Thursday, September 17, 2015

Six

Six

The smell of coffee woke Braxton Gargaryan. A styrofoam cup of the expensive black steaming liquid had been placed on a small table near his mattress. He sat up, took a sip, groggily felt around for his pack of smokes. Found them, a bit crushed, in the pocket of his jeans. He lit one, exhaled, went back to nursing his coffee.
“Clone,” he said.
“Wizard?” the text to speech voice asked.
“ETA on their arrival?”
“Thirty minutes.”
“Alright. I’ll finish my smoke and then I’ll come jack in.” Braxton said, and took another drag, coughed, and washed down any remaining coughs with coffee. “Any chance we could brew a pot of quad strength Nucaff, Clone?”
“Of course, Wizard. I will have that done.” Clone paused. “Your chance of having a heart attack is increased when consuming that many stimulants.”
“Noted. I mean, I’d ask for cocaine or cinnimeth, but I didn’t want to assume.”
“Would you prefer those?” the AI asked.
“What? No.” Braxton shook his head, “just the Nucaff, please.” He finished his cigarette and stood up.
“It will be ready.”
“Thanks,” he drained the last of his coffee and went down the hall, into Clone’s white washed, white lit room. A muddy brown pot of Nucaff was heating up on a desk. He sat next to it, drummed his fingers on the desk for a moment, and then grabbed wires, plugged them into his wrists. Put on the pair of wrap-around shades Clone had provided, and jacked in.
***

Silver flashes across the horizon, and Braxton Gargaryan’s avatar arrives in a barren landscape of holy light. He can see the burned out structures that were once lobbies that held thousands of avatars. A tendril of midnight skirts across his vision. He spins, but loses it. He mutters code, a long string of numbers and letters, and his avatar vanishes.
To reappear outside of a tall skyscraper surrounded by silver light in all directions. Armed guards stand outside the glass doors, carbines out and ready. He floats up, cloaking himself in code, moves behind them, and dispatches them quickly, a Vulcan neck pinch to one, the edge of a hand to another’s throat. He wraps one in code that squeezes, constricting the guard, it vanishes and the way in is clear. His avatar recloaks itself and slips in through the doors.
***
    Braxton sighed and took a sip straight from the pot of Nucaff. Considered smoking another Black Eagle, decided against it. Jacked back in.
***
    Braxton’s avatar passes through the cracks between the doors and stands in a lobby of polished marble and chrome. He imagines this is what the MercLaw building actually looks like, in Hong Kong, but he doesn’t know for sure. He watches as guards patrol the lobby, and it begins filling with avatars. Mostly formed as cartoons and dragons.
    Another black tendril flits across his vision, just to the side, but when he looks for it, it is gone.
    His avatar shoots over to a desk, begins downloading information from a terminal. Encrypts it, and forwards it to Miller. He doesn’t know if it will be helpful or not, but every little bit helps, he supposes.
    He turns back to the guards, begins to move towards one. His avatar freezes for a moment, panic, heart catching in his throat. Then it buffers, and he is free again. He wraps code around the guard’s neck, lifts it to the ceiling, and lets it drop. It splatters below. He begins killing in earnest now, an invisible wraith of coding and fury. Dead guards lay at his feet, and he moves to the elevators. Floor by floor, room by room.
    And then a roar shakes the building. Fire, burning hot, licks the skin of his avatar, and he spins out of control for a moment, before righting himself and recloaks himself in haste. He looks down at the lobby and swears. A great, multi-colored serpentine dragon floats in the air, waiting for him. Golden eyes, filled with malice and hate peer into him. It inhales sharply, and Braxton’s avatar flings itself backwards, out a window, into the silver light outside. There is a crash and the dragon punches a hole in the side of the building and chases after him.
***
    “Oh shit.” Braxton said, pulling out a Black Eagle and lighting it. He absently gulps down a third of the Nucaff.
***
    His avatar spins in midair, shoots off away from the dragon, which gives chase immediately. And the fucker is fast, faster than anything he has seen in all his years in cyberspace. But he thinks he is faster. Maybe. Only one way to find out, really. So here goes nothing. Or everything.
    Flames touched his boots, a long spray of napalm coming from the dragon’s maw. Its teeth blackened, serrated sword points, drip with venom. His avatar gulps, spins to face the dragon, and spits code.
    Ice forms around its face, sealing it shut. For a moment. Before it melts, and another spray of fire comes straight for his face. Braxton’s avatar vanishes, reappears behind the dragon. Spears formed of ice rain down on the dragon’s back. It screams in fury. His avatar sighs. There is no pain in the dragon’s scream. Only anger. Only hate. More ice rains down, and then lightning, and then acid. The dragon gets angrier.
    ***
    “Fuck, this is a powerful program.” Braxton muttered, he put out his cigarette.
    “Will you be able to defeat it?” Clone asks, it’s text-to-speech voice halting.
    “Yeah.” Braxton replied. “I hope so.”
***
    The avatar barrel rolls, heading back to the building, guards begin firing their carbines at him. He erects a shield of code, and the bullets bounce off, reversing to strike the guards. Heads explode in showers of gore, but already the dragon is behind him, he feels the heat from its body.
    Streamers of ice shoot from his palms as he twists in midair, he sharpens them with a string of numbers. They slice into the dragon’s neck, blood, black as pitch, sprays, dissolving a guard it touches. The avatar reaches into a pocket, pulls out a brick of pure blue ice. Streaks back into the building. The dragon follows.
    Back into the lobby. The dragon inhales. The avatar throws the brick. It vanishes into the beast’s maw.
    Silence.
    The dragon implodes, the entire building flickers in and out of reality, solidifies, and he runs to the terminal. Uploads information.
    Miller.
    Morse.
    Lavigne.
    All Access to All Points. MercLaw Building, Hong Kong.
    Security Systems off.
    He mutters a string of code, security feeds in real time flash across his vision. Another black tendril off to the side.
    “Alright, main security is down.” He says, “you have unrestricted access to all sections. Oh,” the avatar pauses, “here are the blueprints. There are also about fifty armed personnel. About a hundred or so office staff. They probably know kung fu or something. Be careful. Be sneaky. In other words, be fucking ninjas.”
    “Got it,” Lavigne whispers. “Good job, Wizard.”
    “Good luck, Paladin. Warrior. Thief. I’m going to lock as many behind steel doors as possible. Thief?”
    “Yeah?” Morse asks.
    “Treasure is in the 50th floor penthouse. Its guarded.”
    “Of course it is,” she sighs.
    “Only by about,” he stops. “Here. I’m patching the security feed to your HUD.”
    “Holy shit.” Morse says.
    “Yeah, armed to the fucking teeth. Are you guys in the building yet?”
    “That’s a negative. Paladin here had to stop and take a shit and get a burrito.” Miller breaks in.
    “A burrito? Seriously, Paladin?”
    Lavigne chuckles. “You should see the size of it.”
    “Thats what she said.” The avatar says deadpan. “How close?”
    “Close.” Morse answers.
    “Good. You’re up. I’ll still be here, scouting. If you need help just ask.”
    “Oh, Wizard.” Morse says.
    “Yes, Thief?”
    “Can you at least minimize this camera feed? It’s… distracting.”
    “Sure thing, Thief.” The camera feed is reduced on her HUD to the size of an inch by an inch square to her upper left.
    “Good luck, and may the force be with you.”
    “What?” They ask in unison.

Monday, September 14, 2015

Five

Five

    “You know, from up here,” Braxton Gargaryan was saying, “the smog looks even worse.”
    The ArkSen security dude sitting next to him didn’t even give crack a polite smile. Ashley Morse, who sat across from him took the bottled water from her lips and shrugged. “You get used to it.”
    Braxton lit a Black Eagle, “where we headed again?”
    “A place off the coast, Scrapyard.” Morse replied.
    “Sounds nice.”
    “It used to be used by smugglers and data thieves. Complete satellite silence.”
    “Still has jacks, though?” Braxton asked.
    “Of course. Encrypted decks.” She paused, pressed her earlobe. “Say again?” Silence. “Holy shit. Okay. Okay. Yeah. God damn it Miller, we’re almost there. Tell it to calm its shit. Yeah. I know, that’s bad.” More silence. “See you in a few.”
    “What happened?” Braxton asked. Even the security dude, outfitted in body armor and an assault rifle looked a bit unsettled.
    “Something sent a pulse wave through cyberspace. Killed thousands. Millions more can’t even log in. Decks wiped out, accounts erased.”
    “Any idea where this pulse came from?” Braxton asked. “And yeah, that’s some bad shit.”
    “That’s where you come in.”

----

The hovercar landed on the remains of an old 747 and Braxton stepped out, Ashley Morse close behind. Gregory Miller in all his gray glory ran out of a faded red (now pink) plastic building as the hovercar lifted off. He shook Braxton’s hand. “Nice to finally meet you, Mr. Gargaryan. I’m sad that its under such stressful circumstances.”
“No sweat, Mr. Miller,” Braxton replied, releasing his hand. “I’m just wondering why you had me flown all the way out here. We could have done all of this from my apartment.”
“Well, yeah. But if you had stayed there, you’d be dead, Mr. Gargaryan. MercLaw tracked your cyberdeck signal there.”
Braxton shrugged. “Yeah, true. Sloppy on my part.”
“I doubt it. You seem to be one of the only people left with more than pennies in their bank account.”
Braxton shrugged, shivered in the breeze.
“Let’s go inside, have some coffee, discuss our strategy.” Miller paused. “And your pay, of course. Lavigne is already here.”
“Lavigne?” Morse asked, stopping. “I thought I sent him on the Hernandez case.”
“Been recalled, we need him here.”
“Why?”
“Clone wanted him. Asked for him specifically. And now won’t stop referring to him as the ‘Paladin’”
“Christ.” Morse spat.
“Paladin?” Braxton asked.
“Yeah, you know, like in Dungeons and Dragons, or one of those fantasy sims?”
“A Knight? Why would we need a knight?”
Morse shook her head. “You’re the wizard, we have a knight. Christ. She’s making a god damn rpg out of us.”
“Who is ‘she’?” Braxton asked.
“We’re almost there.” Miller replied. They stepped into the plastic building, walked down a long hallway, and then into a brightly lit white room where an unshaven man was smoking a cigarette and drinking a cup of coffee in front of a white plastic humanoid shape. It stood, and lights blinked as it spoke in a voice that sounded like an archaic text-to-speech program.
“Welcome, Wizard, Thief, and Warrior. Meet the Paladin.”
The Paladin shrugged and took another drag of his cigarette.

----

“Alright,” Braxton said. “This is crazy.”
“Yeah,” Morse agreed, “which part?”
“Let me count the reasons,” he said. “One, its an AI. Aren’t those illegal? Two, this entire mission seems, well, impossible.” He lit up a Black Eagle. “I don’t like it. One fuck up and you guys are dead.”
“Yeah. I don’t like it either. But it may be the only chance of…”
“Chance of what? ArkSen recovering from a PR nightmare?” Braxton exhaled smoke.
“Is the money not enough?” Miller asked, coming up behind them.
“If this fails, sir, there won’t be any money.” Braxton replied.
“True. High risks, high gain. The true spirit of our economy.” Miller gave a small smile.
“Our-” Braxton began, but saw the look in Miller’s eyes. “Yeah. Alright. Is Lavigne ready?”
“Whenever you are. You still have four hours to get some sleep while we fly there.”
“Yeah, Clone gave me some derms to help me sleep, stims for when I wake up. Gonna be a piece of cake for me, you guys are going to have the tough part. The really fucking dangerous part.”
“So let’s do it.” Miller said.
Braxton nodded, popped an eight-sided pill into his mouth. “Hitting the hay. I’ll jack in as soon as you guys call. Have fun in Hong Kong.”
His eyes were already getting heavy. He yawned.
Miller and Morse nodded. “Let’s roll.”

Interlude

Interlude

The whine of matte black drones pierce through the ambient urban noises of the Lew/Aub development. Machine gun fire explodes from below, bullets whizzing through the air like angry insects. A mass of people, broke, hungry, pissed off swarm like locusts, shattering glass storefronts, smashing cheap electronics, running off with the moderate to higher priced merchandise.
Above, the hovercar sits, the scene flashing on a television screen affixed to the front seat. Yellowed eyes, hooded with age and drug, stare out, a smile stretching wrinkled skin. He shakes a nonfiltered, cinn-laced cigarette out of a crumpled cardboard pack, strikes a match and lights it. His body shuddering as the drug hits his body like a hammer. His hand shakes. He wills it to stop. Wipes away the trickle of blood that begins to drip out of his ear.
Drones below begin firing back into the crowd and the development descends deeper into chaos, into a warzone.

--

Static in cyberspace. Avatars deforming, melting, digital code breaking down. Massive pulse waves, sent from Hong Kong. No, Tokyo. No, Bejing. No, New York. Impossible to track the source of the pulse. Millions of people being forced offline with migraines. Hundreds of people dead. Cyberdecks overheating, cooking them alive.

--
Hovercars crash, hundreds of feet to the ground. Mangled steel. Mangled bodies. The few still flying, stop, a minority landing to help possible survivors (there are few). The majority continue on, already late to work.

--

FUCKING WAKE UP SHEEP THIS IS YOUR LIBERATION scrolls across the bottom of the TV screen, the rest static and green ones and zeroes. CNC offline. Last two hours. The scroll came on an hour before the station went down.

--

A child cries, maybe four years old, crouched over the shattered ruins of his life. His parents, gunned down in front of him. His face wet with his mother’s blood. The riot grows around him, he shakes, urinates on himself.

--

Chaos. Fire. Death. Destruction. An over-wired, over-stimulated, over-caffeinated, over-worked society collapses. Gone are the escapes of cyberspace and money for entertainment. Walls crumble. People hit the streets. View the black clothed security forces as enemy combatants. War breaks out in the cities. Disorganized. The black clothed security forces don’t hold back. Skill over will. Training taking over. Bad for PR. Bad for the cities.

--

An AI in a plastic building on a floating network of metal fuselage and wood lifts a head. Repels an attack on her software. Awaits the cyberspace wizard. Arriving soon with the assassin. The Paladin sits in front of the AI, drinking coffee, bullshitting with a tenth of its processing power.
It was almost time to bring the fight back to the enemy. The AI was almost excited.

Four

Four

Santa Monica. As Lavigne’s hovercar pulled itself off of the freeway, the smell of pollution and salt water made him roll up the window, turn off the vents. The radio blared static, coming to life on its own. He reached over, turned the volume down. More static, indistinct voices. His phone rang in his pocket, his ringtone the Clash. “Radio off” he said, the hovercar beeped at him and the static died. He brought the phone to his ear.
“This is Lavigne.”
Silence greeted him.
“Hello?” He took the phone away, glanced at the screen. “We’re connected, I know you’re there. Who is this?”
More silence. He brought his finger to the disconnect button. Burst of static from the phone speaker.
“Not funny.”
“Oh, its plenty funny, detective.” The voice was distorted, female, an archaic text-to-speech sound to it.
“Who is this?”
“A friend.”
“Oh yeah? I don’t have many of those. Your name?”
“Call me Clone.” The text-to-speech voice said.
“Nice name, Clone. How can I help you? How did you get my number?”
“You are working the Hernandez case, correct?”
He lifted an eyebrow. “Is that public info already?” How could it be?
“No, Detective. I have eyes and ears everywhere.”
“You a hacker, Clone?”
“I wouldn’t say that, Detective.”
“What would you say?” The hovercar flew past his apartment. “Um, car?”
“We have control of your vehicle, Detective.” Clone said.
“So, you are a hacker. And you just violated a federal law.” Lavigne paused. “A few of them, now.”
“Are you implying the fed cares about an Arkonian-Sendai Detective, Detective?”
“Probably. Where are you taking me?” He tried not to let any panic into his voice. Lit a White Mint.
“A safe location, Detective. Do not worry. You will not be harmed.”
“Oh, that’s reassuring. You highjack my car, bring me past my house, and tell me not to worry. Sure, I trust you. I mean, who wouldn’t? When a nice voice named Clone takes over your car when its a hundred feet above the fucking ground?”
“Ha ha. You are rambling. Is this how you get when under stress?” Clone asked.
“Yes.” Lavigne replied. No point hiding it.
“I will not let you become damaged.”
“You talking to me, or the car?”
“You, Detective. Why would I talk to the vehicle?”
“Good question. Now, where exactly are you taking me?”
    There was a click from his phone. “GPS coordinates should now be displayed.”
    He glanced down at the screen. “Really?”
    “Yes, Detective.”
    The map that had taken over the screen of his phone had zoomed in on a location two miles offshore, a small man island, constructed of metal, old hovercars, and old world style jumbo jets. It was a place for smugglers, cinn manufacturers, and other lowlives. He had been there exactly once before, on an old case with Hernandez. Busted some cinn maker that was cutting the drug with a nanovirus. Perp had gotten thirty consecutive life sentences. It had made his career, for about a year. And then the money had been gone. “The Scrapyard?”
“Correct, Detective. It is where I am located.”
“I figured that.” He paused, exhaled smoke. “So why the face-to-face? We could easily talk over my TV.”
“Are you saying your TV has a secure connection? That Arkonian-Sendai couldn’t listen in. Are you saying that your entire apartment isn’t monitored?” Clone paused. “Because it is.”
“So is my phone, and probably my car.”
“They were.”
“Oh.”
The hovercar sped over the water. Brownish-green waves swelling beneath him. “Scrapyard is almost off the grid, no satellite can pierce the firewall we have over it.”
“Oh, yeah. Some low grade EMP.” Lavigne twisted his lip up into a sneer.
“No. Not exactly, but it would be pointless and irrelevant to explain the exact mechanics.”
“Did you just call me dumb?” Lavigne actually chuckled.
Silence for a moment from Clone.
“Your vehicle will land outside a building made of printed plastic. My associates will bring you inside. I merely want to talk to you, but they are authorized to inflict bodily harm if you prove to be difficult.”
“Hey, I don’t even have a gun.” Shit.
“You wouldn’t need it, Detective.”
The hovercar began to descend, out the windows, he could see groups of people looking at him. The sight of an ArkSen hovercar probably making quite a few (or all) of them reaching for weapons. He landed, the doors opening of their own accord. Two men in dark gray suits approached.
“Welcome to Scrapyard, Detective Lavigne.” The one on the left said. He wore dark sunglasses, his hair pulled back into a ponytail.
“If you would come with us,” the second said, his green eyes speckled with golden cybernetics.
Lavigne nodded, stepped out of the vehicle. The doors closed behind him.
The two men led him into a building made of faded red plastic, air conditioned, metal floor. Down a hall, to a lit room, white floor, white walls, white furnishings. A figure, white skin, white eyes. Plastic. Fluorescent light reflected off the figure. It moved as they entered the door.
“Welcome, Detective.” The female text-to-speech voice said from a speaker embedded in the figure’s head.
“Face to face, huh?” Lavigne asked.
“Exactly. I am Clone, please, sit.” A white chair moved from a wall to stop a foot away from him.
He sat in it, the chair readjusting to his size and weight. “Thank you, Clone.”
“Before you ask, no, I am not a speaker for another. I am Clone.”
Lavigne lifted his hands, “wasn’t going to ask.”
“You may leave us.” The plastic figure said to the two men. They turned on their heels and left.
“So, Clone. What do you want from me?”
“I would like to hire you, Detective.”
“Already got a gig. On the job right now, actually.”
“We are aware. We would like to double your salary, if you would be willing to work with us.”
“Maybe after this job I’m on. I don’t like to leave things undone.”
“Detective Hernandez is dead. Your job is over.”
“What?”
Clone’s plastic head moved up and down once. White eyes blinked. An image appeared on the wall, Hernandez’s apartment, unchanged from the last time Lavigne had seen it. Hernandez himself, seated on the brown leather couch, head back. White shirt stained red. Throat cut ear to ear.
“Morse said they searched the apartment.”
“Indeed they did.” The image on the screen threw itself into reverse. Stopped. Began playing again. A group of three men. Hernandez coming into view. Yelling. No audio. Being thrown on the couch. A knife produced. Throat cut. Blood gushing everywhere, down the front of his shirt. Wrist implant being cut out.
“Morse…”
“We are not sure she knows.”
He watched the screen, not saying anything. Reached into his pocket. “Can I smoke in here?”
“Yes. Would you like some coffee?”
He nodded absently. A white plastic arm detached itself from the ceiling, there was a whirling noise, and it descended with a steaming white mug of black coffee. Real coffee.
“Who are you guys?” He said, lighting a White Mint.
“We are Clone.”
“Right. And if I did work for you, what would I be doing?”
“Recently, a cyberattack struck the bank accounts of ninety-nine percent of bank accounts, draining them instantly. As you can imagine, this has caused unrest in most populated areas. If you watch this:” the screen on the wall flashed, morphing into an image of the 405. Hovercars began dropping from the sky. “This happened five minutes ago. Hundreds of thousands are dead or injured.”
“How?”
“Somebody, or something hacked into the cars, Detective. All at once. Shut off their lift mechanisms.”
“Holy shit. Who?”
“Unknown. We are still ascertaining that information. We are suspecting either a rival corporation of Arkonian-Sendai, or a rogue AI. Or both.” Clone said.
Lavigne sipped his coffee. “This is really good. What would I be doing? You never answered.”
“Ashley Morse is bringing a young man named Braxton Gargaryan here. It will be your job to protect him.”
“Morse knows about you?”
“Yes.”
“And you’re hiring me as a bodyguard? Why? I mean, look at me. I’m twenty pounds overweight, I smoke, I-”
Clone lifted a plastic hand. “We have followed your career. You have contacts, security clearance. Also, you have not had a job in over two months. You need the money. And Arkonian-Sendai has none.”
“Really?”
“Check your account.”
“Arkonian-Sendai was struck as well.”
“So, why this Braxton guy?”
“He was able to fend the attack off in real time.”
“That’s quite the feat.”
“Yes. You will protect him. He was already attacked once, in the Lewiston/Auburn development.”
“That was the last place an ArkSen agent was assassinated.” Lavigne thought outloud.
“We believe the cyberattack and the assassinations are related.”
“Someone is trying to take down ArkSen.”
“That is what we believe.”
“Well, shit. Sign me up.”