Wired (Skinned, Book 3) (37 page)

367

"He's right," I said. "He can get me to the servers."

"And he'll do that because he's so eager to help us? Much less get up close and personal again with the girl who can turn his pretty face into modern art?"

"I got you on the ship," Ben said. "You're going to get caught eventually--I don't need to do anything to speed that along. And in the meantime I'm as curious as you are about what the corp is doing. So I'll keep my mouth shut, and I'll get Lia to the servers, and, well, if you don't want to take me up on it, that's your choice. Doesn't seem like you've got a lot of options right now."

He was sounding like himself again, which was almost as infuriating as it was comforting.

"Let's go," I said. "We'll come find you in twenty minutes."

Jude tucked the gun into his waistband. "If we're wrong, and something's happening in the server room, or if you need me--"

"I'll call."

"Be careful," Auden said.

"You too."

Jude grabbed my hand. "We can do this."

It sounded too much like a question.

"We can do this," I echoed him, no doubt in my voice.

Jude shook his head, and smiled.

"What?" I said.

"Nothing."

368

"Let me guess, you're wondering how to admit, without sounding like an idiot, that all this time you were totally wrong about me."

He was still holding on. "Actually, I'm thinking--as usual--I was right."

Ben led me through endless corridors punctuated by locked doors and ID panels, the walls striped with logos making it clear that the mid-decks were filled with server farms for every major corp. Without him I would have been wandering blindly through what seemed like miles of hallway, searching for BioMax; with him I had only his word that he was taking me to the right place. The ship was larger than any building I'd ever been in, and aside from the almost imperceptible thrum of the engines, several decks down, it was hard to imagine we were actually moving through the water. Its size did offer us one advantage: It felt like a ghost town. I caught glimpses of security guards, from a distance, but we made it much of the way without catching their attention.

It had to happen eventually: Footsteps approached. Ben grabbed my wrist and dragged me down the corridor, jiggling door handles while he went until one gave. He shoved me inside.

I waited in the dark, ear pressed against the wall, fists balled, ready to fight.

"BioMax," I heard Ben say. "Here's my ID."

369

There was a mumbled response.

"Headed to the server room now, sir," Ben said loudly. "Just getting my bearings. Easy to get lost here."

Another mumbled response, and then they both laughed. A moment later the door opened, letting in a shaft of light. Ben's face appeared in the crack. "Clear," he said. "Let's go. Fast."

Zo's ViM relay had gone dead, but I told myself not to worry. No doubt all the computer equipment was just jamming the signal. Not to mention the fact that we were in the middle of the Atlantic in a high-security zone; no reason to think that wouldn't interfere with network communications. Still, I started moving faster. We wound down long, featureless corridors, turning corners seemingly at random, but Ben seemed confident he knew where we were going, and I was starting to trust that, if nothing else, he was determined to get us to the server room intact. Both of us. It was clear I never would have found my way here without him. And when we reached the giant steel door with the BioMax logo painted across it, I knew that without Ben, there was no way I would have been able to break my way in.

"Why are you helping me?" I asked quietly.

He triggered the locking mechanism and heaved the door open, gesturing me inside. "Keep out of sight. I'll check on Zo."

The room was loud and cold. Computer servers were lined

370

up like dominos from wall to wall. I didn't know whether it was the refrigeration system or the servers themselves, but there was a low, constant thrum, a vibration. It almost felt like I was shaking.

Ben swept down the central aisle, his eyes pinned on the numbers marking each row. It was a room built for hide and seek, and I tucked myself into one of the narrow alleys between server rows, padding softly down the aisle as I shadowed Ben through the room. He threaded through the rows and I slipped behind him, always keeping the thick, towering computers between us, though he never turned back to look. Finally, he stopped. One row away, so did I.

Kiri was waiting for him, with two BioMax techs. One had a hand clamped around Zo's wrist.

"Learn anything interesting?" Ben asked his "daughter."

"She didn't," Kiri said. "But I think it's safe to say that I did."

Ben's expression didn't give anything away. "Problem?" he asked mildly.

"You tell me." I'd seen Kiri Napoor in a variety of moods--conciliatory, wheedling, triumphant, frustrated, distraught--but I'd never seen her like this. There was no mood, no emotion, just: cold. "Why am I standing here with Lia Kahn's little sister? And why are
you
trying to pass her off as your daughter?"

I cursed myself for not taking Jude up on his offer. If I had the gun, I would ... what? Burst out from behind the servers, guns blazing, shooting wildly? Save the day?

371

Ben sighed. "You knew."

"Of course I knew." Kiri scowled. "It's my
job
to know. I've never understood why you thought so little of me. So you want to tell me what she's doing here?"

The situation could still be salvaged, I told myself. As long as no one panicked.

"Well?" Kiri pressed, when Ben didn't answer.

"What is that?" he said, turning his attention to a small pile of equipment and mess of wiring at the base of the server bank.

"You're asking
me
questions?"

"You're just here to observe," Ben said. "So what are you hooking up?"

"What's she doing here?"

"Is that an uplink device?" Ben said, approaching it. Kiri blocked his path. "Zo's here as a favor to a friend," Ben said. "Nothing to worry about."

"I wouldn't say that," Kiri said. And with the same jaunty grin she'd always given me when talking me into yet another tiresome BioMax PR chore, she pulled out a gun.

The two BioMax techs did the same.

Zo yanked her arm out of the tech's grasp. She brandished the remote over her head. "Don't!" she shouted. "If I press this button, he blows up."

Kiri turned to Ben, eyebrows arching toward her forehead. "Is that true?"

372

"Afraid so."

"A hostage," Kiri said to Zo. "Impressive. And now everything makes sense. I can see why he'd do whatever you said."

"Exactly," Zo said. Her voice was shaking, but her hands weren't.

If I showed myself now, would I make things better or worse?

"It's an untenable situation," Kiri said. "We'll have to fix that."

She raised the gun.

Zo screamed.

A spot of red bloomed on Ben's forehead, and he dropped backward, arms splayed, eyes open. Dead.

I was halfway out of my hiding place--halfway to Zo--when I realized that she was still on her feet, unharmed.

I stopped.

I hid.

It was the smart move; we were outnumbered, and throwing myself at two men with guns trained on my sister could only make things worse. If Kiri had intended to shoot her, she would have done it already. Probably. Still, I felt like a coward. And I hated myself for it.

Ben was dead.

Ben had kept his mouth shut about me, about Jude and Auden. He'd picked a side, our side. And now he was dead.

Without taking my eyes off my sister, I reached for my

373

ViM. If I could get through to Jude, if I could call in a rescue--

"Where are the rest of them?" Kiri asked Zo.

"The rest of who?" She was staring at Ben, eyes wide and watery.

"You're not here alone."

Just tell her,
I thought.

Or maybe,
Don't tell her
. Information was leverage, Riley had once reminded us. Secrets were power. If Kiri got what she wanted out of Zo, what need would there be to keep her alive?

On the other hand, if I showed myself, gave Kiri what she really wanted, maybe she'd just let Zo walk away.

"It's just me," Zo said, and I could tell she was trying to regain some semblance of spunk. It wasn't working. "Sorry to disappoint."

Something buzzed at Kiri's waist. She lifted her ViM to her ear and nodded. "Good. Bring them in." Then she turned back to Zo, with that eerily familiar smile. "I see you're just as big a liar as your sister."

I didn't have to call Jude. He was here, with Auden by his side, both of them frog-marched into the room by four BioMax techs, techs carrying guns--a real one for Auden, a pulse one for Jude, both of them deadly.

"Any problems?" Kiri asked.

"Not a one," the tallest one said. "They fell for it all the way."

374

"Good job." She waved a hand toward the nearest wall. "Put them over there."

The techs shoved them into the wall, along with Zo, lining them up, their hands out at their sides, fingers outstretched, palms empty, nothing up their sleeves, so to speak. Nothing left to stop this ... except me.

"So where is she?" Kiri asked.

"Who?" That was Jude, eyes wide, expression clueless. Unconvincing.

Kiri just laughed. "I know she's here, somewhere, lurking about." She raised her voice. "Are you here, Lia?" she shouted. "Hiding? Typical. Most people would want to help their friends--their
sister
. But not you, Lia, right? Nothing changes. All that matters is
you
."

"How long have you been talking to yourself?" Jude asked. "You may want to see someone about that."

Kiri ignored him, and gestured to the two techs who'd been there with her the whole time. "What are you staring at? Get back to work."

They put their weapons away and knelt at the base of the nearest server bank, where they began fiddling with a web of wires spiraling out of the exposed circuitry. They were hooking up a device and clipping it to the wires.

Seven of them. Three of us, backs against the wall.

And then there was me. Hiding. Waiting. Watching.

In other words, doing nothing.

375

"That's an uplink jack," Auden said suddenly, loudly--far more loudly than he needed to, unless he was hoping to be heard by someone who might be all the way across the room, invisible. "I've seen one of those before."

Ben had pointed it out too--just as loudly.

"Smart kid," Kiri said, sounding distinctly unimpressed.

"So you're uploading something into the network?"

I flashed on the data banks we'd discovered in the BioMax basement, the neural patterns they had filed away for a rainy day, for whatever machine they deemed ready for an obedient human brain to guide its movements, its actions at the beck and call of BioMax, mechanical slaves.

What would happen if they uploaded one of those obedient cybernetic slaves to the network? How much would they control? Maybe the AI, the war machines, had all just been practice--maybe BioMax wanted more than money. Maybe they wanted everything.

Kiri ignored Auden and addressed the techs. "How close are we?"

"Five minutes," one of them said, voice slightly wobbly. "If it works."

"It better work." Kiri jerked her head at the two techs guarding Zo. "Make yourself helpful," she snapped. "Go see if you can't hunt down their little friend. I know she's on board."

They shifted nervously, glancing at each other, but neither moved. One mumbled something under his breath.

376

"What's that?" Kiri glared.

"Bad numbers if we go," he muttered. "Three of them, two of us--"

"They're
children
." She rolled her eyes. "Fine. Kill the defective and the girl, but save the skinner. If this doesn't work, we might need him."

"To upload?" Auden said, nearly shouting.

Not because he was afraid. Not because he was panicking.

Because he was talking to me.

"We can't use him," one of the techs said. "If we upload an intact one, it's possible--"

"Who said he'd be intact?" Kiri smiled. "Now, take care of it."

Kill the defective and the girl.

Two men raised two guns. Kiri watched, waited. Still smiled. And it was like she was smiling right at me, like she knew I was there and was taunting me,
daring
me to show myself, to do something stupid, throw myself at her, at Zo, at the weapons, throw everything away, like she couldn't wait for it to happen, and she couldn't wait to watch.

Two men, two guns. But there were no guns guarding the uplink device. Only two techs, who were barely my size, who had dropped what they were doing and were frozen, watching Kiri, watching the guns, watching death about to happen.

This is a dumb idea,
I thought, but there was no time to think.