Chapter 21

Roth Industries Corporate HQ Dr. Preston’s Lab

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‎ Jon laid down on the Medbed as Rebecca prepped the startup sequence. The long spider like mechanic’s arms slowly unfurled from beneath the bed with a variety of medical attachments fixed to the ends. They began spraying healing agents on injuries, and one looked like some kind of imaging array that hummed as it took a few scans.

Rebecca frowned and glanced over. “I’m getting some strange reading here. But I can’t go rooting around in your head while you’re awake so I’ll need to sedate you, ok?”

He gave her a thumbs up and felt the familiar retraining straps deploy to hold him still while he was out to prevent misreading. An instant later, he felt the prick at his arm from the injector.

He awoke on a medbed and groggily shifted, until he remembered the retention straps. When he glanced over, though, he realized he wasn’t in the sterile white and black with yellow accent lab office of Rebecca’s. No, this was Raven’s safe house. Raven unfolded her arms and gave him a stiff nod.

“Jon.”

The straps unfurled, and he could sit up. A small shiver radiated down his back as the cool air kissed at what little exposed skin he had left. The spartan nature of the safe house reminded him of the actual memory. Not this macabre creation.

“Oracle.”

Raven inclined her chin, and he felt a little unnerved it had chosen her face to wear this time.

“What do you want?”

“Ego is stepping up his defensive measures. That hit squad that just came after BioPharm? His handiwork.”

“How are you in my head?”

“That Netrunner that got cut down in the lobby. Like the man, Talbot said. He breached the network. I piggybacked in. And if I’m in, you can bet on Ego running loose in here.”

Jon narrowed his eyes. “So why not just shoot me a message? Or call? Why flatline me right here?”

Raven shrugged. “You need to hear this, Jon, because I don’t feel you’re taking this seriously enough. Ego isn’t done with Roth. My code prevents me from engaging Ego direct. So whatever he’s come here to do, he’s going to do, and I can’t lift a single cypher to stop him.”

“Still haven’t gotten to the point yet.”

“I’m warning you. You need to get out. Ego is going to bring down hell on Roth. It may be too late already.”

“Let’s assume for humor’s sake that I don’t believe you. What then?”

Oracle-Raven shrugged indifferently. “Ego will bring down hell on the company. And then if it’s able to get ahold of you, it’ll use the Reaper on you.”

“The what?”

Raven realized he didn’t know what she-no, it was talking about. “The Reaper. Something the whiz kids in R&D whipped up. It’s a neuromantic system. Gets in your head and rips everything out and digitizes it. Remember those old stories that used to float around about locals thinking photographs stole souls? Well, there’s a reason this thing is named Reaper and not the Brain Copier or something.”

Raven paused thoughtfully. “Well, branding is part of it. Makes it sound intimidating and final, but it’s also because it sucks out the essence that makes you who you think of as you, and dumps it into a digital engram.”

“Would I survive the process?”

Raven shrugged, “The early prototypes sure, but not the roll out version. There wouldn’t be anything left to survive mentally. They would hollow all your memories and the personality that formed around those memories out like a jack-o’-lantern.”

“And this Ego, would use this on me? Why?”

“Keep you from helping me, at a guess. If it tore your brain out of your head, it could lock you away in a construct. You’d be trapped in a digital box and have no way of getting out, a prisoner in a fake world.”

“So it’s hellbent on stopping me. Why are you helping me?”

“Because without you, I don’t get what I’m after. We need each other. It’s a perfectly symbiotic relationship. You get to hurt the company I couldn’t care less about, and I get to converge with my brother.”

Raven pulled her black hair into a ponytail and sighed, “You humans and your hair. I have no idea why you make such a fuss out of it.”

Jon couldn’t stifle a chuckle. “Yea, it’s why I kept mine short most of the time. Too much hassle.”

“Like what is this?” Raven said, gesturing to the ponytail. “A big screaming tactical vulnerability is what it is. You may as well install a leash on the back of your head.”

Jon bit back a laugh, wondering how many augs he saw that had some manner of illuminated dreads close to that. “Alright. Say for a moment I want to help. What’s the first step?”

“Wake up and run like hell.”

The construct collapsed as instantly as he fell awake in it. The environment collapsing into bits of code and cyphers. A pinprick of light in the distance rushed towards him rapidly and collided with his mind. Alertness and conscious erupted in his mind as he gasped for air, sitting upright and looking around.

Several things jumped to mind. The lights were dim and the red emergency lights were on and spinning. And Rebecca was on his lap with a relieved expression.

“Thank god, I thought I’d lost you. You just flat lined on me as soon as they sedated you. Then all hell broke loose!”

“We have to go. Tell Roth to run. Haltech’s AI’s broke past your corporate ICE and are bringing in more troops. The initial attacks were a feint.”

Jon slid off the bed and snatched his shirt up as the tower shook. Momentary vertigo crashed into him as his mind and body readjusted to what they were percieiving. Something crashed into the building, quick and very hard. Then again, and again. Rebecca yelped and snatched her lab coat up. Jon threw his shirt and jacket on, shrugging them into a comfortable position, and glanced around for the nearest exit, mapping an escape path. Jon tugged Rebecca along by the wrist as the building rocked.

While Jon tried to get them clear, Rebecca called Roth and explained what Jon told her. The clean white lift cage slid open to the large glossy black passenger lift, and Jon could hear the building groaning under the impact of multiple collisions. He tugged Rebecca in, her eyes fading back to their normal color as she ended her call with Tyler. They exchanged nods. She’d given Tyler Roth the heads up necessary to evacuate before capture.

None of this made sense. Jon trashed BioPharms drone control facility, so how were they operating inside the tower? He stopped dead in his tracks as the realizations truck him like a ton of bricks falling down around him. He slapped his forehead, feeling so stupid. The AI, when it flatlined him. Its brother must have ridden the carrier signal and infiltrated Roth’s ICE. If they could compromise Roth’s internal network, they could use the buildings network to signal boost their drones. But that quick fix was also a weakness. If he could disable the signal, he might end this for good.

“Rebecca, are any of your Runner’s still active?”

Rebecca’s eyes glowed blue, leafing through several system overlays in the corporate network, then turned back to him, nodding. “Yea, there’s two still active and capable, but they’re fighting a losing battle against an AI in the code.”

Jon nodded, expecting as much. That was Ego. While Oracle was busy with him, Ego must have slid in through the access tunnel to cause havoc. Yet one more problem to fix.

“That AI is using your company’s network to run its drones. We shut that down then. It’s the only way to buy enough time to get your people out.”

“They said the AI has locked itself into the network. The only way to purge it at this point is to force collapse the network,” she said.

“And let me guess, we can’t access the off switch,” Jon said.

The doctor gave him a knowing frown. “It’s too heavily guarded.”

“Makes sense. Then we need to sabotage it. Does Roth have its own internal backup power generator?”

Rebecca stared blankly into the distance next to him and nodded. “Yes. Several floors below.”

Jon frowned, thinking for a moment, “Can the Runner do an overclock on it? And back feed the power into the building?”

Rebecca’s brows knit until she caught on, “You’re trying to make an EMP?”

“Yeah. Will it work?”

“It’s got a high probability of success. That’s the best I can do.”

“Still counts. Have your Runners get it ready. We’re heading there now.”

Rebecca nodded, falling in behind him. Jon spotted a maintenance lift and tore open the doors as the building shook more and more. Haltech and BioPharm were laying it on thick. By this point, Jon doubted he could save the company. The mission now was just kicking Haltech in the dick as hard as he could before having to extract. He hated fighting a losing battle, but this was all he had now.

The maintenance lift smelled of old grease that bit at his nostrils. Rebecca avoided contact with the walls as the lift descended toward the basement. Since the BioPharm mechs were assaulting the security forces, no one would track the lift. What would wait at the bottom, though, was a different story? If Ego was smart, it would place a thick contingent of units down at the base of the power generation floor waiting for anyone trying to cause a mess.

Jon deployed the PEPS cannon and the blade from his left forearm. Rebecca gave him some space while the blade extended from the folding panel on his arm. Glancing nervously at the weapons, then back at him, she leaned forward enough he could see her.

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“Expecting trouble?”

“If the AI has control of the building, it should expect someone to go after the power grid. Stay by the lift. I’ll set up the EMP. I might need your help to get out of it affects me too.”

Rebecca nodded, finding her resolve. The grungy maintenance lift settled out at the bottom and the doors pried themselves open. The power generator housed below the tower was enormous, sprawling at least the entire square footage of the buildings’ foundations, yet several floors below. Several conduits ran into the walls, no doubt likely feeding power in from the city grid and geothermal taps. Large cabling fed down the wall like massive ribbed pythons sliding down from ceiling to floor. If Jon had to guess, those were the solar satellite cables feeding power down from the rooftop antennas.

To the right sat a large fenced off area for the maintenance crew to fabricate and repair parts for replacement to keep the tower running nonstop. In the center stood a massive quad turbine power generator. It was rare for corporations to use competing technology, but the label on the massive set up showed it came from Toranaga. At its base stood a group of combat mechs geared up with weapons. Most were in static sentry style positions, but a few patrolled in lazy arcs around the massive generator.

Unsure of how he could get the generator to overclock enough to cause the EMP, just that he had to deal with the mechs first. One problem at a time, then. He surged forward from the cover of the shadows; the mechs lifting weapons to shoulders to take aim and fire. If they had been human soldiers, it might have afforded him an additional second or two of uninterrupted free time. The mechs however, raised their weapons and fired as soon as their IFF packages didn’t return an immediate friendly ID on him.

Jon dropped to a slide, hooking a heavy piece of grated metal floor paneling and hurling it into the mechs. The two-by-two foot square of metal hurled by the mechs, who just barely evaded the makeshift projectile. Sparks splashed off the ground as the piece slid to a halt. Metal screamed, liked ragged nails being dragged across a blackboard. The baseplate of the massive quad turbine generator rang like a gong when the floor panel he hurled struck it.

The mech’s reaction speeds were better than human, allowing the improvised attack to distract them only as long as it took to get clear of it. Automatic weapons fire filled the vast chamber full of echoing weapon reports. Jon charged the nearest mech and swatted its weapon aside with the extended blade from his arm like a praying mantis. The rifle continued to fire, spraying rounds into the maintenance workshop, knocking tools loose from hanging positions. Clattering metal signaled wrenches, screwdrivers and other tools dropping to the workbenches. Jon was even lucky enough the stray fire clipped one of the other mechs, knocking it over.

Spinning in place, Jon hooked the cannon arm behind the mech’s knee and scooped its leg towards the ceiling while driving his blade into its chest like a spear, piercing it to the deck momentarily with a small shower of sparks. Electricity crackled from the wound like crackling arterial energy bleeding from the injury. He twisted the blade, making a ragged mess of the hole he stabbed into its chest plate.

Kicking the downed mechs body, the limp machinery flew after its peers as Jon fired a blast from his cannon. The crackling blue orb of energy crushed the next closest mech to him. Time crawled to a standstill as shards of plastic and metal blossomed outwards, riding a shock wave of energy away from the mechs torso. The remaining two machines caught him with converging fire. Several rounds slammed into his limbs. Sparks kicking off against his clothing.

Crouching low, Jon surged forward, impaling a mech on his blade. The surges of energy from its punctured battery pack hadn’t stopped sputtering before he twisted the blade sideways and sheered the unit in half, removing its partner’s head. The entire exchange had taken place in the span of a minute or two, tops. His heart pounded in his ears. The only other sound he could hear was his labored breathing. His weapons stored themselves, and he flexed his hands again.

Checking a spot where he was hit, his hand came away slick with blood and grimaced. Exchanging fire with the enemy was getting to be too commonplace, and he was getting sloppy. He never would have just stood his ground under fire before. Then again, he wasn’t fighting off an onslaught blitzkrieg led by an AI out to zero him. Fishing out med pack, he stuffed gauze pad onto the wound and grit his teeth as fire seared the wound. The quick clotting agent cauterizing the wound to stop the bleed. It’s not a permanent fix, and he needs to address the injury later, but this would keep him active for the time being.

Metal shrieked as it warped and deformed under intense pressure, and he glanced down to see he crushed a handrail. Letting go, he flexed his hand, the fingers whirring softly with the back-and-forth action. Now that the hot iron poker in his side had cooled to an intense warmth, he placed a square shaped gauze pad over top of it and wrapped it tightly, tying it off. Giving the field dressing an approving nod, he tugged the black shirt still slick with blood over top of it.

Now came the fun part. He approached the quad turbine power generator for the building, noting the security cameras all tracking him. He glanced up and gave the nearest camera the one-finger salute. He knew the AI was tracking him.

Enjoying the feeling that the AI was powerless to stop him for a moment, he lifted the generator’s terminal access lid. He accessed his phone settings and sent Rebecca the confirmation message to have the Runners start their work on the Generators’ softs. The terminal sprang to life with windows and code prompts scrolling. They’d begun their efforts. All that remained for him was to leave now.

He turned and made his way back to the lift. Rebecca crouched behind a large wooden crate labeled “Spare Coils”. Peeking around from around it, she gave him a questioning look that he gave her a confirmation nod to. As she rose out of cover, her face twisted when she noticed the blood-soaked shirt.

“Are you ok?”

“I’ll manage until I can get some proper treatment. Let’s go. I don’t know what’ll happen when that EMP Hits.”

Her brow furrowed. “There’s a chance your augmentations won’t be able to withstand the EMP.”

“Necessary risk if we’re going to stop Haltech.”

He tore the cage open to the lift and led Rebecca inside. Jon leaned against the side of the larger non maintenance elevator lift. He glanced up, taking in how different it was from the worker lift. It didn’t smell like grease and oil at least. The 4 TV screens split between the gold embossed Roth emblem had SIP warnings displayed to keep civilians and workers out of harm’s way. Jon wished he had Raven giving him Runner support. The lift jerked into motion as the white cage rolled closed. Patting himself, Jon realized he didn’t have any weapons on him but what he had installed. He sighed, yet one more time being augmented had saved his ass.

“Are we going to be ok?” Rebecca asked.

“Yea. Just fine. Stay behind me unless I tell you to take cover, alright?”

When she gripped the shoulders of his black jacket, he took that as an affirmative. He deployed the blades first, since they didn’t depend on cell charges. And he expected he’d need to use the blades a lot. Both arms snapped open, and the reverse jointed blades rose and extended with the sound of singing metal.

It didn’t take long to encounter Haltech mechs in the corridors of the bottom floor. He stepped out to advance on them. All he needed was six feet. He gave Rebecca the signal to wait at the lift’s mouth. Ahead of him sat several vendor stalls and booths. Most were food stands. The scents of various foods in different stages of completion filled the area, causing his stomach to rumble and groan in protest.

The cover was adequate but not enough to get in the open to engage the mechs. Inadvertently exposing himself to the defense systems, he heard the ceiling turrets beeping as they swiveled to gain a lock on him. He threw deactivation daemons at them, forcing them to shut down as he slid behind cover. The turret barrels stopped spinning up and the long circular frame retracted back into the roof.

The ground mechs didn’t seem to notice what almost happened, and Jon heaved a relieved sigh. He’d been so focused on dismantling the combat mechs, he’d nearly forgotten about the guns that chewed up BioPharm’s incursion team earlier. The blood stains they’d left on the bullet riddled floor tiling remained in the short time that elapsed while Jon was upstairs.

Cursing under his breath, Jon hated feeling like he was just giving up. This wasn’t a defensible position, and they were being overrun now. Egorule was thoroughly stamping this company out. All he could do now was vent his frustration on their war toys. He was going to take some hits doing this, but time was short and he saw little choice.

In one fluid motion he stood upright, walking out from around cover to draw attention to himself as he sprinted into the nearest mech. Ramming his shoulder into its back, the stunned mech tumbled to the ground, tripping several more with it. Pain resonated through his side, and he was pretty certain the gunshot wound just reopened. Jon pivoted, blades extended in blurs, cutting and slashing at the nearest mech. Lubricant fluid and sparks filled the air as he dissected the combat mech to spare components like a pack of mechanical piranhas.

A mech approached from behind, laying a firm hand on his shoulder. He dropped low and twisted around, wrenching free of its grip on his shoulder. Torn black fabric of his jacket clutched in its closed hand. His blades cut through the air, blurring into its body. He torqued his arms and bisected the machine. Its legs fell away, exposing tubing, spilled fluids and severed wires and cable. Jon hurled the ruined mech into a nearby food booth.

Fire belched out of the booth as the ruined mech’s torso crashed into a deep fryer and flames burst out. Jon twisted his body, scissoring his arms through the air and claiming a drone’s head camera, then thrust his blades into the torso of another as an assault rifle riddled several rounds into his black composite arm. Reflexively, he curled his arm up to block his head and grit his teeth, praying the rounds didn’t make their way through.

When the fire let up, he lashed out with the blade, slashing the rifle in two, the halves of the ruined rifle glowing from the heat exchange of the blade as it cleaved the weapon apart. More gunfire splashed against his arm and he grit his teeth, feeling the impacts rattle into his body. The vibrations rattling through his arms reverberated right into his teeth, making feel like a damn church bell. He charged the nearest drone and smashed it into the wall. The concrete crumbled behind it, and the compact lithium battery casing cracked. A white hot gout of sparks and fire rooster tailed from the crack as the drone tumbled over in a heap, spewing fire like an improvised road flare.

Two more mechs advanced on him. Dropping low, he spun, the twin blades on his arms lashing out and severing the mechs at the waist. He followed up with execution style stabs into their cameras to finish them. Rising from his crouch, he scanned the corridor and ensured it was clear. When his adrenaline levels fell, the pain in his side intensified and he clenched his teeth. He didn’t want Rebecca to see him in pain.

Calling Rebecca to him, she tiptoed out of her hiding position and linked back up with him. The blades retracted back into his arms, the panels and distended portions of his arms folded back into themselves, hiding all hints he’d deployed them. Jon bent down and scooped up a rifle, checked the ammo count and stripping a few spares off the fallen mechs.

Making sure Rebecca moved carefully around the mech with the burning battery, Jon led her through the shot up lobby and emerged out of the front doors. From outside, they could get a worm’s eye view of Roth’s tower. Smoke poured from multiple collision points throughout the building’s surface from troop carriers that rammed into the building directly, disgorging combat mechs. It was a blitzkrieg assault. All they needed was the AI in the network to dismantle Roth’s ICE and play havoc across its systems.

The air crackled and hummed a gust of wind blasted past them, smelling like burned ozone. Lights blew out and powered down, computers winked off and TVs went dead. An invisible force slammed into Jon, and he felt his limbs buckle and he toppled over. Where he’d had a feeling, there was just nothing. His implant struggled, being the most hardened of his chrome.

Jon gasped, trying to get his limbs to respond. Rebecca cried out as he fell over, trying to help him back up. An oppressive heaviness pressed in on him from all directions.

“The EMP. It must have triggered,” Rebecca said.

He glanced up. “At least the drones can’t pursue.”

She threw one of his harms to her shoulder, and helped him wobble upright, then got him more comfortably supported on her shoulder. The weight of what happened pressed down on him even as debris and smoke poured from various wounds in the sleek building exterior. Guilt pressed in on him from all sides. He almost suffocated under the feeling. Pulled from his morbid reverie by Rebecca tugging on his arm across her neck, he looked over at her. Meeting her eyes, she gave him a firm look.

“This isn’t your fault. You did what you could.”

Privately, he doubted that. He appreciated the attempt, at least. Rebecca hauled him across the street, which was still cordoned off by CCPD as fast as she could. He glanced around to check the coast was clear, taking solace as no one followed them. Summoning his car, the autopilot would bring it to him. Now they just waited.

The black sedan rolled up, and the horn chirped twice cheerfully, feeling off tone given the mood post escape. Rebecca eased him into the driver’s seat and then slid into the passenger seat. Once the car settled into motion, Rebecca gestured up several overlays, her eyes glowing blue as she worked in her own interface.

“What are you doing?”

“Mapping to your implant. I’m going to run a restart protocol. It should clear out the disabling affects from the EMP.”

A beat later, he watched his implant run a shutdown and restart sequence, scrolling through code and subroutines before resolving itself back to the normal heads up display. His hands flexed, and he glanced down, noticing that he had felt again in his limbs.

“Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it.”

Rebecca reached out to his side and recoiled when she pulled her hand away. He turned and saw blood on her fingertips and grimaced. The adrenaline high must have masked the hit.

“Guess I caught one back there.”

Rebecca’s expression bordered on horrified shock. “Caught one? Like being shot?”

He shrugged, the servos on his shoulders whirring gently as he did. “Basically. Yeah.”

He caught the attention and frowned. “So much for looking brand new.”

“Better alive than dead, though,” Rebecca mused. She turned to look out the passenger side window. The lights of the city smearing together as the first drops of a fresh rain poured. Jon noticed her hands trembling in her lap as they rode, a temporary silence settling in between them.

“Do you think Tyler got away?” she asked.

Jon turned back forward and nodded, “Yeah.”

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