Code Breakers: Beta (13 page)

Still berating himself for falling asleep, he crouched and sidestepped slowly around the perimeter of the building, always staying to the shadows and avoiding crossing any sunbeams.

He could hear Petal’s voice now, pleading. Her limbs moved uselessly.

The questioning continued.

“Where are the others?” one of them asked.

“I’m alone,” Petal said.

“There are two bikes!”

“I tow one, just in case. What do you want from me?”

“Your head.”

The one who had stunned her reached behind his back and pulled a katana from a sheath.

Gabe stealthily made his way around the edges of the building until he was now by the edge of the great train’s shell. The bikes were just a few metres in front of him. Smoke rose from one, filling the area with the stench of burning chemicals that made his throat tighten.

He stifled a choke noise, held his breath, and forward-rolled to the bikes.

The assassin with the pistol stepped back a few paces to allow the other one to stand over Petal. He placed the pistol within the folds of his robes, gripped her hair, and pulled her head back. The katana-wielder assumed a stance to the side of Petal’s prone body and raised the sword.

Gabe vaulted the quad bike and, with two leaping strides, closed the distance. The assassin with the sword turned just as Gabe closed in, but he was too slow. Gabe swung the sickle in a vicious, slicing arc, cutting into the man’s neck. He powered through the stroke, decapitating him.

His body slumped to its knees and fell forward. Blood gushed into a frothy pool on the dust floor at the feet of his partner, who spun to face Gabe, reaching for the pistol.

Petal turned her head, saw Gabe, and while still not in full control of her limbs, thrashed her legs, knocking the other assassin off balance for a brief second.

It was just long enough for Gabe to crack his whip, catching the assassin’s wrist. Gabe pulled back on the whip, overbalancing the assassin, who dropped his pistol and tripped over Petal’s legs.

Gabe was on him instantly, straddling him, bearing all his weight down on the man’s chest. Gabe delivered a firm right hook to his face, busting open a cut over his eye.

“Who do you work for?” Gabe screamed.

The assassin just smiled, remaining silent. His eyes bulged, vessels burst, covering his corneas with a thin film of blood. All the while that stupid, rictus grin continued to expose a mouth of gritted teeth. Gabe backed away. The assassin started to shake as if in a seizure. Blood dripped from his ears, and a high-pitched keening came from somewhere deep in his throat before his chest expanded and his back arched.

With a single scream, he rolled onto his side and died.

“What the hell?” Gabe said, staring at the dead man. “What the actual fuck?”

Gurgling, Petal rolled slowly away from the pool of blood. She moved like a drunken sloth, her limbs not quite translating her thoughts properly. Gabe stepped over the bodies of the assassins and lifted Petal to her feet.

Her neck and shoulder muscles were still tense from the shock. He took her back inside the shelter and laid her down on the makeshift bed made from his duffle bag. The embers of the fire glowed dully within the ash. He gathered some fragments of wood littered around the place and got the fire started again. He propped Petal up close to the fire.

“You just try to relax,” Gabe said. “The stun effects will wear off soon.”

She nodded, mumbling a couple of words that sounded like ‘thanks, man’.

While Petal recuperated, he ducked out of the shelter and inspected the bodies. In terms of assassins, they weren’t exactly highly skilled, and with the use of the stun-baton, he suspected they were just recruits from Libertas. He checked their wrists and confirmed his suspicions: ronin-chips.

Looking at the one who had kind of self-destructed, he noticed his chip was now a charred square on his skin. It had burnt out and seemingly taken his brain with it.

Could Elliot really take people out via his network? He supposed it was possible. When he had his first, crude, brain implant, it had a tendency to overclock the brain, send the body into a kind of self-destruction meltdown. Which is why everyone moved to the safer neck ports, but he supposed those who stuck ronin-chips into their dermal implants didn’t care about the side effects, if they even knew about them.

But one thing was sure: the ronin network was more capable than he, or anyone else, had first realised. With an army of mutable drones, Elliot could do almost anything he wanted. Having control of people’s thoughts and to be able to influence them so directly meant a whole crap-ton of trouble.

Gabe headed back inside and sat with Petal.

“I’m sorry,” Gabe said. “I should have been more alert. How the hell could I just fall asleep like that?”

“You’re getting old,” Petal said, with a slight slur and a wonky smile.

Although meant as a light-hearted joke, he knew it was the truth. In this world he was an old man. Such a brutal existence didn’t favour the old. Life burst brightly like a flame and extinguished before it burnt down to embers. Those who did lose their light, like him, were kicked into the dust. Snuffed out.

But he wasn’t dead yet. He still had a job to do.

One way or another he’d finish it.

Chapter 15

In one of Cemprom’s secret labs, James read the report. He nodded at the conclusion, rubbing his chin. “You make some fair points,” he said. Saladin, the lead clone engineer for Cemprom, stood in front of the seated James, his hands behind his back, small, flitting eyes focussed, waiting.

Rosario Fuentes stood behind him. She ran her hands over his shoulders and bent her head to whisper in his ear. “Saladin’s a prodigy. He knows this subject like no other. He’s right.”

James shivered just a little under her hot breath. He hated himself for being so weak, so manipulated, but Saladin’s proposal on how to stabilise the clones was good, solid work. It was definitely something that under normal circumstances he would have tested, but with Fuentes influencing him, he felt like this decision was no longer his.

Fuentes moved to stand in front of the two cylindrical tanks. The two clones hung in the ’Stem-infused solution. Their eyes were closed, limbs curled into their bodies like two fully-grown foetuses. They were James’ number one and two clones, and ninety-nine percent perfect. Which wasn’t perfect at all.

“They’re dangerous,” James said, as if he had any say over this situation by now.

“And Petal and Sasha aren’t?” Fuentes turned to face him. She looked past him to Saladin and gave him a short nod. The Engineer left the lab, closing the door behind him.

Despite the times he had shared with Rosario, all those passionate, intimate nights, standing there alone with her made him feel like prey. She stalked him, swinging her hips as she closed in, bringing her body up against his, her hands stroking the back of his neck.

She kissed him softly and mumbled the words, “We can do it, together. We can bring them back, fix their code.”

James closed his eyes as his body betrayed him. He leaned further in, feeling the heat of her chest against his, feeling her heart beat through her suit jacket. His hands surrounded her narrow waist, and he pulled her closer still.

With the pain of Petal and Sasha being estranged, the idea of fixing numbers one and two did appeal to him. He just wanted his girls back. But beyond the lust and yearning for intimacy and the desire to be a ‘father’ to these clones, a deep, insistent burrowing of anxiety about Sasha itched away at his psyche; had she really just left them all? Had she guessed his relations with Rosario and deserted them?

She was always impulsive, that was what made her so effective on the battlefield or in conflicting situations. Of all four of the clones, she was the real warrior, always finding a solution or making the best of an impossible situation. But still, he wondered if her silence wasn’t impulsive behaviour but something else.

“Saladin is right,” Rosario breathed close to his hear, licking at the edges, running her hands up and down his spine. “He’s been working on this solution for weeks. He admired your work the day you came to the city. He truly believes he can help you make them all they need to be.”

James sighed, relaxing into Rosario’s clutch. He wanted it so much. Wanted to see them open their eyes and know he, and not Elliot, was their father, their creator.

“The others have abandoned you,” Fuentes said bluntly. “Take this opportunity to be a father again. It’s been so long since your beautiful daughters breathed the air. Let them free from their dreams. Liberate them, James, my love. Liberate them, and let us together save this city from Elliot’s influence.”

“If we do this,” James said, pulling away slightly, not wanting to give in to his desire for Rosario, “it has to be on my terms, under my direction. I’m sure Saladin is capable, his report is especially brilliant, but he doesn’t know my girls like I do. I can’t afford to lose another. I... I couldn’t face that. Not again.”

Rosario kissed him deeply this time, teasing her tongue against his before breaking away. They locked eyes, and Rosario smiled. “I promise you, you will have full control. These are your girls; Saladin just wants to help, as do I. And we do need some help if they’re to have a safe city. We have to stop the scourge of your father, and with Sasha sulking and Petal away with Gabriel, we need all the expert help we can get.”

James breathed in deep, closed his eyes, and pictured clones one and two opening their eyes and looking upon him once more.

“Okay,” he said. “I’ll speak with Saladin, get things in order.”

“This is the best way forward. For all of us.” She walked to the door, opened it, and turned to face James before saying, “I’ll send in Saladin. Might as well get started.”

James nodded while sitting at the work console, already setting up the various holoscreens they would need to monitor clone one’s vitals while they woke her up.

“Good luck.” Rosaria looked back briefly before leaving the lab.

Maybe this was the time, after all. Perhaps it all had led to this moment, these circumstances. Some divine coincidence.

It was time.

Time to wake up.

Chapter 16

Gabe installed the broken fuel cell into the bike. From the two sabotaged machines, he and Petal managed to salvage enough working parts to repair one bike. The fuel cell, although fixed as best as possible, had lost more than half its charge. With carrying two people, it was unlikely to reach Xian’s place on the coast. But it would be better than walking the whole way.

Gabe’s bones ached at the thought of trudging a hundred kilometres, especially as by the look of the black clouds gathering on the horizon, they would be in for a serious storm.

“Just our damned luck,” Gabe said. “No storms for how many years? And now a mother of all blasted storms is brewing up, waiting to fuck us over.”

Petal had recovered from her stun and packed a few litres of water and four more ration packs, the extent of what they could carry on the bike with the two of them, plus Alpha’s motherboard secured in a strongbox.

“Life’s a series of challenges, Gabe. It is what it is.”

“Gerry making ya a philosopher these days, eh?”

“Nah, just tired of railing against bad luck. I’ve had it since the day I was activated. Why worry about it now?”

“We’ve got a decision to make.” Gabe moved to an open section in the wall of the building. “Looking at those clouds and feeling that wind that’s kicking up, we need to choose whether we stay until the storm blows over or try to get to Xian’s before the worst hits us.”

Petal joined him at the gap in the wall. The ragged breach looked like a knife wound. Gabe thought it was probably a metal girder crashing down from the roof, which now lay in pieces across the vast floor of the building.

Even without the roof, the shell of the train carriage would provide them with shelter.

“We can’t stay,” Petal said. “What if there’re more ronin around?”

“Wait,” Gabe said. “That’s what the traffic you detected was: those damned ronin. They were here all this time, waiting.”

“Aye. That sounds about right.” Petal looked away and sighed.

“What is it?”

“I should have known. It’s my fault.”

“Nonsense. We can play the blame game all day, but one thing is for sure, if we stay here, we’ll be attacked again at some point. The fact Elliot can remotely kill a ronin-chip wearer tells me he’s probably got some kind of tracking facility. He knows we’re here, probably knows we have Alpha.”

“Fuck it, let’s go. It’s just a storm, right? I don’t care about getting a bit wet.”

The sky rolled with dense black clouds, a fabric void billowing with angry winds.

“Yeah,” Gabe said, looking at the malevolence gathering in the distance. “Just a storm.”

Gabe turned his back to the storm and checked everything was tied securely to the quad-bike. It started up after a couple of tries. The engine rumbled with a worrying knocking sound. Those bastards really did a number on them, but it was better than nothing.

Petal joined him. “Ready when you are, Gabe.”

“Keep that pistol close to ya,” Gabe said. “Never know what’s waiting for us out there.”

“I don’t detect the network at the moment.”

“Aye. Don’t mean they aren’t on their way, though.”

Gabe gunned the engine and pulled away from their shelter. He navigated the bike through the rubble of the town, watching for dark corners and shifting shadows. His entire body tensed, ready to act. But as they approached the exit road, he relaxed and throttled the bike, headed towards the great black velvet blanket that shut out the light and draped across the horizon. It’d be okay. It’s just a storm.

***

Hour after hour, Gabe clenched his jaw harder, gripped the bike’s controls tighter. White smoke came from the exhaust, and the engine made a horrible grinding noise. He had stopped twice during their seventy-kilometre journey to let it cool off.

The winds gusted at them with such force it felt like they weren’t making any progress, but they crawled forward, stealing more ground from the storm.

It was so dark now that he had to switch on the headlight to ensure he didn’t drive into a crater or tumbled building. Along their journey they saw almost no vegetation, towns, or relics of the time before the war, just open, cracked ground. A few times he nearly pitched the bike sideways into a fissure. He was just thankful that, so far, the wind blew head on. There was no way they’d stay upright with a side wind.

Lightning flashed, lighting up the whole sky. A crack of thunder erupted a few seconds later. Gabe jumped at the noise, feeling the power of it hit his chest. Petal, sitting behind him, gripped his waist tighter.

And on it went, growing fiercer than he could ever imagine. Lightning forked all around them, making the dense, statically charged clouds glow blue. They watched as lightning struck the ground, not once or twice but hundreds of times, as if the very gods were smiting the earth.

“Oh fuck,” Gabe said, leaning forward. The headlight went out.

“What is it?” Petal shouted over the roar of the thunder and the gusting winds that threatened to rip them off the bike.

“We’re done!” The bike lurched to a stop; steam poured from the fuel cell. “The static shorted the H-core.”

The clouds ahead formed a giant cone, forks of light flashed inside the huge swirling form as it sucked up air and dust from the ground. Gabe abandoned the bike. The winds shifted. Dust, dirt, and small stones crashed into his face. He held up his jacket to block out the assault while he grabbed the strong box containing Alpha’s motherboard from the bike.

“Grab what you can,” he shouted, bellowing as loud as he could over the deafening roar of the twisting beast.

“Where will we go?” Petal screamed.

Gabe shielded his eyes, scanning the area. To his right he saw a couple of small boulders. It wasn’t ideal, but in the Great Plains there was nowhere else to go before the tornado struck. He pointed to them, and Petal’s eyes followed him. He could see fear there, and desperation.

“It’s the only place.”

She nodded and held the duffle bag with supplies up to protect her face.

Together, leaning against the violent, battering winds, they trekked towards the dark shapes, hoping they’d offer enough protection from the vicious winds.