The Rendering (10 page)

“Self-destruct initiated. Detonation sequence in nineteen minutes. Self-destruct initiated. Detonation sequence in nineteen minutes.”

On the same floor, in the same corridor, I found the virtual reality combat simulator. The sim looked like the cockpit of a jet fighter, with a scuba suit in the pilot’s seat. Apparently, a trainee—or “test subject,” maybe—would zip into the scuba suit, and they’d run whichever simulation they wanted, with feedback delivered through the suit.

Urban warfare, demolitions, unarmed combat, the works.

But, I learned later, the simulations were
too
good and sometimes actually injured trainees with virtual wounds. So they’d set the simulator to Nonlethal, for safety.

After a minute of furious searching, I found a port at the bottom of the machine, then plugged in the steak and flipped the switches.

This time, the reaction was immediate. Not fire:

Tiny bursts of electricity zapped off the steak, stinging my fingers, then arcing into the cockpit of the VR simulator. I heard an ominous sizzle as the bursts started spraying
around the room. A zigzag blast of lightning fried the potted plant beside me, and I ran, only one step ahead of the chain lightning.

With one last steak in the specimen pack, I’d run out of ideas.

“Self-destruct initiated. Detonation sequence in fourteen minutes. Self-destruct initiated. Detonation sequence in fourteen minutes.”

Fourteen minutes. Not enough time to get away. With the Center’s AI off-line, I couldn’t expect any help, and I didn’t have any clue where to plug in the last steak.

So I figured, what the heck?

Might as well die with a smile on my face.

In the employee lounge, I started a game of
Street Gang
, the Hog Stompers versus the Fists of Kung Fu, as the Center crashed and burned around me.

On a lark, I plugged the cable of the last steak into the game port. I mean, why not?

Maybe it would help me beat my high score.

Hey, this is Jamie again.

A few things you need to know:

First, I’ve seen all Dr. Solomon’s digital reconstructions, and that didn’t look anything like a fridge.

Second, those stem seeds—the “steaks”—were designed to work in the HostLink, right? To put the skunk minds, for example, back into their ordinary skunk bodies. But with an emergency override, they’d activate around
any
sufficient amount of technology. So Doug, for once, had the right idea—as long as you were willing to accept some uncontrollable chaos.

And by
chaos
, I mean
insanity
.

One more thing: Do you know the difference between digital information and physical
stuff
at the subatomic level? Between a software program and an elephant? Between a million lines of code and a strawberry smoothie?

Nothing. If you look closely enough, there’s no difference at all. Life emerges from things that aren’t alive. From molecules, from atoms, from quarks, from membranes vibrating in sixteen-dimensional space.

Sorry about that. Try to ignore the trolls.

In any case, at the subatomic level, everything is made of the same stuff.
Everything
. And with the Protocol and the stem seeds, you could translate digital information to physical reality and back again.

A chunk of “steak” could unzip into a polar bear or a toaster
oven, then vanish into a flash of electrons and stream into a computer as pure software.

You know exactly where this is going, don’t you?

Start with the BattleArmor, the combat simulator, and the video game. Add the new Awareness that Bug mentioned, which had been hiding, waiting, watching—and which overrode the normal safeguards to output the three skunks.

Larkspur: routed through the Quantuum 19 BattleArmor.

Cosmo: routed through the virtual reality combat simulator.

Poppy: routed through the
Street Gang
video game.

A walking tank, an elite commando, and a kung fu biker chick.

Yeah, and skunks.

Except not
entirely
skunks.

Remember back when that “snake fridge” told Doug about “six thousand iterations”? That just means doing something six thousand times, like running a test over and over, or pressing Next six thousand times in a row.

And the skunks had lived and learned and evolved through millions of iterations, drawing on the knowledge of the Center, on databases of human biology and old movies and joke-a-day calendars and—

Wait. How’d I get stuck with the boring explanations again?

Doug here.

As the countdown continued, I pounded on the Fire button, and on the video screen, my Hog Stomper swung his motorcycle twice around his head and—

BOOM

The game exploded. But not in fire or lightning or shrapnel; that would’ve killed me.

No, it was an explosion of goo, of flesh. Of … steak.

Strictly speaking, Douglas, you were impacted by self-extracting nanocellular matter, not flesh. Flesh is the soft tissue of the body of a vertebrate, whereas—

Marshmallow, then.

Imagine an 18-wheeler made of marshmallow hitting you at sixty miles an hour. Apparently, plugging that steak into the video game made it available to the new Awareness, which was searching for ways to output the skunks.

The bad news: I got slammed across the room while the speakers broadcast, “Self-destruct initiated. Detonation sequence in nine minutes.”

The good news: because I hooked the steak up to Street Fighter, the Awareness was able to output Poppy.

When my vision returned, I stared at the video machines, which were now completely engulfed by a bubbling mound of goop. Then I looked higher, toward the ceiling.

At the digital announcement banner.

“Um,” I said. “Me?”

“Self-destruct initiated,” the speakers answered. “Detonation sequence in eight minutes.”

“Yeah,” I said, looking at my map.

Catch the blue shuttle in subsector 2W? Why not? It’s not like I had other plans.

Five minutes later, inside the loading dock, Hund told his soldiers, “If you so much as scratch that thing, you answer to me.”

The guys operating the crane and forklift paled slightly, then
verrrrry
carefully lowered the huge pod—the one with
HOSTLINK
written on the side—onto the transport pallet.

“That’s the last load,” Hund said.

Across the loading dock, Roach tapped the Protocol cube, his eyes shining with glee. “Combine this Protocol with the HostLink, and the country is ours. Not in a decade, not in a year. Not even in months. In weeks—maybe days—they will see, they will
all
see, what beauty is, what perfection is. They will—”

“Doctor,” Hund interrupted. “We’re on a schedule.”

“We’re on
my
schedule,” Roach snapped, “and don’t you forget it!” He slipped the Protocol cube into a secure case. “I’m not pleased with your performance today.”

“The operation was a complete success.”

“In the end, yes. But you missed Dr. Solomon during the first sweep, then lost her nephew.”

“He’s six flights underground, with a bullet in his leg and a bomb ticking down.”

“Still, I expect better of you, Commander.”

Hund’s eyes hardened. “If you weren’t so slow giving me those upgrades …”

“Soon, Hund,” Roach said. “Soon.”

“The
full
upgrades, Doctor.” For the first time that day, Hund actually smiled. “Subdural ilatfanium mesh and synaptic acceleration.”

“Exactly as promised, yes.” Roach looked at his watch. “Now where is that airlift? They’re almost twelve seconds behind schedule, and—ah!”

He shaded his eyes as three huge helicopters, silent and black, dove from the dark sky to hover near the loading dock. Soldiers attached crates the size of 18-wheelers to dangling cables for transport.

“Did you discover anything about that audio in the processing lab?” Hund asked, watching the helicopters. “That voice calling my name?”

“It came from Dr. Solomon’s private data sectors. She must’ve arranged some kind of automatic security for the boy before she died.”

“Doesn’t matter,” Hund said. “In a few minutes, this is all gonna be a smoldering hole in the ground.”

Roach cocked an eyebrow. “Isn’t a thermonuclear device overkill?”

“Overkill is my middle name.”

They boarded a helicopter, to fly away before the whole place blew—with me and my aunt still inside.

I was five feet below them, listening to every word. The blue shuttle the banner had mentioned was a supply monorail, part of an underground bullet-train system that served the Center.

I’d squeezed through a duct and crawled to the shuttle system. I’d found the blue line, then stopped, listening to the conversation overhead.

And I’d shivered at the tone in Roach’s voice when he’d said,
In weeks—maybe days—they will
all
see what perfection is
.

If he stole the Protocol cube and the HostLink, nothing could stop him.

And guess what? He’d stolen the Protocol cube and the HostLink.

I hadn’t done anything right. They were gonna get away with this, with looting the technology and bombing the Center. With hurting Auntie M.

In the gloomy duct, I closed my eyes.

She couldn’t be dead. Maybe she was stunned, maybe comatose. Not dead. Not dead forever, like my mother and father, and never coming back.

You know how I said I don’t remember my parents? Well, I don’t—but I’ve seen pictures. I’ve seen video. I’ve watched my mother holding me, this squirmy pink infant, in her lap and
kissing the soles of my chubby feet. I remember the look in her eyes, the expression of awe and adoration.

I’d never gotten that, the misty-eyed delight, from Auntie M. Instead, I’d gotten love; I’d gotten guidance; I’d gotten solidity. I’d gotten the ironclad guarantee that she’d always be there for me.

Always
. And you know what? She’d never let me down. Not once.

And now she’d gone and left me forever, like my parents?

No, I couldn’t accept that. If only I could get to her somehow, drag her away from the Center, away from the explosion …

Then the speakers said, “Detonation sequence in two minutes.”

Two minutes until the explosion, and my aunt was at least five minutes away.

Well, you’ve seen it on TV a hundred times: There’s a chase, and the hero’s partner gets shot. He tells the hero to go on without him, but the hero never does. Instead, he grabs his buddy and brings him out alive. That’s why he’s the hero.

I guess I’m no hero.

The shuttle door opened. I hesitated a moment. Then I stepped inside, and the door closed behind me.

I still have nightmares about that. Leaving her behind.

Your only option was retreat, Douglas. Even if you could have dragged my body from the
Center—a physical impossibility—I was beyond your help
.

Maybe.

Anyway, I got into the shuttle and looked through a window. I saw the last of the crates—the HostLink—being lifted to a helicopter.

Then things got even stranger.