An Eighty Percent Solution (CorpGov) (49 page)

Martin
cracked the door and watched for the camera to swing away before exiting
.
As a group they bolted back to the eye’s blind spot and just moments later off to the bathroom
.
Reversing their procedures
,
they climbed down
.
The moment their feet hit the ground
, their good luck came to an end.

“Excuse me
.
May I
have your
DNA
, please
?”
The security bot trained a variety of weapons on them
,
but spoke in the most deferential of tones
.

“My name is Tony Meyers, Manager Optical Systems,
sixtieth
floor,”
Martin
said, trying the bluff they
had
rehearsed for an interception inside
.

“Thank you, Mr. Mey
—
”

Andrea struck first
.
Her machine pistol tore into the optical sensors on
the robot’s
head as she dove to the side
.
Tony and Martin both fired simultaneously and with equal ineffectuality at the armored body
.

“Must disable before
its
control gets picked up by human intervention
,
or the mission is blown
,
”
Martin called out
.

Lightning bolts of pain
struck
along Tony’s nervous system
.
The bot’s Neural Amplification Device caused no
physical
damage
,
but
Tony felt his bo
dy tear itself apart
.
The agony made him wish it literally tore him apart to limit his pain
.
He shook violently in place
,
unable to move from his position
.
While the torture limited his curiosity, his mind processed
Martin
and Andrea in similar straits
.

After seemingly an eternity of electrical impulses
that felt as if they
were
charring blackened pathways through his body, a tiny white man, his lower body encased in skintight lemon yellow
,
appeared behind the security bot
.
A single
,
deceptively slow swipe of
his
katana removed its head
.
Another
swing
split the body
vertically
in two
, and
the sword lodg
ed
itself a full
meter
into
its
massive
motive mechanism
.

As suddenly as the pain
had
beg
u
n, it released
.
Tony gasped as the cessation hurt almost as bad as the source
.
Andrew and Andrea lay on the ground next to him
.
It took him several moments to
regain body orientation enough to even realize he also lay
prone
.

“I know
you’re
in pain,” the little man said with a precision in his voice
.
“
The pain was nerve inducted only
.
You must go before the security force arrives
.
You have thirty-six seconds.”

“Thank you…” Tony
gasped
as the trio wrenched themselves off the ground.

“My name is unimportant
.
Nanogate
, however, sends his regards
.
Now, please go
.
You now have twenty-
eight
seconds
.”

“But what about you?”

“Unfortunately
,
I’ve been seen
.
Your faces are known
.
I, however, must erase my
DNA
to prevent implications
.
Fifteen seconds
.”
From out of nowhere the man produced a pair of nova grenade
s.

Tony wasted none of the remaining time
on the horror he felt
as he sprinted for their exit
.
Moments later
,
an
ultra
-
brilliant flare of light announced that everything in a
60
meter radius
of the small man
ceased to exist
.
Tony wasted a brief glance back
.
He mentally sent a “
g
odspeed”
to
their
immolated
savior
.

* * *
 

The
Portland
rain caused the theatre to leak even more
than during their last meeting
.
The rain always lifted
Sonya’s
spirits in the past, but now it dragged her
down
even more into the
gray
oblivion she faced
.
In some places
,
the noise of water cascades covered up even nearby conversations like the sun overpower
s
a tiny penlight
.

Saddened, she watched Tony converse with Carl and Andrew down in the front row
.
In a few moments everyone would share her world, a world that
had
diverged from the others since yesterday afternoon
.
Selfishly
,
she wondered if she should allow them
to keep
the gift of ignorance
.

One of the constant aches in her side increased in intensity to something just shy of a
burning brand
.
She couldn’t continue
to hide her own infirmity much longer
.
They must know the truth
.

Even through her pain
,
she
laughed at herself
.
She wore the pride of keeping the spies from her organization like a cloak of gold
.
In the end
,
a
voiding her mental abilities involved nothing more than ignorance
.
“
You could be wrong,
”
she remonstrated herself
.
“
He could still be guilty.
”
Shaking her head, s
he cocooned herself in his innocence
.

A waterlogged piece of the ceiling chose that moment to drop, hitting the floor with the sound of a gavel
.
Time to deliver the bad news
.
Time to expose their weakness
.
Time to break her dream in two.

“Follow me,” she said, not even looking at her muscle. She walked with dignity to the forward edge of the stage
.
Per agreement
,
Greg and Tuan, the
M
ob enforcers she’d hired
,
fell in
behind her. They
weren’t here
for her protection.

Sonya looked out at the faces that proved
, if not
their friendship
, then
at least
common goals
.
In spite of this
,
sh
e knew over half of them would try to rip apart her vision once
she shared her news
.
She hoped to be able to sway them with logic, but emotion hefted a much larger stick
with
many of
these visionaries
.

She wondered what they saw in her
now
.
She knew what stared back at her
when she
had
checked herself
in the mirror
earlier
—
dark
,
rheumy eyes, shoulders hunched in tension, and a face creased in constant pain
.
Her future
seemed
so insignificant
in comparison to the rift she foresaw
.
She had to find a way to keep them focused on the mission
.
To do that she willed away her pain and her fatigue one last time.

“I’ve called all of you executive members to this meeting for several important announcements
,
and for us to make at least one critical decision
,” she began, pausing while the others quieted down and turned their attentions to her.

“First, you may have noticed that Colin is not among us, but Suet, Linc
,
and Tolly are online
.”

Augustine nodded that the link operated normally
.

“
We’ll
start with the fact that Colin
exhibited frank symptoms
last night and is in critical condition
.
His internal body temperature dropped to
life-threatening
levels
.
I could do nothing more for him, so I took the drastic step of putting him in the hands of medical professionals to save his life
.
Be certain that Augustine helped us forge full medical and a new identity for him
.
It’ll
be months before the bureaucracy correctly sorts it out
.
I have no prognosis on his condition
.
B
ecause of the risk, I’m declaring him off-limits to any visits
.”

“What?!”
Frances
erupted.

“The reason for the ban is as most of you have probably already suspected
.
I can now confirm that we have a bio-weapon targeting our group
.”

Several people nodded and others looked somber
.
No one felt the need to say anything
.

Good,
Sonya
thought
. T
hey had
n’t recoiled from
the danger and the fear
.
“The weapon is of degrading capabilities and probably won’t spread beyond our tiny community
.
I’ve
learned that the
catalyst
for this disease is explosives
.
It’s
triggered by any number of explosives
,
from gunpowder all the way to the newest molecular putty
.”

A minor ripple went through the assembly as some who never handled explosives sighed in relief
,
and
others who procured or prepared them took a greater anxiety
.

“
Naturally
,
anyone outside our group wouldn’t know an explosive from a toilet
and have never handled them
,
so
they’re
safe
.
We
deal with
them daily
, s
o you can see
why
the ban is necessary
.
The perpetrators know this disease’s shape and its parameters
.
I may have saved Colin only to put him in the hands of the
corp
s, but his condition forced my hand
.
If he lives, and
that’s
a huge question right now,
we’ll
mount a mission to bring him back.”

“If they haven’t executed him first!”

Sonya
didn’t see who spoke,
but she felt she missed more and more
lately as she concentrated on the mere process of staying alive
each
minute longer.

“I can’t stress how narrowly he missed death
.
I may have only postponed the inevitable, however
.
This disease has over a seventy percent fatality rate
.”