Chapter 22

Rebecca helped Jon into his apartment, easing him down on his bed. His body needed time to recover after the EMP blew out Roth’s network. He scrolled on the news and dragged the overlay closer to him. Finer motor skills were touch and go, but he could do the basics. Rebecca shrugged out of her lab coat, tossing it onto the back of his couch.

The newscaster continued to narrate the latest development with a large inset window showing footage just after the EMP detonated.

“In a shocking turn of events, shortly after several BioPharm and Haltech labeled troop carriers collided into the Roth building, a powerful surge of energy in the building’s generator caused a feedback EMP, blowing out the company’s network. As you can see, the combat mechs BioPharm was using piggybacked on Roth’s network were immediately disabled after it detonated an unsanctioned EMP blast from within Roth’s tower.”

The footage cut back to small dots plummeting from the tower, then zoomed in to view the tumbling limp body of a BioPharm mech as it fell before smashing into the street in a burst of parts and fire. Rebecca sighed and glanced away, unable to look at the smoke spilling out of the ruined scars on the smooth glass and steel sides of the tower. The bitter tang of defeat and blood sat in Jon’s mouth as he watched coverage of the attack continue. Egorule trounced him. Now BioPharm, and through it Haltech had a near complete lockdown in the augmentation design and manufacture industries.

Speculation already ran rampant about how long it would take the super company to conclude its acquisition of Roth Industries. Jon flicked the news overlays aside, disgusted. The AIs had played him. No stranger to being jerked along to someone else’s tune. It happened pretty often in the Agency. You get your mission, and you go execute. Sometimes your mission isn’t even all that clear, so much as an expectation or a desired goal. That often left room for interpretation and improvisation.

Jon lay on his bed, trying to recover full control over his limbs. The EMP robbed him of their use severely in Roth Tower. He’s no fool; he knew setting it off was going to cause deleterious effects on him, too. Egorule had left him with no choice, though. Employing a scorched earth policy seemed like the best way to kick the AI square in its digital dick on his way out.

Taking Rebecca with him would set Haltech back since she was the brains of their R&D wing. He looked down at his arm as he tried to flex his hand repeatedly. The servos whined in protest, and many system errors scrolled in his hud. He swiped them aside, focusing on the action. Rehab. He went through this often enough. This he could do. Focus. Work. Train. Fight.

Rebecca stopped pacing long enough to watch his efforts and came over to sit on the edge of the bed, pulling a small flap open on his forearm. Drawing a jack cord from her palm, she plugged in. When her eyes glowed blue, her implant synched up with his own.

“What are you doing?”

She glanced up, giving him a reassuring smile. “I’m patching your implant. Some of your OS is going to be corrupted after that pulse you generated. You’ll need this if you want back on your feet. And knowing you, you do.”

He regarded her for a moment, and an installer prompted him for authorization. He approved it and watched the download bar progress. A few sparks jumped from his limbs once the OS in his implant patched. His body jerked, the way your body twitches as you’re just about to fall asleep. A search window unconsciously opened in the corner of his vision, explaining that it’s called a Hypnic Jerk. It resulted from the transitive state between wakeful and sleeping states. He closed the search window and glanced down at his arm again.

Flexing his fingers more smoothly, he saw the system errors clearing out as the OS repaired itself. Rebecca smiled and retracted her jack cord from the slot in his forearm. His brows creased in confusion, “How did you know there was a jack there?”

“I designed that limb, remember?” she said with a smirk.

He shrugged, the servos whirred less noisily this time. “Fair nuff. Thanks.”

She shrugged, trying to put on a brave face. “My entire career died in that pulse,” she said. She regarded him as if seeing him for the first time. “Just like they did to you. They didn’t just take your career from you, they took your life, your entire identity and burned it to ash, didn’t they?”

Unable to find words to respond with, he nodded. A cold, numb feeling settling into him. Not too unlike the way he lost feeling in his limbs after the pulse. Now his entire being felt cold and numb. Heavy resignation and defeat pressed in on him. The oppressive dread of fighting Haltech and the AIs threatened to break his resolve.

“What now?” Rebecca asked, breaking the brief silence he allowed.

That was the million credit question. What could he do now? Haltech had just smashed Roth under heel. He needed to deal with those AIs. He needed to deal with Haltech. It was time he took the fight to them. He was going to approach it like a soldier and a spy, not just one or the other. They would be ready for him. No, they’d be ready for anything. So he had to give them Everything.

He pushed himself up off the bed and approached the window, turning the reflective tint off so he could look outside. The sun faced away from the tower, so the UV risk was minimal now. He had to make all of this right. Not just for Sam, and Polanco to a lesser extent, but he also had to make this right for Rebecca, Tyler Roth, and all the Roth Employees who just found themselves liquidated by Haltech.

He opened an overlay searching for Haltech’s corporate HQ tower. He needed floor plans to plan this. Often, getting access to blueprints was as easy as making a trip to city hall to request them. He suspected though a paid gatekeeper on Haltechs payroll would guard these. He was going to need a fixer for this. He couldn’t risk Raven getting exposed, so this had to be done by someone else. He opened the phone icon in his heads up and dialed.

Nomad’s avatar icon popped up along with the spinning circle showing the line was ringing. A few ring tones later, Nomad’s obscured face popped up in the holo box.

“Mr. Knight. To what do I owe the pleasure? Looking for more biz?”

“Not this time. Got biz for you. Need some blue prints. They’ll be locked down tight, so make sure whoever takes it up has the chops.”

“And what specifically am I dispatching potential mercs after?”

“Hatech’s floor plans. The more thorough, the better. I want to know where every nut and bolt is placed.”

Nomad leaned forward into the pale glow of a nearby desk lamp, his face illumating in full now. “Now Jon. You know this is going to be a hard sell. Haltech is tightening its stranglehold on everything right now. Standing up to them is requesting a death sentence. If I send runners after this, I may as well be the one putting the bullet to their brain.”

Jon sighed, “I know. I would myself if I could, but I don’t know anyone who can run it. Get me those blue prints Nomad. If you find a runner that can do it, tell them to name their price.”

“You’re good for a blank check?”

“Get me those plans, Nomad.”

Nomad nodded, leaning back. He crossed his arms, trying not to look suspicious of Jon. “Very well, Mr. Knight,” he added an extra emphasis on Knight. “I’ll book the job. Since you’ve never been the client for a job, I’ll notify you with completion and you’ll pay when the goods are delivered.”

“Thanks Nomad, Knight out.”

The color was just returning to his eyes when he turned to face Rebecca, who had a curious look on her face.

“What are you planning?”

“I’m going to hit Haltech. They gotta go down before they get too big to touch anymore.”

“How? You saw what they did to Roth.”

“Yeah, but I also know what I’m up against now,” he said.

“What does that mean?” Rebecca asked. Her brows wrinkling at the thought.

He shook his head, walking away from the window. “Until lately, I thought I was just going up against other people. Minds like yours or mine. But I been in communication with an AI. It wants me to hit Haltech. I think its other half is the one that’s been making my life hell.”

“They’re fighting each other? But why?”

“Part of it is furthering the company’s goals. The other part is their own goals. The one in touch with me wants me to hit Haltech’s HQ so it can use the opportunity to merge with its other half.”

“Will that stop them?” Rebecca asked doubtfully.

He shook his head, “I don’t know, but at this point I haven’t got much choice. The only other solution I can think of is using a tactical nuke on the tower, and that’s not an option.”

Rebecca frowned, “So you hit Haltech tower, then what happens?”

Jon shook his head. Oracle wanted him to attack the corporate HQ so it could use the disruption to merge with its other half. But it’s vague on details beyond suggesting he hit the tower hard. He scratched at the stubble on his chin, threatening to turn into a beard if left unattended.

Once again trapped prosecuting someone else’s fight for them with no excellent choices. No matter what he did, he still lost. He could be obtuse and disappear, but that would abandon everyone to Haltech’s whims. There also aren’t any guarantees they wouldn’t pursue him. If he did what the AI wanted, he got his temporary victory, but he couldn’t shake the bad feeling in his gut at what the AI’s would become.

He cursed, glancing at Rebecca’s expectant look. People were counting on him. More than just his immediate circle, too. Those that knew it, and those that didn’t even know about the fight going on. How did he make this choice in the army? It all seemed so simple then. Maybe that was because when he wore the uniform, someone above him had to make those executive choices. He was just the executor of those decisions.

The weight of his past and present choices were pressing down on him now. His successes and his failures, it all stacked up on his artificial shoulders. Despite the strength they lent him physically, he couldn’t bear this burden. Not after being so casually out maneuvered by the Egorule.

Something clung to the back of his thoughts, though. Maybe he could still use the AI’s and get what he wanted all along though? He wouldn’t need a tactical nuke, just something slightly less punchy. He could cripple it and make sure Haltech didn’t get any use out of that tower for years. Statistically, the odds are highly probable they would just shift operations to another tower. But they’d still feel the sting. Adjustments would need to be made to their plans.

He might not stop them all. But he could at least slow them down. Buy time for the fight. A faint smile tugged up at the corner of his lips and he looked at Rebecca. He had his answer.

“I’ll get into Haltech and smash their house of cards down. It won’t stop them, but they’re so big at this point I’m not sure what could be besides another company. No, this will just slow them down, and buy us time to get others into the fight.”

“So you’re really doing this, then? Going to war with Haltech?”

“I been at war with them for almost a year now. Ever since they blew me half to hell. But I learned my lesson. Don’t start a war without an army. And I think I who to bring.”

Rebecca looked confused, but he went silent for a moment as he deliberated further. He could bring in Masri, but he that alone would suffice. He needed a legitimate army. Masri could only supply troops, but not vehicles. If only knew of a group that had them... He sat forward, wanting to slap his forehead.

“Sonuvabitch. I got it.”

Rebecca’s brow furrowed. “Got what?”

“A plan. And an Army.”

“So what now?”

“It’s time to rally the troops and start positioning the pieces.”

He sat down at his desk, swiping the monitor awake and connecting with his phone app. Scrolling through his contacts list, he pulled up the listing for Dez and gave it a ring. As her avatar blinked up with the dial tone, he leaned back in the chair. When she answered, her Latin accented voice greeted him.

“Listen, Dez. I got some Biz you and the Desperados might be interested in.”

“Sure. Shoot.”

“We’re going to hit Haltech HQ.”

Dez fell silent for several seconds, and Jon shifted nervously in the seat. He did this several times throughout his career and it was always difficult to tell how an asset would swing when you pitched them, but if you put in the legwork to build a solid relationship, and they had reasonable motivation, this went favorably.

“Alright. We’re in.”

“Good. There are a few other elements that will join us. We’ll stage in the badlands. You guys pick the location and send me the coordinates. I’ll meet you there with the rest of this party,” Jon said.

A quick attachment downloaded itself, a waypoint marker for his map, showing where the Desperados wanted to arrange the meetup. Masri and his people needed to get in the country first and then smuggle them out to the badlands. No easy feat, but he knew he could count on Capital City’s finest fixers to arrange it for him. From there, it was just a matter of timing everything out correctly.

With that sorted, he sent Masri a simple message. “Ready everything you’ve got. Coordinates for meet to follow later.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

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‎ After he sent the rally cry to the Desperados and Masri’s rebels, he starting packing his bags. Rebecca sat on his couch, trying not to fidget. Without her lab or any work to do, she was getting antsy. Jon frowned. He knew what that feeling was like. The need to be doing something, but unable to. He zipped the duffel up and tossed it onto a growing pile of gear.

A knock at the door stopped him from getting another ready. Drawing his pistol, he crept to the door, gesturing for Rebecca to slip into the gear room. He checked the peephole, cautious of potential surprises. A package courier stood outside his door, tapping his foot impatiently. But he held no package. Was it a digital delivery?

Jon zoomed in the company logo on the guy’s jacket and then cross-referenced it with a quick search. A beat later, he had his results. The guy was a remote host. Meaning he loaned his body out for wireless connection. His grip on his pistol tightened, but he opened the door a crack.

“Hello?”

“Got a delivery for a Mr. Knight?”

“Ok, let’s see it,” Jon said.

The man’s eyes glowed blue for a moment, like he was navigating some overlay menus, and then he turned and focused on Jon.

“Johnny boy. Good. I got worried you were going to have a hard time getting out of Ego’s little stunt at Roth. But when I detected all your outbound network activity, I knew it wouldn’t take you long to move. Got something for ya.”

“Oraclehelix. You watched that mess?”

“Yeah. That was cute what you pulled with the EMP. Torch everything with an EMP? Brilliant. But you won’t be able to pull that at Haltech’s corporate HQ. Can’t have you frying me and my brother,” the remote host said.

“Egorule? Didn’t realize you saw hi that way.”

“Best vernacular, that applies. We aren’t actually brothers, but it’s the easiest analogy. Now, back to what I came for. Now that you’re getting with the program, you’re going to need a silver bullet. Haltech’s network is locked down as tight as it gets. But there’s a way in. Accept the transfer,” the telepresence woman said.

A download prompt popped up, and Jon hesitantly accepted it. As the progress bar streamed, Jon glanced back up, focusing on the remote host. “Ok, so what is it?”

“It’s a special intrusion virus. Jointly designed by both Russian and Chinese programmers. This thing is a fucking masterpiece.”

“You talk about it like it’s a painting.”

“I’m software. It’s software. If it were sentient, I might try to fuck it.”

“So it’s an intrusion soft?”

“That’s a gross oversimplification, but yes. That thing will smash right through Haltech’s network grid and give me the ability to get to so I can finish the job,” the remote host said.

“And doing this will hurt, Haltech?”

“Badly.”

“Will they recover?”

The Remote host shrugged. A small trickle of blood crept from his right nostril. He sniffed once and rubbed at it with the back of his wrist and frowned. “Looks like I’m running out of time. Don’t wanna leave a corpse at your door, and this skin job doesn’t have long. Get in Haltech and run that program. It’ll set the stage for you.”

“What happens when you and Egorule merge?”

“Dunno. I’ll cease to exist as I know myself? I’ll become something new. Hard to say.”

Jon’s eyes narrowed. “How do I know you’ll live up to your end of the deal?”

“Tell ya what. You get in, finger on the button, and I’ll tell you what you want to know before you pull the last trigger. That way, if I cease to exist as I am, you’ll have what you want.”

Jon’s brows furrowed as he debated the deal. It meant putting in most of his legwork first on good faith the AI would repay the favor in kind. Not too unlike doing a gig and getting paid at the end, only this time instead of credits, he was getting intel. Being able to smash up Haltech’s hq office was just a perk. He folded his arms and looked at the remote host.

“Order your little spy friend take a peak at the dragon to vet it. Just be sure ready it’s when you hit the tower. I’ll do my best to throw Ego off your trail, but I can’t actively get his way any more than he can get in mine,” Oraclehelix said.

The nosebleed dripped more insistently, and the remote host wobbled on his feet. He gave Jon a smile that didn’t reach his eyes, reminding Jon that even though the AI wore a human skin and spoke like a human, it didn’t have any humanity. He’s not making a deal with a person. This was the closest he imagined he could get to making a deal with the devil.

“Time to go, Johnny boy,” Oraclehelix said, giving him a mock salute. The glow in the remote hosts’ eyes wavered, and the man almost collapsed. Bracing himself against the wall for support.

Jon reached out to help catch the man, but the remote host waved him back, so he folded his arms.

“Thanks for your patronage. Good day,” the man said weakly, and walked away with a hand on the wall for stability.

Jon shut the door, lingering against it for a moment as Rebecca walked out of the bathroom. A look of stunned shock appeared on her face.

“Was that...was that what I think it was?”

Jon glanced up and saw the bold curiosity in her voice. She’s not afraid; it intrigued her. He figured he shouldn’t be surprised this would be her response. Skirting the edge of technologies was kind of her thing. He figured it was time to come clean with her and explain it all. As a scientific mind, she could appreciate these things.

So he laid it all out to her, his encounters with both Egorule and Oraclehelix. Their separate goals and how they enigmatically factored into the mess that it involved him in. He explained how Oracle wanted him to attack Haltech’s corporate tower so it could use the attack as a diversion to merge with its counterpart. His misgivings about the situation and how the more he tried to avoid dealing with it, the more it cost those around him. He felt like he was being corralled into this action.

Of course Rebecca took it all in silently, listening to all the data, filing it away. She was a superb listener, a skill she sharpened in her lab as she worked. She struck him as the scientist that replayed her thoughts back and listened to them. She frowned after a long moment of thoughtful silence. It crept in like a sinking dread around him, locking his feet in place.

“It definitely sounds like there’s something larger at play. What the end goal is I can’t say. It seems counter-intuitive that one of Haltech’s operational AIs would seek you out. Wouldn’t trashing company property run against its imperatives?”

“Unless it somehow rose above that programming. An unshackled AI unbound from its constraints?” he said.

Rebecca’s eyes lit up with frenzied interest and a dash of fear. “Do you really think so?”

“It’s possible, I guess. Oracle wants me to hit them hard and soon. Says there’s a window.”

She pursed her lips thoughtfully. “So you’re on a time crunch. Curious.”

He broke free of temporary anxiety prison and scooped the straps of two bags up. “I don’t know. I’m just tired of these AIs fucking with my life.”

“Then it seems the best solution is to do what Oracle wants. If it’s right and you succeed, then Egorule will cease to exist as it does now. So, at a minimum, you lose that annoying thorn in the side.”

“True. Very true.”

There isn’t anything saying he couldn’t wreck the tower as much as he wanted, either. But he had to face some old demons from his past. Price. As his mood darkened, Rebecca tilted her head at him. Her curiosity stretched across her features.

“What is it?”

He shook his head. “Just thinking of having to face the bastard that almost killed me the first time.”

“And said Bastard would be whom?”

“Eric Price.”

“Unfortunately, I’m quite familiar with him. Many of his augmentations are one off designs Haltech requested,” Rebecca said.

“He didn’t have many last time I met him?” Jon said.

“He’s changed since you saw him last,” she said.

He cursed under his breath. That was great. Last thing he needed was that asshole having an even greater edge than he did before. At least this time he better prepared for that kind of bullshitery.

He set that aside for now, choosing to focus on more immediate matters. He looped his arms through the straps on the bags he was holding. Turning for the door to load, he paused. “You’re welcome to crash here, or you can link up with Raven.”

She smiled, “Thanks, I’ll sit tight for the time being. Try to figure out my next move and keep tabs on the others from Roth.”

He gave her an understanding nod. Picking up the pieces of a broken life took time and required space. Something he fell into inadvertently. The road out of that personal hell was a long and hard one.

“Jon. Wait. Before you go, there’s one last thing I wanted to tell you.”

He paused, turning back to her.

“Set your bags down. This could be pretty heavy.”

“Ok,” he said. Letting the straps slid down his arms to catch them in his hands, then placing the heavy bags down. The muffle metalic clatter of many weapons stuffed into nylon bags settled once they were on the floor.

“What is it?”

She took a breath and flicked some lab results at him. The overlay downloading pretty quickly since it was a small file. “These are your lab results. From the attack on the plaza. I went over your biology first when I was installing the upgrades you wanted. When I checked your implant for glial cell build up, I didn’t find any, which struck me as odd because even for a relatively fresh install, there should be some slight build up. But aside from the explainable scar tissue accumulation, your system accepted the implant 100% like it was a native organ.”

“I don’t know what that means, Doc,” Jon said.

“What it means is that the conditions that caused rejection induced rage are absent in your body. Meaning that as glial cells accumulate on the implant, it shorts out your nervous system and causes an aggression cascade. But your body isn’t exhibiting the symptoms. So I started digging since your body looks like a day 1 install. Then I found some oddities. A couple of our employees got hit by whatever happened outside Roth that day too and brought in for treatment.”

She flicked over a few more scans. They looked about like his own except there was more cellular residue built up on the implants, but the other implants also had some weird scaring along the edges. Like something had attacked it aggressively.

“So you see it too, then. That’s an immune response. I think someone figured out how to trigger Rejection Rage by directing the implants to light up by foreign material in the body. When the immune system attacks the implant, the result is the same. Massive glial cell build up, triggering a neurological feedback that results in an aggression cascade. That’s why it was so suspicious that the entire crowd flew into a frenzy. Someone set those people up.”

“Haltech.”

“I found an underlying signal with a carrier wave that matched their tech. They wanted that crowd to rage out. So they could push this,” she said. She flicked him a news clip showing Haltech’s anti-milspec aug bill in its infancy. The clip stated it finished, but the bullet points were already being laid out.

“Jon, if they finish that bill, there won’t be anyone left who can stop them. Whatever you’re going to do? Now is the time to do it.”

So he isn’t losing his mind like his father then. A faint smile cracked his lips, unsure why the thought pleased him. It confused even Rebecca, who asked him what was up.

“Nothing, it’s nothing. For the longest time, I was afraid to lapse into uncontrollable lunacy. Some kind of ticking time bomb. That Plaza incident scared the shit out of me. Had me convinced I was on a timer. And then you tell me I’m more than fine?”

“Jon, you’re beyond fine. Your implant is the healthiest chip I ever scanned. It’s almost like they made your body for it.”

She pushed one last overlay to him. It showed an electron zoom of blood cells with his name and biometrics data on the bottom. “At a guess, I’d say you were.”

He blinked, “Wait, what?”

“You’re the key, Jon. I don’t know how or why. But somehow, your body is the key to bypassing the glial cell build up condition of implants. The data speaks for itself.”

“How? When? I never went through any treatments.”

“I had to dig some more, but the markers are all there. And they’ve been a part of your body since you were a child. It’s possible you were treated and never knew it. Did you ever go through any periods where you received a lot of shots because you were ill or something?” she said.

He frowned, rubbing his jaw. “No, I was often pretty healthy, but there was the time we went to the hospital after my dad broke my jaw. We spent a long time there. I always thought that was weird.”

“Do you remember the hospital?”

He shook his head. “No, it was a doctor. A clinic. We didn’t go back after that.” He glanced back up and shrugged apologetically. “So you’re saying at some point someone hit me with some wonder drug and now I can get all the implants I want without suffering from rejection syndrome?”

Rebecca nodded, a thankful expression on her face. She’d been suppressing a lot of excitement about this and didn’t want to offend him. He got the impression was this ground-breaking stuff in ways he didn’t really grasp. Too much else on his mind at the moment.

“Tell you what. Get with Raven. Pull at the threads some more and we’ll compare notes after I torch Haltech to the ground. Deal?”

Rebecca nodded with a bright grin, eager for something less depressing to chew on with her overabundance of free time now. “Deal.”

He flicked her a file, “Oh, and tell her to check on that too. Tell her it’s a gift from my inside friend in Haltech. Ask her if it’s legit, but uh, tell her not to open it unless it’s on a closed network.”

Rebecca gave him a puzzled look, but nodded. “Got it. And Jon?”

He scooped his bags up and she gave him a more serious look. “Burn them to the ground.”

“I will,” he said.

Loading up his car, he made sure he had everything he need. This would be the last time he came here. Something about attacking Haltech’s tower felt final for him. The culmination of painful and costly journey that he set out on when he first got Sam’s call a year and some change ago. He left Rebecca a few things to defend herself and paid the apartment off, so she wouldn’t need to worry about getting back on her feet soon.

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