise so nasty and big it’s scrambling my brain. Movement. Over by the door, one of the other patrons of this cafe is struggling to push past the heavy boys in suits, but they’ve got him. He’s shouting in ‘Rean. Almost growling. Furious. Got gang markings on his jacket. Tower.
He must have popped a screamer. Little rat drone what screams like a banshee.
Now his hood is down and they ripped his mask off, you can see the yellow sickness on him, the black veins in his neck. Infected. Just like me. Cafe Man is on his feet too, shotgun in his hands, not comfortable with letting this pack snatch up one of his gang brothers. All the other punters are gone, probably on the floor under the desks.
“Move now. It’s your only chance.”
Blanky doesn’t have to tell me twice.
Almost fall out of my chair, the screamer still messing with my head.
“Jun! Stay out of this! He’s infected!” Bandage Man shouts.
“Get into the booth. Get me to the main computer.” Blanky whispers.
I’m on my hands and knees, crawling like a baby. Fast as I can. I snatch a glimpse of the back of Jun, he ain’t looking back at me, nobody is.
I’m in the booth, nasty sticky carpet. See the computer. Three screens. One keyboard. A little black box. Wires going into a tube up the wall.
“Look at the screen.”
They’re all black, just the cafe logo and a black screen.
“Move the mouse.”
I’m aware of the shouting just a few metres away, not really listening. When I wiggle the mouse, a little box pops up in the middle of the screen on the left. One box has a word in it and the other is empty.
BAOoo clockchock BAOoo.
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I can’t help but throw myself on the ground, flat to the floor. It’s so loud.
“Cut yourself.”
Am I losing it? Is blankie saying this?
“No time to explain.”
It starts as a moan, then it rises to a full scream. Adult man screaming, weird sound. Big and helpless. Giant baby.
POPOPOPOP.
I see bits of plaster raining down around me.
Someone shooting back at Jun. Bandage Man must have sneaked in a pop gun. This is Tower turf. They’ll be here in numbers. Toot sweet. Bandage Man is mad.
Somehow I got my blade in my hand. I roll up my sleeve on my left arm, and run the sharp edge down my skin. nothing much seems to happen. So I try again, push it in a bit harder. That bite, hard to explain. I almost like it.
Then when the drops of bright red appear, down the line like a string of beads on a rich woman, I get a little scared, but fascinated too, hypnotised, the gun fight fades away.
“Repeat after me - I dedicate this sacrifice to the Crone, the one who came before all.”
BAOoo clockchock BAOoo.
POPOPOPOP.
I can hear myself say it before I even ask myself if I want to.
“I dead Kate this sacrifice to the Crone, the one who come before all.”
Clinging to blanky so tight. Bleeding a lot now.
Then I see it, a vision in my eyes. An overlay on reality. Really too much blood on my arm. This picture overlaid on top. Hundreds of little circles all joined together in different patterns. Most of them are empty but a few of them, right at the bottom, three of them are lit up.
Blood Hacker.
And off this bigger circle, there are a bunch of lines leading to smaller circles. And one of them is...
Password Cracker.
And there are a bunch of circles off this one and one of them is lit up.
Keylogger.
“Smear your blood on the keyboard.”
Feel like I’m in a bad dream now. I’ve just given up trying to understand. I take a great palmful of my own claret, smear it across the keys. It wasn’t quiet, but it’s OK because hell broke loose back in the PC BANG. Tower boys arrived.
I could swear the blood just disappeared, like the gaps between the keys just sucked it up.
Bonk! Clank! Cans of something heavy hit the floor beyond the booth.
I know that hissing sound. Crying gas. Time to run.
And the way I came in is the way I go out.