Stones: Experiment (Stones #3) (67 page)

“Our light armor will hold off these guys until they bring in the LP cannons.” Alexa rolls out from under Jessica. “We have a few minutes, but not much longer. I suggest we take off.”

Jessica sprints to the front of the ship. “Matt said to stay put, so that’s what we’ll do, at least for now.” She stands between him and Yarah.

Both of them sit motionless, eyes closed, chests barely moving.

With trembling fingers, Jessica touches Matt’s shoulder, hoping to wake him. “The holocaust is in full swing. It’s too late to stop it, Matt.” Black dots form on the floor at her feet. That’s when she notices tears dripping from her eyes.

“Hey, can I get a little help?” Alexa has the tip of her pulse rifle pointing through a small port hole. “There’s another one over there.”

Swinging her rifle off her shoulder, Jessica bends and looks through the hole. Two bodies lay sprawled out on the roof near the open gash. Two more are crumpled on what is left of the round table in the lab. Alexa’s next shot splinters the table, dropping the bodies to the lab floor.

Alexa looks up from the rifle. “Any idea what Matt’s doing?”

“I think he’s trying to interface with the ship’s Meshport.”

“He might as well give up.” Alexa looks up over her sights. “Once the war starts, there’s no stopping it.”

Jessica shakes her head. “Matt doesn’t like to give up.”

K
eep looking.

Pulse racing, Matt gazes at lines of dots running off in every direction, each a portal to a world of data. Then he remembers the transport ship belongs to Ryzaard.

“Ship,” he says. “Give me a list of secure entry points.” As he finishes speaking, Matt holds his Stone out in front, imagining all data moving through its interior.

The voice fills the void. “Multiple access points available.” Blue text flows in the black space in front of his eyes. “Please select.”

Jerek Grey

Elsa Bergman

Kalani Maaki

Li Jing-wei

Diego Lopez

Mikal Ryzaard

He instinctively reaches out and wraps his fingers on the last name on the list.

The image of a locked gate appears. “Passcode required. Twenty-second limit.” A number pad appears on the gate, along with a square flashing the numeral 20. With each passing second, the numeral counts backward.

“Any ideas?” Matt says. The counter is already on sixteen.

“No,” Yarah says.

Matt relaxes and lets his fingers hit random numbers.

The counter flashes the number 9 and two words.

Access denied.

“Wait!” Yarah yells. “There was a green number on Ryzaard’s arm.” Two more seconds pass. “I can see it. 159604!”

“Genius.” Matt punches the numbers as Yarah shouts them out.

The counter stops at one, and then flashes red.

Access denied.

Stunned, Matt stares at the crimson words.

The gate fades away.

Ryzaard’s name is no longer on the list.

Matt scans the names. One of the names triggers a memory of the holo Alexa showed him. The words float through his mind.

Kalani has everything coded into a self-executing algorithm.

Matt’s arm shoots out, and his fingers touch the name
Kalani Maaki
.

He braces himself to face the gate again. Instead, he sees the image of a fat sword hanging above his head, suspended by a thin thread. Seconds before the thread breaks, he dives forward, passing under it as it crashes behind him. Blue words appear in an arch above him.

Malo e Lelei. Welcome.

The sound of crashing surf is accompanied by a lush, high-definition view of a white sand beach. As he stares, a massive palm tree grows up out of the sand. Instinctively, he runs to it and starts climbing up, hand over hand.

It’s like being in a zero G world, and he effortlessly scales it to the top.

Once there, his eyes scan the large palm fronds gently bending in the breeze. Small images play on each of them. One of them catches his eye, covered with mushroom clouds and black and yellow radiation symbols. Releasing his grip from the trunk, he pushes off in zero gravity and lunges at it. His grip closes on the rough leaves.

The view goes black.

He’s floating in a floorless dark room with red and white dots on a massive bluescreen. It’s impossible to make sense of it. No patterns. Nothing but chaos.

“Maybe you’re too close. Try zooming out,” Yarah says.

As he thinks of floating away from the screen, his body shoots back until he can read it. Red text on a white background.

Washington, D.C.

He reaches out and touches the red text. The instant his fingertips make contact with the glass surface, the text changes from red to green. Words in black appear alongside.

Detonation request confirmed. Proceeding to arm.

His hand flashes out and touches the text again. This time, it changes back to red.

Detonation request rescinded.

Matt immediately comprehends. Green means the place name is set to detonate. Red means it isn’t yet.

His task is simple. Don’t let anything turn green.

As he scans the text, it extends above his head in a column and drops below his feet out of sight. That’s when it begins to really make sense.

Self-executing algorithm.

Backing out further, he follows the column of red text up with his eyes to the point where it’s green. As he gazes at the place names forming the list, they fade from red to green in slow motion, line by line down the list. Reaching his hand out to a line that had just switched to green, he brushes his fingers against it, reading the words.

Rio de Janeiro, Cristo Redentor. Detonation confirmed.

He presses the words with the fingers of his left hand, but the color doesn’t change back to red. Again and again he pushes on it with no change. His pulse quickens as the words on the next line below fade from red to green.

Havana, Plaza de Armas. Detonation confirmed.

A river of cold sweat runs between his shoulder blades. This time, both hands shoot out, caressing the words, willing them to change back to red.

Red is safe. Green is death.

But nothing happens. The words change to green, like a river of liquid concrete, slowly flowing down the list, hardening into stone with each step, unstoppable, immovable.

Miami, South Beach. Detonation Confirmed.

In desperation, he raises the Stone in both hands and brings the point of it down on the next line of text that is still red, willing it to stay red.

Graceland Mansion, Memphis.

A blue horizontal line shoots out from the tip of the Stone just above the text. Everything below the line falls away and disappears in the darkness below Matt. In its place, two words materialize, the color of sky blue.

Algorithm terminated.

K
alani jumps to his feet, staring at the words on the bluescreen.

Algorithm terminated.

“What just happened?” Jing-wei says.

“I don’t know.” Kalani brushes his fingers on the screen again and again with no response. “It just ended, in the middle. The rest of the algorithm is gone. I don’t understand.” He looks around in desperation. “Ryzaard is going to kill us.”

The holo face of Ryzaard rises up out of a jax on the desk. “We were only halfway through the sequence when it stopped. Status report, please.”

Kalani’s face is almost as white as his teeth. “I don’t know. The algorithm was moving according to plan. Everything playing out perfectly until—”

“Until what?” Ryzaard’s eyebrows drop into a deep scowl.

Kalani’s fingers move back and forth on the screen, searching, frantic. “Someone broke through the encryption and gained internal access to the protocol. I’m trying to find who or what it was.” Sweat beads up on his forehead. Drops from his nose and chin darken the desk beneath his face.

Four sets of eyes stand behind him, watching every move.

“Well?” Ryzaard’s voice has an edge to it that scares them all.

Kalani’s voice drops to a whisper. “Impossible.” He looks up into Ryzaard’s eyes. “It says it was me.”

“Can’t you get it restarted?” Ryzaard says. “Skip through the list. Do whatever it takes.”

Kalani stares ahead and shakes his head. “It’s all gone. Destroyed. All the codes. The entire algorithm. Everything. Like it never existed.” He looks back at Jing-wei, disbelief in his eyes. “It’ll take a few days, maybe weeks, to reconstitute the process.” He closes his eyes and drops his head.

Ryzaard takes a deep breath. All the others hold theirs, waiting for him to exhale, watching him on the holo.

“How far down the chain did we get?” he says.

Jing-wei’s fingers are already dancing over her jax. “South Beach.”

Ryzaard nods. “That would mean how many detonations? There were a little over 200 in all, correct?”

“Yes,” Jing-wei says. “We were just finishing up the second wave, moving onto the third. South Beach was number ninety-six.” She anticipates his next question. “According to our models, that will result in approximately 9.3 million fatalities.”

“I hope it’s enough.” Ryzaard’s eyes focus on Jing-wei. “Are we prepared to move on to the next phase?”

Jing-wei shakes her head. “The sudden acceleration of plans presents certain difficulties. Nothing we can’t overcome. But we’ll need another thirty minutes.”

“You have ten,” Ryzaard says. “No more. We must strike while the fear is still fresh in the mind of every man, woman and child on the planet. Make sure the broadcast is streamed
live
to every corner of the Mesh on every Mesh-site. No one can be allowed to miss it. This is our hour of triumph. Now let’s act like it.”

The holo fades to gray and disintegrates.

J
essica and Alexa are each pumping ten rounds a second onto the roof from above. A never ending supply of combat troops appears with small arms. The platform below them is littered with black corpses.

A blue pyramid inside a clear glass sphere appears below on the floor of the lab.

Alexa trains her sights on it with no effect other than sparks and ricochets. “They’re setting up the LP cannon. We have twenty seconds before they blast us to carbon atoms.” She throws her pulse rifle and runs to the front of the transport. “Keep shooting while I get us out of here.”

Matt and Yarah are both sitting in the cockpit seats, eyes closed, as still as rocks.

She slams her jax into the com. “Upload new sequence. Execute.”

“Unable to execute.” The calm female voice floods the interior. “Ship’s interface is currently locked.”

Alexa looks again, left to right, at Matt and Yarah. “Wake up!” She shakes them and screams into their ears. They don’t respond, sitting like wax figures in a museum.

“We have to go,” Yarah says. “They need us back at the surface.”

Matt hangs in the darkness, still staring ahead at the names of cities and landmarks across the world, all floating in green, all followed by the same two words.

Detonation confirmed.