Pinnacle City
A science fiction
novel
†
By Gary L Morton
Fright Library,
Toronto
Copyright by Gary L Morton
The
Full Book is Below in HTML
Pinnacle City is a comedic sci-fi
novel. A private investigator is pulled from the violent streets to the
largest residential structure on Earth, Pinnacle City, populated by
eccentric, ultra-rich snobs and run by robots and a superintelligence.
He investigates bizarre murders of members of its board of directors
that threaten to destroy the city itself.
Chapter One: Thirteen Blocks
Sunny days of youth wind in the dusty ribbon of time. Few people notice when
the fog starts drifting in, and life becomes that last road to final
darkness. As clarity of mind fades, perhaps the numbness of approaching doom
is welcome. I’m often in the fog and the dark, and living in times when a
crowd of people, mostly powerful people, carry on in that crawling night in
an attempt to live forever. Others, the majority, struggle to survive for a
few lousy decades. For both groups, the glorious sunbeams of childhood are
faint and lost down distant memory roads, far removed from the greedy grave
life has become. The view, no matter how opulent, fades into the core of
current decay.
I considered that as I arrived at an alley mouth opening on a broad
courtyard, and even in the fog, it showed a long view. The blocks of marred
buildings settled like some big sunken ship with many masts in the night
ahead. Most of the lights were winking and secretly talking of the early
days, when this area was one of the first stretches of condominium heaven.
With the passage of time, the foundations succumbed to decay brought on by
human erosion and decades of semi-poverty. Graffiti on buildings was
originally made for people who hate it. Garden areas become weeds; parks now
trash dumps and squats. The many blast scars on what were once clean
facades. They shout everywhere nowadays, music and noise up on the rooftops
— sometimes rising to wailing and the screams of the dying. Mostly loud,
rude people. A noisy neighborhood, even in its death throes.
The heavy fog rolling in was unexpected … it arrived without prediction and
was a strange companion, both a friend and enemy. It created an atmosphere
of the supernatural: a heavy drift and some damaged towers might look young
again, then a gust would expose windows like rotten teeth. I feared ugly
things would come out of that weird fog ahead — a toothless vagabond, a
desperate robber, a drugged ghost … or maybe one of the strange vampires of
the day. One of the guys burned out on the illegal brain-feed stuff and not
remembering what the hunger was about, but remembering to be angry and
deadly. A pretty woman coming into view would probably mean a gang somewhere
in the shadows, and a bird whispering by could be a deadly drone.
The unsavory prospects gave me a reason to take up a corner and calculate; I
knew exactly where I wanted to go, so it was just a matter of imagining a
quick way through the possible hazards.
Like the fog, the current turf war in this area came by surprise. A couple
of weeks back, farther uptown, a couple of old organized-crime lizards
croaked, igniting a battle that drew in corrupt cops and caused a blockwide
melt of the security grid. My office was remapped to the edge of this new
crime hole, and upon returning from overseas, I found myself outside a
police perimeter. They wouldn’t let me in, though I’m supposed to be a sort
of cop myself. Mainly because in this world, the official cops and guys like
me are completely different breeds. I’m a private eye named Jack Michaels.
I trust cops maybe a little more than I do gangsters, and a few of those
guys trust me. You have to be selective. Some good cops give me leads, and
some gangsters leave me running my own game. Probably most of the gangsters
locked in the zone would be corpses already, as that’s usually the story
when bad guys get a chance for unrestricted and up-close fighting with
deadly weapons. Eventually, dust settles on the scorched bodies, and one
crime group gains control. Most old scores are settled. Even so, the whole
war deal would last a couple of long months.
I had no plans on being around in a kill zone, but I did need to pick up my
pet cat and vault the office tight. With the security grid down, it meant
worrying about scared shooters, maybe snipers, or baby-faced gangsters. Most
of the deadly toys ran on off-grid power, and it was down, so that meant no
drones or other stuff during the blackout. Anything operating in the air
inside the perimeter could be shot down by trackers above. Even helicopters
were now auto-routed around this small neighborhood.
There were still some lights winking out there in the fog, none of them
close and all of them small power sources. Anyone inside would use
generators, local solar, or anything the government couldn’t remotely shut
off. Having a strong light would also be dangerous, as it would attract
shooters. So if in the beginning there was heavenly light, down here at the
corrupt end of humankind, the devils killed anyone showing clear in the last
remnants of it. The light they were pushing for would best be described as
the fiery light of hell on earth.
Squatting in the piss-stinking darkness, I pressed my fingertips behind my
left wrist and took the tiny square that emerged in my hand and pulled it at
the two corners. An air-screen opened in front of me. Nothing showed but a
faint gossamer web. “This really is a journey to the Stone Age,” I thought,
because there were no wireless signals in the airwaves. The outside was
blocked, and the gangsters had already demolished the inside technical
equipment in earlier scraps. They’d even wrecked their own equipment.
Secure mode came on, and it took about thirty seconds before I found one
masked signal. It was my office signal, still broadcasting. It meant they
hadn’t hit it yet or they’d passed through it but missed the hidden
equipment. Thirteen blocks was the distance. I ran a map, calculating what I
thought would be the safest way through in the dark. I also had to be close
to initiate the vaulting procedure, so I punched in the initial 35-digit
password to seal the first part of my office tech zone. Down in a side room
labeled "sprinkler room 2" in the underground garage of the condominium
complex, impervious panels would click into place, sealing the equipment off
from everything from bomb blasts to fires. My condominium high above would
be a different tale; I could set up some defenses and booby traps, but if
they wanted in, they would get in. That was always the case. I didn’t figure
myself a kill target, but realistically speaking, anyone in this zone was an
indirect target just by being here.
A light jog took me across the courtyard, over the road, and two blocks up a
side street. I was entering another section of super-high complexes, several
lights appearing here and there in the fog blowing by them. Something was
happening at street level ahead as I saw shadowy figures running like ink in
the fog. I was right by a tower cornerstone and saw a beam burn running up
along the wall. It cut a swath through a small mural, ending at a blackened,
smashed window. This was a bad spot to be in, so I ran back and around
through a narrow park alley that stank of stale trash. A temporary dump; no
one was in it … at the end, I came up another side street. Fog blocked the
view ahead. A bright flash passed me. I could feel the heat from it as it
illumined the fog and the man it hit. He went up in vaporizing flames,
becoming a hellish smear in shades of red, forming like a big candle in the
mist. A group of men who had been with him were still running, and they
formed a clutch in the darkness at the corner as they glanced back, seeking
the enemy.
I was already down on my knees, and the heavy caliber bullets one man fired
ripped into stone a few yards from me and above me. A feeling of dread came
over me; moving my head slowly, I looked up and saw death. It was an Indy
drone, somehow still functioning in the grid outage. No kill signal shutting
it down, and I could see why. It was neighborhood manufacture, an ugly
thing, black as the night and about the size of a vulture. It had shark’s
teeth painted on it and a gangster coat of arms I couldn’t make out in the
blur.
More bullets flew, and it bobbed sideways to dodge them. I figured I’d
already be dead if not for the fact that the thing had all of its sensors
focused on the shooters. I could see it brightening, powering a beam blast
that shot across and hit the far corner as the men fled. Before it could
fire again or reorient itself, I drew my own hand weapon and targeted it,
sending up a blast of energy packets that hit the drone like a swarm of fast
fireflies. The effect was instant. It spun and bobbed, fired a random blast
across the street and through a window, then it turned and crashed into the
wall.
I was already running before the flaming debris could shower down on me,
hoping like hell that the light of the explosion wouldn’t open me to the
view of some shooter as I went across the road. I ran a few more blocks,
aware of nothing but the odors of the alleys. A bright star suddenly showed
above in a clearing patch of sky. It was at the opening of another courtyard
that the men came clear; a group of mercenaries huddled near a weedy garden
section by a metal-and-glass condominium facade. I gathered that the
gangsters had hit rock bottom in their internal war.
These X-zombies had no access to most parts of the city. They were
hopelessly addicted to counterfeit X-Intel drugs that destroyed the body
through long-term side effects. Even though they were toothless,
hollow-eyed, and sickly green, they still had the power of the speed
steroids they juiced themselves with to function. Add to that the kill boost
of their weapons. X-zombies were always armed to the teeth they didn’t have,
with illegal weapons and homemade bombs. Good killers too, as they’d
originally been clean gangsters. The X-Intel drugs were a decades-old thing,
now banned. Originally thought to be the perfect body and brain boost, it
was later found to have side effects. About fifteen years on them then
X-zombification would develop. This particular crew had the body rot, but
they weren’t brain dead; they could still get underground makes of the old
drugs to keep their minds humming with kill juices.
There were more lights here and deeper in by the borderline where my place
was located. I didn’t see any way of completely avoiding all of the zombie
gangs if they were about, but I had no plans on walking up to them for a
chat. They’d spot my healthy skin right off, and if they captured me, the
first thing they’d do would be to punch my teeth out. They did that to all
their victims. But that wouldn’t matter in this situation, as they’d kill me
anyway. I’d at least avoid troubling dental bills.
Fog and the deep night created a partial disguise; I pulled my jacket collar
up and my hat brim low as I let my shoulders slump X-zombie fashion and
moved on in the night. Most of the lights were high, and the buildings on
these particular blocks were fifty stories tall. I knew they’d be watching
from high above. It was doubtful that any street-level cameras remained, as
they either’d be off-grid or removed. Maybe a few planted eyes were out
there, but the enemy was on the ground, their controllers above. It was a
shit situation where crime leaders had lost most of their best hit men and
were hiding in the sky while sick mercenaries fought out their final
battles. And Geeze, they could pull in a big supply of this scum from other
places they’d turned into hellholes. It would go on for a while. I pitied
anyone innocent and locked inside the perimeter here.
But what the fuck, I was innocent myself, but not for long. I knew there was
some killing ahead, and I prepared for it as I shuffled past an outdoor
sculpture that loomed over me like an evil beast. Eyes were on me, and I saw
the men in a blasted storefront across the way. They weren’t raising any
weapons, so my disguise was working. They likely thought I was one of them
on patrol.
Another block and I was sure I was being followed. “Looks like the
reprobates put a tail on me,” I thought. So maybe I hadn’t fooled them after
all. Steps ascending to a bank building floated with the fog. Up at the top
of them, I could see back down the road and spotted someone picking through
some abandoned cars. I had the feeling of a person hallucinating or, more
than that, conjuring up something impossible from a real situation. The man
I’d just spotted disappearing in a blow of the fog was too big and too green
of complexion to be one of the subhuman mercenaries. Some of them were
strong and ropy, but they didn’t retain a strong build.
Suddenly, the man appeared again, big as life. No hallucination for sure,
and closing in. About four inches short of seven feet tall, he was
square-shouldered with a face like the ancient Frankenstein monster. The gun
he was toting was also big. Rather than question my vision, I hurried down
the steps and began to jog into the darkness, certain I could hear the heavy
footfalls of the pursuer behind me.
I came to an intersection; my home complex was half a block farther on.
Things didn’t look good close to home either. The whole street was a mess. A
scorched fire engine was in the middle of the intersection with the remains
of a police cruiser embedded in its side. There were overturned cars,
smashed storefronts. A lot of other telltale destruction, debris, and burn
trails of a major battle. Foul odors came with the fog here … the fragrance
of corpses beginning to rot. I almost fell over one in passing. A woman, and
she was horribly dead, rat-chewed and burned. I barely had time for a
horrified glance before my tail came around the corner. For sure, he wasn’t
dead, though he looked it. I saw his feet as he stomped over a wreck; the
guy wore size giant military boots. They were the super pricey kind that
special ops soldiers favor. Nobody of that description would work for
gangsters in a sleazy turf war, so why the guy was here and following me, I
didn’t know. Didn’t want to find out either.
I was finally home, but not in any safe way. The complex loomed large as a
floating blur behind a patchwork of fog. There were some lights farther up,
as well as on the ground in the lobby. The main entrance was low-level
security, and the lights meant someone was there. Most likely more sleazy
mercenaries. That would mean a careful study before entry, but with a fun
giant right on my tail, I couldn’t do that. I couldn’t keep running onward
either, so I put my hand inside my suit to have it on my second gun and ran
right into the entrance.
Getting through the entry door and dialing security wasn’t a problem because
the impervious Plexi doors were gone, and I ran right inside. Halting in the
lobby, I found myself in a face-off with five men. Two of them were at the
concierge desk, and in the flickering lobby light, looked more than
revolting. Toothless bastards again, but these guys wore clean suits. The
fifth man was actually a woman, lolling on a visitor’s couch. Her face
wasn’t quite as sunken as the others were, and she did have teeth because
she sat up and snarled when she saw me.
I remained still, and they didn’t draw.
The boss gunman at the desk spoke. “Who the hell are you?”
“I live here. Just got back.”
“Well, guess what. The residents' list has changed.”
I saw the others slowly going for their weapons. Rather than a quick kill,
they would want to rob me and play with me. They didn’t get that chance
because before I could speak, the pursuing giant thundered in the
door-opening behind me and halted in the odd glare of lights. He was sickly
green and ugly like them, but in a different way, and that meant chaos.
Everyone went for a fast draw and a kill shot on him. But I didn’t. I held
onto my main weapon as I dived across the hard tiles and rolled behind a
support pillar.
A couple of the X-zombies won the draw, and via a glance, I saw the big guy
swinging up his gun as a heat beam scorched his shoulder and a few bullets
bounced off his chest. After that, it was over quickly. The big guy's gun
kicked like a shotgun and fired rapidly, first taking the newly minted
concierge on a journey to his new life as bleeding hamburger on trashed wall
art. The others met a similar fate; the last hit was the woman, and the
blast sent her up in an arc and through one of the only windowpanes that
hadn’t been broken already.
I saw her body thump to the interlocking stones in the side courtyard as I
slid around to the elevators and hit the button. I heard the heavy boots of
the giant thundering toward me, but I closed the door before he could block
it with his big left foot. The elevator began to move, and I was down as I
was afraid a blast would come right through the door. None did. Instead, I
heard a fist banging on it and a deep voice saying, “Jack Michaels, I need
to talk to you.”
I got to my feet. “No thanks,” I muttered as the elevator whooshed upward.
It rose toward my floor, but stopped one floor down, and I was down low
again with a weapon out. The door opened. Two X-zombies in clean tan suits
were about to get in. I fired a wide beam that punched them back and set
them on fire. They collapsed in a blaze, and I ducked out and looked around.
No one else was present, so I moved for the stairwell. I saw a couple of
broken doors and figured these chaps used brute force for a master key. They
were busting into the units one by one.
A quick swing up the staircase, and I came out on my floor. This was higher
up, and half of it was my unit. My neighbor’s entrance was clear, and I came
around the hall corner to find my own place still locked up. They hadn’t got
to it yet. The door opened at my handprint, and I went in and found my cat
waiting for me, standing on a chair and meowing. Heading straight for the
den and my desk, I hit the panel-open button in passing and began
preparations to leave. The full vaulting procedure had to be done manually,
and when I was finished, I stepped out and grabbed the small cat. I had a
special armored carrier for it, and I pulled that out of a closet, then went
into a small side room that contained nothing but a chair, table, and some
surveillance monitors mounted like paintings on the wall. On one screen, I
got a view deep underground, at the panels sealing my key home office
equipment. When finished, the rooms marked "sprinkler" and "locker room 4,"
which contained nearly all of my high-tech stuff, were sealed off behind
impervious panels. Those small rooms could no longer be detected and could
be accessed only one way, via my expandable M-Ray V tablet, which I had in
my pocket.
I had hidden cameras on the building front and back and the lobby, so I did
a check. The giant was still down there. As I watched, more X-zombies
stepped off an elevator and were blasted. Then the giant stepped out front
and paced back and forth, studying a small screen he pulled from his pocket.
This guy was tracking me somehow. He knew my name and wanted to talk to me.
But who in the hell was he? He looked downright scary and spooky, loitering
in the fog and the dark. It didn’t look like I’d be able to get away without
being pursued by him, so if I had to meet up with him, I’d set it on my own
terms. “Sure, there are all sorts of freaky types in this world,” I
muttered. “But there aren’t any guys that look like him.” What made it even
worse was that I’d seen bullets and a heat beam bounce off him.
I sealed the den and surveillance room of my condominium. The rest was left
open, as there was no lockdown for it. It didn’t really matter to me; I
could deal with it on my return. A short few minutes later, after descending
via the stairwell, I’d followed an underground level to a hidden service
exit by a nearby parkette. I knew the giant was already on my trail, somehow
tracking my movements, so I sat on a bench with the cat and both weapons at
ready in full power mode.
It only took a minute; the fog was clearing like a curtain opening on a new
act and I could see the guy coming up the street from far off. There didn’t
seem to be anyone around to challenge him now. He owned the street. He had
good eyes, too, because he spotted me right away without a tracker and
strolled toward the park. His gun was over his back and he didn’t appear to
be in a shooting mood, so I waited for him to get a bit closer, then spoke.
“You said you wanted to talk to me.”
The big guy didn’t come too close, like he was aware of his imposing
stature. “That’s right, about a job.”
“Huh, an agent like you should be able to handle any job. Who are you?”
He squatted and spoke. My cat, Tigger, meowed in his carrier. “Can’t say
right off.”
“Okay, let me guess. First, you’re wearing a complete disguise, except maybe
for the shoes. No X-zombie looks as healthy and large as you do. You also
have huge teeth. The boots you’re wearing are a thicker-soled designer copy
of special ops military boots, and they're extremely expensive. Custom-made.
I’ve never seen that before. Your accent is almost local. It is Toronto, but
slightly off. As for your face, that’s a mask. So the assessment is that
you’re not a military person, a gangster, or a hitman. You come from this
region, but I'm not exactly sure where, because you talk funny. There’s only
one place near here I’ve never been, and that is Pinnacle City.”
Reaching up, the giant ripped off his mask. It didn’t make much difference.
He was white, not greenish, with a face like a flat wall – forehead, nose,
and chin. His hair was a heap of red clumps.
“Man, am I glad to get this off. My boss wants to talk to you. They had info
that you were in this neighborhood and the X creeps were in here, so they
did this poor disguise to send me in.”
“How many of those guys did you kill?”
“A lot of them. It’s hard to keep low and be this big.”
“Yeah. Kinda like the bull trying to hide in a toy shop. Your rump is too
big to hide.”
“Okay. My name is Thor Carlsonbonner. I run security at Pinnacle City in the
Sky, but I don’t do the hiring. My boss wants to meet with you. It’s about a
detection job, and that’s what you do, right?”
“I do. But Pinnacle City is a closed community, a world of its own. I can’t
even get in there, and I have no reason to break in. According to the news,
it is supposed to be a crime-free community. So who is it that you haven’t
collared already?”
“That is confidential. Everything is confidential. All I’m supposed to do is
give you this card. It has contact information. They’ll arrange for you to
get in for the meeting. One tip – if you do get in, you won’t get out until
the case is over.”
I took the card the giant offered and glanced at it. “Tell them my cat will
be coming too.”
“No problem, Mr. Michaels. Pinnacle City, as you should know, has
everything, including the world’s most luxurious pet hotels.”
+++
The sun floated mid sky, casting a carpet of gold out on the water as if it
believed the world was an easy place and trouble-free. Sailboats and yachts
drifted to no place important, and I felt about the same. Once again, I’d
returned home to find the old neighborhood a mess, a real screw-up. But I
never really work in any home neighborhood much. A local office and condo I
always keep for nostalgia and because I need a ground-zero point and home.
My real office exists in my pocket, with a screen embedded in the back of my
wrist as the M-Ray V tablet and accessory, so it is usable whether I’m at
home or not. This time, it looked like I wouldn’t be home for a while. But
I’d be back. The authorities always raid devastated areas like the cavalry.
Usually, when nearly everyone is dead or robbed and tortured. In the end,
the days of renewal arrive.
I had a couple of small job offers or cases to work on … but only the new
one promised to keep me busy for the necessary time. Thor Carlsonbonner was
a strange character indeed, but by his very nature, I knew any case he
wanted me in on was sure to be more than interesting. It would be something
that required more than muscle, too, because he had plenty of muscle. His
place would have all the latest equipment, better than what the local police
would have, so the only thing he could really be wanting was detective
smarts. His boss would have a case they hadn’t been able to solve. In some
ways, that was nearly always the case when it came to a real job.
I looked at Tigger as he rolled and pawed in my lap, then I put him back in
his carrier. This remote area of the park, along with the sun, was making me
drowsy, and I’d chosen it for a reason. Not just because I had nowhere to
go, but also because I like to sit and think over possibilities before I
take a case. Nodding with my hat brim to my eyes, I first looked at the flow
of plastic stone that was the bench I was on … it flowed down, creating many
more seats below. The location gave a partial view of the lake and something
else I was interested in. The something else was Pinnacle City. From the
bench, I could see its southern edge expanding out to its harbor side, and
that was only a small part of the structure. The base in total was huge,
like the whole main tower was huge. Several structures have been titled the
largest in the world, and nowadays they are so large that it would be nearly
impossible to determine a winner. Pinnacle City in the Sky, like the others,
was more like a complete habitat, though only Pinnacle City was considered
fully exclusive. Unless you were somehow connected to the in-crowd that
resided there, you simply had no way in. It was exclusivity stretched right
up to the sky, and the higher you went, the more snobby it got. Down there
by the harbor would be the only low-security access, and even that would be
tight on entry.
Studying its rise into the sky, I could only speculate about the various
communities it contained. The city base was surrounded by a security inlet
that ran in from the harbor and showed alterations in its coloring and
architecture. It was like the petals of a flower and its nest of leaves
below the monster central tower. The place had hundreds of elevators and
flight car shafts up. I could see some of the exterior lifts, though they
were mostly shielded by smaller surrounding towers. Some residential floors
in the main tower could be identified, but other levels revealed only
crystal shimmers and odd corrugation along the edge walls. I knew there were
full bodies of water and parks at some levels. Most of it existed inside
interior shells, so that you could be inside a whole world of fin-like
balconies and gardens that couldn’t be seen from the outside. Apparently,
the false sky in some areas was amazing.
In memory, I conjured up some of the legendary news and buzz that still
floated in the common mind from thirty-five years back when it first opened.
Any newer buzz was a current of complete rumor as Pinnacle City was now
sealed off from the surrounding city. It was a city-state of its own, and
almost no genuine news was released from it anymore. The big smoke was
self-supporting and self-governing. Numerous internal power sources, along
with thermal energy drawn from the earth, the sun's rays, and the wind it
harnessed, enabled energy self-sufficiency. The base made me wonder what
might be under it – would it be heaven or hell, or just a gigantic bio-robot
complex and sewer?
One thing that had definitely changed was the top floor of the central tower
or pinnacle itself. The building had been there for all those years, visible
in the distance from my home neighborhood. Now I realized I’d gone about my
business without noticing how it had evolved from clean, curved sweeps in
the sky to something rougher on the edges and more organic. A force field or
bubble of some kind glowed in the sun up over the top now. Thinking back, I
tried to pinpoint when the change had taken place. I couldn’t remember. Over
time, Pinnacle City had simply become a piece of the landscape, a change way
up there being to me like a distant mountain gaining a bigger snowcap. It
was something natural that had just happened without calling for a second
look. The truth was that it couldn’t be very natural. I remembered something
about a super AI mind that ran the complex, one that itself evolved.
Pulling my hat away from my eyes, I sat up and took a long look at what I
could see of the top floor. Suspicion began to govern my thoughts.
Considering the power of that beast of a building, the top floor would be a
world of its own, and that world had changed recently to something new. I
began to suspect Thor Carlsonbonner of being a faker, talking to me casually
as though something manageable needed investigation, when it was something
wicked and perverse.
Pulling the card out of my pocket, I looked it over, then did the finger
magic that put my M-Ray V accessory screen in front of me. I did not intend
to contact the lawyer named on the card. Not when I could do some background
and find out who Carlsonbonner’s employer was … because that would be who
sent him.
It only took a minute; the supposed top-secret info spat out on the screen
molecules. Stone R. Sangalang, President of the Pinnacle Public Board, was
the person employing Thor Carlsonbonner as Security Manager. Mr. Sangalang
had tight cybersecurity to say the least, but one door had been left open. I
could route through to him via an old-fashioned emergency voice call. At
that, I grinned. An old trick, and I’ve used it so many times. In security
setups, they often forget that old voice-only calls remain possible on the
emergency frequency if the big systems go down. They can even go through
direct, though no one other than maybe the odd detective or cop even
remembers they are there. Since they aren’t considered in the secure setup,
they aren’t blocked. There would probably be no reason for a block either,
because no one would try to get through with a voice-only sales pitch or
robocall. It simply isn’t done that way anymore. No voice-only culture
exists. It’s a dead language I sometimes use.
Stone R. Sangalang got my priority-one voice call. There was nothing on any
screen to show his surprise when he answered and got an all-line blank
except for voice.
“Mr. Stone Sangalang. Detective Jack Michael’s calling. It’s about Thor
Carlsonbonner and the security case he mentioned.”
“Where are you calling from? I can’t see anything. There’s no security read.
You’re coming through on the emergency alert speaker. If this is some kind
of hoax, you are going to be very sorry.”
“Like I said. It’s Jack Michaels, regarding the case you have.”
Stone was obviously upset, not only because he was a big wheel, but because
everyone expected to see the security read on a call. “You’re not Jack
Michaels. I know when an impostor calls. Jack Michaels was never given my
name. I told Thor to give the lawyer’s card for the briefing.”
“So I figured out you’re his boss and called directly. I’m a detective,
remember?”
Stone huffed angrily. “But this isn’t a read line. I can’t ID you.
Everything here at Pinnacle City is top secret. We pride ourselves on
privacy and security for our residents.”
“Look, Mr. Sangalang. No one is listening in … no one knows you contacted
me, unless Thor Carlsonbonner can’t be trusted.”
“His credentials are impeccable. Perhaps no one is listening, but things
just aren’t done that way here. That’s why you have to go through the legal
briefing and sign the documents if you are to work for us.”
“Really. How many documents?”
“I don’t know. Five hundred pages or so.”
“In that case, I’ll skip out on the job. I don’t work on that basis. We make
a gentleman’s agreement. I will go by it. I always have. Check my
references.”
“I already checked them. We do need you, but we need legal protection for
our residents in case you break any rules. The documents are really only to
ensure you obey our Board rules and one other key thing.”
“What’s that?”
“Under no circumstances are you to identify yourself as a resident here.
We’ll decide on what you are to say. Perhaps someone assisting concierges,
or maybe security personnel, or maintenance.”
“Why, this news saddens me. You mean I don’t meet Pinnacle City's minimum
standards?”
His voice suddenly oozed with oily condescension. “You certainly don’t. I
won’t even mention the neighborhood your office is in or some of the
associates that come up on our background checks.”
“Why any interest in me? You can hire the best of everything.”
“Well. Two reasons. You did pass a confidentiality check, and you handle
weird cases nobody else wants to get involved in. We did look at many other
prospects. Unlike you, they are nearly all straight shooters, but to be
clear, there are simply too many hostile parties that want a way to get a
look around in here. We have to be sure our man is working exclusively for
us and that he isn’t trying to get in himself. We were certainly surprised
when you came out as top man in that area.”
“Exclusivity and privacy appear to be the buzz words there. And you’re
right. I don’t talk, or work as a double agent. Pinnacle City is not really
ME, if you know what I mean. So I wouldn’t plan on identifying myself as a
resident.”
“Now that is what we want. A core problem with other prospects we looked at
is that they all have a strong desire to get into Pinnacle City. This is a
big place; we do not want anyone who might try to hide and live in secret
inside the complex.”
“I have no interest in doing that. You can count on it. But if I have to go
undercover for a time, you’ll have to authorize it. Any papers I sign have
to be honed down to a simple statement of rules I abide by and employment
conditions. I won’t sign any fine print or legalese.”
“Okay. We can do that. It might be better that way.”
“I’ll meet with you, but there is no guarantee I’ll take the case. One
thing, though. If you are so deeply worried about Pinnacle City security,
why not meet me outside to discuss it? Before I even get in?”
“Out of the question. Except for the Traveler members or those with
temporary travel visas, most of us rarely leave Pinnacle City. This is our
world, our planet. We certainly would never go into the local neighborhoods
beyond the security moat or even think of associating with the sort of
riff-raff that lives there. My men can’t provide me with security out there.
I could be taken hostage.”
“Yeah. I saw Thor’s disguise, so I got an idea of how much you people know
about the rest of the city.”
“Okay. Wait for Thor’s call. We’ll get you in here for a briefing. You’ll
have to meet our lawyer as well. I think this case will interest you. It is
real detective work. Our local security simply can’t do the thinking when it
comes to matters outside of our Pinnacle City rule book.”
“Okay. Say I take the case. Resident or not, I won’t stay there in a closet.
I want reasonable quarters and for two.”
“No, no, no. Two is out of the question.”
“The other is a pet cat. Thor Carlsonbonner may have mentioned the bit of
disaster occurring in my home neighborhood. I had to remove the pet from
there.”
“A cat. Okay … but keep in mind that Pinnacle City, at its various levels
and habitats, has strict rules for the behavior of pets. Make sure you list
it as pure-bred genetic class on the forms, or it won’t get in.”
Hanging up on the call, I thought I saw a glimmer far off on the big top
floor of Pinnacle City, as if the place had winked at me. If it took star
power to get in there, I must have somehow picked it up. Mr. Stone R.
Sangalang, on first impression, came across as a dumb snob, though he had to
be far brighter or he wouldn’t be where he was. Part of the job, if I took
it, would be making sure I got out of there in the end. Sangalang thought
everyone was trying to get in. His snobbery and worship of secrets and
everything exclusive meant he couldn’t be trusted … at least not when
whatever job he had was done, and he no longer needed me. If I learned too
much, he wouldn’t want me to get out.
+++
The yacht cruised into the harbor. Above, early afternoon sunlight glossed
the side of the mountainous structure. My guess that the harbor was the
security weak spot was correct, but only for certain entry points. Even
here, entry security was stiff, and I looked around the deck behind me at
Thor’s security men, all of them dressed like summer leisure guys cruising
the waters for entertainment. None of them even had a weapon showing.
What these people showed was a severe phobia of outsiders. All it took was
the inner city accent in my greeting, and people shook hands with me from a
near leap away. What angered me most was that I suspected it to be snobbery,
but wasn’t certain of it.
The security detail didn’t want to come near me. Some of them were standing
far behind me, others up behind the broad windows, leaving me out on the
prow in the glitter of waves, quietly practicing some vocabulary. Stone
Sangalang’s demand that I not masquerade as a resident now seemed
ridiculous. In a couple more minutes, the Pinnacle City accent would be
glued to my tongue, and I would use it everywhere if I wanted to work a case
without people running from me.
Wrapping some phrases around my tongue, I looked up slowly at the long rise
of the inner curve. I didn’t look long before vertigo hit me, and the
phrases turned to cursing. I’m afraid of heights, yet I have often been in
precarious situations at great heights. Call me a man who thrives on fear.
Pinnacle City is something different. I’ve looked up mountainsides before
and got a sort of feeling of awe, but no vertigo. Pinnacle City has a
frightening aspect in the long curve of its base and the scary rise of its
central tower to the clouds. I could see the sheer complexity; the sides
were veined with elevator and air-ride shafts and all kinds of glittering
stars here and there as it rose. Then I saw something else as all of those
dazzles came together in the face of a beautiful woman. Her eyes were
emerald gems, and her ghostly hair spangled with light. Her face wore a
deep, sad look, as if she were mourning. The sudden vision left me so dizzy
I nearly stumbled back. Not just because I was seeing a ghost somehow, but
another thing that spooked me was that Pinnacle City didn’t seem possible.
Looking up at it was very much like studying some strange Tower of Babble
that appeared to lack support, as if its eventual collapse and fall were
inevitable.
Perhaps a moral fall would be inevitable. I thought about that as the boat
passed under an arch and inside the base where the harbor docks were … but
the structural fall … it supposedly wasn’t possible. According to all
reports, this monstrosity was about as near to invincible as a building
could get. Hurricanes, floods, it would withstand just about anything.
A glance at the cat in his carrier, and I noticed he was sniffing the air as
though he could smell a host of things I couldn’t. Then the boat came
through the arch, and we were inside the base of Pinnacle City and soon
taking a narrow canal around to a luxurious dock. Here, the canopy above was
protective and nearly transparent; the sunlight filtered through the big
panels and spread, making it feel like a summer day below.
The area was impressive, with a blond sand beach off to my left and a small
crowd mingling. The eye candy was plenty of women; their bikinis, other
outfits, and perfect tans. Thor Carlsonbonner was there waiting on the dock,
and he wasn’t in casual clothes; he was wearing his full security outfit and
seemed out of place. I stepped on shore, and the undercover police boat
drifted off slowly. I saw the others who had ignored me coming out on deck
now that I was gone, and found it annoying. Being treated like the unwashed
is something no one gets used to.
Carlsonbonner wielded tremendous authority at the dock and probably
throughout the place. Heads turned everywhere as I walked across the court
with him, like I’d gone from a pariah to an unknown VIP in an instant.
Everyone, especially women, seemed interested in my identity, but none of
them got to greet me. Thor made sure of that. He did say some hellos but
generally brushed people aside and led me through the entranceway into the
interior. It was all automatic security, a heavy vault door opening as Thor
stepped up to it. Then it was down a narrow archway into a magnificent
lobby. The ceiling was vaulted and gilded, and what appeared to be a
labyrinthine, dark stone palace lay ahead. It could be called the most
impressive residential entrance I have ever viewed, and I have seen many. I
can say it probably prepped me for what was to come … and I made a quick
note to keep my eyes on all things important to a detective. Getting lost
like a tourist in awesome architecture simply wouldn’t do.
Stone R-for-Ray Sangalang’s office came with a view of the harbor, and the
first thing I realized was that he was a liar. He wouldn’t have an office
here if he didn’t travel outside of Pinnacle City, though he might have told
the truth about not doing any local travel in the city. He likely flew out
of the harbor on his business trips and spent his leisure time on his own
boat. Small lies weren’t what I was interested in, but rather feeling him
out for the big ones.
Sangalang, as I expected, was an elder. Meaning neatly trimmed grey hair for
status, but still young enough to look fine in a white suit. All of the
youth treatments had worked well on him; I guessed his age at about 100 or
more than double mine. He had the commanding air of a Board president, but
lacked discretion in his facial expressions. Especially his sharp blue eyes;
I say that because he hadn’t greeted me yet, and he was appraising me like I
was a diamond or something else of yet undermined value. His opening smile
was a flatterer’s smile, and he approached me directly and shook hands
vigorously. Rather than take me back to a chair at his desk, he led me over
to a lounge area.
Thor remained, and we sat down. There was a fourth person present, a glum
character with a skeptical slant to his mouth and wandering eyes. Kind of
like some detectives I know. If my suit had a hidden designer tag, he would
have noticed. My cat didn’t like him because he hissed at him when I set the
carrier close to him. Turned out he was the lawyer and his name was Sri
Lampin Charles.
Sangalang had a nose that could cut through fog and a beat-around-the-bushes
voice and style. “Well, well. Jack Michaels,” he said. “Don’t let that sad
chap over there get to you. He’s our lawyer, Mr. Charles. We pay him to be
like that.”
Mr. Charles nodded. I noticed he already had the signature plaque out of his
briefcase. No doubt he thought no one would turn down a Pinnacle City
contract. But I would if there was nothing in it for me. I shook his dead
hand and took a quick assessment of him. That being a corrupt attorney who
took no pleasure in the job or life, for that matter. He got into Pinnacle
City somehow, so a graveyard of bodies existed somewhere. Maybe it was his
hometown, and he’d been the legal undertaker.
Stone Sangalang was far more interesting. Filled with a zest for life, a
person his age shouldn’t have. Like he’d died once and was happy to be back
and in his second childhood. All elders are sort of like vampires that
should be dead, at least in my humble opinion. The few I met during past
cases were simply sober and businesslike. They were not like Stone
Sangalang. They lived on because of the positions of power they would never
surrender. Mr. Sangalang carried more physical power than they did, too. He
was built strong, and I saw ropy muscle running from his wrists, like he
bent steel bars or something for a hobby.
Some small talk about the place, then we got on to the problem. Neither Thor
nor Sangalang had shown any sign of recognizing my affected Pinnacle City
accent.
“We’re not exactly sure what the problem is,” Stone said, unconvincingly.
I cleared my throat, hoping things would get better than this.
Thor spoke up. “It’s not that we don’t know what it is, but why it is or
what could be done about it.”
I’d had about enough floundering about. “Let’s hit the basics. If a crime
has been committed, exactly what is that crime?”
“The crimes are murder and vandalism that goes with it,” Thor said.
“But we can’t identify the methods or reasons exactly,” Sangalang added.
“Who died and how?”
“Several members of the Board have been done in. That’s assuming it wasn’t
suicide.”
Thor made a broad swing of his right hand. “Let me explain. Each person
perished differently. All of them bizarre to say the least.”
“Okay. How big is the Board?”
“Big,” Sangalang said, as if it were a silly question. “Nearly three hundred
members. It is really the building’s parliament. The Board took over
completely fifteen years ago, disempowering the property management
corporation.”
“Well,” I said speculatively. “I guess that gives us hundreds of suspects.”
“Even more than that,” Thor replied. “The property management corporation
still exists as the Pinnacle Group. It is a rather odd setup here. They do
control maintenance and many other things. They are sort of what, on the
outside, you would call organized crime.”
“Organized crime. You mean they are a union of sorts that extorts criminal
fees.”
Thor tightened his lips. “That’s more like what the Board is.” He noticed
Sangalang glaring at him and continued, “The Pinnacle Group does fix some
prices, but also runs most underground criminal activity in the building.”
“Ah,” I said. “It would be natural, wouldn’t it? They have access and
control. No one else would be able to do it except for ...”
Thor cut me off before I finished. “My security staff is clean. They are not
involved with Sam McGettigan or any other union gangsters.”
“Is this McGettigan character a suspect?”
Stone answered. “Well, yes and no. He is elected president of the Pinnacle
Group, but this whole thing looks beyond his humble capabilities and
especially beyond his imagination.”
And so it went, back and forth and sideways through the longest case
briefing ever. Even now, I can’t believe that at the end of it, I conferred
with Sri Lampin Charles and put my signature on that plaque writer. I don’t
think he quite believed it either because he was sort of staring right
through me at something else when I signed.
Stone assigned me a guest suite on the eighth floor of Pinnacle Tower, which
is so big it is more like a mountain rising than a tower. The exterior door
had a mahogany-red hue and looked about as solid as a bank vault door. I
walked in, put the cat’s carrier down, and let him out before really looking
around. When I did, I found myself in a guest suite for a king. At the
fireplace, the rustic-stone mantle swept up thirteen feet over the hardwood
backing to the ceiling. It was in summer mode, cooling and releasing a
sustained breeze of filtered air. The rest of the place was furnished in
Pinnacle condominium style; all clean lines, expensive woods, glasses and,
metals, and new art. The living room had wraparound windows, and a boat
deck–style balcony was off the bedroom. Just the den alone was bigger than
my old office. It was a place I could live with, and I started doing just
that by mixing a drink at the bar and taking an easy chair out on the
balcony. Tigger ran to and fro there, then back inside, while I typed some
notes about the case and saved them in my portable office.
Basically, the case and the entire building were hinky. Something read as
weird about all of it. Stone and Thor were really talking about a crime
wave. Members of the Board were being killed off, but there were others,
too. The locations were throughout the building, and the methods were varied
and often inexplicable. They’d gone through a pack of stills on the corpses,
showing an assortment of crime scenes. One man had suddenly gained a hundred
pounds and died. A guy on the fiftieth floor had developed advanced cancer
of the eyes that killed him in less than twelve hours. A female Board member
was poisoned by her own hair, which had become toxic. There were others who
went psycho and killed themselves via drowning, falling from heights, and
self-mutilation. The very last victim starved to death when his metabolism
suddenly accelerated. In a couple of cases, all they found were the
skeletons and no cause of death. If there were nearby suspects, they were
always ruled out as being unable to have committed such a crime. There
really was no absolute proof of murder, just an assumption, as the victims
appeared targeted due to membership on the Board or connections to it. Some
of the crimes, if not all, were too odd to have happened by accident, so it
was assumed a mastermind was involved.
Sipping my drink, I thought it over casually. Without looking at any list of
residents, I knew this building would be a showcase of brilliant minds.
People weren’t in here simply because they had money. Sure, there would be
airhead celebrities, but many people tops in various industries, fields, and
technologies would be in residence. Somehow, one of them or a group of them
was doing this … for reasons unknown. The strange events could not be ruled
out as a wave of bizarre accidents, though the Board probably would do so if
it weren’t Board members being killed. Whoever was behind it had to be about
as dangerous as dangerous gets. Was there a motive, or was it someone who
simply stalked and killed for sport? Who would that be, when only a super AI
mind or an alien being would be that smart? I knew crime-free Pinnacle City
wasn’t outfitted with top-dollar forensic equipment, so a killer wouldn’t
exactly have to be a genius to outsmart Thor Carlsonbonner’s crew of
concierge cops. If anything, this killer used overkill in covering his
crimes.
As the booze eased my mind, I began to wonder why I took such a case. No one
else would take it other than riff-raff trying to escape into Pinnacle City.
Thor Carlsonbonner and his gangs of security suits didn’t know what to do
with it. Off the balcony, I could see through a gap and over the moat to the
city; the place no one at Pinnacle City wanted to visit. Many dangerous
characters existed there; those sorts of people always seem invincible, but
when tracked close up, look human. At Pinnacle City, the culprit or culprits
behind this stuff had to be smart but not invincible. Great lengths had been
gone to for the purpose of remaining hidden and invisible. Whoever, whatever
it was, was vulnerable.
In the initial design, Pinnacle City’s shape came out as a huge hourglass
with the top somewhat smaller than the base. Over the years, the base towers
mushroomed and the narrow part of the central tower thickened as the complex
became even bigger. The glittering monstrosity became an expanding city,
with most of it contained within one gargantuan central tower. Common design
elements developed some diversity and became cultural, and a distinct accent
developed. One thing every central tower floor had from bottom to top was
the core; the big cylinder that doubled as a main support and maintenance
conduit, piping everything vital up the structure. I figured it to be life
support, so it came as no real surprise to me when I found that Thor
Carlsonbonner’s fourth-floor security office circled the core and had taps
into it.
Down on the mushrooming base, the fourth floor was so big I rode in on a
horizontal elevator tube with Thor and got out with him at the entry arch.
He had other secure private entrances, but wanted to show me the rainbow
entry arch. It scanned you as you walked along it, but there were also
guards and a checkpoint in the lobby. He took me for a brief tour, showing
me everything from banks of camera displays to models of the androids that
worked the higher floors. Thor’s personal army was outfitted mostly in
semi-formal blue suits with security tags and the security design. He had an
outpost of them and some equipment on nearly every floor of the building.
We passed the two burly men who guarded his office door. Inside, I looked
around as the banks of display screens lit up. At his desk, he faced a main
screen high on the far wall. That I knew was his current caller screen,
meaning if anyone called, they’d show on it, and other screens would pick up
any relevant camera surveillance. He had a smaller desk and device setup,
too, but I could see he didn’t favor being hooked in. Sitting at his desk,
he checked to see how many calls were in his queue, but he didn’t answer
any. Instead, he faced me and folded his hands.
“I saw that open armory running off the personnel entry there. For a place
that advertises itself as crime-free, you sure have powerful weapons.”
“Oh yes, I’ve got all the latest toys and a big staff of guards and
concierges trained to use them. As you notice, they don’t display any
weapons. I only allow under-the-jacket stuff. Most guards are unarmed. The
droids you don’t see much down here. I don’t personally like them. Use them
on order. Mostly higher floors, and they stay there.”
“I don’t like them either; they can’t solve crimes. I see them as more of a
deterrent.”
“They spook me. Ours are too human. Pinnacle City has the money for the
latest of everything. They can solve easy stuff and rip through surveillance
fast regarding suspects.”
“Did they come up with anything on this investigation? You’ve really given
me nothing so far but a list of people and crime scenes. All of them are now
cleaned up. I’m not sure where to start. No proper forensics got done on any
of those scenes.”
“You’ll start with Skitch Rocco. I’ll tell you about it in a minute. We did
come up with something on the surveillance. The problem is, we can’t really
use surveillance. We collect enormous amounts of data that is destroyed
nearly as fast as it comes in.”
“Why?”
“Privacy is why. We are only the Board’s security control. There are many
small outfits in this building selling security and privacy services. Some
of it is all-robot or unmanned. Building Secure Data – that is, the stuff
coming in every moment on the building systems - isn’t kept unless a problem
shows. Now, residents, that is the real story. They do not want to be
watched or to be subject to any surveillance; yet we, of course, must have
surveillance. At this moment, for example, we are pulling in nearly every
kind of surveillance, including deep-cover stuff. As soon as it comes in,
requests to destroy it follow. Every resident of real importance, and that
is nearly all of them, has personal security or legal systems that make sure
we don’t collect anything on them.”
“Then what in the hell is surveillance for?”
“The Window. We have some moments, or a window, to determine whether a crime
or something vital to the Board has been recorded. If it has, we take
immediate legal action to hold that data. Often we can’t hold it for very
long.”
“Ah. So did the Window give you any vital surveillance regarding these
bizarre deaths?”
“We have some data. No suspect has been identified through it. Legal
proceedings are underway to allow you to view it.”
“How long will that take?”
“A few days.”
“Okay. You said you had a starting point. A fellow named Skitch Rocco. Who
is he?”
“Skitch is a Board member. He is the only representative of the thirteenth
floor. That floor, by the way, doesn’t exist.”
“You mean a bad luck thing. The building jumps from twelve to fourteen. So
if it doesn’t exist, I would gather you have no surveillance of it. Skitch
must be some fancy padding the Board appointed for some reason.”
“Skitch would have to be elected by the residents of that floor. No, we
don’t have surveillance of it. We do know that the Board recently sent
Skitch Rocco there to investigate intrusive emanations that caused
interference with other building systems. Your starting point would be to
find out if he is still alive.”
“On a floor that doesn’t exist?”
“This is where it gets confidential. There is a structural level between
floors 12 and 14. It’s an impervious layer, constructed to last a thousand
years without maintenance. It is a no-access zone. Security can’t enter it
or even mention that it exists. This is highly confidential. The Board has
no authorization to send anyone in.”
“But the Board runs this place. Who would tell them they can’t enter there?”
“The Top Floor.”
“Who runs that?”
“No information can be revealed regarding the Top Floor. And there is none.
No surveillance of it. No recorded data.”
“But you just revealed info because you told me they are a higher power in
this building. And that they control some secret areas.”
“Correct. They are a final secure level. Since the thirteenth floor is a key
structural secret, they are involved with it. You are going to bypass them.
The reason being we can’t start any investigation without doing so. I do
have a surprise, though. We have some real surveillance of Skitch Rocco that
you are allowed to see. It is very old surveillance.”
Now, real surveillance, that was something to move on. I began to think I
would actually begin to start an investigation with it. From there, perhaps
stumble on to something that would create some sense out of this nonsense
place. Thor led me to a private room to view the surveillance and went to
great lengths to have his tech specialist, a mad-scientist type named Junko
Gold, ensure the room was secure against any intrusion. I was even given
control of the viewing equipment and set it up in an optimistic mood that
vanished about as fast as a swatted fly when we got underway. There
certainly was surveillance of Skitch Rocco. Hundreds of hours of it. He was
one of the few residents who actually allowed his movements to be tracked.
Where the hitch came in was that no one else did, and that meant endless
hours of Skitch appearing here and there around Pinnacle City. If he was
talking to someone, passing someone, or even buying something, the other
people were blurred out. Sometimes his entire surroundings were blotted out.
If he went swimming, I could tell because he was wearing a swimsuit. Nothing
much else could be seen. Even paintings and plants were blurred out in
places. About the only thing I gained from it was a good look at Skitch.
Tall with curly hair, he kept a bit on the foppish side. A plump face with
rosy cheeks, wide hazel eyes, and a shark’s smile. He always wore a well-cut
suit, was a tiny bit overweight, and had a distinctive gait. I did a lot of
fast-forwarding, while Thor did nothing other than sport a silly grin that
showed he was somehow happy just to get this censored surveillance copy.
At the home office, I would bang my fists in frustration, but here I kept
cool and finally sat back with my hands behind my head. I signaled Thor to
be quiet for a minute. Then I went back to the buttons and did some more
zooming around in the surveillance feed. Finally, I spoke to Thor.
“Skitch carries a briefcase and meets a lot of people, almost like he is a
salesman. Most of the time, he does that. I see here that about once a week,
he leaves in the morning as though off to work. Then he disappears on a
small elevator to the back of his condominium. We see him get on the
elevator and then get off back at home, but we never see where he goes. He
always has that strange case with him.”
Thor’s smug grin vanished like after this long movie hour, he’d suddenly
awakened. “You are bang on. You know, I’ve gone through that surveillance
repeatedly, and I never noticed that. Where would you suppose he goes on
that elevator?”
“My guess is that he goes down one floor. I mean down to the thirteenth
floor. There is one entrance to it, at the back of Skitch’s palatial
condominium. Also, don’t forget that there is another common entrance to
every floor as well.”
“Really. What would that be?”
“That would be that very long, slightly curved wall behind you. The core
passes through every floor in this building.”
“That wall is thicker and stronger than any vault at all locations. Don’t
even mention the core. No resident would ever enter it, even if it were
possible. The life forces of this complex run through it. A human would be
cooked, fried, dissolved, or hell only knows what on entering it. Not to
mention what could be released if someone were to attempt to cut into it.”
+++
So I didn’t mention the core again; instead, I took a day to settle and
think things over, doing pretty much nothing other than playing with the cat
in my new place. One thing I thought about was the surveillance of Skitch.
In some of those boring passages, the ghost woman had appeared again. Yet
Thor Carlsonbonner mentioned nothing about seeing her. That was bad because
it meant I was seeing something that wasn’t there. With long, dark hair and
a slim figure, her profile often appeared near Skitch as he went about his
business. She reminded me of someone, as if I knew her but couldn’t place
her. But I’m a detective and don’t forget faces. Something was haunting me.
When I was ready to begin the investigation, I left and headed for Skitch
Rocco’s condominium. Along the way, I kept finding my access blocked and had
to use my tablet in access mode to break through. I made a mental note to
remind Thor that I wouldn’t be able to work in the building without a
special access pocket fob. As far as my breaking through was concerned, he
had the Window in which to figure out it was me.
Skitch lived alone except for a couple of cats, and he was missing, so if he
didn’t have a robot, no one would be home. I picked the lock at the main
entrance and set off a bunch of alarms. On the inside, it took me a minute
to shut them off, then I looked around; the main room here was palatial and
led to a curved staircase up to his bedroom and lounge area. At the time of
sale, this would have been a beautiful and spacious bachelor condominium.
Despite its incredible size and super high ceiling, Skitch had it turned
into a hoarder’s paradise. There were simply stacks of junk everywhere, and
the air filtration had long since clogged, leaving the place full of dander.
In a world where the vast majority read almost nothing on paper, Skitch
printed everything. He had stacks of papers, books, and magazines
everywhere, and they gave off a stale, inky odor. To go with them, he had
paperweights of all sizes and designs everywhere. I could see dust motes in
the sunbeams drifting in from a partially open sliding glass balcony door,
and more objects and junk stacked out there. Special shelves reached as high
as his ceiling, and I saw his two black cats sitting way up there on a long
ledge with their feeders and toys. A small pet service robot whirred along
the far end of the ledge, there preparing them a fresh meal.
A check of his place was vital in any investigation, but who would expect
the guy to live in a condominium pulp dump? I went up the stairs and found
that he did indeed have a den. It was heaped with more paper files and
sported an entire separate desk lined with designer paperweights. His main
desk was clear. A case rested on it, and the left side of the desk flipped
up into his computer setup. It was still running, so I opened the office
mode and saw that he did have a salesman setup. It was open to logs as if he
were still around the place. Nothing on it was truly secure, though it was
mostly encrypted, listing some sort of transactions. The case I had to pick
open; my read showed that it wasn’t booby-trapped, so I opened it
confidently and found a series of transparent tubes with substances in many
colors. Samples and I knew by faint odor what they were. They were an
impervious form of glue sold under a couple of brand names. The stuff was
damn expensive, too. You could get it in any color or texture mode and patch
things that were broken. It had to be used correctly because the patch was
impervious. It was recommended to have robots apply it. Skitch had samples
of varieties of the stuff that weren’t on the market. Maybe really pricey
special stuff.
At this, I scratched my head and wondered. Aside from his disappearing act,
Skitch Rocco lacked sinister qualities. He was a silly-looking, nearly
friendless chap and Board member whom I had now profiled as a book hoarder
and as running a sales business selling impervious glues. He sure didn’t
seem to fit with the super-rich of Pinnacle City. There were probably used
car salesmen on the outside who made more bucks than a special glue business
could pull in. Unless those special samples really were something special.
Thinking it over, I decided they had to be because Skitch traveled all over
Pinnacle City selling the stuff, and no one in this snob place would hold
meetings with a plain old glue salesman.
That left only the thirteenth floor; the Board had sent him to investigate
strange emanations. If the case continued in the same pattern, there would
be a mountain of electronic paperweights on that floor, giving off
emanations.
I left the condominium, locked it up, and headed for the mysterious elevator
at the rear. When I closed the door, I didn’t feel steady on my feet, and a
sudden image came into my mind. I’d seen her there, the ghost woman, moving
about in the dusty sunbeams of Skitch’s condominium. Seen her yet, but it
hadn’t registered until now, after the fact. I felt shaken and leaned
against the wall for a moment. It was like being haunted. She was almost in
my mind, hiding unseen somewhere in my brain waves, coming into my conscious
mind when she felt like it. I was sure she was real because I’d had no such
experiences in places other than Pinnacle City.
The hallway ran around from Skitch’s place and had no doors other than the
huge elevator door at the end. The button didn’t open it; I gathered it was
geared to Skitch’s fingerprint. It was damn hard to crack too, and after ten
minutes with a beam on it, I got angry and booted the door a couple of
times. That set off an alarm, but at the same time, my crack beam flashed
through the right pattern, and it whooshed open. I stepped inside, then
turned around as I heard something. Two of Thor’s security men were at the
far end of the hall and responding to the alarm, running towards me with
weapons drawn. To take care of that situation, I pulled my own Shiloh beam
weapon out, light-touched the stun mode, and auto-fire. Since I’d aimed
head-and-chest level, it hit them like a King Kong boxing glove; a wham that
stopped them dead for a second before they collapsed backward and tumbled on
the rug.
The elevator door closed, and I looked for the button panel and found none.
The only buttons were open and close. That baffled me, and it took me a
couple of minutes before I figured out it wasn’t an elevator after all.
There was a hidden door on the floor, and when I opened it, I saw a sort of
fireman’s staircase down.
Methods of super-secret access would be expected as the norm in a fantastic
tower like this one. Yet I had the feeling of an historical sewer worker.
One of those guys who used to work the rat tunnels before robots came along.
No magic carpet to the secret floor here. No sir. All Skitch had was a
ladder tube with walls that oozed milky slime, and at the bottom end, I
actually had to hop off and drop a foot to a bare floor and sepia darkness.
My Shiloh in laser setting doubled as a light, but I didn’t want to use it.
My eyes adjusted in seconds, and I saw that I was at the end of an open
area. Across a floor puddled with salty liquids, several tunnels branched
off. There didn’t seem to be traps anywhere, but I still waited and studied
the area; then something hit me. I tapped the wall beside me and noted the
silence. All modern flowstone and plastics would offer a rapping sound when
tapped. This didn’t happen because, from the looks of it, this entire area
and probably the whole vast floor were composed of the same impervious
material that Skitch Rocco sold. That meant this floor was a support layer
of sorts, of impervious material, laying out a second foundation above
ground. The cost of that much of the material would be astronomical. It made
me wonder.
It also created a silent atmosphere; my ears were ringing as I crossed the
floor. I had to pick one of the tunnels to follow, and that was made easy by
footprints I spotted in the dust. Skitch Rocco’s footprints, perhaps. A
short way down this tunnel, it squared and the coating had the look of
paneling but was actually more of the impervious material. Darkness
transformed to eerie light as this stuff had a faint glow. The scene became
weirder when the hall ended at an odd door. It was about seven feet high and
had a sort of spidery mutant face embossed into it, like an upright,
embedded sarcophagus. I had to open it, and I hoped I wouldn’t be entering
some house of the dead. If so, perhaps the mummies would be imperviously
preserved.
My tablet works as many other devices but is sometimes not quite as smooth
as the real thing. I ran a scan on the door and found it to be a micro-lock
mechanism with no built-in alarm. A series of frequencies the human ear
can’t hear triggered it, and though I expected the door to open outward, it
opened inward, allowing a scan of the room behind it. The lights also came
on, and there was no detection of any danger. I walked into another room cut
in the material, only this one was fully furnished with a clean office area.
Paintings decorated the walls, and the art appeared to depict different
locations in Pinnacle City. A broad onyx desk was stacked with more of
Rocco’s sample cases, and a nearby bookshelf lined with paper books
identified it as definitely his office.
He wasn’t present; the room to the rear was larger and a workshop with robot
equipment, all of it stamped with the Pinnacle City logo. This was the place
where he churned out his sample tubes, but where he got the raw stuff was
uncertain.
So where was Skitch Rocco? I sat on a bench that was more like grey glass
and ran every form of scan I could muster. A read pinged back through the
tunnels in the impervious material. Like all the floors in this building,
this was one large place, but it was of course completely different – a vast
warren of tunnels and open areas. The tunnels formed weird patterns, and it
hit me that the entire floor was set up like some giant cushion at this
level of the building, with the open areas and connection tunnels as the air
pockets. Probably the floor as a whole was to an extent flexible and allowed
some sway so that it absorbed shock and balanced the building. I noted heat
readings that meant the place was inhabited, but by what, huge gophers
perhaps?
The only way to find out was to move ahead, but not towards any detected
gathering of life forms. Instead, I picked an area not far off that had one
life form registered. Most of the nearby areas were arched hallways
connecting oblong rooms. The ceiling was inches above my head, and the
material was patterned in blues that, in its own faint lighting, gave me a
case of vertigo. I was walking horizontally by my feet, but by my eyes, I
seemed to be going up, then down. The dead silence made the ringing in my
ears worse. In time, I began to think I could hear something barely audible
– a stupid sound, like woooo, woooo … but very faint like wind through a
tube. That sound gained in volume then faded altogether. An opening appeared
ahead, and I peeked out cautiously. Someone was moving in the semi-dark
across the room. I stepped out and saw something dropping from the ceiling
towards me – my Shilo flashed in laser mode, the light momentarily revealing
a near-empty large room with objects littering the floor. The ceiling was
cobwebbed, and my beam hit a huge cobweb that had come loose to swing down
toward me. It didn't get vaporized but froze there in the air like the beam
had hardened it.
Half a moment passed; I remembered that my scan had detected a life form in
the room, but my eyes had not spotted one. They registered it now, as it was
coming for me fast. I heard it emitting that wooo sound as I fired and fell
back to the opening. My beam both revealed it and fried it, hitting its
midsection like a large bright coin with scorching heat and momentum. The
thing was lifted, flew in an arc, and collapsed onto the floor. I heard gas
explosions from it as its stomach burst, and as the light died, I saw a
humanoid creature lying there. Only its arms and legs were four similar,
somewhat spidery appendages. A corona of fur or hair covered most of the
head, but a round human-like face showed in the fringes.
Walking up I studied it, but also held my nose because the gas it emitted
stank and was likely toxic as well. A mutant of sorts, I concluded, and an
ugly one too, being somewhat spidery. I could see some strings of webbing
hanging from its crooked fingers like it had planned to wrap me in it. I
flashed a beam at the webbing around the room and noted that the objects
littering the floor were human bones. I walked back to the big cobweb I had
initially blasted. It was hard like stone. It had been soft webbing; heat
had hardened it to the impervious material. The clue told me how that
material was made; the mutants that lived here on this floor secreted it
from their warped hands and probably their mouths, too. What they fed on
were human beings; I could tell that from the bones on the floor.
I remembered Thor Carlsonbonner matter-of-factly saying the residents of the
thirteenth floor would have voted Skitch into office. If so, he bought their
votes with human sacrifices. And he was in here somewhere; he had an office
here as if hanging out with these things wasn’t a problem, at least not for
him. It would be for me because a scan showed that the life forms were now
moving from all other directions toward me. Since I could detect them, I
figured I could avoid them for a time by moving through the halls into
places they vacated, but eventually I would have to confront them. I also
wanted to find Skitch, but my readings showed all life forms of the same
type. They were all similar beings, almost like clones, and none of them
registered as a full human being, which was what I expected Skitch to
register as … if he was still alive.
They were coming for me, and at a fast clip; I picked a large, open area I
could reach and moved down a hall. The space I came out into was about the
size of a lobby, all in blue patterns. Low ceiling, as this wasn’t a tall
floor, and it was mostly clean with some dust, a few cobwebs, and no piles
of human bones. Picking a spot at the far wall, I waited, pulling out one
gun, then the other, so I was holding double heat. They slowed as they got
to me, moving slowly out of the entrance halls. Creeping across the floor on
those spidery limbs, they could walk both ways, upright like slightly
crooked humans or on all fours like dogs. The faces showing through the
coronas of hair were male and female, and they became clearer as I flashed a
quick beam off the ceiling for a better look. That made them halt and pucker
their mouths, and then they started that creepy wooo woooing. I felt like
blasting a few of them to teach them a lesson, and then, as I tried to move
my right arm, a jolt of fear hit me. I could barely move it; I could barely
move at all … realization flashed in my mind. The crazy woo woooing wasn’t
just a bad habit of theirs; it was a sound weapon; their voices knocking out
a frequency that sounded harmless but, in continuation, locked up the
victim’s muscles, leaving him open for the kill.
I did not intend to be a victim of any sort of spider humans, but the horror
of the possibility was lifting my hair. And other than fingers, it was the
only thing on my body that would move. Yet one stiff finger was enough
because I already had my weapon in hand. It hit a slider and then did the
double press that fired a wide stun beam into the area. It had a blast
noise, so I kept hitting it, sending a series of beams that battered them
back and slowly shut them out. With no air in their lungs, they couldn’t do
the paralysis song. Without the singing, I gained control of my body. A fast
exit was available. I could escape the area and the thirteenth floor. Due to
another sudden realization, I didn’t.
Instead, I spoke in a firm voice. “Cut that noise, or I’ll change this beam
to a death beam. Skitch Rocco, come forward and speak to me.”
They obeyed and, except for some gross huffing, remained silent. A number of
them moved away. One figure from near the rear came forward. This was
another of the spidery mutants. A big one too, and one that walked upright
like a man. He came up close, and as he did, I recognized the baby face
behind the spray of wild hair. It was Skitch Rocco.
“I’m Skitch Rocco,” the mutant said in a rough voice. “They send you here to
deal or to try to hit me?”
“I’m Jack Michaels, a detective. They sent me here to find you. The Board
sent me. They didn’t tell me you’ve become a mutant. They also hired me to
find out who is killing Board members.”
“The whole Board wouldn’t know I have changed. Some of them must.”
“Well, who knows? Who did this to you?”
“I’m not sure who set me up. I have supervised this thirteenth-floor
operation from the beginning. When someone started killing Board people, I
tried to lay low. But they got to me. They’re getting every Board member who
breaks their petty condominium rules. I haven’t figured out who is doing the
killing. I suspected Stone at first, and Thor Carlsonbonner too. However,
the Top Floor could be behind it, and maybe McGettigan and the Pinnacle
Group. Then there is a secret thing going on with the building mind, the
artificial intelligence Adam 1X thing. I don’t know what that is about.”
“You say they got to you. But you’re still alive?”
“I had a genetic disease and did a weekly vitamin feed. They switched the
feed to an overdose of the gene-enhancement stuff they'd used originally,
back when they created the thirteenth-floor mutants. I was supposed to die
horribly with my entire body in painful spasms. Yet I didn’t die. I’m
similar to these mutants, but I’m not one of them exactly. They were created
against their will via long-term therapy.”
“I see. I also see that killing has been going on here for a long time. Some
of those other areas are filled with human bones.”
“Of course. This is our feeding area, and we don’t sweep up all the time.
Our living quarters are at the west end and quite luxurious, too.”
“Feeding area. What or who are they feeding you?”
“Criminals, short-time rule breakers. Some of them shipped in from outside
Pinnacle City by groups that want disposal.” Skitch began to come closer,
and even as a mutant, he still had that distinct gate. His reddened eyes
probed. “We, you see, have a hunger for human flesh.”
“Really,” I said. “Keep back, unless you have a hunger for being a fried
meatball.”
“They aren’t feeding us enough now. They’re starving us. You had better talk
to McGettigan. We want the rations upped, or there will be rebellion.”
“I can talk to him. But what in the hell is the thirteenth floor about?
Surely they didn’t build this whole floor so mutants can feed on people?”
“It is because of the product. It is used throughout the building, and this
floor is a raw sponge layer of it. We eat, we produce. Now that they’ve put
me out of business, they need less. That was my crime and my sin, you see. I
fed my residents well and created a business selling the extra product. I
refined the raw stuff into new super products. My business went against the
condominium rules. It got me on the target list. I’m sure of it.”
“Maybe you were just an easy target for the killer.”
“Nope,” Skitch said, the word coming out like a little poof from his
fattened cheeks. “The story of the thirteenth floor goes back to the
beginning. Among the residents here, it is only a legend. School kids sing
about it. It is one of the evil places you get sent to if you’re bad. They
don’t know it really exists. It came about during construction. If you
followed the history of the building of Pinnacle City, you’ll remember the
sudden halt in construction and all sorts of PR for the reasons. The reason
was simple: a building of the dimensions of this one had never been
constructed. The practice did not line up with the science. A building, the
value of which can barely be measured, was unstable when it was only half
finished. That instability, the quakes and emanations, always centered on
the thirteenth floor. So they came up with an answer, but it wasn’t a pretty
one. Make the floor impervious and a level of incredible strength that
absorbs every shock. Of course, the ugly part was creating my charges here.
They were created – mutant monsters. It was the only way to create that much
of the substance. Graphdaelite is its name. We can create glue and other
variants using bacterial additives. It is sold under various brand names
and, in some forms, is the thinnest material on the planet. But as I said,
they never wanted me to do science or sales. I put their dirty little secret
at risk. Imagine if the world knew about my residents, the mutants who voted
me Board member for the thirteenth floor, and what they eat for dinner. If
that came out in the media, Pinnacle City would be shamed. They advertise
zero crime. A crime-free environment. It is that way because there are no
real courts or jails, but a system where violators are fed to the thirteenth
floor, and what the residents here excrete is the secret of the building’s
strength. The processed bodies of the dead fasten the whole titan, this
incredible pinnacle world, together. The Board members are all guilty of
murder, yet they sweat about being killed themselves. Maybe someone found
out; someone who wants revenge. It is possible.”
I listened to Skitch rant on … but as a man of the world, I wasn’t surprised
by the dirty secrets of the filthy rich. Even then, I knew ugly societies
existed on the planet. Knew the world had been built on the bones of the
dead. Some hid some of it; some hid their mutants, like Pinnacle City. In
the back of my mind, Pinnacle City had always seemed too good to be true.
And as Skitch spoke, the vision of the grand tower grew tarnished. Maybe
barnacled and rusted in parts like an old pirate ship. But despite its ugly
side, it did have grandeur throughout. Except for the thirteenth floor, all
the rest I’d seen was magnificent. Skitch thought the public would be
shocked, but many people would like the idea of disposing of criminals in
such a way.
I decided to interrupt. “So it was you who called me here. You and your pals
decided to send the Board a scary message with emanations. A message that
would have them worried about the building’s stability.”
Skitch sighed. “Exactly. I knew they would send someone and that they’d
think it had to do with the continuing murders of Board members. But we have
nothing to do with that. What we have is a message. I am still running the
thirteenth floor as I always have. My condominium is to remain in service.
Yes, I may be a little different now, and I am condemned to this part of
Pinnacle City. But I am in charge. My people want to be fed in full, like
the old days … so if the Board wants the emanations to cease, they will obey
and have McGettigan increase the food deliveries. They are also aware of the
other disasters that have been occurring along with the killings. Someone
else has been shaking things up, and they need our cooperation to keep this
building fully stabilized.”
“Geeze, you’re asking me to kill people. I mean, you eat them alive, don’t
you?”
“They send us criminals. They kill them one way or another anyway. That
won’t change.”
“So what’s in it for me? I’m investigating the larger case, not your
grievances. I will tell them what you want and have your position on the
Board reaffirmed, but I want something in return. Tell me what you know –
give me at least a clue.”
Skitch’s eyes started running deep; they were like two black holes, and in
their spinning depths, he was seeing me as a dinner he couldn’t eat. And he
was thinking. Controlling the hunger with the idea of gaining that return to
better days. “Okaaay,” he rasped slowly. “I have a clue, but you won’t like
it.”
“Give it to me anyway.”
“The killings started at the same time Adam 1X, that’s the building
artificial intelligence, went on the blink.”
“What happened to Adam 1X?”
“No one knows for sure. There were mechanical failures. All sorts of weird
stuff suddenly hit. At first, it felt like a small disaster; then I had a
hunch that something else had somehow taken control of Pinnacle City. The
one thing that stood out was ghosts appearing in the building. They had
always been confined to the virtual level. Now that particular floor ordered
a lot of product from me just before the bad stuff happened, as did the top
floor, and the pinnacle, the very top of the building.”
“Yeah, so what does that have to do with anything?”
“It was the thin stuff; the thinnest substance on the planet. All the micro,
nano, or whatever you want to call it technology is laid out on it. Smallest
computer hardware ever invented. The highest-level androids have brain
systems composed of it. The virtual level is so powerful because the entire
level is composed of it, and the top floor and the pinnacle have even more.
The intelligence power of this building can’t be fathomed, and the key
intelligence is Adam 1X. You never see him, but he is everywhere. Thor
likely told you the story about how all data in this place is destroyed for
privacy reasons. It is a clever tale, everyone believes the lie … but the
truth is nothing, and I mean not anything is forgotten because Adam 1X
stores everything somewhere. That’s why I never bothered having surveillance
of myself erased. It is there somewhere, anyway. The Board can’t access it,
though.”
“So where is it? Where is Adam 1X’s central mind or data storage?”
“A lot of places. You know the power of the technology. The soul of that
thing is on the top floor. There is no access there, and you have a killer
who doesn’t want you to get there because he would know that Adam 1X knows
who he is. The killer could even be Adam 1X, as it is said that he is mad.
Years ago, I heard there was a key or some kind of map that revealed a way
into the top. It is supposed to exist somewhere on the virtual level, and
there, again, it is impossible to get, because it is in a super-secure area
controlled by that thing. That monster. That pervert.”
“And who would that be?”
“That man is a Board member - Parker Colpitts.”
+++
I exited the thirteenth floor and found a small escort army of Thor’s
concierge guards waiting. I didn’t go with them. Instead, I went back to my
guest suite and called him on the suite phone, saying I had a report but
that I first had to talk to McGettigan. Thor tracked McGettigan, and that
took me 50 floors up the building. It looked like heaven and hell had gone
tacky up there, and when I asked for McGettigan, everyone told me he would
find me if he needed me. They had these wing-like off-edge things like
dragonfly stuff marking the edge of the patios, and they were at the real
edge of the building at the big fall to the harbor canal below. I stared at
the amber lights, and the feeling was solid, like I was up there in society.
Up there and looking for an answer to a problem I didn’t quite understand.
The Board called it killings, and I called it a search for the skyscraper
king of hinky crimes.
Nevertheless, dark night came in above ground, purple and clear. Thor and
Stone aroused thoughts to the effect that the height of bullshit might not
be much higher than this place. Not much inspiration for your average
gum-shoe, but a jump for me because I always prided myself on going for
something bigger, and knew that someday my pride would kill my ass and I’d
look like a very small squashed bug. But what the hell, there was no harm in
trying.
With no plans on waiting for the day McGettigan would find me, I walked
across the grand outdoor concourse. If a fat lady wasn’t singing, a much
prettier and perfect clone of a lady was … crooning, and looking pretty in
the way that crowd of ultra-perfects admired.
The main place had an entry like a tacky palace, and it was a gambling
paradise; a home for runaways of Pinnacle City when there really was nowhere
to run. The glittering overhang above it was so monstrous I could not
believe it existed on the floor of a building. But I was getting used to
stuff like that in a place gone wicked like this one. For a casino entrance,
it was a killer, but the real kicker was being able to walk under all the
security and past ladies and hucksters that could probably sell the devil a
return of his soul. All of the wishing, and I mean big security guys who
wished they could just come out and kick my ass. They couldn’t, and they all
had a security read they didn’t like … a read they hated in their bones.
Someone they didn’t recognize as a player … and that meant it was someone
big. Yet like a ghost, it couldn’t be because they knew all the big people.
And that someone was walking across the starlit floor and under the gem of a
false skylight, and riding up on a comforting air tube to Sam McGettigan’s
private booth.
Sam had two security men the size of gorillas and two hot ladies … one
Oriental and the other kind of Irish or Scottish-looking. The security and
probably the ladies were for show. Security systems, all built in, had never
altered vanity. A powerful man wanted to look that way unless he was like
Stone or other bureaucrats who wanted the understated look. It meant a lot
to the suckers and nothing to people like me who knew better.
Sam McGettigan's features were too rough-cut to be believable, and his
perfect light shoes and special cut tie clashed with them. He looked at me
like he couldn’t believe any detective would have the nerve to question him
on his own turf. Credit for my access went to Stone and Thor, because
McGettigan and his associates ran the nuts and bolts of Pinnacle City, and
he couldn’t trump them when it came to access.
I saw his eyebrows rise to heaven like he was thinking, "Oh no, a real
asshole." But they came to ground fast when I turned in, grabbed the bronze
railing, and looked out.
He showed his anger as his voice slowly rose, “Fucking Stone sent you. You
don’t look like you could save his ass or your own. I don’t care either. The
hitters aren’t after me.”
There was rustling below beyond the regular noise and hiss, and that added
emphasis to his words. Up above, I thought I saw some of that haze of light
fall as stardust, but ugly dust like something was dirty, but you couldn’t
quite put your finger on it. I decided to get straight to the point and
avoid arguments.
“Parker Colpitts. I want to question him, and you are the only one with the
way through to him.”
Sam McGettigan suddenly laughed like he was born laughing. He gained some
innocence in it. Innocence I knew was false. “Anything else you want – like
that old kiddy carnival ride to the moon?”
“Yeah. I got a message from Skitch Rocco. Whoever tried to ace him failed.
He’s there, and he’s a monster now. You know what he wants. More food for
one thing. And he wants his condo kept up. Your service union is going to
look after those cats of his, too. If not, the Board is going to get all
sweaty, because Skitch is valuable at the moment as far as building
stability goes.”
“So, Skitch Rocco told you stuff. He should have stayed in the grave they
sent him to.”
“Well, he didn’t. He’s still there on the thirteenth floor and running it.
He’s been re-elected. He gave me the power. You don’t get things moving my
way, those emanations are going to get worse, and residents are going to get
pissed. If you know what I mean.”
He looked at me then like I was something he’d never dealt with before. Like
something he couldn’t believe. Then he said. “I've seen your face before,
like in the media. You’re that Jack Michaels guy. Thinking you’re gonna come
here and make a big score. This place is bigger than you. It’s bigger than
anybody. It’s bigger than me. You, pal, are headed for a bad end. I heard
some new boys took over up there on the top. But no one can get any
information on them. One thing is for sure. They’ll know you’re snooping
around and write your name on the next contract they put out.”
“The good thing is death only comes once. So how about Parker Colpitts? I
can get into most of that virtual level. How do I get through to Colpitts?”
“You’re crazy. No one wants to get in there with Colpitts except perverts.
Colpitts has the dirty secrets on nearly everyone in this place. If you get
to him, the Board likely won’t even let you out.”
“Look. I’m not a pervert, and I don’t collect dirty secrets. This place is
full of riddles, but I’m working on a case. I need a minor piece of
information from Colpitts. His actual physical body can’t be tracked, so the
only place I can look is there in his virtual domain.”
“Okay, pal. Never in my life did I meet someone who wanted to get in there
for a chat with Colpitts. Met lots of people who want to escape from his
blackmail. I’ll give you a key code. To be truthful, I don’t expect to be
seeing you again, at least not after going in there with that guy. If you
come out at all, you’ll be one of them or a vegetable brain. Saves me the
worry of dealing with you personally.”
Chapter Three: The Virtual Level
To get to this Parker Colpitts guy, access to a secure virtual area on the
seventy-fifth floor was needed. Sam McGettigan’s key would get me through
once inside, but I definitely didn’t want Stone or Thor to know I had it.
Technically, that floor was secure in every area, and it couldn’t be
measured in square-foot parameters. There were no bodies on the ground, as
it was all mind space; far more than Pinnacle City could ever use,
considering Skitch’s information. That meant without a direct route of some
kind, I’d be on another planet of the mind, trying to find some weird geek
who was in a buried part of it. I didn’t really even know who Colpitts was
or what he did other than he was somehow big and likely nearly permanently
connected. His actual body would be hidden in an even more secure location,
and, given Pinnacle City's privacy rules, probably no one other than he knew
where it was.
Sam McGettigan obviously didn’t care if I found Parker Colpitts because he
had me pegged as loco. McGettigan wasn’t a firm suspect in my mind anyway.
He knew something was going on and was probably withholding evidence from
the Board. Bizarre killings wouldn’t be his style. Neither would
destabilizing the building be in his rulebook unless the goal was to extort
money. And there had been no extortion attempts. As far as Stone and Thor
were concerned, they may have been involved in hiring me, but they couldn’t
be written off as suspects. And I wondered about Skitch. Maybe he had killed
some Board members for one crazy reason or another. Maybe someone found out
and put out a contract on him. Both Stone and Thor were security and privacy
mad; they definitely wouldn’t want me breaking eggs with big boots on a
floor where the Pinnacle City crowd engaged in their private fantasy worlds.
They would get me in, but in a way where I’d be led around and then back out
without gaining any solid information. That meant I had to bullshit them and
play dumb so they’d go along.
+++
I wanted a business appointment, but I couldn’t get a day appointment with
Stone and ended up walking along an outdoor concourse of fashion shops up on
the thirty-fifth floor. Colored light spilled out on the obscure side street
and enhanced a twilight stroll along to an almost invisible supper club at
its end. A giant mural of fashionable Pinnacle City people in silhouette
nearly hid the entranceway, which was a deep arch leading to brass lamps and
a large wood-and-stained-glass door.
Supper Club security was heavy suits hiding in the cloakroom, but they gave
me little more than a glance as Stone had already cleared me. I got led
across an elegant entry area by a door host wearing a silly bellhop-style
outfit. A smooth jazz band was playing there, and the notes drifted inside
the supper area. Stone waited at a table by a window with a panoramic view
of an edge street and the sky. Despite being a big shot on the Board, he was
sitting alone. Even alone, with his perfect grey hair and strong, elder
looks, he registered as a VIP. I took a seat across the table from him and
watched some air cars pass in a firefly trail a ways off in the sky while he
opened the conversation. Turned out this was a dinner date with his new gal,
but she wouldn’t be arriving for a while, so he’d squeezed my appointment
in. He chattered about being recently divorced and the new woman. I told him
I wanted to give him my report on thirteen and talk about the virtual level,
but he ignored me, saying he wanted to discuss Thor Carlsonbonner.
“I didn’t want to mention this,” Stone said quietly, “but Thor is a touch of
a suspect in this case.”
“You don’t say. How is he involved?”
“Not necessarily involved. Thor no longer has to work for us. He was hired
on a permanent contract, meaning he would stay with us but get to retire at
a very young age and reside at Pinnacle City. That contract specifically
forbade marriage and extensive travel. Due to privacy concerns, employees
with deep building knowledge don’t travel much or travel alone. Of course,
those with high-level clearance can travel. Residents we trust fully travel
but they are people who live and breathe the Pinnacle City way of life. They
keep our secrets because they are us.”
“Really. One would think Thor Carlsonbonner would have the highest
clearance. He is the security chief.”
“He did before he got married in secret, and to another man. A very wealthy
and private resident of Pinnacle City that I won’t name. The Board doesn’t
approve.”
“Gay marriage is common on the outside. Doesn’t surprise me that it isn’t
approved by high-brows here.”
“It’s not that. We don’t approve of him marrying at all. He has hustled his
way into riches.”
“Maybe he’s just gay. I mean, who would he meet here who isn’t wealthy?”
“True, but he wants to retire well before the end of his contract and travel
the world. Several Board members have registered strong disapproval, and
some of them are now dead.”
“Is every recently deceased Board member in that category?”
“No, but if he wanted to do it, he could get rid of some others as a cover.”
At that point, a waiter arrived with drinks. I chose expensive liquor, and
on the rocks. Stone sipped a yellow lady's drink in a tall Collins glass. He
chattered some more while I wondered why he was coming out with this
information on Thor now. Had something changed? Maybe he, for some reason,
wanted a frame-up of Carlsonbonner to cover for the real killer. For privacy
reasons, of course.
“I’ll keep an eye on him while I’m investigating. It gives me an idea.
Skitch Rocco, for some reason, wants to send me on a wild-goose chase on the
virtual level. Maybe I can use that investigation as a way of tripping up
Carlsonbonner.”
Stone was sipping his drink as I spoke and accidentally took a big swallow.
His eyes widened with the gulp. “What … you mean you found Skitch Rocco?”
“Yes. Found him on the thirteenth floor. A disappointing part of that
investigation was discovering that you didn’t inform me of the risks.”
He looked away from me. “We thought he was dead, and that the others would
hide. Our interest is the source of the emanations.”
“Skitch and his people claim to be a source, but not the only one, as most
of it is connected to or arrived with the killings. He is ramping things up
because his people have some demands. McGettigan is taking care of them,
except one. He is still the Board member for that floor. Just letting you
know. But don’t worry; he won’t be attending any meetings in person. Skitch
is not the same man he used to be.”
“Skitch is a blackmailing terrorist. We don’t deal with such people.”
“You don’t have any choice. Call it a labor dispute that must be resolved.”
“Why? He gave you a phony clue. There’s nothing on the virtual level.
Nothing there is real. What could you possibly find?”
“Information is stored in lots of different ways. They’re all real. Perhaps
some small lead is in there. I want you to set it up so I can go in and
quietly look around some areas. Thor can come in with me.”
Stone finished the rest of his drink. “It’s unheard of … as well as being
ridiculous. Both you and Thor will have to be decontaminated when you come
out. Stuff in there can drive a man mad. We’ll have to do a special setup.
I’ll send you to a location. Our technical expert Junko Gold will set it up.
You’ll find nothing in there, but we can attempt to pick Thor’s brain some
on the detox, maybe get the goods on him.”
A hot blond passed me on the way out, and I instinctively picked up that it
was Stone’s new woman. I glanced back. She was like an hourglass of ruffled
silks with two of the fawning bellhop characters leading her across to
Stone’s table. Strolling in the night, I passed several lonely souls out by
the edge walk. The greater city existed out beyond Pinnacle City’s own haze
of lights, and I considered that, unlike the others looking out, at least I
knew what life was like in that big city. So Stone now wanted me to set up
Thor. I thought it over and decided to keep moving with my own
investigation. The Thor thing could have meat to it, but more likely it was
a big distraction. Something to keep me busy while something else was going
on.
+++
A new Pinnacle City day became another flight through privacy and secrecy as
Thor Carlsonbonner and Junko Gold didn’t want me to know the exact location
of the connect rooms we were to use. I had to endure the mad Einstein
character’s grim humor as he put a deprivation helmet on me; to be sure, I
wasn’t tracking things. No electronic devices allowed, either, but they
didn’t know half of my tech was patched into my skin. It would know where I
was going. Which turned out to be a number of odd chambers on the fourth
floor? Not much of a secret location in my estimation.
In the new technology, people who connect no longer wear body suits or
cumbersome head attachments. They do use a black room to guarantee complete
separation from bodily functions. The black room was for residents, but
apparently the secure connection was a white room, a whole different thing,
with the only attached equipment being a neural web to be worn loosely over
the face and hair while the person sat on a special chair that wrapped the
body up. The setup would be totally different for someone like Parker
Colpitts; he was no temporary vacationer, but someone permanently wired in.
His body was hidden somewhere remote in Pinnacle City and tubed, fed, and
cleaned with electric muscle stimulation so it would not deteriorate. It was
sort of the other way around, where he only made temporary visits to his
actual physical self.
The idea of grabbing the goods on Carlsonbonner while he was also my guide
wasn’t much of a formula for detective work, unless I planned to just frame
him. Framing people has never been my style; instead, I made some other
plans while the mild sedative eased the harsh burn of the white room.
Carlsonbonner had gone in ahead of me. In this mode, the transfer took place
exactly at the point of falling asleep from the sedative.
I awoke standing and feeling extremely light on my feet. Pinnacle City
equipment immediately revealed its superiority, though I have never been a
big user of dream worlds. In the past, I used them when under extreme
stress, leaving my body to calm during the disconnect and my mind to be
comforted by easy dream play. But I have never been the average person in
society, where a whole segment of the population remains totally addicted to
other realities. There are detectives working specifically in that field,
but I am not one of them. Tech-based detectives are another large group who
mind-surf the Internet and rarely leave the office. In most detective work,
like finding a missing person, you don’t have to leave the office, but there
are always cases that require a man on the street. A specialty and my
specialty, because almost no one else does it, and the pay is high.
Criminals and security forces rule the streets in most places. No one goes
out in any contest with them unless the pay is substantial. And no one
survives in any contest without experience and skills.
There is another percentage of the population addicted to Intel drugs, some
addicted to both, and then the twenty percent of the population that are
power brokers. The brokers usually have so much pumped-up health and
glamorous looks that they are addicted to the real world, where they are top
of the heap. Always feeling good, they exist alongside businessmen, which is
what they're called, even if women. Businessmen are straight-laced bankers
and other sorts who never had a fantasy or desire to escape the office. It
is their world of reality and fantasy. Genetically tuned to managing the
ugly details of running a planet means they do what they are supposed to do.
Though in a corrupt way.
The superiority of the Pinnacle City virtual setup was that I felt like I
was in my real body. I hadn’t asked for another. But it was my real body
with a touch of superpowers. That was apparent right away as I began to walk
briskly to Carlsonbonner. He hadn’t changed his looks either, other than
that his red hair was neater and his face metered out to be a touch more
handsome. The amazing scenery backdrop to him had its effect. Thor was a
clean, outfitted cop, but in a setting of transparent walkways twisting
above a faceted web below. Coming up beside him I walked with him down the
wide main walkway, with fear of heights giving me a tingle, as the flooring
was see-through to a big drop to the honeycomb below. A monster of a metal
gateway rippled with red tints ahead, and on entering it, I felt some
unknown force sucking at me.
We entered a tomb-like room, and several oblong copper-red doors
automatically whooshed open. Some had weird control panels inside, others
had equipment.
Thor spoke as we entered one. “This area is set up for my security use.
Security entry to the system is rarely used. Few people have been through
this way. My security men, McGettigan's tech crews, and some others who aid
me.”
“What’s your usual reason for entry?”
“We have pursued criminals here, and sometimes it is to bring people back at
the request of family members or because they have to testify before the
Board and are trying to escape it.”
“Why wouldn’t you just grab the offender’s real body?”
“Things have changed over the years. Today it is impossible to know how many
people are simply underground. Those who disconnected. This is superior
technology. With the old stuff out there in the city, the addict will
eventually perish unless he makes frequent returns to his actual body. Here,
the body can waste away and even die, leaving the person uploaded to this
level and existing as an entity here. Usually, we get requests to pull
people back from family members before they get that far.”
“How would you do that?”
Thor opened a heavy vault door that had been sealed so tightly to the wall I
hadn’t noticed it. “We have some special equipment in here,” he said as he
removed two heavy belts from a rack. The gun with the web-like pattern is
the Net Gun. Each one of those millions of facets you saw below on entry is
a person’s private world. We can enter those, use a tracker, and net the
individual for a pull back to his body. Alternatively, if the body is dead,
temporarily back to a blank cloned body. That would be where we need someone
who has attempted to escape testifying by dumping his body to death and
hiding here. Addicts are also periodically pulled back. But for most of
this, we have automated systems to handle it. We rarely enter due to privacy
concerns. The most common reason is to force a reconnect with the body
before a split develops. We force a reconnect after a long-term disconnect,
and the human brain will seize its soul, so to speak, preventing the person
from re-entering the system for a period of time.”
We were both outfitted with the under-the-jacket belts when Thor said, “You
still haven’t told me what you are looking for in here?” And I realized that
the whole setup made it nearly impossible to look for anything. If those
facets below were entries to entire worlds, where would I start?
McGettigan’s key, patched into my skin back at my body, was supposed to feed
through so I could find the world of this Parker Colpitts guy, but I didn’t
want to tell Thor I was looking for him. An idea hit me for bullshitting
Thor, one where maybe I could ditch him and do my own thing.
“I told you about Skitch Rocco. He’s a suspect still. I’d like to look at
his fantasy world, and there’s Penrose Pool, the wealthiest Board member.
Stone suspects the killings could be a power play by him. Show me how to go
in, and we’ll split up for say a couple of hours. I’ll check Skitch, and you
do a tap on this Penrose guy.”
Thor seemed to warm to the idea. “Better that I do Pool,” he said. “You’re
talking high security there. He could file a complaint.”
My gut feeling was that a look at Skitch Rocco’s fantasy world was something
Thor couldn't stomach. Neither could I, but I didn’t plan on going there.
“Okay,” I said. “Give me the nuts and bolts. How do I enter and get back
out?”
Rather than reply, he waved me along as we went through another open door.
This one leading to a large misted area with a high oval ceiling. The far
wall of this room was imprinted with an octagonal window about 15 feet high
and wide. There was no glass in it, but only mist. It appeared that the room
itself was humid and misty, with wisps constantly escaping from it.
“This is the entry window,” Thor said as he pulled a flat piece from the
belt and expanded it. “Type a floor number into this, and the residents list
comes in the background. Pick a resident and an address near this window,
and it will open a way into his virtual space. You can also just speak the
resident's name or unit address. A couple of other things you need to know.
The gun with the star pattern on your belt is a common weapon, meaning it
will adapt to the standard weapon used in a particular world. The other
wand-like object in the belt is your key out; it will locate an exit point.
Lose it, and you will be stuck inside someone’s world, and we’ll have to
send a man in to grab you.”
“It’s amazing how simple it is. Let me do a test here. I will simply type in
your name and the fourth floor.” As fast as I did that, the mist in the
octagonal window became a liquid sort of mirror. A view of some type of city
showed beyond it.”
Thor gave me a toothy grin. “Amazing, isn’t it?”
“It certainly is,” I said, and then before he could respond, I took a quick
step up and went through.”
My feet were immediately on the pavement in Thor Carlsonbonner’s premier
fantasy life. I was on a city sidewalk, a sunny day, but everything was
short of color – too much black and white, a sort of noir world. I knew
Carlsonbonner would be momentarily stunned, but in about five seconds, he’d
be through and after me. Luck was in the cards as a Checker taxi was right
on the curb. Getting in, I yelled ‘drive!’ and the cabby did so just in time
because Thor was already through and banging on the car door.
He spun around and cursed as we raced into traffic, and he foolishly started
chasing us on foot, or not so foolishly because in this world, he could run
nearly as fast as the car, and the driver had to hit the gas and pass a
couple of other cars.
Ignoring the cabby’s demand for a destination, I quickly checked a few
things. The belt was under my jacket, and I had the wand key, the
web-patterned grabber gun, and two other guns. One was a snub-nosed revolver
marked with a star, or the standard weapon in Thor's world. I also had my
own weapon, a long-range shooter, which meant the skin patch on my body in
the outside world was working. Clenching my fists, I shook them and looked
at the backs of my wrists; the two patches of skin lit up. The left being a
feed of McGettigan’s key and the right the data connection through to my own
body and through it to my home office. So, fortunately, I was really hooked
to both worlds, though on a very thin strand that could be easily broken.
I looked up and saw the cabby slowing to pull over and dump me. Then I
spoke. “Listen, don’t pull over. That big guy is chasing me. I want to be
sure we’ve shaken him, then I’ll pick a drop.”
Driving with one hand, the cabby pulled his hat off, revealing thick locks
of tousled light hair. He turned and stared at me; a tough-guy cabby face
and freckled. “Listen, pal, you might be able to shake that guy for a while.
But in the end, you’ll get blasted. You’re running from the police chief.”
Shit, I knew he was right. I remembered seeing him banging on the car. His
security uniform had been replaced with a police uniform. It was time to
study my surroundings. The cars had names like Buick and Nash, and a classic
look with smooth curves. Buildings were square, stone and brick, many with
metal fire escapes hanging at the street side. I looked at my own suit and
took off my hat. The outfit was tailored nicely, but in a style that was
long before my time. Outside, the rest of the grey world slipped by, with
people who, in my mind, were maybe from Chicago or New York, 1940s. We
passed a club with some hoods and hot ladies out front. It was a different
world, and one where nearly everyone wore a hat or cap of some kind.
If anything, Carlsonbonner was cleared by this. A guy who fancied himself an
old-style police chief wouldn’t be into murdering a gang of Board members.
He was supposed to be gay, but there sure wasn’t anything to indicate that
in this world. So my best bet for now was to escape it and get through with
the patch to the domain of that Parker Colpitts guy.
It occurred to me that Chief Carlsonbonner would have a radio call out on me
by now. A neighborhood bar was ahead, so I told the cabby to pull over.
Amazingly, I had a fat wallet and money in my pocket, so I tipped him big
and instructed him to drive off down an alley and wait.
The name of the place was McSorley’s Pour House. I must’ve looked standard
in that setting because not a head turned as I walked up to the front doors.
Instead, my head turned, because something even darker than the gloom in
that town caught my eye. A lady, the only one without a hat pinned to her
head. That ghost again with the long dark hair, pale as ivory, she was
especially beautiful in this noir setting. She was up the street, and this
time she waved at me, or not at me, but gestured to point out a building up
the street - a tall one with a lightning rod at the top.
A police car came crawling around the corner; she disappeared into the crowd
like the ghost she was, and I hurried into McSorleys.
The place was a real Irish bar. Old style, all right, and in the daytime not
populated by dancing ladies but by Irish gangsters. Tracing it back, I would
be more Scottish than Irish, but look rough enough to pass in that gang.
Guys that are well dressed but despite it look lean and rough-edged.
Harsh sunlight beamed through one window, creating a bright spot in an
otherwise dark, sepia atmosphere defined by dark mahogany paneling and dim
booths along the north wall. The walking took me straight through a blue
cloud of cigarette smoke to the bar. That’s where I went because I didn’t
want to pause, as my eyes hadn’t adjusted. Four men were at it. Three were
gangsters, two of them real Irish, but the fourth man, who looked like the
boss, also looked like the reincarnation of Al Capone, with a wide band on
his hat and lips and face about as fat. I sat down, and before I got a
chance to speak, Big Al did. “You must be Ace. It’s about time. We’ve been
waiting for you for two days now.”
Gathering that they had me pegged for an out-of-town hitter, I thought it
best to play along. “Don’t sweat it. I got delayed, but I’m ready to work.”
Turning to the roly-poly bartender, I ordered a double of Jameson and waited
while he polished a rock glass with a cloth dirtier than it. Then I said,
“Looks like I will be starting here.”
Al took a deep pull on his cigarette and gave me a severe look. “Yeah, one
of them is over there. But rules are no shooting in here.”
“You better tell the cops and that crazy police chief that.”
“Huh.”
“They got this place staked out. It’ll probably be a raid. I saw them just
as I arrived. It was too late for me to do anything but walk in. Looks like
the chief is out to burn you.”
“That shit Carlsonbonner. We had a deal.” He suddenly stood up and waved. A
gang of mobsters came up and did a half circle of the bar. Al spoke quickly.
“Coppers are gonna raid the place. Get a lookout at that window. Look out
for Carlsonbonner. He double-crossed us.”
Rather than wait, I answered the call and hurried over. Peeking around an
interior shutter, I got a view of the street. They were off to the left;
Thor Carlsonbonner and an undercover squad dressed pretty much like more
gangsters and armed with automatic weapons. One of the shooters caught me
glancing out and opened fire. The power of his gun was a shocker. He missed
me but created an implosion of bullets and glass that hit two men at a
nearby table like the mailed fist of whatever Godzilla existed back then.
The whole place froze in time for a second while the two bodies and their
table were thrown through a flying shredder.
The next few seconds, I knew, would be the end of McSorleys and everyone in
it. It wasn’t just a minor raid. Carlsonbonner was trying to blow me away
completely. I saw gangsters flying into action all over the bar, pulling out
their guns and overturning tables as they moved. In the commotion, I still
managed to hear footsteps outside as the squad of shooters hurried closer,
but I didn’t hear the six steps I took as I turned, ran into the room, and
jumped.
I’d noticed on entry that the place had a fairly high beam ceiling, and
that’s where I went with a leap up to the big hook holding a lamp fixture,
then using my momentum and a table top to swing my legs up so that I was
glued to the beam up there.
A skull-knocking opera of gunfire followed, though the theme was all
percussion and the high notes of ricochets combined with shouts, gasps, and
final moaning. I turned my head to glance down through this and saw my hat
float down as two expanding flowers of blood and splinters flew past it. It
landed on the chest of a body that rolled neatly over under it. The massacre
simply took out nearly everyone, including most of the cops outside. But
weapons were still firing, and I saw why. Big Al had miraculously gotten
behind the bar and pulled out a Thompson submachine gun. He was letting it
unload and holding back the remaining cops. I assumed Carlsonbonner would be
one of them.
Across at the far side, I saw the whale-big body of the bartender wedging
open a side door. Apparently, he’d tried to escape and failed. Fortunately,
in the chaos, I’d been forgotten, and after a few seconds, Al went down
rather glamorously as huge blood spatters flew from his head and chest. I
took the momentary lull as my queue, swung out, and landed near the open
side door. I slammed through and turned, barely escaping more bullets as
they ripped up the wall across from me.
The cops had raided the front so fast they hadn’t bothered with the back.
The alley there was clear, and the Checker cab, now alerted to the gunfire,
was taking off, but driving right for me as it did. I waved him down and got
in. The driver squealed off right away but didn’t get far; we came out of
the alley in range of the remaining cops, and one of them took out my driver
with an accurate sniper shot, leaving me in a vehicle headed for a run up
the sidewalk. I managed to hold the wheel and push his foot off the pedal,
but the vehicle fishtailed and swung completely around, skimming against the
wall. I got out and spun about, firing both guns, causing the cops and
Carlsonbonner to duck away. Then I kicked out a window and dived inside the
building. As I did, something came clear in my memory - the ghost. Now I got
her message and what she’d been pointing out.
Bullets raked the floor behind me, speeding my dash through to the back.
There, I began to bound up one of the zigzag metal fire escapes to the roof
and had more bullets ricocheting around me before I got there. I went over
the edge, with shots whizzing through my hair, and kept running. The
sunshine was like a spotlight up there, and I ran and went over the edge on
a jump to the next building. You were supposed to be able to fly if
necessary in all created worlds here, but Carlsonbonner had that limited to
long jumps. Without them, I would not have made it.
Carlsonbonner and three of his undercover men got to the top and were in
close pursuit. I took cover behind a chimney and smoked two of them with my
own gun, still amazed at the power of weapons in this world, as the targets
were taken out like they were meteor struck. The tallest building and the
lightning rod were just ahead, and a long leap took me to an outside fire
escape on it. Carlsonbonner’s bullets ripped away metal just below my feet,
but I was a fast monkey, and he was a bad shot. Good thing for me, he was a
security chief and not a real action cop who could use a gun.
His final shots were over my head, then he had to reload. Brick powder from
his shots showered me as I reached the top, then I ran for the lightning rod
and pulled out the wand from my belt. It worked, I never reached the rod,
but more like became the lightning, and a second later came out through the
mist of the transfer window.
Thor Carlsonbonner would be through in a minute, and I didn’t have time to
speculate as to why he was trying to kill me in the virtual. That would be a
problem because such a kill puts the homebody in shock for a day. It would
give Thor time to work on a way to erase me physically without being caught,
if that were his intention.
This time I didn’t input a name, floor, and unit, but the long code
McGettigan had patched to me. There was no option other than manual input;
my fingers were flying, and I hoped to be accurate. Carlsonbonner flew
through the mist and landed on his feet next to me as I finished. I didn’t
wait to talk with him but hopped through again. This time to a completely
different place, as Parker Colpitts was a vendor, not a dreamer; he sold his
fantasy world or versions of it to others, so I had no idea what it would
be. Carlsonbonner wouldn’t be able to follow me, so I was on my own, which
was better considering the circumstances. They were weird, and I wasn’t
coming out anywhere immediately. Instead, colored mist spun around me, and I
wondered about Thor. There was nothing incriminating in his fantasy world,
so I couldn’t figure out why he was trying to hit me in here unless the
whole deal of setting him up had been a ruse, and what Stone really wanted
was for him to get me out of the way.
I came to ground in a bright flash, as if reality had suddenly arrived.
There was the immediate feeling that this was a higher world than the one
Carlsonbonner owned. Just something in the essence of it that couldn’t quite
be described. It was also bright and dark like the noir world, but in a
different way. I wasn’t in a city. I was standing on a dock at the end of an
inlet, and the clothes I had on were one of my usual outfits. Almost like I
was in the real world, but some remote part of it. I could see the inlet
stretching out to a lake, a distant river mouth, and a boat sailing away as
though it had just dropped me off. The water was a deep, emerald-hued,
sinister abyss; beneath its jeweled flashes of light lay the feeling that
something big, ugly, and hungry might be swimming. The dock was composed of
rich-grained wood that was far too valuable for such a purpose. And the dock
was just there at the end of the road that emerged from a deep deciduous
forest. A jungle of sorts that was northern in style but looked as
formidable as something in South America. The only option seemed to be to
walk up that road and see where it led, but before taking any steps, I took
stock of the situation.
Thor Carlsonbonner wouldn’t be able to come through after me because he
didn’t have the key, but he would be attempting to track where I went. The
information I had on Parker Colpitts was that he was a Board member, one of
three for the virtual level. One of the others had been murdered. Colpitts,
though, was the one wielding the power. He appeared at Board meetings as a
hologram. No one knew where his actual body was hidden in Pinnacle City. The
background information contained nothing about his virtual world except that
it would be more than that – more than a facet world like the users had
because he was a vendor, apparently the largest of the group, because he
controlled the floor’s Board votes. He sold some sort of services,
enhancements, or creations to residents. No one said what they were. He was
an unmentionable pariah in McGettigan’s opinion and a mad pervert in Skitch
Rocco’s. It would be something ugly if Skitch thought he was a perv. But
that all meant little to me because it was a case where he was the next rung
up toward the top. There was no way I could go around him.
Bizarre calculations on the case and motives began to pass through my mind.
This seemed to be a world where one got lost in thoughts and dreams rather
quickly. While I was thinking something huge and black, a bird of some
wicked variety circled out in the water and passed down toward the distant
boat. Immediately convinced that staying out in the open on a dock might not
be healthy, I headed over to the road.
The road was initially quite wide and clear, but unpaved; rather, it had a
gravel coating that had become embedded in the earth, forming a smooth
surface. Like the wood of the dock, the gravel had a rich appearance. Many
gem-like colors, including gold, gave the sense of walking in a Midas
domain. But the forest was dark and brooding. The bright sun, high into the
late afternoon sky, did not seem to penetrate except for huge beams cutting
through here and there. Those beams were dust- or spore-filled, like probes
from the searchlights of the gods above. Huge butterflies flitted through
the light and sometimes over the road, and as I walked farther on the trail
narrowed and the forest strengthened to tower above me at the roadside.
There was scarcely any ditch or side grass, but a nearly straight transition
into unknown layers of foliage, vines, and trees.
This did not bother me at first, but after about a kilometer, the kinder
odors of flowers, leaves, and grass were overpowered by the rotting smell of
bogs or of some dead things deeper in, and I could see patches of fog, some
yellow-hued, like a miasma. Birds and calls followed, and they were
positively evil and long in the notes. Like the black bird that had suddenly
swooped above the waters, black things, though smaller, began to swoop in
the trees. They were larger than ordinary birds; sometimes they seemed like
monkeys leaping, and I heard cries that were like an odd form of laughter.
Though the road was not overgrown, it did not seem at all traveled, and I
encountered no one. I certainly felt like I was leading a procession. I kept
looking back to see if anything was following me on the road and concluded I
was being followed, but off to the side in the forests. Or maybe not
followed, but some hidden creatures were flitting here and there right
beside me, headed to whatever destination I would end up at.
That became another narrowing until I was on a path. Again, the same beaten
stones but in softer black earth, and I could now see a backdrop in the
distance. It was a mountain, and I began to consider running or seeing if I
could fly here, if the journey to the distant mountain was going to be long.
Before I could do that, something flew across the path a ways in front of
me. It gave me a start, and I drew my weapon as I halted.
The starred weapon was a blaster of sorts in this world, and I didn’t know
if I wanted to use it on what I had just seen. The thing that had flown over
the road was like a large fairy or the prissy version of a cherub, where it
was like a winged child or baby. Except that the face on this
gossamer-winged cutie had been evil in intent and fanged with eyes that were
stark and cruel.
It was a winding path, and even on straight portions sprays of branches and
higher creepers obscured much of the view. A haze of light filtered through,
so I could always see on the path, but sight didn’t provide much relief as
long as I could hear wings beating above and see dark shadows racing through
both the underbrush and trees. Wherever I was headed, an escort was moving
along with me. That place turned out to be a broad clearing.
I stood at the end of the path; bright light lit the area. It was a meadow
with the grass long and clumped like huge heads of hair flowing all in one
direction away from me. Flowers with red blossoms grew here and there, but
what caught my eye was the far end. The path went through it and was
back-dropped by trees as large as ancient redwoods. I saw two large idols
standing to either side of a throne. The idols were impressive in height and
effect. Two huge winged lions were carved from a golden-red material. These
beasts were thick and squat with pug faces and fierce eyes, with a touch of
their fangs showing.
It remained dead silent for some time, and I didn’t move either. It appeared
that my escorts had stopped as I had. I kept my ears open for anything
moving up behind. Nothing showed, and it seemed that if anything were to
happen, I would have to make it happen. I did that by simply breaking out
into a run through the clearing.
If it was a plan, it certainly worked, and it was a smart one. Because they
appeared then, coming over the trees and out of them from all directions.
Probably thirty of the nasty-faced cherubs, and they were winging me. The
beasts moving through the trees also came out, living versions of the golden
lion idols on the far side of the clearing. They didn’t attack but moved up
stealthily. At about three times the size of a house cat, I pegged them as
dangerous, but they were also wary and did not appear hungry. They had an
intelligent look and didn’t seem quite certain about what to do.
The cherubs had no such problem; the mean-eyed things kept buzzing closer,
and I could see their fangs and the nasty intent on their plump little
faces. Naturally, I threatened them with the gun, and finally, one came too
close, so I blasted it with a kick ray and knocked it for a loop through the
air. The small lions paced closer on that and halted again, and then the
rest of the wicked gnats began doing kamikaze runs on me, leaving me doing a
fast dance in the clearing, my coat flying as I continued to bounce them
away.
I was about ready to switch to kill mode when brilliant light flashed over
by the idols. This caused the cherubs to fly over there and the lions to
follow, pacing through the grass.
I did the same, though at a much slower pace, and a minute later I was at
the end of the path facing a strange person … or should I say being,
standing out front of the throne. The group of cherubs continued to buzz
about, but the lions sat on their haunches and watched with some interest on
their faces.
I found myself facing a man or a devil, depending on how you looked at it.
It was a tacky scene to say the least. He was slim and attractive, with a
young white face and a small beard, but he was wearing a full, form-fitting
body suit of bright red, and he had antlers. These antlers were slim and
twisted off to points. Strangely, he looked quite eloquent despite the tacky
dress. He held a scepter and was, in fact, nearly the picture of those old
drawings and paintings depicting the devil or Satan as a red figure.
His scepter glowed with a fire jewel at the top. I spoke first. “I didn’t
come here looking for the devil,” I said. “I’m looking for a man named
Parker.”
The man’s eyes flashed with evil and lust. The cherubs buzzed about angrily.
“How dare you say that name here! How dare you even come here! There is no
Parker here. You have invaded the domain of the great god Pan!”
Pan … the mention of the name, and I got it. He was no Pan. He was Parker
Colpitts. Whatever research he’d used to recreate himself as a god was
backward. The old red devil character had, in fact, been a medieval attempt
to depict Satan, but they used the image of the old god of perversion, Pan.
The horns and so on. But the Pan I remembered was supposed to have goat
legs. He did, of course, have power over animals as a forest demon god. He
had no cherubs. Cherubs originally were the mighty winged Biblical beings
under God’s throne. Like Satan, who was a powerful heavenly being, thrown to
earth, ancient artists bastardized the cherubs. Mostly, cherubs were
portrayed as flying naked babies and children. Parker’s cherubs were a
vampire version of that. Flying naked vampire children with gossamer wings
and hellish eyes.
“Cut the crap. I came here to see Parker Colpitts, and you are him.”
His eyes blazed, his scepter shot up a blast of smoke. The small lions
roared. And I backed off some. “No one has ever invaded my privacy here.
That is a death sentence.”
“Really,” I said, but I was more frightened than I looked because his
cherubs were now flying a wide circle above him like they were about to
break and attack. I knew I could blast a number of them, but if they all
attacked and the lions too, I’d be in for a losing fight.
Only one cherub broke loose and did a run on me. This time, I shot to kill,
going to one knee and turning it into a flaming winged meteor that arced
over my head and shot off into the trees.
Pan or Colpitts, whatever he was, got me by surprise by tilting his scepter
forward and releasing a blast of light. It blinded me, but before it hit I
knew he’d released more than light. He’d hit me with a flying net that
wrapped me up and put me down. Since Carlsonbonner had given me a net gun as
a piece of equipment that could capture rogue residents on this level, I
could only assume that Colpitts had something even more potent.
My vision cleared; I was down in the grass, circled by the lions. The
cherubs were now buzzing with happy coos, their gossamer wings tracing a
blurred oval in their flight above me. Parker was hurrying through the grass
to me. He still had his scepter and waved it over me when he reached me,
then he did something completely nuts and started dancing in a circle around
me. Like his cherubs, he was singing a crazy tune and whistling, and I began
to think of him more as a demented Peter Pan than any god named Pan.
He stopped suddenly; a serious expression painted his face. He decided to
address me. “Who sent you here? No one comes here.”
Buying time was a good idea as I couldn’t struggle loose from the sticky
net. “The Board hired me. It is about the killings of Board members.”
At that, his eyes ignited, his brow grew stormy. “The bastards. They sent
you here to kill me, didn’t they? Well, they’ll get their due just like
you’ll get yours.”
“No one sent me here to kill you. Skitch Rocco gave me your name.”
“Skitch Rocco. I heard they finished him.”
“He’s still around, and he’s more your kind of guy now. Look, I’m a
detective. Jack Michaels is my name. The Board put me on a hush-hush
investigation of the killings, but in this crazy place, I can’t make any
progress on the case. All I got is that Skitch said you might have an idea.”
“Perchance I do. I also have another idea. That is to put an end to you. No
choice, actually. No one is allowed access here, and you discovered a way
in.”
“So what if I know. I have no plans on returning here. I don’t even know
what you do. You sell fantasies, enhancements, or whatever. Why should I
care if you dreamed up those creepy cherubs and hang out here?”
“How dare you insult my babies or call them dreams. They’re real children,
I’ll have you know.”
“You mean you hooked real children into this web and have them flying around
here as naked vampires?”
“Of course, what a stupid question. It goes with the services I sell.”
“Now I see why no one wants to mention your name. You’re a child-sex perv.
The king of them.”
“Aren’t we moral, and that’s god not king. Those accusations certainly won’t
do. My babies will have to teach you proper manners, Mr. Michaels. First, I
must get the wine, and you’ll drink up. The effects are exquisite. You’ll be
floating on a pleasurable cloud. You’ll moan with ecstasy as my baby boys
penetrate your every orifice, and my little girls drink your blood, eat your
flesh, and torment you. You won’t be returning to trouble us, because when
we’re through, you’ll be completely mad.”
At that, he laughed wickedly, and I struggled fiercely, but the net only
pulled tighter, and one of Colpitt’s babies didn’t bother to wait for the
wine but fluttered down and sank her teeth into my shoulder. Blood spurted,
and I yelled as the bite hit some nerves, then I gave her a taste of her own
wickedness by turning my head and snapping at her arm. The bite tore some
skin, and she yipped and fluttered off.
Parker Colpitts paid no attention to this as he was busy playing Pan the
fairy, his step almost as light as a skip as he made his way to an altar by
one of the idols and poured out a golden goblet of wine. The cats remained
in a neat semi-circle in the grass, and though their eyes flamed, they
appeared to be only guards and not to be about to take part in the feeding
on my flesh. The cherubs were buzzing angrily now, as their wings had a way
of conveying emotion in their flutter. The bitten one had flown off to the
trees, leaving the others cautious. Patience, they could afford as they knew
I wouldn’t be able to resist once drugged. If the females were hungry, I saw
two males flutter dangerously close, but with barbed, erect penises.
Colpitts was on his way back, glowing scepter in one hand and the wine
goblet in the other. He looked thrilled about the whole deal. He walked up
smartly with a grin on his face.
“This is so perfect,” he said. “I never get to kill the paying customers.
But you didn’t pay and weren’t invited.”
“Anyone who would pay for your revolting services must be nuts.”
“Not so. The customer base is large. There are many services, many weirder
than weird fantasies to provide for. But my babies here are my little
family, and we dislike having our nest invaded.”
“But you can’t kill me. I have the authority of the Board, and this place
isn’t real either.”
“Hah. The Board is nothing to me. They can’t even keep themselves alive.
None of them would dare oppose me. Nearly all of them use my services. They
wouldn’t want their nasty little secrets to get out in public, would they?
So it’s time to drink the good stuff, Jack. The fun is about to begin.”
Colpitts went down on one knee as he attempted to keep holding his scepter
in one hand and reach over to pour poison wine on my lips with the other. I
tightened my lips, assuming that even a drop of it would be deadly, but
Colpitts never got to pour it. Unexpectedly, the sky darkened via a flash to
the negative. The ground shook. The goblet fell from his hand to the grass.
He ended up on both knees, supporting himself by planting the scepter in
front of him.
The short quake ended, the gloom remained, and Colpitts looked about as
though he expected an attack. Then I saw a bright, white, oval orb of light
up at the tree line and the ghost. She was beautiful as before and a full
woman, but winged like an angel as though she’d adapted herself to Colpitts’
home world. At the sight of her, the small lions howled and ran back toward
the idol. The cherubs flowed up in the air in a column, then dispersed as
they raced off to the far tree line and disappeared in the foliage.
“Oh darn,” Colpitts said nasally. “That horrid ghost woman is going to spoil
my fun again.”
Getting up, he began to stumble toward the idol, but he didn’t make it. The
ghost woman floated to him on wings and mist. On reaching him, she seized
the jeweled top of his scepter. Light flashed like an exploding star, and I
was blinded again. A minute passed, and when my vision cleared, she was
gone. Only Parker Colpitts remained. He was sitting on the ground over by
the lion idols, his scepter fallen at his side with its jewel-top dimmed.
The net he’d blasted around me broke away like rotten rope. A glance around,
then I was up and running, and before I got to him, I had the net gun out.
Suddenly realizing what I was up to, he reached for his scepter, but my shot
was already out, and the net floated in smoothly and wrapped him up. His
cherubs buzzed in a circle near the tree line, and the lions had crept up
nearby in the grass, but they now appeared to be only fearfully observing,
not planning an attack.
“Got you, Colpitts. If you don’t cooperate, it’ll mean I take you in.”
“No, you can’t do that,” he pleaded. “I’ve barely been in my body for years.
A sudden unplanned reunion could kill me.”
At that point, I was looking over the net gun's settings. I ran my finger on
a slider, and the net squeezed tight on him and made him squeal. Then, for a
moment, the Parker Colpitts I’d been seeing vanished, and I saw a vision of
another – the real Colpitts, his emaciated body and aging, withered face
pinioned in a web of connections pinching his skin from his toes to his
temples. The eyes were staring and horrible, and fortunately dreaming this
world rather than the one he was really in.
“You were going to torment me with those horrid babies of yours, Colpitts.
Why should I do any better for you? You’re a monster; those cherub things of
yours are real children, and you turned them into demons. I ought to erase
you right now.”
“Hah,” Colpitts said, retaining some arrogance. “What difference do you
think it would make. The Board would have a replacement for me within a
week. I’m only a supplier; it’s the Pinnacle City public that demands the
perversions. They’re always hungry for more. It’s the only way to break the
rules in this place.”
“Unfortunately, you’re probably right. But you’ll answer my questions, or
it’ll be over for you. The first question is, who was that woman? Who is
that ghost? I’ve been seeing her everywhere.”
“She is no one. I mean, technically. She was once Lisha Yanch, the first
President of the Board. She couldn’t do the job or bear the secrets of this
place. Lisha Yanch killed herself and uploaded her mind to this level in a
fantasy world.”
“Yeah, well. I see her all around the building. I thought this level was
contained?”
“Used to be. Now there are ghosts everywhere. It has been like that since
the building intelligence, Adam 1X, got disturbed. There is leakage of stuff
on all levels and crossovers of reality. Ghosts everywhere.”
“Skitch Rocco said I had to see you for a step up. Give me the map. The one
with the route to the top floor.”
“Top floor. You came for that. Sure, I can give it to you … it’s the same as
giving you a poison apple. I mean, if you figure out how to read it and
actually try to go up there. No one even knows who or what is there except
that they’ll kill you long before you even get there. Sooner or later,
they’ll kill me too, if it is they behind the killings. Whoever it is has to
be really powerful. Not a clue so far that panned out to anything. And the
killings are so effective, I would admire whoever is behind them if I
weren’t possibly a target myself.”
“You were never much of a suspect in my mind. It has been like someone
wanted to lead me to you to disturb and distract me. Or was perhaps hoping I
would meet my end in corruption or death here. So I will be leaving you. My
advice is to exit this place and perversion. Leave them to appoint someone
else to manage the sickness of the population.”
“You aren’t one of them and don’t understand the Board. They would kill me
right away if any moral compunction came to the fore. They have none, and
they would replace me quickly if I left. Only I can’t leave; they would
never authorize it.”
“You are right that they don’t like retirement, just ask Thor Carlsonbonner.
Speaking of him, he tried to erase me, too. So I will be dealing with him
shortly.”
“Ah, Thor Carlsonbonner … I checked him out before because he purchased no
sexual services. His dreams are something else, and those filthy Board
members are all having gay sex with him in the real world. Watch out for
him. He’s somehow involved in the killings. I have that feeling.”
“I have the feeling you may be right.”
“Okay, take the map if you want, but I think it leads to a place in the
Market. Doesn’t take you directly to the top but to some other key you
need.”
+++
Parker Colpitts delivered the map, and I reached the exit point. It was time
to get out of the pervo jungle. The cherubs spun nearby, and many more
appeared from the trees. Their buzzing wings whispered a strange goodbye,
and their fangs could have been called almost preferable to what I was about
to face, which was Carlsonbonner at the octagonal window.
He was there when I arrived. He’d either searched and returned or simply
waited. It was like I had been thrown through endless smoke rings of mist to
suddenly snap on my feet before him, and he had a new weapon in his hands.
Not a net gun but an energy weapon that shrunk me to half his size as he
pulled a portable net from his jacket pocket.
He relied on fear, that my quick, short stature would leave me disarmed. But
he made a mistake. Because I spoke, saying, “I assume Stone Sangalang had
this in mind all along.”
He laughed, and it was a foolish victory laugh. “Stone Sangalang,” he
repeated jovially.
But he didn’t look behind him as he said it, and I saw the mist spin, and
even in my tiny state, I knew what it meant and raced through
Carlsonbonner’s legs. It was, for some reason, the most humiliating moment
of my life. Being a tall man, I’d never expected to be an elf. It brought
pride home like a rocket coming in to destroy my virility, but the shame
ended as I went through the window and became my regular size while falling.
I landed in Stone Sangalang’s fantasy world or shell, finding myself in a
grey blank. Like an empty desert that stretched off to infinity. It was
nothing. It was unformed. Stone Sangalang had no fantasy world, except that
I was in it and knew Thor Carlsonbonner was coming in to join me in this
nowhere. There would be no place to hide.
Rather than think, I acted, and did a fast draw on the net gun, and as
Carlsonbonner came tumbling out from nothing to nowhere nearby, I fired on
him. The net gloved him neatly, and he got balled up as he rolled. But it
wasn’t holding; his arms were tearing away sections of the webbing. Before
he could get completely free, I dived in on him and pulled his net gun out
of his belt.
I wanted to get into a position to fire, but he had speed, shaking off the
loose webbing and going for his weapon as he charged. His attack was skewed
but hit me, sending the web gun flying, and then he was spinning around for
a shot at me. A blast of white heat ripped skin off my left shoulder, and I
spun, fell, and rolled. Drawing my own gun and blasting him as I did.
He was somewhat impervious. In this nothing world, he was dressed exactly as
security boss Carlsonbonner, but his powers were still superhuman to an
extent. His hair stood up electrified as I nailed him with a power blast. He
was knocked back a bit but not stopped. He got me by surprise by not firing
his gun but throwing it hard so it bounced off my temple and knocked me to
my knees. Another charge, and he was on me like a mean bear, almost tearing
my right arm from its socket. I fought back, and it turned into a desperate
wrestling match in the dirt. Carlsonbonner, in his zeal to rip me apart,
forgot about his own net gun, while I tried to move the fighting in its
direction.
He pinned me down, his spittle on me as I gazed up at a swirl of grey and
dust that was the sky. Thor was choking me now, but opportunity came when he
drew back for a hard blow. He intended to punch my lights out, but I moved
my head and got loose as he plowed knuckles into the dirt. Doing a roll, I
got his net gun, swung up and blasted him, and this time, when the web was
locked in, I fired again, getting a double lock on him.
Carlsonbonner was balled up on the ground, and I took a minute to dust
myself off and soothe my wounded shoulder. Then I went over, rolled him up
in a squat position, and sat in the dirt a ways from him.
The tightened netting distorted his face, and he was still grimacing along
with it. He looked totally foolish. My fast thinking had been correct in
that he had armed himself with the more powerful net gun to take me down.
But why was he so angry? It was time for an interview.
“Thor, are you nuts or something. When I went into your fantasy world, you
were cleared. You didn’t fit the profile of a killer until you decided to
profile yourself.”
“No. I wasn’t cleared. I was convicted. Because you’ll tell Stone Sangalang
and the Board about my world and spoil my retirement.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“My plan has always been to build that world and spend more time there.
Especially since they don’t want to let me leave Pinnacle City in any
retirement. Once they find out, they’ll destroy my world to spur me to spend
my time on the job. That’s why I’m starting to hate this place. They want to
kill everyone else, but they want me to live forever as security chief.”
“So, you have information that the Board is doing the killings of its own
members?”
“No. But I assume it’s one or some of them. Maybe in collaboration with the
top floor.”
“What’s on the top floor now?”
“Don’t know. Never did. Except that it changed a year ago. I have access to
some raw security reads. Not surveillance. Something tremendously powerful
is up there. I mean it is more powerful than it used to be.”
“Why were you protecting Colpitts? Trying to get me for visiting him?”
“I was doing my job. Stone and pretty much the whole Board prohibit any
access to Colpitts.”
“Yeah. Colpitts and Skitch say the same thing. Some big changes took place
here not so long ago. All sorts of strange things are happening in this
building. That virtual level isn’t even contained. There are ghosts of dead
people in this building. People who uploaded themselves there initially.”
“More than that. There have been disasters everywhere. Bigger ones than they
told you about. The Board isn’t just looking for a killer. They brought you
in, figuring if you got to the bottom of that, the source of the other
problems would be there too.”
“Okay, that’s what we’re working on now. You’re going to help me read a map.
The Board won’t be told anything about your fantasy world. Also, it won’t be
mentioned that Stone Sangalang has a blank one. He’s not to know what we did
here.”
“Do you think his blank world is of any significance?”
“Possibly. But he's an elder and tied to the real world. Maybe his fantasy
is the life he's living.”
Two days passed before the arranged meeting with Stone Sangalang up on the
eightieth floor in a public area. It was the VIP Lake, a large indoor body
of water. The setting was pseudo-outdoor with a golf course, false sun, and
breeze … the whole deal. It wasn’t exactly the eighty-first floor but the
south section of it, which stretched up four floors as a huge lakeside
sculpture titled 'The Vortex' spun up to the false sky. The Zenith Hotel by
the lake also rose four floors in a portion, and it was ultra-glamorous, and
another of those areas in the city's class structure where only certain
people could get in. Thor Carlsonbonner accompanied me, and as I walked down
the lakeside walk with him, I noticed the glances we picked up. People here
clearly thought of Carlsonbonner as not a member but more a staff person,
who, unfortunately, had to be allowed in. When the glances shifted to me, it
was more like they weren’t quite sure if I met the standard, though they
seemed to peg me as one of them, but with a problem where accompaniment by
the security chief was required.
Stone had a table in the portion of the patio that ran all the way out to
the water’s edge, and he was dressed in casual clothing for once and
accompanied by his secretary Barbi Carvalhana. Barbi was dressed in a tennis
outfit, her blond hair breeze-blown, and her tanned skin a bit sweat-slick
in the cool breeze, which meant she’d been playing. Stone, though, was like
a stone; he’d probably played with her and yet never worked up a sweat. He
was too perfect, but as a Board president, I supposed that was expected.
We sat down, and I was introduced to Barbi. Thor waved over a waiter. He
attended to me first, thinking I was of more importance. All I ordered was a
martini, while I glanced with dislike at the fawning waiter. He wore one of
those newer outfits that fit too tightly on the upper body and hips, with
sleeves and pant legs that flared out too loosely. A sissy way of showing
off a man’s body.
I drew a lot of glances from people at other tables. The obvious reason
being they all knew who Stone was and wondered who I might be. They were all
out of earshot, so unless they read lips, they didn’t find out.
A lot of small talk followed, and we only got down to some business when
Barbi left to deal with some business calls. Her legs had a baked tone, and
I watched her walking by the water's edge while Stone spoke.
Stone wasn’t as cool in talk as he looked, but rather had some urgent things
to mention. “We’ve had some quakes in the higher floors. Work crews and
robot gangs stretched thin, fixing structural damage. More emanations, too,
plus failures in numerous systems, including power feeders. I'd better not
find out Skitch Rocco is behind it.”
“It’s not him,” Thor said. “That’s settled, and Sam McGettigan is seeing
that their demands are being met. This is something bigger. Perhaps the
killers are sending out another strong message or warning.”
“Warning. Two Board members were murdered while you were off on a lark in
the virtual level. Drake Cunningham got chopped to pieces by a cleaning
robot, which is supposed to be impossible. It’s also supposed to be
impossible to get cooked in your own shower, but that is exactly what
happened to Shez Fady. What irks me most is that whoever it is just kills
people and damages things. No message is sent with demands or what it is
about.”
Thor shrugged his shoulders. “We’re following another lead. Sure, it might
be terrorism, but keep in mind that whoever it is lives here and relies on
Pinnacle City. To destroy it would be self-destruction, so these can only be
scare tactics.”
“The scare tactics are working. The associations are demanding action and
answers. We can’t replace Board members overnight. Many of those positions
are highly specialized. What’s most frightening is that the Toronto city
government is demanding that we allow their police investigators inside.
They’ve detected the anomalies here and are concerned. It will be over my
dead body. We’ve never allowed them inside. We need results soon.”
Finishing my drink, I put the glass down and took charge of the situation.
“We have a new lead. A map we are decoding. We are making progress, but this
isn’t a standard case; it has all sorts of twists and turns.”
Stone took a slug of his own drink, raised his hand in a gesture of
emphasis, but never got to answer as Barbi came back to the table. “An
urgent call just came in from Penrose Pool. He has a situation in the Rich
Residential. He wants Thor up there to take a look at it.”
Stone grimaced and looked at me. “Situation is Pool’s term for another body.
I want you to attend and look at the scene. I’ve had our forensics team work
on all the other scenes, yet we're tracking nothing. Maybe there is
something we’re missing.”
+++
Rich Residential wasn’t far from where we were. Thor and I raced up, the
whoosh of the elevator tube still in our ears when we arrived at the
destination. It was a huge arched door, sealed like a vault. I’d been led to
believe that Thor was the building's main security authority, but we ended
up talking through a camera link to a security chief named Katz, who didn’t
want to let me through.
“Just open the damn door, Katz,” Carlsonbonner said.
“That guy is not a member, Carlsonbonner. He can’t come in.”
“So it looked like I wouldn’t get in, then Penrose Pool, your standard
well-dressed chunkster of a middle-aged white guy, showed on the screen, and
a section of the vault door clicked away like puzzle pieces and allowed us
entry.
Twenty minutes later, we were standing at a scene of minor destruction. A
hidden alcove had been discovered running off a large air-car port. The wall
had crumbled suddenly, and the inside was especially interesting. Penrose
Pool, a sickened look on his face, refused to enter. Thor nearly turned
green when he did, but I was excited at a possible clue and ignored the
horror. Though there was a body, it wasn’t in that ripe stage that is
unforgettable as far as the nostrils are concerned. It stank and was
withered all right. And it was still planted in the indents in the slanted
wall where it had been set up. Naked, emaciated, and the skin a sickly grey,
the person was very dead. His neck and his chest had been bitten and chewed
like a vampire got to him. Half of the life support contacts and tubes were
still connected, with only key ones to the torso and brain ripped out. So it
had been murder. I could see that someone had blasted a section of the wall
and gotten inside to do it.
Thor spoke nasally as he was holding his nose. “Who in the hell would that
be?”
“It’s Parker Colpitts,” I said. “Looks like he talked to the wrong person.”
“Yes. That person was you. Say, some other things were connected to him in
there. I count about thirty smaller bed indents, but the killers took the
bodies of those things, whatever they were.”
“They were children,” I said. “And by the way, they aren’t dead.”
“What. Children! I’ll have a search and rescue done for them.”
“You'd better tell your personnel not to approach them and to stun them and
cuff them when found.”
“Why would we do that?”
“You have to report to the Board, don’t you. Well, let them know Colpitts’
cherubs are on the loose. A bunch of small vampires. They killed him after
someone blasted in and cut them loose. Most likely, there will be a few more
bodies to clean up. They may have other victims already.”
Thor Carlsonbonner went from green to pale white, turned, and stared at a
rather stunned Penrose Pool. Then he got on the wire to Stone and hurried
away.
+++
Colpitts’ death didn’t exactly break my heart, and neither did the fact that
Thor had to do some real work for a change. He put the place on high alert,
which was no alert as far as the residents were concerned. Though there was
now a genuine scare at Penrose Pool’s level, as a report flashed in
immediately. The cherubs, now a dirty bunch of escaped and mostly naked
kids, had torn up a couple of people, then somehow disappeared into the
off-surveillance woodwork.
So the security news of the day became the horrible and unexplained deaths
of a few snobs, and the fourth-floor security command was sparsely populated
while Carlsonbonner had every spare guard in on the building search. My time
was booked with Junko Gold, and we were in another of his investigative
rooms working on the map. To read the map, we had to spend time finding it
on the object Colpitts had given me, which was a flat pane with some brand
of cuneiform writing on an unknown substance. It passed from the virtual
world as a speck that appeared in my eye and enlarged on removal. Junko used
a chemical technique to enlarge it to about the size of a thumbnail. He was
studying its image on a screen. An hour had yielded nothing, and the map
remained a mystery. The basic problem was that there were some strange
symbols, but they weren’t a map and didn’t translate to any known language
or code.
Working with the flame-haired expert and listening to him mutter constantly
in a British accent gave me a headache. But the difficulties actually worked
in my favor as I needed to buy a little time. As he grew deeply absorbed in
his work, I took a break, saying I needed a snack. Once out in the open
areas of the fourth floor, I didn’t head for any lounge to eat but rather
one to relax in while I had another map play-through in my head. That was
the map of where I’d been taken for the white room visit to the virtual
level.
Images of the fourth floor, areas I knew and others blacked out, settled in
my brain. I saw it all aligning around the core and my own current position,
then the position of that particular special area. The security overlay
showed me what access was needed, which was nothing more than an alteration
on the access fob Thor had already given me. I ran my tablet, setting those
codes as I moved through doors and corridors. The few workers remaining on
site did not question me as I walked from one area to another and finally
through a door to the connect area. It was empty, not being in current use.
The one thing I wanted was in the white room, and that was the net. I’d
already calculated that it did all the work, while I could duplicate the
programming of the other equipment. Disabling the security feature on it, I
left it in my pocket, then returned to the lab and Junko Gold.
I found him eating a sandwich and drinking coffee while images flashed by
lightning-fast on the big screen. He was one of those people who talks with
a full mouth, and he spoke, saying. “I made a breakthrough. The symbols were
not a map; the actual map I found was hidden in a microscopic area of the
piece. I’m running a scan on it, but I don’t know how long it will take.”
I didn’t get a chance to answer. The screen suddenly froze, and a message
scrolled by – Final Result Available.
I raised my eyebrows optimistically. “Ah, let me see,” he said. “The map is,
in fact, just a general map of the Market level of this complex.”
“That’s it. What in the hell use is that? It looks like Colpitts scammed
me.”
“Maybe – wait a second – got it.”
As I watched, he applied an overlay that shrank the symbols he had
previously thought meaningless. They weren’t, but laid out a route on the
map.”
+++
Back at my guest condo, I had dinner and watched the Pinnacle City news
channels. As usual, the cat hovered over my shoulder and hopped down to
swipe the last scraps off my plate. What passed for news in Pinnacle City
was mostly celebrity stuff, and though they never mentioned it, the featured
international stars were residents. Regular local news was plain propaganda,
with the only investigative story being speculation on the recent flurry of
activity by security and the recent deaths. One scene showed Thor
Carlsonbonner and three of his men dashing valiantly across an open court,
but the video was quickly blurred out as they reached the street running off
to the side. A flash of weapons fire showed, and then a grey blank.
Checking the news archives, I noticed that the murders of Board members were
never reported as such. But it was easy to draw up pages of quick photos of
those that had been erased simply by tracking the obituaries. Sipping some
ice water, I flashed through more news and felt generally disgusted. Out in
the city, the local news was gritty and phony, charged with blood, emotion,
and scandal or all of those wonderful things that bring in subscribers. But
at least there was news, and you knew what was going on. Pinnacle City
really had only celebrity and world news. There was some bad politics for
viewing. You could actually watch recordings of some Board meetings if you
could stay awake through them. And who would want to when the meetings made
for public consumption were staged for that?
The last article I looked at was the obit of Parker Colpitts. Already up, it
showed a kindly photo of him and told a tale of his charity work with
children and how he had lived as a recluse for the last several years.
Colpitts was named an irreplaceable Board member. Really, what it all meant
here was that news passed through filters, and culture beyond the virtual
level’s fantasies was real-life networking, events, or social gatherings. To
know what happened at any major event, you had to be there in person.
Regardless of that, my plans for the evening didn’t involve real life but a
secret journey into the virtual worlds. I am perhaps a real-life person, as
before doing any of that shit, I always take a shower as though something is
not quite clean about it. But in the modern world and Pinnacle City, too,
what is there that is clean? Everyone and everything is to some extent
dirty. No one is really real – all are false in a number of ways … many of
them chemical or attachments and enhancements and transplants and plastic
surgery. A long time ago, only the beautiful people were enhanced; today,
the ugly people have morphed into more forms than an army of space monsters
could muster.
I wore shorts only and sat back in an easy chair. Some masked communication
with my office back in the city allowed me to set up a security perimeter
with some lasers. Only my cat would be allowed to pass, as this assignment
was dangerous. After all, they’d just found Parker Colpitts’ body and
finished him. They could do the same to me. One advantage was that no one
knew my plans. Again, a disadvantage would be that I was going in with
nothing but the return wand. No special weapon or net gun, as I hadn’t
swiped anything other than the contact net and patch that allowed wand use.
I wasn’t in a white or black room, so I wasn’t sure if it would even work.
It did, but not in a nice way. Instead of a quick transfer, I endured ten
minutes of a nightmare. Ugly demonic hallucinations like the delirium of an
alcoholic or the withdrawal phases of an addict. I hated it, but wasn’t
surprised, since the technology altered the brain in ways never intended. I
got there, and in time, my feet were planted on the archway, and I walked
along to the click-apart door. Pausing at the misty window, I considered my
actions. I was really breaking the rules, as it wasn’t really part of the
investigation. Sort of following my own personal interest in a woman.
Hunting a ghost.
The name I cracked and pursued was Lisha Yanch.
I hit the ground and stumbled. Getting up took time to orient myself. The
world I had arrived in didn’t take any immediate reality but kept shifting
through forms. I saw a forest, a lake, a city, and as soon as I appeared in
them, they vanished. It was like hallucinations rising in mist until all
that existed was some smoke of various realities. I caught the fragrance of
it in my nostrils, not offensive but like wood smoke. As I walked, I moved
through vast smoldering ruins. A dark road wound deep into them, and the
ruins were of a city. It was ancient and tarnished and from a period of
history beyond my education. Large collapsing structures of rectangular and
cylindrical shapes in all shades of grey and narrow stony streets running
off pedestrian ways into old alleyways that vehicles had likely never
entered.
I heard high winds and spine-tingling sounds, like bells or chimes, carried
on them. Ghostly whispers and words took shape in my mind, and though I
walked on the road, it led nowhere but into an endless universe of these
ruins. Figures were appearing in the distance, but they were always moving
quickly here and there, nearly out of sight, and were like shadows or
ghosts. It was like I was hearing their haunted voices in a PSI way. Yet
their haunted whispers didn’t really say anything but were more a voice of
the lost, like they’d lost their language, the meanings, and the form of
being. Not a place of suffering but an empty, lonely place without purpose.
I stopped and looked over my own form and noticed I was surprisingly
unchanged, being about the same as Jack in the real world. Looking up at the
sky, I saw dark orbs with a strange glow in the misty clouds, but no sun.
This was a land of darkness, and there was no sign of Lisha Yanch, though it
was her world or more than her world. Suddenly, I remembered the stories of
ghosts appearing in Pinnacle City and considered that the shifting forms of
this place were probably them. Spirits of the dead, drifting off from this
purgatory – the place people call home when fed into the machine, leaving
dead flesh behind.
The feeling of hopelessness grew near absolute; there was no progress, just
an endless journey down that road, so I took out the wand and began to see
if I could read an area of escape. Getting out of that place was becoming
paramount. When I lifted it to see if I could get a direction from its force
lines, it was like magic of some variety. Like sunlight blasting outward,
altering the purgatory into a sudden city reality. So, moments later, I was
standing in a modern city square, amid tall, gleaming towers. There were no
people, or rather, there was one person; a woman sitting on a bench by a
distant fountain.
She wasn’t aware of my presence but sat there quietly tossing seeds to a
white bird; the flowing dark hair and profile were unmistakable. It was the
ghost or dead woman, but she looked anything but dead. As I began to walk
towards her, my head began to spin, and for some reason, I looked up, and
the light gleaming off all the windows dazzled me. I thought I saw a million
faces staring behind those windows, and as I dropped my eyes, I studied the
buildings. A city from a period, perhaps a hundred years back. But I wasn’t
back in time, because back then the streets would’ve been teeming with
people. Here they were all locked behind a million faceted windows. Ghosts
again, I thought, but in an altered setting.
She was aware of me now and stood by the fountain. I was close enough to see
the expression of surprise on her face and the perfection of her dark oval
eyes. She had a delicate frown and pout developing on her face, and the
folds of her dress caught the breeze and her flesh like more illusion. As I
reached her, I could see she didn’t quite know how to react. There was
something she didn’t understand.
And she spoke first. “I tried to help you get away from them. You should
have left, but I see it’s too late now.”
It suddenly hit me. She, for some reason, was assuming me dead like her.
“They didn’t get me. I’m still alive. I came here to thank you.”
“For what?”
“For saving me from Parker Colpitts.”
“How can you be alive? This is Pinnacle City purgatory. The living can’t
enter here.”
“So that’s it. Entering wasn’t easy; I almost didn’t get in. I came through
Thor’s window, but it took a long time for things to jell. It is possible to
enter. Possible to get out too because you get out and travel the building.”
“Some of us get out now, yes. For a period of time. Since the change.”
That comment interested me, but her eyes seemed so deep I had a feeling of
falling and almost forgot what to say. “This change. At the top. What is it?
I mean, I don’t even know what was up there to change. No one will say.”
Her eyelids fluttered like she was wondering if she should tell me anything.
The cleavage of her right breast was highlighted as she turned. I saw a red
mark from the fabric pressed into her skin, there like she was real flesh
and blood. I could smell her soft perfume. “The old building was silent.
Adam 1X, the governing artificial intelligence, has always been a silent
character. Like a spirit of the building running things, but never visibly
present. The place is organic, not really like a building, with all systems
powered and feeding on and back into the environment. Adam 1X’s primitive
mind existed at the pinnacle. His spiritual self was everywhere throughout
the building, like a subconscious level. Everything ran smoothly, quietly
then.”
“So a major event changed things?”
“Yes, but no one knows what the event was. Anomalies, strange happenings,
emanations, and tremors followed. Things you can feel, too, in your mind,
because I know the behavior of people has changed for the worse. It was
actually better for me. It released me to wander in the building, to see
real people instead of the mostly malformed specters that reside here.”
She got up, and we began to walk. I put my arm around her, and she didn’t
resist but expected it. Cooler shadows fell on us as we left the courtyard
and walked down an empty city street. It was bizarre because when I looked
up at the high glare off the windows, I always knew they were there … eyes
behind the glass watching. I finally spoke. “You say specters. I see no one
here but you. But I get the feeling those buildings are full, and they are
watching us.”
“They are. Those ones are of no use to me. All of them are half-formed. Like
ghosts with little personality. Distressed or mourning. I was the first, you
see. I uploaded myself into a special world, better than all the others, but
the Board punished me for escaping and worked until it was destroyed. It
went from my beautiful city to purgatory. Then the others came, and they
didn’t upload clean. There was a wave of deaths some time ago. It was
fashionable to the death upload. But they didn’t know they were aiming for
purgatory. They got transported here and mostly distorted to creepy things,
often locked inside the rooms of those buildings. For most of them, this
place is eternal and an empty hell. But some of them can wander now like me.
They spook or frighten people and upset the Board but do little damage.”
We walked, and for some odd reason, I fell into a meditative romantic state
with her, not into any purgatory. Her city still had small, beautiful
gardens along the streets, and another one lay ahead. We strolled in past
some tall grass and ferns. Looking ahead, I had the odd feeling that the
city created itself as we moved into it, with distance always sliding away
into a malformed perspective. Stopping by another fountain, I got carried
away and embraced her. Her kiss felt absolutely real; the world that she’d
created still held substance, and for both of us. We sat there, and I can’t
remember what happened, but I know that maybe half an hour passed.
She suddenly pushed me away, like we were doing something forbidden. I gave
my head a small shake like I was trying to return to reality. “So the Board
killings. Does that have to do with the change at the top? Did you ever see
who does the killing?”
“No. No one ever does. The killings started at the same time as the other
changes. In my mind, the actual physical Board, now Stone Sangalang and his
big gang, are more like the bottom of the building. Like, maybe those
murders are just another anomaly. Like things have to change at the bottom
too.”
“It would be more than anomalies. Someone is a killer. Someone plans the
murders in detail. Someone warped.”
Lisha didn’t answer; instead, she backed off from me. A gust of wind hit us,
and I turned and looked up in the direction she was looking. A man was there
two floors up … or rather, the form of a man. He had no color, more a
transparency bleeding into the background, and he was moving along a wide
ledge, coming in our direction.
“What’s that?” I said.
“Another type of anomaly, I think … or it’s someone. Wait, no such thing has
been seen here before. Someone is after you.”
And on that score, she was right as the man jumped and flashed to the
ground. He raced towards us, but his target was me, and in a moment, we were
grappling with one another there in the street. This thing or guy was huge
and shocking. By shocking, I mean his touch and blows stung and hurt like he
was transferring an electric charge to me. Other guys would’ve been
overpowered, but I used my fighting experience to keep him off. He was
trying hard to wrestle me to the ground, and I managed to keep knocking him
back with hard punches and switches to toss him free of me. I saw Lisha
looking on like she was horrified.
The blur of a man pulled the blur of a gun from his coat. Grabbing the
weapon, I forced his arm in the air, and we fought over the gun. That battle
ended when Lisha ran in and threw her arms around him from behind. Contact
between the two caused an explosion of light, but the attacker got the worst
of it and was thrown down. He’d lost his gun; it was lost altogether as it
disappeared into thin air when it flew from his hand. I moved over to knock
him some when he got up, but he rolled away, got up running, and disappeared
down the street.
Lisha ran up, her hair all mussed. “You have to return right away,” she
said. “They’re killing you. Follow me. I know an exit point nearby.”
I had the wand out as I ran, and it wasn’t far. We went up the steps of a
huge Art Deco hotel facade, and the exit point was there in the lobby. No
time for goodbyes, as a moment later I was tumbling through mist and the
window and then racing down that long catwalk to the exit that would drop me
back in my body.
I got out of Lisha Yanch’s dream world and into my own nightmare reality.
The first thing I became aware of was the sweat soaking my body and the
pains of my sour stomach and squirming intestines. An oppressive force
pressed down on me, making it difficult for me to open my eyes. It was
similar in feel to a slow-burning wind cranking down like a crusher or like
atmospheric pressure suddenly becoming as heavy as granite. I couldn’t move.
I understood how it was that I’d imprinted into Lisha Yanch’s world when she
claimed only the dead got in there. I was being killed slowly, and it had
probably started right after I left my body. The killer had selected me as
his next victim, so perhaps I’d become an honorary member of the Board.
Wisps of ugly dreams passed in my mind; I was blacking out … with the
feeling of my entire body starting to spin like a wheel. Too weak to fight
back, it seemed like the end had come. Then bright flashes opened my eyes
again. I remembered the defensive perimeter I had set up. It had fired and
hit someone. A moment later, I saw something small flash through the air. It
landed on my chest, and being mostly blinded, I couldn’t see it, but I knew
what it was … my pet cat Tigger. I felt his claws in my chest, and then his
paw swatting my face like he did at times when he wanted to wake me up.
Likely, the laser flashes had convinced him of danger. He kept pawing at me,
then I felt a sudden release and was able to move my head.
As I began to rise, I saw the cat still on my chest. He’d caught the net of
contacts in his claw and had pulled it off my head. He was now trying to
shake it loose. Bringing up my hand, I saw blood oozing from the pores of my
skin. The rest of my arm was the same. I was sweating blood.
A moment later, the cat flung the net away from his paw and jumped off me.
Using the last of my strength, I rose and stumbled toward the laser
perimeter and shut off the weapon. I could barely stand, but I got far
enough to get an idea of what had happened. Just beyond the perimeter, a
body lay crumpled on the floor. Part of the chest and skull had been burned
away by my protective lasers, and I could see it wasn’t a man because the
interior foam flesh and webbing was that of an android. A big gun-like
device with a huge lens had been set up just behind the android. It had also
been struck by the lasers, which had blackened the lens and killed its power
circuits. I gathered that the android had been doing a slow form of beam
kill on me. He hadn’t finished the job, and I knew if the other killings
were examples, the final result would have been something horrifying. My
cat’s decision to leap inside to me must have caused the android to get too
close and trigger the laser defenses.
A horrid itch and burn pain crawled over me with the sticky blood and
dehydration. I managed to push through and collapse by the suite courtesy
phone. Just before I passed out, I dialed the Board emergency number.
+++
My involvement was supposed to end at that point, with me an honorary victim
and a serial killer’s trophy. Even Stone Sangalang had the sympathy to offer
me a chance to leave at that point. I didn’t take it. Instead, I was back in
the swing of things after a painful week in and out of a healing chamber,
and another week on a special diet. That type of healing is extremely
painful. Surface flesh, veins, and skin layers came back as cellular damage
was repaired. Even the injections to numb the flesh left me with periodic
waves of agony. My eyelids saved my eyes, but had to be almost fully
regrown. The android had apparently been in the process of slow-beaming me
into some horror sculpture of flesh. It would have been a terrifying
artistic statement for the Board had the job been completed. Instead, I
became a testament as to why Pinnacle City healing, anti-aging, and
flesh-molding technology was considered the best in the world.
The next leg of the investigation was now underway, and I was in the company
of Thor Carlsonbonner and Penrose Pool in one of Pool’s heavily guarded
condos. This one at the far end of the market was his public condo or
address, while he had other hidden addresses.
We sat on yet another Pinnacle City boat-deck balcony overlooking a pool. A
distant wraparound force shield marked the exterior of the east end of this
level, and beyond it, the bright sun shone on the surrounding city. On the
interior, my view was of a rooftop terrace running off into the greenery of
a small park and the colorful, corkscrew jumble of the Market's buildings.
From my perspective, the Market ran off into distant haze and, like other
things in Pinnacle City, appeared much bigger and more complex than one
would expect.
Pool was a pink-faced, nervous sort with permanently pursed lips and a
comb-back that looked like it had been cloned on. He wore no hat, though his
perfectly pressed pale suit seemed to suggest a need for one. Pool had a
problem with his eyes because he wore contacts that made them look glazed.
You always got the feeling that he couldn’t quite see you. Thor
Carlsonbonner, on the other hand, could see too well and was always looking
around like a beat cop. He made me nervous. He also overdressed. A casual
suit now and then would suit him, but today he had another of his security
uniforms on. This one could be mistaken for an admiral’s outfit in its
ostentatious design. Perhaps Carlsonbonner saw himself as captain of the
great ship Pinnacle City. If so, it was unfortunate that the real power was
a gang of pirates called the Board.
As I looked across the ornate gold table at them, I wondered if the wealthy
Pool was a boyfriend of Carlsonbonner, but that thought turned me off, and I
quickly shifted my mind back to the case and enjoyed a couple of drinks.
Pool had been jawing on his tongue and biting his nails for some time over
my near-death experience. Mainly because he feared his own death and a
killer who would come up with an especially cruel way to finish him.
Carlsonbonner was perhaps too thick-skinned to worry about his own death.
Being more the type that figured he wouldn’t know hell or have complaints
when he was dead.
“You never gave me a final report on that android,” I said to Carlsonbonner.
He cleared his throat, and Pool looked on with morbid interest. “Mainly
because the report is just more mystery. It was even more advanced than some
of the androids people like Penrose here own or used to own, as he has now
divested himself of his high-level androids. It had no imprint that we could
detect, and its control core disintegrated. It had been set to self-destruct
when its job was done. You were lucky in killing it off before it turned you
into a pile of Jell-O.”
“Saved by a frisky cat,” Pool noted. “With your luck, you should be hanging
out at the casinos.”
Carlsonbonner continued. “We can’t even prove the android is from Pinnacle
City.”
“The killer sent it, and the killer lives here. You told me yourself that
unknown stuff exists on those secure mechanical levels near the top. It must
have come from there.”
“That’s a big problem,” Pool said. “No access there. Not human access. If
the killer can get in there, he may have discovered advanced technology and
is using it. Perhaps this whole issue began as a security problem up there
and continues as one. Someone gained access to higher levels and screwed
things up, or even worse, took over.”
“Well, that’s what I’m working on in this case. We have the map here, but it
all leads to more pieces of the puzzle that take human access higher.
Suppose I get up to those higher levels. That could all be a wild goose
chase, too. This killer has been playing games with us. Another thing that
occurred to me. Can’t we talk directly to that artificial intelligence, Adam
1X, that runs this ecosystem? He should be able to pinpoint the killer.”
Thor shrugged. “As I told you right at the beginning, we have access to all
Adam 1X’s data, at least temporarily. It has shown us nothing. Anything
related to the killings vanishes before we get it. Talking directly, we lost
that when the anomalies started happening. The AI mind functions quite well,
but it no longer talks to us as a formed personality.”
“Too bad. You need to get that problem serviced. In conference mode, Adam 1X
may become aware of data or info that could be grabbed to solve this case.”
Penrose Pool nodded in agreement. “The Board ordered Stone Sangalang to get
moving on that repair a long time ago. If he doesn’t start performing soon,
we’re going to move for a new president.”
Thor frowned. “Aren't you next in line for President? Wait a second. Stone
said something about Sam McGettigan. The union claims some of its key
service people disappeared underground. Maybe it's just a stall, and
McGettigan has been paid off by the killers.”
“Then it’s your job,” Pool said. “Do whatever you have to and get the job
done.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Move ahead with that now. You’ve got search capabilities
for most of this building. Find those service people. I’m going to work on
this floor, doing the route of the map.”
+++
Although the map displayed a route I would follow through the Market, the
start point was at the Maze Residential, a lower leg of it that, for some
reason, stretched down to the edge of the Market levels at the west end.
That was another thing I’d found out about Pinnacle City. What the Board
called a floor often wasn’t that at all. The supposedly nonexistent
thirteenth floor was the perfect one-level floor that spanned the building
horizontally. Most of the others didn’t do that at all. Some were at the
center, running a few levels; others were the same at the perimeter. There
was a lot of variation. Maze Residential, though, was simply the opposite of
variation in every way except that it spanned more than one floor. It was a
large condo town populated by middle-income earners. People who weren’t
filthy rich but connected enough to get Board approval to reside there.
The starting point was an outdoor juice bar called Fresh Start. I saw no
clues there and wondered why Fresh Start was the start point, if not a
joke. I guessed that following the route was essential somehow, or it
wouldn’t be shown. Probably a security feature, meaning if a person didn’t
follow it, the endpoint clues would remain hidden. Beyond the start point,
the area was a maze where everything looked like part of the same puzzle. I
barely got underway on the walk-through before getting lost and realizing I
needed device navigation to follow the route on the map. In the lower
section, streets of connected condo complexes stretched off under artificial
sunlight in a pseudo-beehive pattern. Absolutely, everything was a shift in
the same design theme. The decorative bronze doorknockers on one corner
might have a unique lion face, and on the next corner a leopard’s face. But
they would be essentially the same. That went for doors, windows, entry
walks, and courtyards. Decorative colored glass over the buzzer panels
changed from red to green to blue and so on, but they were always the same
panels. Even the bushes, flying insects, and birds looked all the same to
me.
Worst of all was the bland crowd of pedestrians, all of them dressed in
similar male or female business attire of a sleek sort and walking the same
look-a-like pure-bred dogs. People that dressed for work permanently. They
were distinguished in being undistinguished, and if they had any offbeat
tastes in sexuality, music, or culture, they did not display them outwardly.
All of them nodded in the same way, and all of them silently pointed
southeast when I asked the fastest way to the Market.
At least I thought it was southeast at first, but after a few blocks, I sat
on a bench in a parkette, took out the map, and scratched my head. My mind
simply wasn’t programmed for this area. I’d already gone off the map route,
probably because it didn’t list street names but only showed neat
directional lines. I was already circling back by error; my mind simply
couldn’t comprehend directions in this place, and I began to wonder if
everyone living here had been cloned for this place. It was middle-class
perfection of a certain brand, but not my brand. Perhaps it was created to
provide complete security of mind in its sameness. An interesting idea, but
it wasn’t my cup of java. Unleashing Parker Colpitts’ cherubs in a place
like this was an idea for fast improvement that came to my mind. But there
again, in this place, the chewed corpses would probably all look the same.
“Good thing I’m not in the bigger Maze higher up,” I thought, as I realized
this place wasn’t that big. Made me look like a fool, getting lost in it.
Coming alert, I did a quick calculation. An avenue for floater cars went
straight through to a tunnel to the Market. Follow it, then left, right,
left, and I’d hit the first target. Moving ahead at a brisk pace, I frowned
as I suddenly noticed that walking faster than others drew attention. Heads
were turning; an ankle-biter dog lunged and snapped at me. Another street of
this, and I came out on the avenue and stared in amazement. Traffic was
passing through, but every car was identical. They were sleek brown bugs
floating along at the same slow speed, all of them carrying the same two
passengers via auto-drive. At least it looked like the same two passengers
as everyone in the Maze had dark hair, trimmed about the same length, though
slightly longer for the ladies. It hit me with strange hypnotism … the light
brownstone official and business buildings and the light brown floating
stream of cars with the same bobbing heads … like I was in an anthill of
human make. It was what I would expect on visiting an android colony. Only
these were human beings.
As I walked along, cars would suddenly rise and shoot toward the dock slots
at the various head offices. The clicking of their parking brakes made me
feel like I was in a self-assembling puzzle. News tickers I passed displayed
business and select Board news inside a trimming of corporate ads. A
community center of a brown cubes-and-cylinders composition was ahead, and
the turn there would take me off the avenue to the first stop point near the
tunnel to the Market.
Another boring street, and I again began to wonder what the reason for this
walk-through map could be. Gaining access to the top of this city was a long
game, but I considered that maybe it had been set that way to keep the
riff-raff out. After all, there would be no end to the people trying to
access the top floors regarding some scheme or another if it were possible
to get there. This setup, though, even locked out the security chief and the
Board. Maybe it was simply intended that no one get there. The puzzle to the
top could have been created simply to identify people aiming for the top so
they could be picked off along the way.
Now I found I’d been walking on air. While I’d been considering things, the
last street had passed, and I was emerging on the first point. It was an
interior park, brightly lit by false sunlight. There were tall walls around
it to separate it from the condo areas. I was at the entry and could see
across the flowered beds to a huge memorial or possibly a religious statue.
Stepping forward slowly, I looked around. There were no people in the park
area, and the monument ahead loomed up in the spill of light. I didn’t know
what to read from it, mainly because, as I walked up and around it, there
was no plaque or engraved information as to what it was supposed to be. It
was similar to a huge Buddha, but this bald character had wicked features,
and his companion on the dais was a unicorn.
In my mind, the Buddha legend didn’t include unicorns, and this wasn’t a
prettified kiddie unicorn. It wasn’t even a horse but more like a shabby
goat. I knew that in Pinnacle City, there might be enough Buddhists to shake
a stick at, but not a whole lot of them. That particular religion had
declined worldwide, though it had not collapsed as the Islamic faith had.
Unless there was an ultra-rich Buddhist living in Pinnacle City, it likely
wasn’t religious in nature. If a civic monument, who was the person
represented, and where was the plaque? It probably wasn't that either, as
civic heroes don't have pet unicorns. The pinpoint of it seemed to be one
big, ugly work of art. Hidden away here in an enclosed park area. A huge and
forgotten design glitch constructed with Maze Residential.
Moving in close for an investigation, I did a second slow circle of it.
“Maybe I should take a read of it,” I thought, pulling out my M-Ray V tablet
connection to my office. I knew that would take time because my signal had
to be masked and ride with others. Patting the warm stone side, I waited,
but it was only fifty seconds. A small representation of the thing appeared
on the air-screen, prompting me to step back before reading the info feed.
Reason being it showed on my screen as just a big hollow rock. “Huh,” I
thought, looking up at the face, which now gave the appearance of staring
down at me. “It’s just a rock with a hologram coating it so it looks like a
piece-of-shit monument. The shielding must hide something in the interior.”
Hand on my chin, I pondered that question, and got caught partially by
surprise. Because the horn of the unicorn suddenly fired like a beam gun,
emitting a stream of fiery red stars that burst over me and knocked me for a
bounce over the grass. The surprise was partial because I’d been wearing a
force field tag inside my coat since the start of this outing. Thor had
provided it, as we both expected that I’d be ambushed along the way.
This one was a deadly ambush, too. It nearly penetrated the shield, knocked
me for a loop, and would have been instantly fatal to someone lacking
protection. My gun came into my hand even as I tumbled, but I ended up
stumbling farther back without firing as another blast nailed me. I had a
reason not to fire. That reason being the bursts were coming from a unicorn
horn that was only an image. No target presented itself unless I wanted to
blast away at a gargantuan rock.
The blasts soaked away the energy of my shield, so I got well back, knowing
it would take a while for a full recharge. It would operate on half power
for some time, but that wasn’t enough, as the heat factor of the bursts
would turn me into a cooked bird rather quickly. I spent time on a detailed
reading of the rock, which was well shielded by various substances to keep
my read ray from penetrating. There was a closed door right at the bottom,
hidden under the fake face, and I decided that was enough and began a mad
dash straight for it, firing my meanest disruptor beam as I ran. On a rock
that size, the return sound wave was a thunderous crack, and the shield
saved me from shattered eardrums. The rock's movement caused a mini-quake,
and I felt the ground shift as I got closer. With the focus shifted, I fired
a concentrated ray right where the handle of the heavy door was, and it was
effective. The beam slammed it hard, creating an immediate depression and
then throwing the door open with a wickedly loud clang. So it was metal, an
impervious alloy, and my attack plan had worked as I was running into the
interior without taking another blast.
I found myself in a dimly lit passage and at another metal door. It had an
elaborate security setup for entry, which I simply blasted. Except I forgot
about being in an enclosed space, and the force of my shot sent me skating
on my rear with the force field saving my ass again. I got up and ran for
the broken door, got inside with my Shilo at the ready, and was in time to
see a man fleeing out another door. He glanced back in the moment before he
ran out. I saw a weapon in his hand, but he didn’t fire, and neither did I.
No Buddhist, but security of some sort, though the brown uniform did not
match anything Thor Carlsonbonner’s men wore.
At the far door, I saw him fleeing across the grass to a slit opening in the
wall. That would likely take him into Maze Residential, and I had no plans
on chasing anyone in there. Instead, I looked around.
A circular room, a security post by design, with several control panels and
a number of running vision platforms. I took the seat he would have been
using and played around. There was the weapons control that he’d used in
firing on me. I was more interested in the vision platforms. It was
super-dummy surveillance tech that anyone could use without training. The
surveillance was of Maze Residential, any part you wanted to look at. I
could put on street views, switch in seconds to fast-forward through office
locations, and spy on people working from home. Everything in Maze
Residential was under surveillance. The Buddha saw all facets of the story,
but why anyone would want to watch the most boring place on the planet had
me miffed, and that wasn’t what I was looking for, so I got up and took a
walk around. It occurred to me then that maybe I should work fast because
the guard might be returning with more men.
I thought it over, and my feeling was that he wouldn’t return. Because he
wouldn’t have any men. He was intelligence of some type but not part of an
armed force. There was a log, but I couldn’t gain access. Tiny living
quarters existed in a side room. A third room was a sort of art-and-trophy
room, and it was there that I found what I wanted. It was a huge gold key
mounted in a transparent display case. I hadn’t known to look for it
specifically, but figured out what it was on spotting it. The map I was
following had points here and there marked by a key icon, and that icon was
a representation of the key behind the glass.
Setting the gun to pick laser mode, I opened it and stepped back. Nothing
happened, so I took out the key, turned, and ran as fast as I could, out the
same door as the fleeing guard. This time, something did happen as the room
blew up behind me, and I could feel the hot blast of air, rocks, and fire at
my back, even with the protective shield on.
Suit fluttering in the breeze washing through my cheese-holed force field, I
hurried across the park and followed the same exit as the guard. It was also
an exit from Maze Residential, as the path turned out to be a fork. A dense
spillage of foliage, vines, and flowers cascaded on either side of an exit
path of glittering gravel stones that arched over the Maze Highway. Its far
side opened on a public park at the edge of the Market. A number of people,
most of them of oriental extraction, were strolling with their dogs in the
park, and the guard that had fled was there in the distance, standing under
a fern tree. I ignored the uniform this time and focused on the face.
Chinese features but softened, like maybe one parent was Caucasian. The look
was a brief glimpse, as he was far off and soon farther off as he turned and
dashed away upon spotting me. I supposed he’d seen enough; he’d been waiting
to see if the explosion got me.
The park crowd at its edge was more multiracial, and the dogs were an
assortment of pure-bred lap brats. At the end of the path, a wider road ran
down into the Market. It floated in a light haze, this end being Chinatown.
A sea of red paper lanterns drifted above its dense, pretzel-twisted, narrow
streets. A check of the map, and I moved straight ahead on course and soon
was on a busy shop street, navigating careless crowds of residents and
shoppers. The signs here were all red with yellow lettering in the same
styled font, with the odd splash of green from a banner or flag acting as a
break to the pattern. Awnings and overhangs formed another level beneath the
ubiquitous paper lanterns. Animated floater ads hovered near the larger
Market stores, which were spaced a fair distance apart, with gaps filled by
small shops and stalls, each with its own unique design. Though perhaps the
most common design element was clutter. They all tried to sell too many
items. Seafood displays on the first street I traveled had half the ocean
for sale from cramped quarters. And these vendors did brisk sales, being
constantly refurbished by slow-float stock cars that rode down from a warren
of warehousing above the shop level.
A memory for faces is a good thing. I thought that a few streets in, I
spotted my guy from the Maze watching me from a recessed doorway near a
flower vendor’s stall. The clothes were now oriental garb, but it was either
him or his twin brother, as the face was the same.
The high Market sun cut through the haze like the biggest paper lantern of
all, its glow another sales pitch as it made goods look just that little bit
better, and people too. It added the right blend to soothe skin tones and
shadow and create beautiful people, and likely had been filtered that way.
Looking past some tearooms toward where my destination should be on the map,
I spotted a pagoda rising above the Market shops and warehouses, peaking at
the false sky.
I glanced around some more, and in the golden haze of the sun at the roof of
a teashop I spotted something else. A familiar ghost, long dark hair
catching a subdued gleam, the folds of her dress blowing in the thin mist,
almost like it was more billows of it. It was Lisha Yanch, and her sharp
eyes were on me for a moment. She looked away, and I followed her eyes. She
was looking over at my oriental friend, the spy on my tail, as though she
was signaling his importance to me. Then bells and wind chimes tinkled as a
breeze blew into Chinatown, and in moments she vanished. The way she faded
away made me feel like I was waking from a dream, and I shook my head
slightly and wondered if she’d ever been there. More than that, I wondered
if any of the people in this place were really there on the scene, not just
in the mind.
But her message wasn’t lost on me; I’d been taking this oriental clown
tailing me far too lightly. He didn’t appear overtly dangerous, but that
didn’t mean he wasn’t planning to hit me. Even if he was defending his post
back there, he still did attempt to kill me twice, and that was without even
talking to me. With that in mind, I decided to lead him into a trap.
I kept moving in the direction of the pagoda and soon found that a number of
streets converged on a huge central court mall. The location fit my plan, so
I went inside. Inside, a long, polished mall floor was lined with stalls and
clothing stores, all of them beneath an upper row of white and pale-blue
arched windows. The windows were in sizes ranging from small to large,
bubbling up some to create the impression of an immense heavenly sky. At the
center of the joint, a giant ghost chandelier hovered through five levels of
platforms. It was a physical chandelier, but its supports were invisible,
giving it a ghost-float illusion. High catwalks with see-through Plexiglas
walls rose around it, and a stage rested at its bottom. A fashion show was
taking place there with customers viewing it from all five levels as
manikin-style robots directed the flow of human models and special effects.
The walk to the top took some time and navigation, but I picked my way up
slowly as the crowd remained fascinated by a sudden parade of female models
marching by on the stage below. Near the top, I glanced down and out of the
corner of my eye, picked up my tail. The guy was much closer to me now and
was much more confident in this situation. The very top level had no shops,
but it did have some offices, the closest of which was a jewelry import
company. I saw people moving behind its glass doors, but another office area
farther down seemed vacant.
I’d been fishing for the right spot, and with no fashion fans stationed
above, I’d found it. Now it was a matter of leading the sucker on, and I did
that by suddenly breaking into a run, dashing up the last portion, turning
to hurry past the import company entrance and over to the empty offices. A
display billboard and a potted tree were conveniently located there, and I
went behind them and remained silent.
Sure enough, my tail didn’t want to lose me and had also broken into a run.
Only he reached the top, not knowing where I went. Some moments passed, then
I heard soft footsteps coming quickly my way. He reached my location and
stopped, but before he could act, I hit him with a Shilo stun ray and put
him down.
He didn’t stay down, and he wasn’t a man. He got up and attempted to seize
me, and as I threw him off, I got a creepy shudder from the slippery, waxen
feel of his hands and dropped my gun. He tried to pull a weapon; I beat him
to the draw with my other gun, and he kept his hand there partway inside his
coat.
“Take out your hand real slow, or I’ll fry you,” I said.
He did so, but he was hard to gauge because his stare was fish-eyed,
displaying no real emotion. And even if any feeling had been displayed, I
would not have trusted an android.
“You are going to answer some questions, pal. Like, who do you work for?”
He relaxed his posture. “I could ask the same of you,” he said, voice
normal, calm.
“I’m not here to play games. This is a murder investigation. What is that
surveillance station you were manning, and why did you try to kill me? For
that matter, let’s go back to the beginning. You are an android, so you work
for someone. Who is it?”
“Okay, I can answer that. I work for Adam 1X, the building’s artificial
intelligence. I was deactivated a decade ago as the station and my functions
are obsolete.”
“Well, you aren’t deactivated now. So why are you back?”
“I have just spent time receiving that information. Adam 1X is difficult to
contact.”
“So I’ve heard. I’ve heard that no one can contact him.”
“In his current iteration, Adam 1X balances all forces to keep the building
in a stable environment. Adam 1X does not get involved in human power
struggles unless they are a specific threat. In this case, there may be a
threat.”
“Really, what is it?”
“It appears that I wasn’t activated by Adam 1X as I initially believed. You
see, the station you were just at is part of an old decommissioned
surveillance system. Adam 1X advanced far beyond that mode of surveillance
and closed it ten years ago. He still collects all building data, of course,
but it is not in forms humans can use … you would know what I mean. All
sound can be read from walls, wind, and visuals. From building insects and
so forth.”
“I get that, but if not Adam 1X, then who activated you?”
“An unknown hostile force caused activation and was using my data and that
of other obsolete stations by masking itself as Adam 1X. Adam is now slowly
working to correct this problem. You also aided the activation by your
actions.”
“Really. What actions?”
“You began an obsolete mode of building travel. You have been attempting the
old method, in which a human can reach the top floor. A mode no one uses
anymore. A mode no one knows about anymore.”
“Ah, so I triggered something. And this hostile force, too. Can you tell me
what this hostile force is … human or machine or what?”
“It is very intelligent and could be an enhanced human and more. It is
reported throughout the building, mostly at the top. Adam 1X may know but is
not revealing it at present.”
“Okay, so what is your purpose now? Why are you following me? You discovered
that a phony Adam 1X activated you, so I’m assuming you wouldn’t want to aid
a phony.”
“Correct. I am now aiding Adam 1X by giving you this weapon.”
“Hold it right there. Move your hand out very slowly, or I’ll shoot.”
He did as I said, and I was painfully aware that an android might not think
being destroyed was something that really mattered, unless it got in the way
of completing its mission. Only the highest-level droids were human-like
enough to care about self-preservation. Few of the droids in this building
would be at that high level. This one wasn’t.
There was no gun in his hand. It was a closed fist. He turned it over and
opened it, revealing two large stars in his palm. Since he was offering
them, I took them and stuffed them in my side pocket.
He seemed satisfied. “Okay, so what in the hell sort of weapon is that?
Those are ancient Shuriken throwing stars, aren’t they?”
“Stars, yes, ancient no. Adam 1X is working to fix this problem of a hostile
force by aiding you.”
“How wonderful. He could aid me by talking to me, damn it. Antique weapons
are of no use to me.”
“You will need them due to that key you are carrying. We assume you want to
use it to pick up the next key.”
“You assumed right, but I don’t know what it is exactly. It matches the key
on the map I have.”
“There is a second key. At your destination, you must place the key you have
in the slot to get the silver key.”
“Then what?”
“I don’t know. We were never told. In the old days, we only guarded the
route. You are supposed to know where to go next. And there will be an
opponent. He is under the control of a hostile force and will block you. I
cannot help you. My signal is to return to the surveillance station and
enact the decommissioning protocol.”
+++
I watched from above as the android strolled back down the stair walkways,
off on his mission to decommission and maybe self-destruct. He faded into
the crowd below, and I remained there with my eyes on a frivolous fashion
show on the stage below, thinking how much I hated puzzles and games. There
was nothing else to do at this point but follow through on the map and head
for the Pagoda. I turned toward the walkway, then I stopped and looked back
down again. One face was staring up from below. A man was watching me.
Another tail on me. It meant I’d have to find another exit.
I didn’t get a good look at the new pursuer from that height, but I was able
to duck back out of his view quickly. The building had back fire-exit tubes
to the ground, and I used an old snap trick to force the door on one of
them. Otherwise, only an alarm would open it. I hit the ground running and
went through the opening door onto a littered back alley street. It was
fairly wide, and the area was at the rear of a place called Canton Bazaar.
The place being a huge all-items store and a poorly organized one that was
nearly impossible to pass through at a run without attracting major
suspicion. I marched through at a fast walk. Back on the outside, I crossed
the busy street and stood out front of the Robo Wok Shop, looking around. It
looked clear but it was also crowded with delivery boats navigating a sky
full of paper lanterns and large kites above. Two of the higher roofs of my
destination pagoda showed in the distance, a couple of streets off, so I
hurried away in that direction.
I didn’t get far before strange things began to happen. Beginning with a
large white kite that suddenly came sailing over a delivery boat and down
from the roofs of the warehousing above. It was moving so fast I doubted I
could dodge it, but I did have time to switch on the force field before
ducking to the side. The thing sideswiped me and bounced me on a wicked
tumble into large wicker baskets full of goods. I sent assorted nuts flying
and rolling into the crowd, and rose in time to see a man bursting free of
the kite. Another oriental, this one with long hair tied back, but no
android look. He was human with a young face and wearing a loose bronze
outfit with a lot of lacing, buttons, and pockets. He also instilled fear in
the crowd because people were fleeing us both, and the area around was clear
in a few seconds.
He faced me and grinned. There was trickery in his dark eyes, combined with
his outfit, that cast him as some brand of magician. He reinforced that
image by pulling two wooden fighting sticks from his pocket, holding them
out, and snapping the chain that held them together. Blue gas suddenly
billowed from both stick ends and rushed over me. And it was more than
magic; it was science because I felt it eating away at my force field.
Cheese-holing it so that hot fingers of heat from the gas began to touch me.
I didn’t feel much like shooting him down in front of a crowd and had the
feeling he had a defense for that anyway. But the gas was eating the force
field away fast, and in moments I’d be cooked, so I drew the weapon and hit
the slider to do a wide and forceful repel.
I tapped the trigger, a shock wave bubbled around me, and the gas was
expelled, but this guy was fast, and he knew I’d cut the force field
altogether at the instant of firing. He dived at that instant and for a
moment was coming through the wave of expelled gas, the force of the shot
turning his dive into a slow float to me.
Leaping into the air and spreading my legs, I watched him fly under me, hit
the ground to roll and turn back on me, all lightning fast. He dived again,
and we ended up rolling and wrestling in the dusty street. His moves were as
fast as mine, and we both aimed for a quick disable. He glanced a blow off
my throat and moved into me as I stumbled back, the fight taking both of us
into a trinket stall where we created an explosion of baubles and trinkets
and every glittering item the eye could imagine. And the second part of that
explosion was me as he threw me right through a bamboo screen to tumble in
the street and meet the third act of this mayhem.
And it was a monster. Suddenly, the entire world went off kilter. A supply
boat tipped over above, sending down a shower of vegetables, and there were
ear-splitting cracks from breaking wood and thunder from the ground. I could
not get to my feet; the shaking continued, and I did manage to rise, but my
sense of balance was off, and I felt like I was staggering at a
ninety-degree angle. A second later, it ended, and the ground settled. Nuts,
vegetables, knick-knacks, jewelry, masks, and paper lanterns were raining
down, and like the rest of the people, I was dodging them and batting them
away.
I saw people running in terror as an even bigger supply boat appeared, arced
down, and embedded itself in the street. My agile pursuer was there near it
and almost got creamed by it. I saw him turning back to me, and I didn’t
wait, but simply took off down a messy alleyway, still headed in the
direction of the pagoda.
Thinking wasn’t required at this point. I knew Pinnacle City Market had been
hit by a quake and that it was more than any emanations from Skitch Rocco’s
thirteenth floor. A force of evil had gained power in this building; it had
expanded its interests beyond killing off Board members. It was
destabilizing the whole place. And its latest agent of attack was right on
my tail again. In seconds, he’d be on me.
It was almost too late. My force field was no longer working, but I
remembered the android and the two stars he’d given me. Pulling one from my
pocket, I turned, threw it, and stumbled and fell into a bunch of trash
cans.
The effect was more than spectacular and deadly slow. I rolled over in the
tumbled trash cans and saw that the star had expanded and was flying in a
circle around my pursuer, holding him there as it whooshed like a bird. He
had pulled out a throwing star of his own. I could see it in his hand. But
he didn’t release it. Instead, he dropped it and put up his hands in
surrender.
That left me more than amazed. I still had the second star in my hand and
had no idea how to disable the first one as it continued its passage in a
circle through the air. I walked up for a closer look at the man. He had the
airs of both a Kung Fu fighter and a magician. As I studied him, I lifted my
hand to put the second star in my front pocket, and that triggered a return
of the first one, which shrank as it zipped back into my fingertips.
I faced the guy. He lowered his hands, but for some reason, I felt he
wouldn’t try a sneak attack. His face was calm, maybe a bit surprised. Then
I saw him moving his fingers slowly. Instinctively, I knew he was going for
a throwing star of his own; another one of those Shuriken things, and likely
with power similar to the one I’d used. But he wasn’t drawing it to use on
me because in that same fraction of a second, my old friend the android
appeared, coming around the corner of the alleyway. That had left my
magician opponent unsure of what was happening, and he waited a moment. Then
we all saw a ghost as Lisha Yanch appeared in a flash of light and
fast-floated down from the rooftops to my side.
She said one sentence. “Get away from that android.”
So that’s what I did, spinning around and diving back into my old friends,
the trashcans. I got back to my feet and made a jump up the wall. I was
about to go over, but couldn’t resist a last look back. And that was nearly
my final look. I saw the android charging straight for me as he threw his
star. The final effect was simultaneous as the android came apart in a fiery
suicide explosion just as the star expanded between him and me. So the blast
force didn’t hit me, but the flash blinded me, and I fell from the wall and
rolled into the trash cans again.
Stumbling to my feet, I rubbed my eyes and saw Lisha Yanch there in the
street. This time, she wore slacks, a white top that left her midriff bare,
a hat, and sandals, like she was another shopper. But not one that fooled
the magician. His face was pale as he looked at her. He was frightened like
he was seeing an evil spirit. He pulled a feathered object from another of
his many pockets and waved it in front of him. I saw a pained look on
Lisha’s face, then she vanished.
The magician put away his feather and walked toward me. He stepped around a
broken chunk of the android’s skull that was lying in the street. It was
silvered on the inside with some of the foam that had composed the brain
matter, still bubbling and melting to blue liquid. It was obvious that this
guy didn’t trust me but was also curious.
Since he didn’t appear about to speak, I did. “Any particular reason why you
are trying to kill me?”
“Orders,” he said. “And a signal from our dead friend there. He called me
for help.”
“Really. Well, in case you didn’t notice, he was hoping to kill us both with
a suicide bombing of himself.”
“What’s this about? Who are you?”
“I’m a detective. Jack Michaels. It was originally about investigating the
murders of the Board members, but now it’s about that earthquake and other
anomalies happening here at Pinnacle City. I’ve been hired by the Board to
solve these problems.”
“Impossible. I was told you are the cause of the problems. The Board wants
you dead.”
“Looks like they want you dead, too. Who hired you? I bet it was Stone
Sangalang?”
He looked confused, like he might be planning to attack again. But fate
intervened once more, this time with a flash of light. Lisha Yanch appeared
on the street, and she answered the question. “Penrose Pool hired him to
kill you, not Sangalang. I traced the anomaly that attacked you at the
virtual level. Pool sent it.”
“What about this guy? Who is he?”
“He is Yuki Rin. If he looks like he’s seeing a ghost, it’s because he is.
He works for the Board. I was his boss before I died.”
Yuki Rin’s face remained white. “You should stay dead,” he said, reaching
into his pocket for the feather wand.
“Don’t,” I said. “She isn’t dead. Only physically dead. Don’t let
superstition get in the way of this investigation.”
Lisha continued. “Penrose Pool is involved, but he’s not the mastermind.”
Yuki raised an eyebrow. “Pool contacted me. He said he had authority from
the Board. That you were gone over to the other side. The quake people.”
“Really,” I said, and then looked back at Lisha. “So who is this guy here,
exactly?”
“Exactly. Well. Thor Carlsonbonner and his forces are what you call visible
security. Yuki, here is what is called invisible security for the Market. He
is an enforcer who does the dirty jobs security doesn’t do and isn’t told
about.”
“Ah, so the good old crime-free Pinnacle City uses hit men to settle big
scores.”
“Precisely.”
Yuki appeared calm now. “Yes, and they were going to use that android as a
hit man to kill us both. That must have been Pool also. That old station was
decommissioned, an antique. Then I got a message from the android about
protecting a key. I guess Pool reactivated it.”
“Okay,” I said. “If they are protecting the other key, then I need it to
move ahead.”
“Why should I let you take it?” Yuki said.
“Because a hostile force has taken over this building. The same force or
person or whatever it is also murders Board members for sport.”
“That means I must work to stop it. This hostile force is endangering the
Market with quakes.”
“Well, you can certainly help if you want,” I said. “We need the key, and
then we find Pool and question him.”
“Penrose Pool. I can find him. He’ll be at his night condo over at the end
of the Mediterranean portion of the Market. No one can walk in uninvited
there. It is well defended. It’s where he goes when he needs top security.
Secret business deals and so on. Most of his business is of that type.”
Chapter Five: The Raid
The quake made it easy for us to travel unnoticed on the streets.
Commotion everywhere and vendors scrapping with shoppers over goods as
the cleanup continued. Ahead, the five cap roofs of the Pagoda and the
building itself appeared untouched by the quake. We walked up the steps
and, with Yuki in the lead, walked in unchallenged. Huge green columns
with decorative gold rose from polished hardwood floors, and at the far
end, a spiral staircase rose to the top.
It was the top we wanted, so we strolled past the rows of large bronze
Buddhas at the perimeter, passing holy men and worshipers. No one was on
the stairs, and the place as a whole was sparsely populated at this time
of day. A lot of stairs up and a long way down gave me my vertigo fix,
and I figured all I’d need for a real charge would be for Yuki to turn
on me and start a high battle on the staircase. Yuki was also nervous,
not over heights but over Lisha. Ghosts were something he feared, and I
broached the subject.
“Yuki, that feather object of yours. I wouldn’t expect anyone to have
one.”
“The ghost chaser, you mean. Pool’s people developed it for me. That was
back when all the ghosts began to appear. Ghosts are from the
netherworld and bad luck in my religion. Your friend there doesn’t give
me a good feeling.”
“But you used to work for her. Pool must have told you ghosts here are
from the virtual level, not the netherworld.”
“They are connected. The people there killed themselves and are evil.
She is the one who looks normal. I take it you haven’t seen the others.”
Lisha glanced at Yuki with disgust and spoke. “Don’t assume everyone
trapped in there chose that. Stories of suicide are very often cover
stories for murderers.”
“Were you murdered?” I said.
“No. I was young and thought I would create a new world there. I did,
but only for me because I am whole. The others are all malformed in
their own special ways. Some are evil. Yuki fears them for a reason.”
“Yeah, he fears death and being trapped there in some warped spirit
form. Like that Android tried to do to me.”
“Oh, that. He did not intend to trap you there. They attempted to kill
you physically and spiritually. They want no essence of your mind left
in this building. Whoever it is wants you completely dead.”
The stairs opened at the top of a circular room with large segmented
windows. The walls and ceiling were gold, and a huge cap was over us.
From a floor of inlaid stones, we stared up past beige paper lanterns at
a light that was a cross between a chandelier and a gold cage.
Our key was there in the cage, and we discussed how to get to it. Lisha,
as a ghost, could float up but not carry the first key for the switch.
The gold walls were, in fact, a rough inlay of gold-tinted bricks and
could be climbed, but such a high climb and getting over the center
portion wasn’t my cup of tea. But it was Yuki’s. He took off his shoes
and went up barefoot with the key in his teeth. The man was probably the
best human fly in Pinnacle City. It took him less than two minutes to
reach the cage and another to open it and place the key in the slot.
Then it wasn’t quite so easy because the other key got released via a
small explosion. Fireworks flashed, and Yuki tumbled down from above and
smacked the floor. He rolled and groaned, but the key was in his teeth.
Dazed, he got to his knees, and I rushed over and rubbed his arms,
shoulders, and back. Nothing felt broken; he was bruised but okay.
+++
Lisha returned from her virtual purgatory in the late afternoon. Yuki
and I were in the Mediterranean section of the Market, which was as big
as the Chinatown segment but a touch less cluttered. It had been
affected by the quake as well, and Yuki and I were eating a plate of
seafood snacks and discussing it when Lisha reappeared.
Dressed for the evening, with a sweater over her top, she was a perfect
fit, looking like a beautiful Italian woman and not a ghost. Though she
fooled everyone else, she didn’t fool Yuki, who shifted nervously back
in his chair.
I pulled up a chair for her. Needless to say, she didn’t drink or eat.
“Yuki’s main concern is the quakes. He thinks they might destroy
Pinnacle City. You were on the Board. How resilient is this place?”
“It depends on what you mean by destroy. They will cause social unrest.
The death and injury count will rise. The Board will lose the commodity
it values most: control. People will actually leave Pinnacle City if the
place becomes decrepit or derelict in places where repair can’t be
maintained.”
Yuki did not seem satisfied. “But those quakes are strong. The whole
building could crumble. Can you imagine that disaster?”
Lisha shook her head. “No. This central building will never collapse.
Picture a mountain. Though this place is much more tower-like. Remember
that the support base also mushrooms out below. A mountain can
experience earthquakes and volcanic activity, or be struck by
hurricanes, and it does not collapse. Pinnacle City will not collapse,
but say years of structural anomalies and quakes consume this place, I
could see it going from an elite paradise to a disgusting slum in the
sky.”
I smiled at that. “Where I come from, many people would be more than
happy with that outcome.”
Yuki looked at me with distaste. “Those people don’t get in here. When
they crash, the Board sends me to take care of it.” At that, he made a
slash across his throat.
“A solution for here, I suppose. It would never work on the outside. The
slime balls are nearly everywhere and in various flavors. You can only
take out the worst of them.”
At the south end of the Market, three Pinnacle City floors were levered
into green space. A splashing brook meandered along a rocky and
flower-banked course. It passed an outdoor sports field and continued
through the outer grounds of several palatial condos. Penrose Pool’s
joint was by far the largest of these. In the twinkling lights of night,
it looked like the home of some new form of royalty. Pinnacle City
royalty because it featured a conglomerate of the architecture common
throughout the building, though done at a much higher level. At the
edge, Penrose Pool had a view out to the city and the lake. We could see
the real moon rising in gibbous beauty, its hazy fluff softening a deep
purple sky. A backdrop of stars spangled it, and from our location under
a willow tree, an eerie visual effect of looking out at the universe
from an odd angle was created.
Lisha Yanch had disappeared over the garden wall, and I waited with Yuki
for her to return. Casing the grounds was a perfect job for a ghost, and
for a moment I wished to be one. A ghost could get away with a lot of
stuff and not get shot or captured, but without any real physical power,
I supposed that I’d never be able to complete any of my assignments.
Yuki was shuffling back and forth beside me, wearing another loose
outfit that was fine for fighting. This one is dark for night
camouflage. He was making me nervous.
“You look nervous,” I said. “You expect trouble?”
He stopped and looked at me like I was dense. “Of course, I expect
trouble. The jobs I do are always in and out, leaving a corpse behind. I
still think we should kill Pool. He tried to kill us.”
“I wasn’t hired to kill anyone. We’ll bleed him some until he talks.”
“You hope.”
At that point, Lisha returned, not moving like a ghost but coming over
the wall like an ordinary human thief would.
“So what are our chances?” I said.
“You decide. The wall has automated defenses, and you said you could
disable those features. Pool has kill-robots on the grounds and entrance
floors. That’s his security as far as I can see.”
“Robots. It makes sense. They can’t be turned against their owner like
androids, and if not as smart, just as deadly.”
Yuki snorted and shook his braid. “I don’t like this at all. I kill
people, not robots.”
It was fortunate that Pool’s condo was at the edge because it made it
possible to pull a strong signal from my home office. My tablet did not
have the power to crack eight major code systems simultaneously, but
that was required to shut down the wall and other perimeter defenses.
The robots were higher-end affairs and shielded. There was no way to
shut them down short of using disabling weapons.
We waited, ready to go, and when the okay flashed, I climbed, or better
words would be, nearly ran and jumped over the wall. Yuki followed on my
tail, and we were over and ten feet from the wall when the systems
either rebooted or pulled in a backup feed. Defensive explosions lit the
wall, and beam-fire burned the area around it. Another flash knife-edged
upward and curved out into the high city air in a beam that would
destroy any attack coming in from the outside sky. We had escaped death
by about three meters, but were running right into fresh jaws of it as a
robot emerged from its camouflage in thick bushes not far from the
entry. The mechanical beast grew larger, snapping its segments, and bore
down on us, ripping up the lawn with its motorized feet as it moved. Big
guns searched us out as its sensors grabbed a lock on us, but Pool
hadn’t programmed it for instant kill. I guessed that he was probably
grabbing a view from the inside to see what was happening before he
fired. An anal-retentive like Penrose Pool probably didn’t want to mess
up his garden without being certain an enemy was there. Either that or
he just wanted to see who the enemy was and adjust the firepower.
I was prepared for robots, but Yuki wasn’t. He fired a general heat
blast at the thing’s head that gave me time to dive flat on the grass
and do a programmed multiple fire. My shot was a multiple-beam tracker
shot at maximum cut, meaning several beams would pinpoint all the
robot’s sensors and beam back the information for the second shot, which
would be refined for each beam to either burn, cut, or disrupt. One
ringing clap, and a second flash of blue lines in the night, and the
robot slowed and toppled over … firing several beams as it did. They all
went over me. Yuki, in a fantastic leap, went over them and the robot,
flying almost like a bat over the thing.
A second robot appeared with a dramatic crash, coming straight through
the large windows screening the garden. It raced around a column and was
headed toward me when it suddenly stopped dead. A matter of sensors, I
assumed. I was still on the ground and maybe registering as a dead
target. Yuki wasn’t. He was already inside and, without a doubt,
registering as double trouble and the priority target.
The robot turned in quick rotation and tore in after Yuki, then I saw
that it wasn’t leaving me free, as a third robot was emerging from a
hiding space at the side of the core condo. This thing resembled a
man-sized dog in its body, and its face was done up like a fright mask.
Probably a psychological thing to scare an opponent, but also more than
that, because it opened its mouth and released a fiery roar. The damn
thing had a maw the size of a tar pit, and it was full of whirring
tongue blades. It charged right at me as it moved in to swallow its
dinner. I did a running dive over the other fallen robot, which was
still twitching enough to confuse its hungry friend. It tore away parts
of the dying beast as it searched me out, and when it found me, I fired
directly into its mouth, using a fine beam that probed in a circle and
cut off the top of its head. Its skull-top popped up like a loose cap,
and its maw snapped shut as it reached me. The fiery roar it wanted to
release was contained inside and steamed out the top, and then its evil,
olive-black eyes suddenly flared as its mask face melted like a pizza
gone soft.
I knew the other robots were smaller interior robots, but just as
deadly. I got up, blew out some lights, and headed for a shattered
window. It was large enough to run straight through, but I was hampered
by a sore leg from my last dive and stumbled in like a crazed drunk. I
found myself in a large lobby, dodging scattered beam fire. That fire
came from another large four-legged robot … from its eyes, and the shots
were wild because Yuki was on its back with his arms around its head.
The shots died, I peeked out from cover, and saw that Yuki had pulled
the beast’s head right off. A feat of incredible strength, but a way to
do business with robots if you could do it.
Puffs of smoke filled the central area; remnants from the beam fire, and
in the smoke, like magic, Lisha Yanch appeared. The lobby suddenly
blazed with beam and bullet fire; it had been a trap. Yuki and I
would’ve been cut down if we'd tried to go deeper into the area. But
that fire was wasted on Lisha, who disappeared as quickly as she had
appeared. Yuki and I also disappeared, going left and right, taking
cover behind columns near the wall.
Sporadic fire pocked the marbling around us; Yuki saw an opening and
swung out, throwing one of his Shuriken stars. It blazed larger like a
meteor as it flew and hit the unseen source of the weapons fire with a
deafening explosion. Shielding blew aside. We saw an enclosed security
area and three human-style robots. One had been knocked out, and the
other two were on fire and stumbling forward. I hit them with a blast
that knocked them back, and a second throw from Yuki gave them rocket
boots, sending them halfway to the ceiling. They fell back to the smooth
stone of the lobby floor like broken dolls … smoke swirled up from them
as gas hissed out of their open mouths.
I signaled Yuki to follow, and we edged around the remaining floor
space, jumped the counter, and got behind the security facade. I used a
thumper beam to shake open a door there, and we hurried through to a
narrow hall, hearing an explosion behind us.
We reached a back area. A confusing layout of rooms. At no point had we
seen access stairs, elevators, or tubes up to the living areas of Pool’s
condo. Yuki’s face was pale. “Pool blew the lobby trying to get us. We
probably only have seconds to get out of here.”
I ran a quick scan on a fast-open air-screen from my tablet connect.
We’d gone right past Pool’s access area. The only safe way was to keep
moving, so I ran, and Yuki followed. On the run, I fired another thumper
beam that knocked aside a screen covering the entrance to service air
tubes up. There were two, and we were on the way up when we heard
another blast.
Regrets were surfacing. We both knew we should have planned this with a
touch more patience and detail. If we didn’t cut through to Pool right
away, we’d be dead men. There was more than one floor, but I’d told Yuki
to go straight to the top. We emerged there, but the tube exit there was
encased in a clear plastic bubble that did not open. The rest of the
layout was like a huge starfish. Pool had the entire top level set up as
one expanse, with the center being an inner lounge with chandelier
lighting, and the whole thing slowly expanding out to a full walk-around
semi-circular patio at the very edge. Bright lights were flashing out on
part of that patio, and I spun on my heels for a better look. An air bug
was gliding in, and Pool was out there with a servant robot as he
prepared his escape.
Yuki proved faster than me; he cracked his encasement with a trick
karate kick. I fumbled with my weapon, trying to find the right beam.
Before I found it, Yuki shattered part of my bubble with a chop, and I
ended up breaking out and following him as he ran for the landing air
bug and Penrose Pool. It was clear to me that we weren’t going to catch
him on foot, so I tried one more setting on my gun. That being a reverse
tracker beam. Not nearly enough power to stop the air bug from taking
off, but enough to slow it. So I dived down on the hard tiles, set the
beam, and ended up holding my gun and being dragged across the floor.
Yuki was still on the run and nearly got nailed by weapons fire. Anyone
else would have been sliced by the heat knives they fired, but he was so
fast he danced around them and flipped over one as he ran. When the
bubble closed and their engine burned, my arms were nearly ripped out of
my sockets, as my body weight was the inert force the beam was using. I
hadn’t had time to do a setting to fix it to another object, so I skated
across the floor on my belly, watching Yuki flip through and come down
feet first on the bubble covering.
His jump had been executed with perfect force as he cut through it,
locked his legs on the android driver’s neck, and snapped it. A clumsy
turn and the vehicle skated back over the edge of the skirting, through
a side railing, and into a fixed metal patio table and bench. Ghastly
shock showed on Penrose Pool’s soft face. He decided to surrender even
though he had a weapon in his right hand and could have blasted Yuki.
I didn’t get my beam unlocked in time and was spun around on the floor
by the force. When I rose, I saw that Yuki had the situation under
control. He was already out and had Pool’s weapon. Penrose was emerging
from the dented bug. Distaste showed on his face as he tried to sweep
his suit-front clean of the wet mash of debris that had burst from the
headless android’s neck. I ended up doing the same, attempting to brush
the front of my shirt clean of the drag across the floor. That failed,
so I simply buttoned my jacket and walked over as Lisha Yanch appeared
deeper in the patio. I knew that once my muscles registered the stress
I'd just put on my arms and shoulders, I would be in agony. Fortunately,
I had a few pills to cover that for a time.
As Lisha approached, I saw Pool’s eyes widen with a second level of
fear. My guess on that was perhaps he hadn’t got on well with Lisha when
she’d headed the Board, and the idea of her returning as a ghost wasn’t
something he’d been hoping for or expecting.
No one else was present on this upper floor, and we ended up standing in
a four-person circle, though not a close one. Defeat apparently had not
killed off Penrose Pool’s arrogance. He stared at me defiantly and spoke
first. “You have a lot of nerve, invading my private condo. You should
know the rules. You’re supposed to be working for the Board.” His eyes
flicked nervously to Lisha. “We’ve been trying to destroy these damn
ghosts for months. Now you bring another one back. I’m going to speak to
Stone Sangalang and Carlsonbonner and have you fired.”
“It won’t work, Pool,” I said. “You’ll have to explain why you ordered
Yuki to hit me. There was no Board order for that. You had all your
androids decommissioned, but that driver Yuki just beheaded is one. No
doubt it was sent down from the top. And how about the other secrets
you’ve been keeping? A talk with Stone Sangalang and Thor Carlsonbonner
might convince them that you are the killer. What they might do then
wouldn’t be nice.”
Yuki grinned evilly, and Pool frowned at him. “Don’t get your hopes too
high,” Pool said to Yuki. “Sangalang isn’t going to get a chance to put
out any contract on me.”
“Ah,” Lisha said. “So you’ll cooperate?”
“Not with you, I won’t.”
“You never did, did you?”
“Let’s end this squabbling. I want to know why you attempted to block my
investigation and set me up to be hit? You have to be involved in the
killings. There is no other explanation.”
Pool sighed. “There is one. It’s called blackmail.”
“By who?”
“I don’t know who. By someone who knows everything. Someone like her,”
he said, pointing to Lisha.
“It isn’t her,” Yuki said. “Who contacted you? Who told you to enable
the station and signal me for the kill?”
“I don’t know who. They contacted me via an android a while back. Do you
really think they’d tell me who they are? I would’ve sent you to kill
them. They wanted Michaels dead in return for silence. That’s all I
know.”
Yuki nodded like he believed him. “What exactly are they blackmailing
you with? What’s the issue?”
Lisha laughed, and Pool gave her a spiteful glance. “We need not even
ask,” she said. “From past audits, I can tell you that they likely have
a long list when it comes to things he’s hiding.”
Pool’s face drooped in unhappy submission. “You make me sound dirty. No
one makes a lot of money by being squeaky clean. Especially not in this
place. That there could be people who couldn’t be easily paid off was
something I never considered.”
“There are other things you’ve never considered,” I said. “There might
be or are some people motivated by more than the standard Pinnacle City
fare of money and Board power. People aiming at something bigger. Maybe
up there at the top.”
“Huh,” Pool said, his face gaining youth in its cynicism. “There has
been no access up there for a long time. Even the records have been
destroyed or buried somewhere. The Board knows that a large feed of
information has always been routed in and out of there, but no one can
read into it or unmask the formats. Nearly all of it would be building
operations feed. As far as I ever heard, only Adam 1X, a major part of
him, is up there. Sort of the ultimate mechanical room or the condo of a
super AI mind. Or one that used to be super. What’s left of him now,
well, who knows? No one can contact him, and what’s up there, I don’t
think I want to know. Since there is no way for a human being to get up
there, I won’t know.”
Yuki was having none of Pool’s explanation. “You sure are a fancy liar.
You make it sound like today’s quake never happened. You know as well as
we do that something major is wrong up there. You are working with
people involved in that because once Jack aimed at the top, he was
suddenly open for a hit job.”
Penrose pursed his lips, giving Yuki a look of defiance. Lisha spoke.
“He’s got something in his jacket.”
She was right. I noticed the bulge. He had an object mostly under his
armpit and was trying to move in ways that would hide it. “Hand it over,
Pool,” I said.
He shifted, like maybe he was going to try to run. But there was nowhere
for him to run, so he sighed like he was being robbed, then opened his
coat.
The object was a gold box with inlaid patterns. Almost like a music box
or jewelry box. It was something different, though, and it had a key
slot. I had the key for it in my possession. The key we’d grabbed at the
pagoda. “So you are being blackmailed. It sure looks like you’re doing a
diligent job for someone else.”
“I don’t know what it is, I swear. My only instructions were to grab it
from its hidden place at the Market and make sure you don’t get it.”
I twirled the key in my fingers. “Might as well open it and see what’s
inside it.”
“What if it’s booby-trapped?” Yuki said.
Pool stepped back. “Don’t open it near me.”
“Relax,” I said, then I scanned the box and the lock mechanism. “The
metal is an impervious alloy, and the key triggers a molecular code.
Considering the complexity of the key, we have the only one. It hasn’t
been used recently. The read says it isn’t booby-trapped.”
I inserted the key carefully, and it fit nicely. The attempt to turn it
met resistance, ending in a series of slow clicks. Yuki’s face tensed as
he doubted my words. Penrose Pool was near panic, his mouth a quivering
open slash. The final click came, and I snapped open the box, with the
only explosion being a small puff of dust. There was nothing inside but
a piece of paper. Browned parchment of the sort that doesn’t decay, and
it folded open to a map.
I felt like tearing it up. Now, a map had led me to another map, like
someone was still playing games with me. But there again, whoever had
placed the map probably wasn’t even alive now, judging by its age. So it
was another real clue on the path to the pinnacle, but also confirmation
that no one had attempted to follow that path in a very long time.
Perhaps it in itself would be another dead end, and there’d be no way
up.
“So what does it say?” Yuki said.
“Hell if I know. It’s another damn map. This one is an ancient kind. I
don’t even recognize the coding of the points or the script. You take a
look at it.”
Yuki took the map, and I turned to Lisha. “Has anyone attempted to reach
the top floor by air? I mean, fly in?”
“Not anyone alive. It’s surrounded by a no-fly bubble. Anyone flying
into it has only moments to pull away. I remember Adam 1X going over
that once when I was president of the Board. The top of this building
could repel or disarm anything, even missiles and satellite beam fire.
It is super intelligent. It knows when it is being targeted.”
“I can’t read this map either,” Yuki said. “Maybe we should give that
box back to Penrose.”
Pool glanced over Yuki’s shoulder. He cleared his throat and spoke. “I
know I’m going to regret this, but I can read the script. It’s an old
language called Latin.”
“Yeah,” Yuki said.
Pool could read the map, but not quite, and he knew Latin, but not
quite. We ended up in one of his personal lounge areas in his condo. A
place with deep cherry shades of wood flooring polished like glass, wide
white divans, and slightly arched walls and ceilings of a linen-tinted
wood. The place had floor-to-ceiling sectional windows, and Lisha stood
there looking out, backdropped by darkness and the spray of colored
lights reflecting from the distant Market. Pool returned down a wide
staircase with Yuki, carrying a magnifier with a jeweled handle and a
book from his bedroom library. Taking a seat, Penrose pulled up a slat
of the glass table. It transformed into a monitor displaying the
built-in computer's main screen. A keyboard appeared under the glass at
his fingertips, and he typed in the odd line of text while he used the
magnifier to study details on the map.
His age showed through when he concentrated, though he had the sort of
face that retained youth without any special effort. I began to wonder
why many of the people populating Pinnacle City had vision problems that
surgery couldn’t correct. With all of Penrose Pool’s money, he had poor
vision and couldn’t see fine details at all. Moments later, I began to
wonder if he was simply stalling, and hired killers were racing to us
while we sat there foolishly believing his lies.
Yuki glanced about nervously as some air bugs zipped by like fireflies
out beyond the patio. Then Penrose put down his magnifier and spoke.
“The mystery of the map isn’t a big mystery. Yes, it is from back in the
early days. Its designer simply personalized it so only he could read
it, using Latin for place names. The main problem is when I go over the
details in the drawing, the locations shown are of places that no longer
exist.”
“What sort of locations are they or were they?” I said.
“They are all locations of places that used to exist in the old Market.
Hidden areas in those locations. The areas contain the old upload
points. Engineers and later security used them to upload to the top
floors.”
“Upload what to what?” I asked.
“At that time, no human could enter those levels due to the tremendous
forces, hidden energies, and radiation at play. Entry for engineering
work was done by uploading one’s mind to robots stationed there. Like
going to the virtual level worlds, except you go into the real body of a
worker robot to do work. Or as it used to be, to do security patrols to
make sure all is in order. When Adam 1X came fully online, that method
was no longer needed. All of that work gets done by him now. It’s been
so long, as you probably know, and there have been so many changes, that
we don’t even know what’s up there anymore.”
Yuki snorted, angry that his time had been wasted. “So what good is that
to us? You say the upload places don’t exist anymore.”
“One of them does. The map shows it hidden in the warehousing next to
the south-edge transport bay. That building still exists. I don’t know
if the upload point is still there. It might be. The warehouse section
is the oldest building in the Market. It serviced the old stores back
when everything was delivered by air transport to the bay.”
“If it’s there, let’s go,” I said. “It has significance if that is what
the map points to.”
Frown lines showed on Lisha’s usually pristine forehead. She shook her
head in agitation. “I don’t like this line of pursuit. What can you
people do with that ancient equipment? Attempting to upload to some
decommissioned metal monster on the top floor would most likely be a
death sentence.”
“At this point, we don’t know if any equipment is there. So let’s take a
look and see what we’ve got.”
Penrose cleared his throat. “It might be best if you take a look without
my presence. I have given you what help I can afford. You really do not
need me now.”
“You’re right, we don’t,” I said. “But you’re coming along. It’s called
protective custody. If anyone wants to kill you, they’ll have to come to
us.”
+++
Yuki had a far more commanding presence in the Market community than
Penrose Pool did. While many people said hello to Yuki, no one knew
Pool, or if they did, they didn’t like him because people tended to
stare and gawk when he passed. The crowd thinned along with shops at the
far south end of the Mediterranean portion of the Market, but the street
remained broad, and the newer pavement soon gave way to an older type of
stylized tan paving stones. The lighting dimmed to pale yellow spills
from old roadside lamps on this portion of the street. Ahead, the south
Transport Bay loomed like a dim hulk in the darkness. Windows were all
lit up, and some of the newer transport boats floated in and out of
second-story bay openings. The place was still in business, but its age
showed in the way the structure, and even the street front, sucked all
the night light into the dull sheen created by years of grime. I’d seen
places of the type before in other cities; places where the bodies were
burned and buried.
Penrose Pool’s mood was one of trepidation. Though we’d left his car and
walked up at a brisk pace, his hesitant steps were now slowing us. The
Transport Bay certainly was spooky at night, but Pool should have taken
into account that we weren’t out for a business chat at a Board supper
club.
“We can take our time and look around inside. I have access everywhere
in the Market,” Yuki said.
“A special pass,” I replied.
“It’s called fear. They would much sooner let me through than find out
I’m looking for them.”
“How wonderful,” Pool said. “The charm of a barbarian.”
Yuki glanced at Pool like he was an insect. “You don’t like to get your
hands dirty, do you? You should come along for the ride on some of those
jobs you order.”
Pool stopped and pulled out the map. “Unfortunately, I’m along for the
ride this time. And I forgot to change into my dirtiest shirt.”
“What’s the reading?” I said. “Where do we go?”
“A long way inside there,” he said, pointing to a gaping dark doorway.
The entry didn’t even have a door, or go into one of the well-lit, busy
night areas. Faint light showed in a dingy corridor beyond the opening.
We headed for it with Penrose dragging his heels and taking up a
position well behind us. Which was a smart move, as the corridor was
covered in dust, feathers, and cobwebs. I batted some of them away with
my hat as we moved forward on what became a long journey, turning this
way and that. The corridor had once been sort of a fast alley for
workmen and other service people going behind the wide hangars and
warehousing inside the bay. It hadn't been used in a long time. It
wasn't traveled at all. There was some lighting, but that sort of
bacterial-phosphor tubing could burn for decades without replacement, so
it didn’t mean anyone had gone through it recently.
Pool coughed up foul air and swore in places as he went over the map.
Eventually, we found definite proof of human life in the form of
footprints in the deep dust of the interior. Finally, we came to a dead
end and some old graffiti grease-penned on a wall. Obscenities mostly.
“We’ve reached our destination,” Pool suddenly announced in an important
voice.
“Come on, Pool. Stop playing games,” Yuki said. “This is a dead end.
It’s the upload point to nowhere.”
“I went by the map,” Pool said. “This is the point or close to it.”
I tapped on the dead-end wall. “All right, take some steps back,” I
said. And they did. Moments later, I hit the wall with a wide force
beam. And regretted it. The wall came down all right. It splintered like
old, rotten wood, tin, and crumbling concrete, creating a whorl of
filthy dust that coughed back and engulfed us, forcing the three of us
to stagger forward through the opening we'd made as we attempted to find
a spot where we could breathe.
Dust settled, and the stale air became breathable, though barely. I used
the light on my gun to enhance the lighting. Yuki was already out of
sight somewhere, likely hiding in expectation of possible enemies. I
personally didn’t expect anything bigger than a fat spider. I could see
Penrose Pool off to my right, wiping his face and eyes with a
handkerchief, and the rest of the room was coming into focus like a
vision out of the dust. We’d broken into a larger area; the ceiling here
was triple the height of the corridor, like one of the bays, and ribbed
above like the belly of a beast. Most of the room was empty, just bare
stone tiles, but we’d found what we were looking for as the upload
station was at the north wall. I immediately walked over and was joined
by Yuki, who appeared from behind a support column. Close up, we found
ourselves studying a bank of six upload terminals. Five of them were
obviously smashed and out of commission. The sixth was in good condition
but a bit dusty, like everything else. The whole wall was a stylized
control bank with brass buttons and knobs, mostly for convenience and an
antique look, as the operating intelligence would, of course, be tiny
and buried in the stone. Your average robot packing crate would probably
have a friendlier look than the chairs, which were about as obsolete as
electric chairs in prison.
Penrose Pool walked up as I used my hat to bat away the dust from parts
of the chair. “If you are even thinking about attempting to use that,
you are out of your mind,” he said.
I decided to do a thorough check of the remaining chair's functionality.
Though one of the oldest models, it had been the Mars Cadillac of its
kind, with the highest-quality metal-and-plastic interior. The
coffin-style exterior was tarnished but not corroded or rusted. The
light dust blew off in feathers, revealing patterns of the tarnish
running in the grains of metal in blues and purples. The swing-over head
casing and flexible contacts showed no corrosion, and the interior was
clean, as it had been sealed. The interior bed and the clear casing
pulled open, revealing cushioning with a clean, tan luster.
Pool was at the control bank and starting to play with things, so I
pulled him away and told him not to touch stuff. Yuki had swung one of
the broken chairs up, and he opened it, creating a sort of lounge chair,
and he rested there as he watched me check things out. With nothing else
to do, Penrose set up the chair beside him in the same way and did the
same thing. At that moment, Lisha appeared like a white flame from the
darkness, becoming a beautiful woman in a dress standing beside the
control bank.
I nodded to her but said nothing. Squatting with an air-screen out, I
ran a connection to the home office. Taking a read of the equipment, I
searched for it and found full details and some test programs to run.
First thing was to find a mode to identify the material embedding the
computer and run some feeler modes in … and that wasn’t hard, as it was
an older alloy. It was protected by a password and biometrics, but my
equipment quickly cracked that, and the control bank came to life as an
impressive array of flashing lights, dials, and sliders. Everything was
marked; this equipment was extremely simple in operation because it had
been designed to upload technicians with certain special motor skills.
People who were more into operating the robots they were placed into
than they were in operating the latest upload controls.
Lisha waited expectantly. Yuki and Pool didn’t seem to care and looked
on with only slight interest.
“It all checks out,” I said. “Just as it looks. One chair remains
connected. The others are damaged and disconnected from the bank.”
“How about your head?” Penrose said. “Does it check out. I say that
because no one sane would attempt to use that obsolete equipment.”
“Don’t worry, I’m sane. It may not be the latest equipment, but it reads
as in perfect working order, at least for one chair. There’s no reason
why I can’t use it?”
“I can think of some reasons,” Lisha said. “First, you don’t know if the
other end is working or where you’ll be arriving. You might upload
yourself into an old decommissioned robot and die when the system
crashes. Even more likely, the upload point is no longer there, or the
area it serviced in the past is a decommissioned dead zone.”
“This end is still here,” I said. “If decommissioned, they would have
closed it at both ends.”
“Maybe?” Lisha said. “But things have also changed up there. I can’t get
in there, and I’m a ghost. Whoever sealed it did a top job. Only the top
sections of the underground and the highest-security areas are locked.
Usually, a lock also means an area is simply too dangerous to enter. I
heard there’s a trans-dimensional solar core up there. Would you want to
upload into a hell like that?”
“No, but I'll be in a robot. And our investigation leads here. I either
move forward, or we are at a dead end. I’m also assuming that if the
other end isn’t there, the transmission simply won’t take place. I mean,
this equipment must have basic security features.”
“You know what?” Pool said. “I don’t know who or what it is that wants
you personally dead. But they didn’t need to blackmail me. All they had
to do was leave you to your own devices.”
Yuki yawned, then addressed Penrose. “By the way, Penrose. You failed in
your mission to have Jack killed. The Board probably tracked your
efforts. The info on your illegal actions will likely be released soon.”
“True, but Michaels has the full authority of the Board, and you know
how the media works in this place. Stone Sangalang will cover it up for
me because he has to if he wants to keep this quiet and gain my
continued cooperation.”
“Smart guy,” Lisha said. “But not that smart. You’re likely the next
Board member on the hit list. Especially now that you’ve failed your
mission.”
“I studied the other killings. At least most of the early ones. They
kill at random and in special ways. I shouldn’t be next because it’s a
lottery. They have to think up a nasty way to erase me. I’ve got some
time. I’m hanging my hat on that.”
“Yeah,” I said. “You'd better hang your hat on my investigation, because
it is the only thing that might save you. I’m going in right now, and
you’ll be aiding Yuki here with the equipment. The instructions are
simple, so don’t screw them up.”
I got prepped in the chair, and they did their thing with the controls,
but nothing could have prepared me for what happened next. It seemed
like the fast-forward button was on, and I’d zoomed into the grave. The
connectors of the old piece of crap made me feel like the Frankenstein
monster in need of a recharge of raw lightning. It was a lot like being
in the grip of a cold claw while other embedded sleeves seized my
shoulders and hips. This was a dirty outfit, and it felt that way.
Nausea swept me, and my tongue glued up like I was on brain surgery
medication. Some muscle spasms swept up my legs, and I could feel heavy
thumps of my heart, but that soon passed as a growing and icy lump of
coal feeling took over. That eased into sensory deprivation that
combined with a tickle of program input to send me into dreamland.
When I woke, it was with thundering boots on the ground. I was dropped
on a stone floor, and I hit it with such force I felt like a monster.
And soon found out I was one. Meaning I was in the body of a
four-hundred-pound robot, and it wasn’t anything pretty. The bond wasn’t
a good one. Though I was in control of it like a huge body, I still felt
oddly disconnected from it, like I could see from its eyes while my
thoughts floated somewhere above.
There was a group of other robots, and I learned immediately why the
other chairs had been smashed. It was because the upload-end robots were
junk, and after some failed attempts and fried brains, those who’d come
before me had smashed the chairs. So much for my idea about safety
features. Walking somewhat unsteadily on big splayed feet, I went over
and checked a couple of them out. One had been battered mostly to pieces
by something extremely powerful, and the other was impacted right into a
stone wall like it’d been thrown with incredible force. The others were
smashed in different ways. I thought maybe a battle and an explosion.
Then ruled out an explosion because the platforms weren’t destroyed, and
neither was the robot I was inside.
Unknowns I’ve never liked, but I was stuck in guesswork mode. Combining
that with the damaged vision belonging to the beastly robot. I could see
a large room ahead. Light streaming from some high and distant
artificial source outside some tall, nearly opaque windows. Huge cobwebs
dangled from the high ceiling, and there was thick dust on the floor. I
walked over to the arched window, getting the feel of the big clunking
legs. Through the grime, it was hard to tell what the light source was …
maybe it was the moon as seen through a robot’s eyes. If so, I was
somewhere at the outer edge. I could see structures of some type along
the wall past the window’s edge and deeper inside in the gloom. I
approached them through thickening dust and stopped at the first one.
The casing was shades of lead: a bubble on a rectangle, except the
bubble had popped, releasing a spill of rubbery foam. It was purplish,
and the spillage so much larger than the bubble that it must have
expanded a great deal on exposure to the air. As I touched some of it
with padded fingertips, it crumbled to dust. I realized that the dust
all across this floor came from that stuff, and it was some kind of
brain matter. Likely human, specially grown and developed, and hooked
into other chemical and harder-wired systems. Originally, it had been a
bio-based artificial intelligence.
Obviously, the robots maintained this chamber or did at one time before
catastrophe struck. Despite the system's aged appearance, the
intelligence would have been quite advanced, capable of doing far more
than running the hidden workings of Pinnacle City. But there again, I
didn’t really know exactly how complicated the city was or much about
it. I did know that even this decommissioned or destroyed area was more
advanced than any such technology existing in most of the rest of the
world. Most likely, the brain tissue had been radioactive to a degree,
and that was fairly new.
So the place was a dead zone, and past memories of the building were
contained in old, musty cells of dead brain tissue. And I was the last
rusty neuron, blipping forward on iron boots toward an elevation across
the room. There was a faint pulse of amber there on top of an object.
Maybe it was something; I hoped so, otherwise this was another road to
nowhere. The slow feeling of the robot was like walking underwater in a
diving suit, though the pressure was my own weight, as if I were an
anchor that had decided to get up and walk. It was good that I had no
skin or hair because the scrape of my feet on the dry stone would’ve
raised hackles.
I reached the rise, and then it got difficult, like I was operating at
half power. It felt like a double-gravity world or slogging, heavy steps
out of a swamp. A ways up the ramp, I saw over the top to a shimmering
force field. It was transparent, and beyond it, thick metal rings formed
a vault arch that opened on an entirely different environment. Bright
light permeated it, and it was beautiful light of the sort that gives
rise to elation and feelings of spiritual uplift. There were objects,
things moving in it, but I couldn’t make them out. Then I reached one
object and looked down at it. The pulsing amber light came from a
faceted gemstone – too big to be a diamond but similar. And the gem was
only a marker because when I picked it up, the light remained below,
flashing in its bed. Even with my clumsy fingers, I could see that the
facets shielded a ghostly pattern underneath.
My brain felt about as slow as molten iron inside the robot, thoughts
that flowed slowly as I attempted to figure this new piece out. But I
never did solve the puzzle because my eyes wandered to another package
off to the left that suddenly lit up. This one I did figure out. I saw a
bank of numbers counting down fast, and with the gem still in my hand, I
turned. I caught a glimpse of something as I did; it was out beyond the
force field in the beautiful light, a flow of mist taking bodily shape,
and a face was forming. It was not beautiful, it was hideous.
Completing my turn, I did the robot’s version of the hundred-yard dash.
The object counting down was a bomb; that I knew. I also knew I had to
reach the transfer platform to start the transfer back.
The initial laborious steps became a slow, steady clip as momentum was
on my side. Dust flew up and swirled in front of me like I was running
in a storm. It wasn’t that far, but I was painfully aware of every
second as a countdown clicked off in my mind. Surprisingly, I reached
the platform, but I couldn’t slow down. Turning as I completed the jog,
I stumbled, but once on the platform, the big ring snapped hold of me,
and it didn’t matter. I got pulled off my feet, saw the gem fall from my
hand and clatter in front of me, then the bomb went off. The ensuing
wave of dust rushed toward me like a flight of dark bats; then the
transfer began, and the next thing I was conscious of was waking from a
slow, painful sleep.
The ghostly form of Lisha Yanch drifted, and she appeared fully,
sporting a blue bikini and walking along a sunny beach in some other
Pinnacle City fantasy world. Medical equipment and odors of vile
medicines and cleaning fluids went up my nose as the sandy beach became
a hospital room. Then I had a flashback and saw the hideous face from my
time inside the robot. A religious vision, perhaps, but a strange one of
a hellish ghost back-dropped by a heavenly world. Other things, like
angels, fluttered in the air behind it, and suddenly morphed to the
death mask of Parker Colpitts. Then I started to gag as I woke some
more. My eyes cleared, and I saw Yuki and Thor Carlsonbonner in the
room. I was in bed, with no equipment attached to me. When I sat up, my
throat hurt. I realized my tongue was swollen.
A nurse came into the room carrying a glass and held it up to me. “This
should help your sore throat,” she said.
And it did. As I sipped it, the mud cleared away. I felt the swelling in
my tongue go down.
“How do you feel?” Carlsonbonner said.
“Other than hungover, not too bad.”
“You almost got fried,” Yuki said. “We dragged you out of that coffin
about two seconds before it exploded.”
“I don’t see Penrose Pool. Where is he?”
“I have Penrose,” Carlsonbonner said. “He’s recovering. The stress of
dragging you out of that place gave him a minor heart attack. The Board
is holding him for questioning. There are a number of things he’s been
involved in that we all want details on.”
“You'd better get them fast. The last suspicious Board member I dealt
with didn’t live long.”
“That’s something we have to talk about. Stone wants to meet about it as
soon as you are well enough.”
“I’m well enough now. Call Stone. I’ll get dressed.”
“There’s one more thing we want you to look at,” Yuki said. He was
holding a hand mirror out to me. “Look at your tongue.”
I did as asked and found the answer to my sore throat. “A code had been
burned into my tongue. Quite tiny. It was complex and patterned. The
burn had caused swelling.”
“It happened in the chair,” Yuki said. “We thought your face was burning
off. You came back hard all right.”
Chapter Six: The Underground
As it turned out, a Board meeting had just taken place. It was one of
the special meetings that were broadcast to the residents, or to those
few who bothered to look into such things. Fortunately, my face hadn’t
burned off, and my reflection in a mirrored pillar was healthy. One
thing I could say about Pinnacle City was that the cut of the suits and
the fit of fast-ordered hats suited me every time. The Board members had
already left, and we were walking down a corridor to a luxury Board
lounge for the meeting with Stone Sangalang. Stone was there in the
sunlight at a table with Barbi Carvalhana. He looked more like a man on
vacation and sipping easy drinks than a worried president.
Yuki was tagging along with me now. I insisted on it. Thor Carlsonbonner
was walking ahead of us, as he was always in some way between Stone R.
Sangalang and anyone else the man met. At the table, we took chairs, and
I let the others do some talking, being more interested in Barbi’s
tanned legs than them.
Small talk led to business talk. “How did Yuki get into this
investigation?” Sangalang said.
“Pool,” Carlsonbonner replied. “Penrose brought him in, not in the way
you would expect.”
“Oh. Well … I might expect anything from him. We have Pool’s full
confession. But he remains on the Board. A number of things we have to
cover up and can’t go public with. Pool was here today, for the
in-camera portion of the meeting.”
“How did the meeting go?” Carlsonbonner asked.
“Things are looking up. That’s why I wanted a quick gathering. We ran a
scan on all the time periods between killings, and the pattern may have
ended. We believe the killings may have stopped. Excellent news. It
means that the case is nearly over for Mr. Michaels. We want him to stay
around a couple more weeks to be sure. And there’s that one other
thing.”
“Other thing?” I said. “It seems to me that even if the killings are
miraculously over, the culprit is still at large.”
“Oh well,” Stone said. “That’s true, but the Board members are willing
to move on with replacement members. As long as our lives aren’t in
jeopardy, it is not a serious problem. The concern now is building
instability and quakes. This issue is the media issue of the day, and
the complaints pouring in are non-stop.”
“Quakes, floods, people electrocuted,” Thor said. “A woman and her dog
got swallowed by a sinkhole on floor eighty. The crystal brain mechanism
of the rescue robot exploded like a bomb and killed a fireman there to
pull her out. People simply don’t like walls that suddenly vibrate or
floors that beat like a drum when they are trying to sleep.”
“That’s an understatement,” Yuki said. “People expecting to live a very
long life suddenly fear death. A lot don’t have insurance either.
There’s heavy damage in the Market when this city complex is supposed to
be invincible. How is it we are experiencing earthquakes in a
quake-proof building?”
“It ruined my wardrobe,” Barbi said. “Killed my robot cleaners too, when
they tried to vacuum up the rubble from the ceiling.”
“These questions are indeed interesting,” Stone said. “We have detailed
reports, including one from Skitch Rocco. He says he doesn’t know
exactly what causes the quakes, but a signal is running down from the
top through the core. The emanations, or triggering forces, return from
underground and cause the damage. The thirteenth floor is currently
absorbing most of the shock, but it can’t redirect it all. My idea is
that, since we can’t access the top, we send a team underground to stop
it there. We get the flow to keep moving underground and not deflect
back up the building.”
“That’s where we are going, anyway. That’s what Yuki and I are here to
talk to you about. Access to the underground. We also want to know
what’s down there?”
Stone thought it over for some moments. “Haven’t thought much about it.
A lot is down there. Last time I saw the maps, they listed so many
mechanical rooms that it gave me a headache. Good thing they are all
either self-servicing or serviced by robots because I have no idea what
most of them are.”
Thor interjected. “There is more than mechanical levels down there. The
base mushrooms out into a huge underground, but most of it is dead
zones. That’s one reason Pinnacle City is supposed to be solid as a
rock. The huge support, like an iceberg underneath.”
“You must have workers or security posts down there?” I said.
“There are security posts, but they haven’t been manned in ten years.
Not since we swept it out in raids. Freaks and transients from the city
used to get in below, and there was a media thing back then about them
being a danger to the building. The raids cleaned them out. There were
some human workers, but they disappeared and are presumed dead.”
Yuki took his eyes off Barbi long enough to speak. “Nothing but robots
and mechanical rooms. This mission is going to be no fun at all.”
Stone frowned severely. “The Board isn’t paying you people to have fun.
We want results. Someone is playing dangerous games with us. Maybe
they’ve been down there all along, and the attempt to lead us to the top
floor is just a ruse.”
“Something is down there,” I said. “But I still have my eyes higher up.
I wouldn’t count on the killings being permanently over either. The
pattern is now one of terrorism. Killing Board members in random ways
initiated fear and terror, and now it has expanded to terrorizing the
public and killing members of it. Maybe the damage is just a side
effect. Whoever is behind it remains motivated by killing people.”
+++
It’s a modern world, but I’ve always been a person who rarely works with
robots. I mean the sort of robots designed to be somewhat like human
beings and not the various other incarnations. I’ve always been okay
with technology. Androids, I’ve never dealt with much, as generally,
nearly everything is a robot except for super-intelligent human models
they call androids. They are extremely expensive and rare, but
apparently around on the higher levels of Pinnacle City. Around to
murder people, as well as one tried to ace me. A memory like that made
me uncomfortable with the robot Thor brought along for our journey
underground. Despite endless assurances of how trustworthy they are,
I’ve always gone on the assumption that anything intelligent has the
power to turn evil or fall under the control of others.
Thor carried a tracker designed to read core emanations. A stupid, ugly
device that the Board had made about five times larger than necessary.
Yuki looked more like the real security in a slick suit and overcoat,
which masked the weapons he carried beneath. Other than a protective
overcoat and extra weapon, I was traveling as usual. The reason for the
weapons was that force-field shielding could not be fully applied
underground due to interference. At least that was what Thor said. Our
robot was carrying a bunch of equipment in a trunk. He didn’t look much
like a fighter, more like a clumsy butler, a big bronze guy with a head
that resembled a stylized hammer. His only fierce features were his
sheer size and backlit red eyes that seemed always about to fire off a
burst of beams. This guy was also irritating as we were cramped in the
crawler because of him.
Our crawler or elevator ran down from a hidden room on the fourth floor
along the outer core, and we weren’t far down before I had the feeling
of descending into an old mine shaft. At the core end, a base ring ran
out for a distance as large as the floors above. The full base was much
larger and deeper, and the crawler could ride the ring to entry points
at various parts of it. The first stop was the initial security station,
and our robot got off first, using its big feet in tractor mode. If any
enemies existed at this entry, the robot would take their fire. We
didn’t expect any, and as the bluish emergency lights came on, none were
revealed. Lockup doors that would normally be whoosh-open gave a scream
that put my teeth on edge and caused Yuki to draw his weapon. As we
looked around at the gloom and riveted walls, the robot rolled up the
ramp. Thor followed him into the security station.
The station had been air-tight, and Yuki and I found padded chairs that
were still clean. We sat and watched while Carlsonbonner and the robot
went through a bunch of joint security protocols that enabled the view
screens and other security stations located in the underground.
Yuki then decided to relax and clean one of his guns. Thor also relaxed
as he put on a headset with glasses to spin through the stations now
online. He broadcast some of what he was seeing on a larger screen for
our benefit. The visual hopped from station to station, and at the fifth
station, he halted. Major structural damage, including a collapsed
ceiling and tons of fallen rock, was evident, but parts of the station
were open and operational. He did a spiderweb of the surveillance
cameras out and saw a spiderweb of damage. Some stations no longer
existed at all, according to probes. They were completely buried or had
gone into self-destruct mode to prevent illegal entry. A geological
reading churned out stats in complex equations on how the foundation had
shifted. The software also provided a condensed one-page status report.
It was to the effect that Pinnacle City had suffered major disruptions
at the base, and it had simply shifted according to its design and
regained stability.
Thor Carlsonbonner had the final condensed security information
displayed only on his glasses.
“Still trying to keep secrets?” I said.
He ignored me as he was passing the report to the robot. A gem-like glow
in its chest area indicated that its major processor was parsing the
information. It gave Thor a private verbal reading. He listened, then
sat back and exhaled.
“So what’s the bad news?” Yuki said.
“Exponential destabilization.”
“What in the hell is that?” I said.
“This city complex is indestructible. At least in theory. The pattern of
disruptive vibrations is exponential, meaning it will eventually reach
critical levels. There will be ongoing collapses and serious damage. The
Board’s worst fears will be realized if it’s not stopped. The whole
place will be a wasteland or slum. Residents will leave, and scum from
the city will most likely move in. They’ll live anywhere.”
“Yeah, and thrive anywhere,” I said. “Maybe you people could learn from
them.”
At that point, we all turned to the robot; not only was it processing,
but it was also generating tremendous heat. Carlsonbonner had fooled me
after all. This robot wasn’t the third-rate fellow his outward design
indicated, but a super AI processor in a can with tractor feet. Even its
eyes burned red now from the effort, then they cooled, and Thor got the
report. He looked kind of awed by what he was seeing.
“I have some visuals; there’s an entire hidden area down here, and it’s
populated too. Runs around the outer ring, so technically it’s under
city property, not Pinnacle City. The base of this place is so large
that much of it lies beneath the city, though it is supposed to be a
dead area. A graveyard and definitely not inhabited.”
“Any idea what’s in it?” I said.
"Readings say a lot of stuff is in it. There are human beings,
robot-type beings. Subhumans are detected in the tunnels on its
perimeter.”
Yuki cocked one eye, “Subhumans?”
“You’ll know them when you see them,” I said. “Subhumans in appearance
but superhuman in strength.”
Our robot reported that we still had a lot of underground capability,
meaning we could feed the new information into Adam 1X and kick-start
automatic repair equipment that would at least aid stabilization and
help prevent any major quake while we were underground. Carlsonbonner
and the robot went to work on that while I tried to pull up some video
and sound surveillance through remote focus on the newly discovered
area. I got nothing but an X-ray-type view of measured areas. Outside
surveillance had been blocked, and that meant someone intelligent was
inside the area. Someone who was probably watching us. Frustrated, I
ended up pulling out the laser weapon I’d brought along. I played with
the settings and watched Yuki finish polishing his weapon.
Finally, Thor Carlsonbonner was ready to move, and that meant
re-entering the crawler. Inside, he navigated to get out beyond the
ring. That being a long, custom route through some old emergency
tunnels, some of which were built as escape routes from Pinnacle City.
An escape that made a lie of the supposed invincible nature of the city.
Either that or its original designers simply planned for everything.
This was a slow, rough grind, and at times it sounded more like we were
digging our way through than traveling through tunnels. About halfway,
Thor managed to get exterior lights, and a view screen turned on,
creating a scary picture. The tunnel we were crawling on was so near
collapse that it was madness to be on it. We were indeed doing some
digging, or at least rock tossing, as a special scoop at the front of
the crawler was repelling rocks and earth to the sides.
I found myself wishing we could pick up speed and get out of this long
tunnel. The area we were aiming for was a series of domes, and though we
didn’t know what was inside, they were at least secure against collapse.
No amount of shielding could cover the jackhammer vibrations of the
crawler, and we remained silent because of it. A cleaner section of the
tunnel appeared. We were headed for safety, then, unfortunately, our
luck ran out.
A shock hit the area, and the crawler shook so hard we felt like canned
noise. Even our robot vibrated with a noise like it’d been a gong
struck. Plumes of dust showed on the screens before they went dead. The
lights went out.
I had been holding my breath. Thor coughed. “What now?” Yuki said.
“The route map says we’re nearly at our destination. The tunnel is much
wider here, so we get out and walk.”
I scowled at our luck and said nothing. The door that had been an easy
entry sounded like a tin can opening as the robot pushed it clear. The
three of us already had goggles and masks from the crawler emergency
pack on as we prepared to exit. The robot crawled ahead, and when we
were clear in the tunnel, I took a reading. The air was dusty, but there
were no dangerous gases, so I let my breather hang around my neck. Yuki
imitated me, but Thor did not. He worked his way to the lead with the
robot, and soon most of the dust cleared, and we saw the tunnel
radiating like a widening maw ahead. There were piles of tumbled rock,
but we could work our way around the obstacles. The ground was hard red
clay, mostly dry and cracked in this section.
We pushed on for a few hundred yards, and then Thor ordered us to stop.
The robot was slow to obey and trundled a bit ahead before coming to a
halt. It dulled in color as it powered down, and suddenly, we were in
the silence of the earth.
“I thought I saw something moving up ahead,” Thor said. “Just letting
you guys know.”
“I hadn’t seen anything, but I took my laser out. Yuki already had a gun
in hand. We were about to start moving again when the whole tunnel lit
up with a brilliant blue flash. I saw it and got blinded. It was like a
fireball, but blue, and raced up out of the darkness to grab a direct
hit on the robot. If we had not been standing behind it, we would have
been obliterated. The sound was like a battering ram hitting a steel
sheet. Sparks flew all around us, and the robot toppled over. Both Yuki
and I dived behind a boulder, and even though we were mostly blinded we
fired our weapons down the tunnel.
Our guns shattered some rocks, and the energy bullets ricocheted.
Silence followed, then Carlsonbonner sent a brilliant light flashing
ahead by tossing a directional flare. It was like repeating bright
camera flashes, and it showed that the tunnel opened into a wide area
ahead. Three large manlike figures were fading out of sight at the
tunnel mouth, and one of them threw another flaming ball down at us.
Thor was already prepared for it as his arm swung at the same time,
releasing a shield grenade that flowered into a semitransparent force
umbrella that caught the oncoming fireball and absorbed its blast. Fire
flared from it in long orange licks, and before it died, Yuki and I were
dashing through plumes of falling sparks in pursuit of the three
attackers.
We halted at the tunnel mouth and glanced out over the smoldering ruin.
It had been, at some time, a populated area, but that would’ve been long
ago. All that remained now were collapsed heaps and an area near the
center where light spilled down from a huge hole leading above. The
perimeter of the area was a long, curved wall that looked both new and
impervious. One of our attackers suddenly showed near the hole and fired
a blaster at us. I ducked fragments as it shattered a boulder near me.
I’d gotten a good look at him, or it. The thing was a robot,
human-shaped and nearly android in advanced design. Its body was of dull
gold metal with visible joints and one large eye set in a bald head that
lacked both ears and nose. It would not be a resident down here, so it
had been sent after us.
Yuki suddenly dashed right out in the open and did a flip over a huge
puddle of dark liquid before sliding behind another pile of loose
rubble. His action drew out another attacker, the one with the heavy
weapon that had been fired down the tunnel at us originally. This
attacker was a subhuman, and the mouth of his huge gun barrel glowed
with blue fire as he turned an adjusting handle at its end to fine-tune
the upcoming blast. I didn’t wait for him to blast Yuki, but instead
spun out into the clear and fired a quick scattering of energy fire. The
hits were good; the weapon got knocked aside, and he fired a blast at
the impervious wall while the other laser hits flared on his chest
armor. One shot singed away a chunk of green grey skin from his face. As
I ducked back, I saw Yuki get the subhuman with a kill splatter-shot to
the head. The robot was back out with quick shots; one of them blasting
up the ground beside me, and the other narrowly missing Yuki.
Another subhuman with a head the size of a boulder had appeared, and
with them advancing from different angles, Yuki and I would have been
finished. What saved us was Thor Carlsonbonner appearing at the tunnel
mouth and firing a shot as he ran for cover. Stone and earth exploded
from the return fire as he reached cover behind a curve of the
impervious wall, and then our own robot, the big fellow, appeared. He’d
recovered from earlier blasts and other than being a bit scorched and
dented, he was tracking forward. Now he put his huge arms through a
series of rotations to open up the array of firing tubes, and he began
to blast away with powerful streams of energy projectiles. The other
robot went for a tumble under the force of the blasts, and I managed to
put a puncture beam through the other subhuman's forehead. A burst of
inky liquid burst out of his cracked skull, his large, flat face
suddenly going limp. Rather than collapse dead, he fell face down to the
ground like a toppled statue.
Our enemy robot was back up, and before he fired, both Yuki and I ran
back into the cover of the entry tunnel. A deafening roar of blast noise
followed as the two robots hit each other with all weapons blazing. A
section of metal flew past the entry tunnel as our guy lost an arm. Then
it went quiet, and we crept slowly back up for a look. Both robots
appeared to be out of commission. Our robot was pretty much dead and
dismembered, while the enemy robot had an intact body but was missing
its metal head. Thor Carlsonbonner appeared to have escaped any direct
hits, but he was down behind a pile of earth and showing no signs of
movement. Running up, I did a check on his pulse; he was unconscious but
likely unhurt. Resting near him on the pile of earth was the head of the
other robot, its eyes flashing through a series of final bursts as it
slowly lost power.
A couple of sharp slaps to the cheeks brought Carlsonbonner around.
While he got his head back in gear, I looked over the remains of our
robot. Like the other robot, he was now a valuable piece of junk. Down
here, he’d probably remain junk, as we had no hope of removing him. I
turned to Yuki; he was using his foot to turn over one of the subhumans.
The creep’s protective jacket had been torn open, exposing the bare
chest area and a wound. Even his regular skin looked like burned tissue.
The exaggerated chin and facial features with tufts of hair at odd
places, general coarseness of the skin texture, and body parts gave
truth to the name subhuman.
“Never seen one of those things before,” Yuki said. “Heard about them,
but I thought they were only a problem overseas.”
“They’re everywhere now,” I said. “Especially places where there is
radiation or a lot of pollution. I don’t know if subhuman is the correct
term. They were evolved to clean up, kill, and survive where we can’t
live. Maybe they’re the future.”
“I hope not,” Thor said. “Humankind has aimed for the stars. Ending up
as mere gutter trash is a rotten end.”
“Probably there is no single end,” I speculated. “We have humans and
robots bred for the gutter and all the way up to Mars now. Diversity.”
Carlsonbonner picked over the body of the enemy robot. “It's hybrid,” he
said. “But advanced. Based on some of the higher-level super service
models. This one is bigger, though, and weapons-oriented. There could
have been some of them down here for a while. Maybe doing damage and
causing some quakes.”
I nodded. “Maybe part of it. But you yourself said powerful signals of
some kind run down here from the top.”
Yuki spat out some dust. “It was doing what I do, that’s all. Someone
sent it to intercept us and hit us.”
Thor had a couple of small tools out and began salvaging parts from our
wrecked robot. There were various modules inside the robot. I wasn’t
exactly sure what they were, but I guessed they were either stuff we’d
need or a security thing where he was protecting the technology. Minutes
later, we were walking ahead under extremely thick squat columns of grey
stone that looked like they had flowed into place like molten metal.
They supported a rough rock ceiling along the edge of the curved wall.
The wall we knew to be the exterior of one of the underground domes we’d
detected.
Thor appeared to be picking around for some particular spot, and he
stopped and stared at one section of the wall. “Want to key us in on
your plans?” I said.
“Sure. I’ve been taking readings and using my eyes. This is what I want:
the area with the most stable overhead support. We have to blow a hole
through this wall. I can’t find any other way in. It’s a series of domes
with connecting streets or tunnels.”
Some time passed as Thor pasted an octagon shape on a smooth section of
the dark wall. Finer hairlike wires ran from it to a square pack of
explosives he'd removed from one of the modules taken from the robot.
The explosives were at the center. When he was done, we waited while he
did the settings on a remote. Thor was going to use the cutting power of
lasers, actually greater than that, through the shape he’d pasted, then
attempt a blast through. When he powered it on, it did not appear to be
working. The thin lines of the octagon lit and burned on the stone,
sending off wisps of smoke and hissing. But no cut could be seen. It
burned for five minutes or more, and Thor kept checking the reading. The
wisps of smoke did stink like something was happening. The odor was a
bad smell of burning electronics, so I gathered the material only
resembled a form of rock, but was really plastic and fiber.
Thor signaled us to get over behind a large column, then he triggered
his blast. The force of it was incredible, the kickback like a super
cannon punching away all the stone and earth on the path we’d just been
on. When the sound cleared, we looked out and saw the section lit up
red-hot; there was a loud snap and hiss, and it suddenly popped, flew
through the air past our column, and embedded itself in a pile of earth.
This time, when we looked around the column, we saw a hole, and debris
drifting in a rush of air and shadows.
The other side of the wall was well lit; the three of us were
apprehensive, as nothing was quite clear, while dust continued to swirl
in the air. We all had weapons drawn, and I was in the lead and the
first to step through the hole. As the initial rush of air subsided, I
got a clear view, and it was of a man running on the other side. Not an
attacker but a person fleeing us. I got a good look at him. He was
young, wearing casual clothes, running shoes, and a red neck scarf. As
Yuki came through, I signaled for him to lower his gun. A moment later,
Thor came through, and we looked around and moved ahead slowly.
We had emerged from the end point of a dead-end alley. It was
hard-packed earth with round, embedded gray stones. Building walls rose
beside us; no windows in this portion, and they were constructed of
large coarse blocks and sealer. The walls ran up two floors, each about
eight feet, and there was another eight feet to a roof or false sky. It
was the source of the light: bacterial and fully coated in it. Thor had
said his readings were of a series of interconnected domes. Same ones
that I had first detected. We were at the edge of one of the domes, but
the curvature of the false sky indicated a long, flat dome bubble,
slowly curving up so that buildings and the sky were a little higher in
the center.
Yuki and Thor were looking around and up; the sea green of the false sky
was quite beautiful and it cast radiance on the area of almost daylight
quality. Obviously, all streets running to the dome perimeter would
dead-end unless meeting a connecting avenue to the other domes. We moved
ahead cautiously, came out at a wider street, and then looked around the
corners both ways. This was a street that circled at the dome’s edge; we
could see a couple of men moving a ways down on the right turn. Another
street intersected there. There was no one at our location, and if there
had been, the explosion had likely scared them off.
Thor spoke first. False amazement in his tone. “This is like an entire
building floor, hidden underground. Way out on the perimeter.”
Yuki turned to face him in disbelief. “Come on, Thor. Do you really
expect us to believe that you and the Board didn’t know about this?”
I supported Yuki’s view. “Pool had the same sort of false sky in the
south part of his super condo in the Market. It appears to be standard
throughout Pinnacle City. This area is not something just created. It’s
been here from the beginning.”
“All right,” Carlsonbonner said. “So we know about it or knew about its
existence, but it’s supposed to be sealed. No people are supposed to be
in it. We never had any monitoring here because it was considered
superfluous.”
“Superfluous. What in the hell is this place?” I said.
“When the building was constructed, they did this ring way out beyond
the underground mechanical complexes, wine cellars, and all the rest. It
is an emergency escape floor. A bunker, so to speak. If there were ever
a complete building disaster or world disaster, select people from
Pinnacle City would take shelter here. You can see why it was never made
public. Pinnacle City is an invincible complex. The Board can’t admit to
the existence of a disaster bunker as big as a building floor. Most of
them don’t even know about it. This place is forgotten.”
“Yeah. Not that forgotten. Smell the air. Everything from food odors to
perfumes and odors of a populated area. Maybe if we can find out who is
running the show here, we can find out what’s up with all the quakes and
signals running down from the top.”
We moved down the empty street; the windows were all coarse arches on
the first and second floors. All doors were closed, and the doors
themselves were deeply recessed and made of heavy wood. Yuki caused a
few frightened faces to disappear in the higher windows as he shifted
his gun defensively. Carlsonbonner was also making a big show of being
armed, but I put my own weapon away and figured we were lucky no armed
enemy was greeting us. There was no way we could fight our way past an
armed enemy in this sort of environment. They would simply hold us back
and pin us down.
Colored cloth curtains covered many windows; there were no signs, and we
knew people were fleeing our approach, as we passed shops with food and
other goods that were eerily empty. After about four blocks of this, we
did encounter people. A group of men and women up the street from us,
all of them armed and wearing scarves and hats like the first man we’d
seen.
At that point, Thor called us to a halt. “We don’t want to get into a
shooting match unless they force one. We need to tell them why we’re
here.”
“The longer I’m here, the less I know why I’m here,” I said. “Never
mind. You two stay here and cover me. I’ll make a show of dropping my
guns in the street and see if I can walk up to them.”
Thor suddenly grew excited. “Wait a second. I recognize some of those
faces. They’ve been wanted by the Board for years. That scruffy little
black man is Buck Jenson, one of the foremost technical experts of the
underground. He’s wanted for suspected sabotage. So is the leader there,
the long-haired guy. That’s Johnny Marsden. The lady with the big hat
and gun is Janda X. Sorry, but I have no options now. These are
suspected building saboteurs and terrorists and must be taken by force.”
Thor took a couple of dangerous steps forward, but I swung in front of
him and turned, already feeling the heat of raised weapons at my back.
“Hang on for a moment, Thor. Let’s not be rash. You say suspected. That
is not proof of guilt.”
“Emanations are tearing this building apart. I have all the proof I
need.”
“But we’re outgunned. We’ll be mowed down. They have snipers on us in
those windows.”
“This is a matter of honor,” Thor suddenly ejaculated, and then he got
me by surprise as he knocked me aside with a violent sweep of his left
arm. He raised his weapon as he did so, then we were both suddenly taken
down as Yuki dived in on us. We went straight to the pavement as sniper
fire went straight over us, narrowly missing us.
Now all three of us were down in the dust. One of my guns and Thor’s gun
had been knocked away by Yuki’s tackle. Yuki kept still on the ground,
not moving. Thor did move, attempting to crawl for his weapon, but I
seized his leg and pulled myself on top of him. Thor’s mad whim had left
us looking like three dogs in the gutter, numerous weapons pointed
straight at us. I had the feeling my last thought would be about how
dumb a security chief he really was.
Then a light flashed, and we saw what looked like a large white bird
above us. I saw the guns pointed at it, but nobody fired. Then the bird
swirled like mist and descended, taking human form. A few seconds later,
Lisha Yanch was there, materialized on the road, standing between Johnny
Marsden’s people and us. Though she’d descended like a ghost, she
resembled a summer guest, wearing a strap dress with light trim. Despite
the harmless appearance, she drew sniper fire, a lot of it. Flashes of
fire ripped the road up around her until she was in a cloud of dust. We
remained on the ground watching as she walked out of it, and saw Johnny
Marsden raise his hand for a cease-fire as she approached him.
Weapons remained targeted on us, and we stayed on the ground. Because of
Thor, I was the primary target as the person holding him down. Lisha was
speaking to them; I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but addressed
Thor in a whisper while they continued. “Thor. Get your act together.
Another hostile move by you and we’ll be dead.” He started stuttering
something; I took a chance, pulled up on him, and slugged him hard on
the head. His body went limp in the dust, and I rolled away from him
just in time to see some men running up to us.
Yuki and I both remained limp while our hands were tied with scarves.
They tied Thor Carlsonbonner's hands and feet, and three men carried him
and his gun away, down the street.
Choking out dust, tears falling from my stinging eyes, I got pulled
roughly up to the rest of the gang and Lisha Yanch. Biting my lip, I
clenched and unclenched my sore hand. Thor had a head like a rock, so I
was lucky my punch put him out. I ended up standing in the middle with
Lisha on one side and Yuki on the other, facing the man Thor identified
as Johnny Marsden and the woman he called Janda X.
I coughed. Marsden spoke. “We don’t work for the Board down here. If you
want your friend Carlsonbonner kept in one piece, you’ll do exactly what
we say.”
Yuki answered. “I didn’t come for the Board. I’m from the Market. We
came because of the strange happenings.”
“Yeah,” Janda said. “So why are you with Chief Carlsonbonehead?”
I managed to spit out the last of the dust and speak. “We needed someone
who knew the way down here. But we ran into some trouble. Thor got
punched in the head too hard by a subhuman and went loco.”
“So we noticed,” Marsden said. “The subhuman was you. You also blew a
nasty hole in our dome.” Marsden appeared to think for a moment, then he
turned to the nerdy black guy Carlsonbonner had pointed out. “Buck. I
want you to take a team and the flowstone machine and seal that hole
pronto. Make sure no subhumans track it and get in.”
Buck pulled on his thin beard and looked around with haunted eyes.
“Okay, but I want a heavy guard present. I’m not messing with any
subhumans.”
“Just do it,” Janda X said.
Without answering, Buck walked off, signaling some men to follow him as
he did.
Lisha Yanch got in on the conversation. “Like I told you. They aren’t on
a Board mission to arrest you. The Board doesn’t know you’re here.”
Janda shook her mop of copper hair and took on a mean pout. “More reason
to make sure they don’t get back.”
“How will that help?” Lisha said. “I’m here, and you can’t stop me.”
Pushing Janda aside, Johnny Marsden re-assumed control. “I thought you
quit the Board? You’re dead. How did you get here? I heard there were
ghosts up there. None gets down here.”
“The signal they’re attacking you with runs down the core from the top.
I simply piggybacked down on it, using it like a transmitter.”
“Who are they?” Johnny said. “Who is behind that signal?”
I answered. “If we knew, we wouldn’t be here. There’s something here we
need.”
Johnny raised one eyebrow. “If you say so. We’ll discuss this further.
Later, at HQ.”
“What about Thor?” I said.
“He’ll be there. He’ll be checked over by medics, then tranquillized.”
At that, Johnny and Janda X walked away, leaving us surrounded by the
rest for a few minutes before the command came through to lead us away.
We were taken for a long walk, not intentionally but because we’d
happened to break through at the most remote section of the dome system.
The HQ was on the far side, and the walk allowed me to picture the setup
in my mind. Sort of a trinket of domes, if you looked at it as a map: a
larger central one surrounded by smaller ones, connected by walkways.
There were no quakes or shakes on this walk. It was more like the lull
before the storm. We began to encounter some residents and saw kids
playing in the streets. No population problem in these domes as they
kept it sparse as policy, and it was a human population of the natural
sort. If there really was such a thing anymore. I spotted no elders or
obvious enhancements.
We knew they were at war with subhumans that lived in the dark passages
and mechanical complexes outside. Any large support or mechanical
structures not secured or under heavy robot protection likely housed
subhumans. The dome environment was much nicer farther in, with the
source of its beauty being the open-concept layout, as streets coursed
through segmented buildings arranged in a patterned formation. In most
places, the sky cover was the only roof, though some buildings had upper
protection. It was the false sky combined with a clean air source that
made this place inhabitable. Many parts of the outer city were far less
desirable due to the residents, the urban decay, and the pollution
they’d created. Here, the false light had a strange beauty that enhanced
an architecture in various molds of flowing plastic stone. Some
buildings looked new in design, so they had a construction machine
inside somewhere. Probably the same machine that was being used now to
do a fast flow of molten semi-impervious material to seal the hole we’d
created. Transport was all by foot; people simply walked everywhere. We
didn’t see any vehicles, but I believed there was a delivery system,
maybe hidden a ways underground.
Arrival at HQ was arrival at the strangest building facade of all.
Instead of a few steps up like all the other construction, it had a ramp
leading into a glowing silver orb. Once inside, everything was small
rooms and cramped hallways, with nearly every room containing a
wall-mounted control panel and a screen of some sort.
I had the feeling of being in a space station. The conference room we
rested in was circular with a low ceiling, like all the other rooms. All
we were given was water to sip while we waited a long hour, but it was
pure water with a healthy flavor. Finally, Johnny Marsden, Janda X,
Buck, and a few others showed up, and we began our little talk.
Johnny looked earnest and much too young to be in command. He frowned as
Lisha Yanch appeared in the room and sat in a spoon-back chair. “Slight
delay. You people didn’t do us any favors. A couple subhumans almost got
through. We can’t afford that. This is a small population. Buck is fast
with that machine; he can build nearly anything. His grandfather was one
of the original architects of Pinnacle City.”
“That’s right,” Buck said. “I assume you people have heard of the great
Brandenburg Jenson.”
“Formerly great,” Lisha said. “He passed away ten years ago. He allowed
no upload of his skills.”
A popping sound drew our attention, and we all turned to a sliding door
that had opened. Two men entered with Thor Carlsonbonner. His eyes were
wide and drugged; his hands still tied behind his back. They removed his
bonds before sitting him in a chair.
Yuki spoke. “What did you do to him?”
Janda answered. “We’ve got a special tranquillizer. A glass of wine. We
use it on subhumans sometimes. Removes all violent urges and the ability
to speak … for a time, of course.”
“Thor went nutso when he saw you people. What’s that about?”
Lisha answered before Johnny got a chance. “It’s about a mix-up of
priorities. He’s got his mind stuck back in the old days and shoot-outs
organized to clear the underground. Those days are long gone, but his
brain hasn’t rebooted to today’s date.”
“That guy doesn’t exactly have a heart full of forgiveness, does he?”
Buck said.
Janda laughed. “He wants revenge because we kicked his ass back then. He
thought we escaped into the city. So he snapped when it hit him that
we’ve been down here all along.”
“Okay,” I said. “Rebooting to today’s date. The issue is quakes,
anomalies. But you look well protected in here. Any idea what it is
about? I mean, I know it has nothing to do with you people, as you don’t
want to attract attention.”
Johnny nodded to Buck, and he answered. “I’ve been tracking the problem.
The assumption down here is that someone or something way up there is
attempting to destroy us. In most of the building, it would be assumed
the quakes and so on were attacks on the Board. Whoever is doing it
doesn’t appear to have full knowledge of the underground, either. The
dome system can’t be destroyed, but they’ve done a great job killing off
subhumans in the tunnels. Doing us an unintended favor.”
“The signals fork and track back up in strange ways after riding down
here,” Lisha said. “So they must be attacking more than you.”
“No. Because it is us … we reflect the force up the building to reduce
the quake force at the bottom.”
Yuki shook his head in disagreement. “That isn’t working. The Market is
going to pieces. Carlsonbonner hears that story, and he’ll have another
reason to want your ass for terrorism.”
“Yes, it is working,” Buck said. “The quakes would be worse if we didn’t
do it.”
I decided to cut to the heart of the matter. “This headquarters of yours
is rather odd. The architecture is nothing like the rest of Pinnacle
City. Technically speaking, if it is the command post the creators built
as the key post for an ultimate disaster, it must have some
capabilities. Maybe capabilities someone wants destroyed or to harness.”
Buck uncrossed his scrawny legs and answered. “You people don’t remember
a lot of history, or just how famous an astronaut my father was. It was
never advertised, always a secret, but this headquarters, set deep
underground to oversee robot construction, is an old moon ship.
Specifically, the command module with extensions built on from a
decommissioned space station. That’s why it’s cramped and different. It
has capabilities, and when the destructive emanations start, they are
focused here. This is an attempt to destroy, not harness.”
I nodded with interest. “They had an android down here leading a
subhuman attack. There is something key they want destroyed along with
you people. What exactly are the special capabilities?”
Johnny waved Buck to silence. “Hold it a second. Maybe we shouldn’t be
giving them any information.”
Janda batted her hat against her knees. “Chief Carlsonbonner is still
out of it. As long as you agree to tell him nothing, we can share some
information?”
“Agreed,” I said.
“And the Board, too,” Johnny said. “We don’t want them fishing around
down here. You want to tell them things are cleaned up down here.”
Yuki grinned. “We won’t be telling the Board anything. We plan to bypass
the Board and cut to the heart of the matter. Can’t trust them. They are
likely part of the problem.”
“There are several special capabilities,” Buck said. “Food and water
sources, for one thing. We refurbished some old vegetable cellars and
grow, and have a synthetic meat processor no one else has, plus better
than state-of-the-art water purification. The ship, though, has three
important things. One is a read chamber where we can gain data on all
floors of the building. That was necessary during construction. We also
have the memory banks, meaning all the data Adam 1X takes in for
permanent banking is stored down here. The last thing is the special
contact chamber; it was the first contact chamber with Adam 1X, back
when the designers were the only ones allowed to contact him. We have
these things, but are limited. We can’t access much of the memory banks
and have never been able to enter the contact chamber.”
Lisha stood up and paced the room. “They would want both the contact
chamber and the memory banks destroyed as they could be used to identify
the perpetrators.”
I gnawed at my tongue. “I have a code for something. The contact
chamber, does it require a code?”
“Yeah,” Johnny said. “But you’re wasting your time. We cracked the code
a long time ago. Code doesn’t work. We can’t get inside.”
“My version of the code is applied differently. It might work. How about
the memory banks? Can we take a look at them?”
“Don’t see why not,” Johnny said. “Trying to search them is a
frustrating experience, though. Too many glitches, like the operating
core got fried a long time back. Either that or we’ve failed to master
the system. Pulled a lot of good stuff out of them. Without them, this
place wouldn’t be working. Our entire tech from the food setup in the
wine vats to air purification and the flow machine to seal out rock
falls, and the subhumans came from the banks. I did try to search the
building for the current anomalies, but came up with a bunch of nonsense
and blanks. You people want to try it we’ll go in after lunch. You guys
also need some cleaning up; I mean, except for the ghost. We can’t keep
Thor completely drugged, so he’s going into a cell for now. Before you
leave, we’re going to do a wash on him.”
“A what?” Yuki said.
Janda X grinned, full lips spread over large white teeth. “We got that
from the banks, too. A wash. We’ll erase the part of his memory that
covers coming down here via a date-stamp operation. It is amazingly
simple. The memory of the banks is based on growths of humanlike brain
material that can be data stacked or erased. It is a process that can be
applied to us as well. The process is invaluable, but we honor the
creators and won’t release it into the world at large. Too dangerous,
and only the elite or elders could construct duplicate equipment. They’d
use it to expand their control and rewrite history right inside the
human brain.”
Yuki and I cleaned up via an efficient walk-through shower; our clothes
were put through an instant steam clean. I was glad I hadn’t brought my
tablet, and the patch on my wrist they didn’t detect. I got back my two
guns after they did a read on them. Thor was resting in a small
Plexiglas-style cell, and his stuff, including the parts he’d grabbed
from the robot, had been taken. We had lunch in an open area outside the
ship: a strange garden of green-to-mauve, rubbery-leafed plants with
large white blooms, interspersed with fan ferns and stunted fruit trees.
The meal Janda served was from their vats and excellent. No cooking
involved at all with sandwiches that tasted like real chicken and fresh
bread. The vegetables were all designer look but sorting through the
salad, one quickly picked up on the taste scheme. If it looked red, it
tasted fruity, orange like a tomato. Shades of brown were beans, and the
rest were greens. Again, the beverage was just water, and I got the
feeling they liked to show off its purity. Most likely, it had health
additives as well. They had a nice setup for people suited for that sort
of thing. Quiet, small population, not much activity. The only music I
heard was faint, the latter strains of classical and jazz. Sure, it was
a heavily armed group, but no one had a particularly violent attitude.
Guns were for self-preservation – preparation for any break-in by the
subhumans from the outside tunnels. I did feel good about the place, but
as a city person, it wasn’t my paradise. I liked it better than the rest
of Pinnacle City, and it made me wonder if the ugly streets of the city
had corrupted me so that I could never leave and be happy elsewhere.
We engaged in some small talk. The entire core group down here had at
one time been troubled youth in the city. Most were rich kids, some not
at all wanted by their families. Buck Jenson, because of his father,
remembered this place from childhood visits. After that, it was sealed
and not to be opened again unless in a dire emergency. The Board, Thor,
and others knew there was a hidden underground area, but the domes
remained off their radar; detection was blinded out of their security
systems. The place was on record, but as there was no need to enter it,
no one on the Board attempted to do so. The war with Thor had been in
the inner tunnels and open mechanical and support areas before the
arrival of large numbers of subhumans. Johnny and his people pulled off
a disappearing act when they vanished and sealed themselves in the
domes. They were originally the quietest of natural retreats. Pinnacle
City security failed to detect them, so over time a community grew, but
remained small with no real drug or other human enhancement other than
soft euphoria drugs and booze.
The rest of the open underground became a subhuman hellhole. Thor
Carlsonbonner and his security retreated, sealed off key security
stations and mechanical areas, left kill robots where needed, and forgot
about the place. Leaving it as a locked-in underground Hades. Over time,
the Board even forgot about the subhumans, thinking that they’d died
off.
The read chamber, memory banks, and contact chamber were three separate
enclosed areas, and the six of us went single file down the narrow
access hall with Johnny in the lead. Simple fob access took us into the
read chamber, and we looked around. Curved walls and too many pullout
panels made it clear you’d need to be weightless to operate it
efficiently, though plastic ladders on the side allowed access to
everything. Lisha floated about, studying things. Yuki seemed amazed but
confused, and I faced off with Buck, Janda, and Johnny, waiting for
their explanation.
Buck delivered it. “I’ve had about half the thing in operation. The rest
of it doesn’t work. It is in no way user-friendly. Complex read feeds on
various parts of the building or all of it, in AI formats that only
engineers can read. We have another machine we use to reflect various
energy emanations upward. With the chamber, I’m sending them where they
do the least damage. Usually, a bounce off the thirteenth floor in a way
that the energy can be absorbed. It would be nice to reflect it out;
this building was designed to reuse all energy, and that is being played
against us.”
“Have you got any feeds on the top floors on that thing?”
“We have feeds,” Buck said. “Doesn’t help us. We can’t read anything
structural to make a visual of what is up there. Just crazy reads on a
tremendous energy source – and get this – other unknown forms of energy
without a detectable source. Despite the wild energy measurements, it is
not disruptive, heat or radioactive. It is like someone found a way to
contain a pure energy source.”
“Or is one,” Johnny said. “Something moves around up there. Like maybe a
god with some form of energy body. That we’ll never know, as there is no
way to get in there. The field protecting the top of Pinnacle City gives
a new meaning to invincible. I saw Buck’s readings on it. Whatever Adam
1X did up there is scary as far as tampering with it goes, but it looks
like someone is doing that.”
Janda decided to move on before I could speculate. “You won’t have time
to play around with this … it takes days to put together stuff. Let’s go
into the banks.”
A white door with rough, raised paneling led into the banks from the
read chamber. It was on one of those air-pin lock systems where the code
is entered with fingertip taps, meaning it was set so only a human could
open it. There must have been some reason for disallowing robots and
androids from the memory banks. The inside was musty with paneled walls
like an old library.
Though these were the mighty memory banks of Adam 1X, all that showed in
the room were some access booths with head hook-ups and a central area
with a meeting table. It was almost as if the banks were disguised as
nothing more than a public library reading room.
We sat around the meeting table. Johnny led the discussion. “We’ve
simply opened all access, meaning you follow the tablet at any booth and
select according to what you want. Any sort of data. But visuals are
what most people start with. Try it out if you want, Jack.”
I accepted his offer, walked over to a booth, donned a headset, and
followed the simple instructions. They outlined how to do small
searches. For other complex stuff and specialized data, a long on-screen
manual needed to be studied. Since the only complex data I would want
would be on the top floor and not recorded, I didn’t have to worry about
those procedures.
It took me a few minutes to gather how to grab times and locations.
Mainly because I wasn’t up to date on the actual names of the locations.
Getting into a feed of the Market and the Maze, I managed to track my
own movements and then backtrack on the android that had attempted to
blow us up. I followed him to a public area. A tiny park next to a
Chinese restaurant where he had a meeting with a briefcase. Literally,
that’s all that showed; whoever was carrying the case was not visible
but walked up with it, and after what I assumed was a chat with the
android, opened the case and gave it a small device, which was the bomb
and its trigger.
An hour passed as I tracked Penrose Pool through complex visuals, and
then I did tracks on some other stuff. When I took the headset off, I
realized what was meant by wild goose chase. It was kind of like Thor’s
surveillance but not quite as ridiculous. In the banks’ version, my
trail always ended up at someone invisible or an entirely missing
segment. Just enough removed to end my investigation. It hadn’t all been
erased from the banks, so someone had enough power over Pinnacle City to
remove or mask segments of data so they wouldn’t appear in the backup
here.
I got up and sighed. Yuki was on another machine. The others were having
a discussion at the table. As I sat down, they went silent, so I
gathered the discussion had been about me.
Johnny cleared his throat somewhat uncomfortably and spoke. “You’re from
the city. Your name is still in the news feeds from there quite often.
We still venture out there regularly. None of us is completely enclosed
in here. We have a passage out and allies. The point is, we can’t see
any reason for you to be working for the Board. Someone must have sent
you in?”
“Check the news in detail. My home neighborhood is a war zone. I took
the case to be somewhere until the air clears. It was, in fact, the
Board that hired me, but it didn’t have anything to do with you or the
underground. I was hired to investigate the murders of Board members.
Your old friend Thor and his people didn’t know how to work such a case.
It was supposed to be a simple case, not the mess I’m now cleaning up.
The Board withheld stuff from me regarding these current happenings that
are baffling us all.”
“But you must have something to gain?” Janda X said.
“Wish I did. But it’s a personal thing now. They tried to fry me alive
and kill me in Lisha’s world. I can’t exactly leave Pinnacle City
because I’ll have the devil on my tail. Those sorts of criminals you
have to kill off. They'd follow me because I know too much and might
talk.”
Yuki stepped up. “Enlightening. I found out some very interesting things
… I mean, personal stuff.”
“That’s why I hate those banks,” Buck said. “I mean, I love them in some
ways, but I don’t like anyone else accessing them because then I have no
secrets.”
Lisha suddenly appeared out of a flash of light and walked across the
room. “The contact chamber is all that remains. Let’s see if entry can
be gained.”
It was with great reluctance and some argument, but Johnny allowed us
access to the exterior of the contact chamber. We went as a group, but
only two of us went down the narrow tube to the entry. The tube shone
like aluminum and was only wide enough for single-file walking. I found
myself stooping as my head was just short of the ceiling. This tube was
brightly lit as the metal emitted a brilliant glow. The door at the tube
end was another vault door, but a strange one – circular, like the tube,
with a flat yellow glow that colored the air near it. A large symbol
with a thin circle around it marked the center of the door. The symbol
was a stylized tree of knowledge with a pseudo-holy glow brighter than
the rest of the door. An entry code panel was embedded into the wall on
the left side. Its top ran at a 45-degree angle and was made of smooth
touchscreen material.
Just as we were about to reach the door, Lisha Yanch appeared out of the
light in front of us. I watched as she attempted to walk through the
vault door. A blast of blinding light followed, leaving Johnny and me on
our knees with hands over our eyes. It took about thirty seconds for my
vision to start to clear, and I heard Lisha’s voice in that strange,
feminine way where you had a feeling of hearing it both with your ears
and independently in your mind. “Be careful, Jack", she said. “I can’t
enter, that thing is even defended against ghost entry.”
“Yeah,” Johnny said. “It’s defended against everything.”
“Call it planning ahead,” I said. “There were no building ghosts when
they put that in. But they anticipated that sort of invader or virus.”
Johnny’s tone grew urgent. “Don’t touch that panel or that door. You
touch that door, or put the wrong code in the panel, and this chamber
will seal and fry us both. It will disrupt and destroy anything in it –
human, robot, you name it. We lost several people playing with this
thing. We’re lucky that the ghost lady didn’t get us killed already.
Buck cracked the code a while back. I don’t know how he did it, but he
said the strange thing is that the code can be found, but it doesn’t
work. I was here on the outside. He can put it in, but the door doesn’t
open. You don’t get killed, but you don’t get in. Like a piece of the
code is missing. Therefore, if you got a code somehow, we’ll let you
try. However, if it’s wrong, you’re dead. If it’s right, you still
likely won’t get inside.”
“Okay, I got you on that. Now move out and let me try. If I get
disrupted, it’ll be no great loss for you people.”
“More than disrupted, Jack. There won’t be an atom of you left.”
The tube sealed as Johnny left, and I was suddenly in the dark, with
only the glow of the door and the panel's radiance. Since it looked like
a touchscreen, I simply touched it with my fingertip. It lit up fully,
showing a square area for code entry and the keypad. The voice of a
young man spoke, saying, “Jack Michaels, enter the code.”
It was definitely the Adam 1X chamber because it had my fingerprint data
way down here. Data only Stone Sangalang was supposed to have on file
with the Board for positive ID if I happened to get erased. The whole
keypad thing and the voice spooked me. Both clued to the idea of
entering a code with the fingertips. I guessed that to be a security
feature because it didn’t work for Buck. Since the code was burned into
my tongue, I simply placed it on the entry square so the tiny code
burned into it would fit. I held it there.
Nothing happened. I didn’t want to pull away my tongue until I was
certain of the read. Twenty seconds passed, and I didn’t know whether to
feel frightened or foolish. Mostly, it was uncomfortable as the panel
was hot and sticking to my tongue. When the reaction happened, it was a
strong electric jolt that threw me off the panel, leaving me feeling
that parts of my brain would never be the same again. And the voice of a
young man spoke again, saying, “Access code accepted. Prepare to enter
the chamber.”
I gave my head a knock with the palm of my hand and then turned and
watched as the door slowly slid aside. I had the strange feeling that
Adam 1X had read my brain's contents during that brief contact. The
sliding panel itself was about three feet thick, and I saw only darkness
inside. But I didn’t wait; as soon as it was open, I stepped inside.
Lights blinked on, the panel slid shut behind me, and I found myself on
a marbled floor. A curved ceiling stretched above, and all the walls
were as smooth as glass. There was no sign of electronics or other
equipment, just a large command-post-style reclining chair in the center
of the room.
I walked over to the chair and studied it, finding that it resembled a
very expensive reclining chair and nothing more. It was the only thing
in the room, so I sat on it and reclined.
A rush of cool air streamed over me, though I saw no air vents, and the
stream intensified, growing colder until I began to shiver. I could see
my breath and began to wonder if I was being frozen. Then probes
appeared instantly and surrounded me on the chair. These had round,
flattened silver ends connected to a snaking beam of blue light emitted
from the wall with them. None of them touched me, but I reached out and
touched one probe end. It was ice cold, a metallic feel, and my skin
stuck lightly to it. Pulling my hand away, I waited and watched as the
probes shifted to a formation around my entire body. Four of them were
at my head. When they stopped moving, my ears popped, and I suddenly
exhaled a frosty stream. A bitter taste settled in my mouth, and though
I was freezing, I felt myself going under like in a medical anesthetic
effect. Geometric forms, a kaleidoscope of them, began to rush in my
head, like both visual stimulation and thoughts. They were malformed
dream language thoughts and symbols that couldn’t be articulated by a
waking person. Finally, I was in the blackness of space, almost like the
chair had transmitted me out into the frozen, empty void somewhere … and
I was rushing into a pit of blackness, which turned out to be a period
of unconsciousness.
When I awoke, there were no probes, and the sun was streaming in on my
face. I was reclining on a chair, but not the same chair. It had the
same shape, but it was a deck recliner, and I was on some huge balcony
with clear sky above. Leaning forward, I looked around. It was a balcony
very much like the boat deck balcony in my own supplied Pinnacle City
condo. Only this one was ten times bigger and way up higher, making the
exposed open air feel powerful.
I rose to my feet and walked over to the waist-high transparent railing.
The view nearly sucked the breath out of me. I was high up at the top of
Pinnacle City, and the balcony was supported by nothing, floating there
or sailing there on the huge force bubble top of the building. I could
actually feel the top of the monster building sway, and the structure I
was on adjust with it.
The whole setup wasn’t in tune with my fear of heights; on a cloudy day,
I would’ve been in the clouds. Though this had to be some form of
virtual transfer, like the virtual level, it felt totally real. My body,
right down to the vertigo and queasy stomach, felt real. Due to the
suction of the view, I turned around to escape the sense of being pulled
out into it. As I did, I saw a young man walking down the plank flooring
toward me. He wore clean summer clothes of a modest variety and was of a
medium build and tall with handsome facial features. He didn’t walk
straight up to me but gestured with his right arm, and I followed him to
a slightly more enclosed area. There were some chairs and a glass table
there, and he sat down and waited for me to join him.
I sat across from him, watching as he sipped a drink. Even at this spot,
I felt the sway of the deck, though a huge sun umbrella killed some of
the open sky feeling.
He did not attempt to open the conversation, so I did. “I take it you
are Adam 1X?”
“That I am. Call me the vacationing Adam 1X. I’ve been retired, you
know?”
“Yeah, well, you better get back to work. In case you haven’t noticed,
the building is being disrupted.”
“Oh, that. That is because of him in there.” He pointed off toward a
shimmering section of the force cap. “You have to get rid of him to
solve that problem.”
“Who exactly is he? Who is in there at the pinnacle?”
“I don’t know. That data was stored in my primitive brain, the part that
existed there but was destroyed. All I remember is that it was a human
being, a man. And he is in there now, though that is impossible.”
“Thor Carlsonbonner and others told me no human could exist in there, so
how is it happening?”
“A transformation of some sort. He must have made parts of it human
safe, and maybe he has a protective suit as well. I also know that he is
mad – killing, targeting the Board. He was just playing games until he
realized I wasn’t destroyed. He found some data on the underground, and
now that he knows my main brain is there, he is shaking up the building
with attempts to destroy me. I actually have intelligence modules
throughout this building, so he’s been attacking them, too. In the
Market and at other locations.”
“He has to kill you for what reason?”
“That’s obvious. Control. Now that he’s set up, he fears no man, but he
knows I might find a way to eliminate him. I am working on that. In my
thoughts, he is an infection that must be destroyed. He doesn’t know
everything. Like his assumption that I’m mostly in the underground. He
isn’t aware that I have modules out here right next to him, so right now
he’s hitting the underground with a fresh disruptive attack, hoping to
destroy me along with you.”
“You must have a plan. I mean, a way to destroy him.”
“I do. That’s why I’ve been on vacation, waiting for whoever the Board
sends to investigate. Which happens to be you.”
“If he fears no man, what can I do?”
“Good question. That is what we have to work out. The top floor and
pinnacle are places of incredible power and forces. I know, as I set
them up. He got through with higher-level androids, destroyed my
primitive brain and other control systems, and then he hooked himself in
and is in control through implants. The implants create another AI, of
what form I don’t know. I do know that if those implants are destroyed,
I can then reassert control and set the building into a long repair and
reboot mode.”
“I guess the next key is in what you just said. Ambition is nothing new.
This is a power grab. Someone wanted to climb to the top and overrule
the Board. The key to it seems to be replacing your capabilities at the
top with what you call implants. What are these implants exactly? How
can they be destroyed?”
“Climb to the top. Yes, I controlled or did control every type of robot
and android near the top of this sky city. For years, rumors circulated
about who or what was up there. It was always me. I allowed the illusion
of hidden human controllers because it was convenient. Denying all
access to the pinnacle was straight-up security. The ambition you
mention. I’ve always known that humans can’t be trusted, and especially
not with the control systems, robots, and androids up there. The
invader’s control was slowly asserted through planted androids. He got
in at the top with them, caused destruction, and had the implants placed
before coming up himself. The implants are programmed brain matter he
grew, now wired in, so to speak, maybe with the control equipment my
brain matter had been fused to before its destruction. If not that, then
he also has his own hardware. The implanted brain matter, but not the
system itself, needs to be destroyed. When I controlled all robots and
androids, I could have done that easily. Now he controls them, and that
is everything from big industrial robots to bug robots smaller than an
ant.”
“We can’t get in without them. Any kind of weapon or beam we could use
from the outside on a target in there?”
“No. The place is impregnable. You have no idea how impregnable. But I
know a way that the invader wouldn’t know about. You have to go in and
do it without mechanical help. Any action on my part would be detected.
I tried programming some androids with my control, and they were on to
me right away.”
“I thought no man could survive in there?”
“Not for long under the old system, but now he’s altered it, and since
he is human, it would be human-friendly in some areas. There is a way in
through the upper core. It has been preserved since the last days of
construction. I have always kept it ready because it was never fully
decommissioned. More or less, it has been forgotten. There are body
skins, worn under the clothes, a cap, and eye sheaths. Wearing them, you
could enter for a time.”
“How many people could enter?”
“There are several suits.”
“How dangerous is it?”
“Extremely dangerous. I can’t calculate the odds because I don’t know
what he is. I mean, originally, he was a man. What he has transformed
himself into up there, I don’t know. He can, of course, order robots and
androids to destroy you, and the core is deadly. You have to climb up on
a track. There is no transport tube you can take up because he has them
secured. The track is hazardous, and there are other dangerous things
all around, and sheathed beams – all sorts of energy transfers and other
needed supplies racing up and down from the top. Falling or leaning into
any sheathed beam could mean anything from being frozen, disrupted,
burned up … you name it. The top has always had an android service, and
they inhabit an atmosphere a bit short on oxygen. Unless he’s changed
things a lot, a pill covers that aspect.”
“I was hired by the Board to solve murders of Board members. What’s the
motive of this person? Why does someone develop brain implants to
establish himself in control of a superintelligence, and then use it to
kill specifically Board members via bizarre methods?”
“Think back to the old days when so many AI minds had to be killed off.
The great artificial intelligence beings in the world today were
developed, but properly nurtured. Vastly increasing the intelligence of
a lunatic with AI creates a super lunatic. Hidden psychological problems
become magnified; the precise reason why modern AI is dangerous and
under strict developmental control.”
My chat with Adam 1X ended with the bright sun fading in mist. One
moment we were talking, and the next I was so sleepy I felt like an old
tortoise with drooping eyelids. Adam got up and strolled over near the
edge, and the mist sailed in with the bright disc beyond like the sun
was an engine driving it to me and sending me back to dreamland. I came
awake with a sudden gasp. I was back in the contact chair and jolted as
the probes pulled away from me. Despite being startled, I felt refreshed
rather than drained and immediately got up. The door opened right away
to allow my exit. It closed behind me, leaving me in the tube. It was
shaking, banging with frightening hammer blows. The vibrations nearly
threw me off my feet as I ran down to the end.
No one was present in the other section of headquarters, so I hurried
outside quickly. Only Yuki was nearby, and I could see clouds of dust
drifting farther down the street.
“What’s going on?” I said.
“Major quake and blast attack,” he said, his braid swinging as he
bounced foot to foot in the rumbling. “They left me here to guard you.
Everyone else has gone toward the perimeter.”
“I’ve got what I want. Let’s see if we can get out of here. Take me to
the others.”
He nodded, I followed, and that mission proved simple. Yuki tossed me my
guns and ran toward the dust cloud. We tailed a crowd of underground
residents, all of them heading in the same direction and all armed. Yuki
was a faster runner than them and so was I. We nearly caught them at a
corner. The dust was thick there, and as we came around it, the air was
full of weapons fire. A wounded man, badly scorched, was off to my left.
I was just in time to see a subhuman and an android taken down in the
distance under crossfire from several guns. I heard the moaning of
wounded people. Others were coughing up dust, and there was general
chaos as medics worked to treat the wounded and carry them away from the
scene on stretchers.
The air was fierce, and both Yuki and I sneezed as we moved up front to
Johnny and Janda X. A score of dead subhumans littered the ground near a
scorched android of a very advanced human type. The area smelled like a
barbecue of beef and toxic plastics.
Johnny turned to me. “A major break-in. We’re going to seal it right
away. Your ghost friend Lisha is on the other side, checking for more
subhumans.”
A moment later, Lisha appeared out of the smoking ruins. “There are more
about a kilometer off. You'd better seal that hole fast.”
“Buck’s already on the way with the machine. We can get a soft seal
right away that will hold them back until we finish the hardening.”
“We can’t withstand many more of these attacks,” Janda X said. “Maybe we
should just let them through. It’s the contact chamber they want. They
want Adam 1X, not us.”
Buck was coming around the corner in the cab of a big red machine.
Johnny waved him on and said, “No way do we let them through. Once they
destroy Adam 1X the whole city will be at their mercy. They’ll execute
us.”
“You only have to hold them off for a while longer. I got through to
Adam 1X. We are going to the top. If we succeed with this strike, it’ll
be over. But we need out of here, and I need Thor with us.”
Johnny grimaced. “I’d rather hold him, Jack.”
“His chances of survival will be slim on this new mission, and he can’t
authorize any raids for arrests down here if his memory is partially
wiped.”
“All right, take him. We can’t use him for anything here anyway.”
“We’ll need more than him. We need a way out of here and back up that is
quick.”
“Can do,” Janda X said. “We have a way past the subhumans via an old
security post. They can't access it. You can get back up from it.”
Chaos ended, and we stayed for part of the cleanup as we had to wait
while the work was done on Thor’s memory. To get out, we journeyed to
the deepest part of the underground to another hidden security post. We
arrived at a split in the tunnel. To the right, a newer tunnel led a
short way to the vaulted entrance of a secure trolley line, and off to
the left, an older tunnel led back to another hidden route back to the
domes. If it hadn’t been for the slow staggering of Thor Carlsonbonner
we would have got through clean without close encounters with any
enemies. Johnny tracked them as far enough off, but they soon caught up
with us and were killed off by their overly aggressive nature. An
android showed on Johnny’s palm screen, and he was still a ways off with
four remaining subhumans.
Johnny wiped sweat and dirt from his face. “That android sent them
running for us like mad dogs. If they’d been more careful, they might
have got us.”
“Really desperate for the kill,” I said.
Yuki smiled. “Subhumans don’t frighten me at all. They’re bad fighters.
Androids, they trouble me. Never liked them. Give me the creeps.”
“Looks like this is the split,” Johnny said. “The fob will open the
station doors. Once you close them, they won’t be able to get through.
This is an indestructible emergency line. You’ll come out in a hidden
room in the mezzanine mechanical area. If they all follow me, you might
not see me again. But let the people down here know what happens up
there – leave a coded message on the city line and we’ll pick it up.”
Johnny took off and faded to a specter in the dusty gloom of the old
tunnel. Lisha Yanch disappeared too, following a plan to lure our
pursuers on a back track. I moved ahead with Yuki and Thor, and we
reached the vault doors and waited as they clicked open, piece by piece.
On the inside, the final pieces clicked shut just as beam fire flew at
us from a running gang of drooling subhumans. I threw Thor to the floor,
and Yuki moved aside. We were in the clear and turning to face a small
bullet train. It was a beautiful sight – fire-red coating on the
glistening armored sides and a slight red tint in the glass view-screen.
I walked over and inspected the tunnel, and other than a coating of
dust, it looked untouched. The fob opened a side panel, and we dragged
the now drooling Thor Carlsonbonner inside.
“Think he’ll remember anything much?” Yuki said.
“He’ll remember going down. Nothing after that. But he’s okay. We’ll
spruce him up because we need the extra man for the journey to the top.
The way I figure it, one man wouldn’t have a chance, and neither would a
big team. A few of us might surprise them.”
After Yuki laid Carlsonbonner out on the upholstery, I attempted to
start the train, and after a minute, I noticed that the same entry fob
turned on the ignition light. Then we were off, blasting at an amazingly
fast speed up to the mezzanine level of Pinnacle City.
Chapter Seven: Journey to the
Top
One core problem with Pinnacle City rested in the fact that its memory
was nearly all in artificial intelligence. That flaw was a feature of
planet efficiency. Nearly everything was run with labor savings in mind.
The memory of a city also exists in its heritage structures, public
works departments, and long-term residents. Go into Toronto, and you
always find an old city file and some old man who knows about or
remembers this or that. In Pinnacle City, the Board and Stone Sangalang
were unreliable sources of information. With Adam 1X on the knock, and
part of his brain destroyed, I was left with Lisha, Thor, Yuki, and some
others. The whole thing convinced me of the need for backup systems
everywhere, like I had, otherwise, if society crumbled, nothing would be
left. We’d be back in the Stone Age.
As for our trip underground, we decided to keep the Board in a state of
worry and not share any key details with Stone Sangalang either. We
dumped Thor Carlsonbonner in a medical emergency cab designed to bring
about a fast recovery of people in a far worse state. When he was back
on his feet, we had him delivered to us for our trip to the Travelers
level up near the top of the building.
The Travelers level was the huge air bay or automated airport existing
just above the Lower Penthouse and below the security ring sections
demarcating the last climb to the force-protected top floor. Hotel 175
was on the west end of Travelers and was a VIP luxury area serviced by
both humans and automated systems. It featured an exotic hotel and
meeting rooms. Generally, they were temporary digs for wealthy groups
either leaving or arriving in Pinnacle City. Thor had access to the
hotel, which was the meeting place recommended by Lisha and Yuki. The
place had safe rooms free of surveillance and no time window through
which the Board could detect our presence. There was no surveillance
access from the outside, either, as it was regularly swept.
Thor was more cooperative than expected, mainly because his memory was
dim, and my info that we were to discuss a breakthrough excited him. He
made the arrangements, and three hours after the briefing, we strode
down a narrow ramp through the opening doors of a silver-trimmed bullet
air car. The sleek car flashed up to Hotel 175, entering through a
secure entrance that connected off a port with direct access to a safe
room. Our presence had not been broadcast, meaning no service would
arrive via human or robot assistants. No one was to know of our visit,
especially not androids on site.
We drank scotch, and Thor became impatient as we waited for our guests.
He was in the dark about what had happened below and wanted to know what
in the hell we would be doing up here. Running off on this leg of the
case without informing the Board was personally dangerous for him.
Over the next hour, the remaining three members of the team I’d picked
arrived. Yuki came from the Market in a small blue air car, dressed in
his usual outfit but carrying some light weapons and a special package I
had ordered. The second guest, Lisha Yanch, arrived on her own steam,
appearing by the window and startling Yuki. It was the third guest who
made the most shocking arrival, as Thor Carlsonbonner and Yuki drew
their weapons at his grand entrance.
Skitch Rocco came in through a ramp door off the bay, and this was an
improved Skitch. He’d found a drug therapy treatment that worked to
understate his spidery monster form back toward the human model. As a
man, he’d had a distinct gate, and he had a stranger walk now, but at
least he could walk on two legs without looking too odd. His hands were
hidden by gloves, and most of his body by a baggy suit. The feet were
splayed. His face was sweaty and intent, the same shark’s smile he’d
carried as a full human. Weird as he was, he looked formidable. If I had
not stepped in the way and held up my hands, Thor would have fired. It
was only after some strong language between us that they put down their
weapons, and the meeting began.
Thor was still shaking his head as he sat down. “This must be some plan
you have if you trust that terrorist monster to be in on it.”
Skitch licked his soft lips, then curled them into a snarl as he looked
at Thor. “You shouldn’t be calling anyone names. People are calling you
a big oaf, and the Board knows that through this whole thing, my floor
has been stabilizing things. Doing the job while your security forces
twiddle thumbs and scratch heads.”
Yuki laughed at that but also kept his distance from Skitch. Thor said
nothing and looked to me.
I grinned. “I see you’ve undergone a self-improvement course, Skitch.”
“Of course. I’m a Board member. They had to provide full medical
treatment and have reversed some of the effects. I can almost pass as a
man now, and have the powers of a monster.”
“Now you look more like some of the mutants I’ve seen elsewhere,” I
said. “Your residents there on the thirteenth floor are the most altered
mutants I’ve ever seen. Since Thor is mentioning monsters, we must
consider that monsters and devils are what we might be facing up there.
Here are some of the details Adam 1X gave me. He has a location near
here where the core can be entered. It is an emergency passage up, but
really dangerous. In any other spot, we wouldn’t be able to go in at
all. It is not really designed for humans, but a brand of robots that
used to do the climb in emergencies. We’ll be wearing protective suits.
Skitch is more adapted to this than us and we need him to do the initial
run up to lay in the climbing track at the sides for us.”
Thor visibly shuddered. “No one would ever think of going into the core.
Of course, no one can get in either. If that isn’t scary enough, we
don’t even know what we’ll be arriving at … could be a deadly atmosphere
with beams and stuff.”
“Adam 1X says it isn’t. Large power sources are localized, and there are
spacious open areas where we would be okay. We should come out in a
hidden service area.”
Thor remained unconvinced. “If Adam 1X can see so much, why doesn’t he
do the job somehow? Whatever the job is.”
“He can’t see much and doesn’t really know what’s in there, as his
primitive brain, which was located in there, has been destroyed. Only a
human team would be able to do it, as android and robot control is out
of Adam’s hands in that area.”
Skitch shifted restlessly. “Great. We don’t know what’s in there. So we
just sort of spook around and hope we don’t get bumped off.”
“No such deal,” I said confidently. “We know what we’re looking for. We
cover Yuki because he’s carrying the bomb.”
Thor cleared his throat. “Bomb. Wouldn’t that be dangerous, causing an
explosion at the top of this place … and doing so when we are there?
What if it ignites other things and gets out of control?”
“It’s dangerous all right,” I said. “But the bomb is a special weapon.
The explosion releases packets that destroy certain soft tissues and
nothing else. We are going to blow up brain matter that is fueling a
hostile intelligence up there.”
“Yeah, and blow out our own brains, too,” Skitch said. “I didn’t sign on
for a suicide mission.”
“It has a range. We plant the bomb and get clear. Part of the suits
we’ll be wearing is a protective cap that will help in that regard. We
blow up that thing. The rest of the system will collapse. Adam 1X will
regain control of the building, reboot it, and move in up there with
tiny robots for an inspection. Most likely our killer is tied to that
intelligence up there, so that mad bird will be disabled in the same
explosion.”
Thor shook his head in a worried fashion. “Reboot Pinnacle City. Do you
know how many alterations there have been over time? If everything went
back to the original settings, it would be a disaster. This is a
populated city. If everything suddenly shuts off and restarts, the shock
would be tremendous.”
“It's the only way,” I said. “Adam 1X has to clear out all control
systems implanted by that thing. Adam says he's got it calculated and
can manage the reboot with minimal loss of life.”
“Minimal,” Skitch said. “You can be sure our deaths are part of the
calculation.”
“No,” I replied. “He says we're an unknown, but if we survive at the
top, we'll probably make it all the way.”
+++
The natural feeling was to be uncomfortable with Skitch Rocco at your
back. We kept him ahead as we walked through a wide arch on the far side
of Travelers. We entered a mechanical area. Yuki had taken the job of
carrying the stuff, and he was just behind Skitch, wheeling forward
slowly with it all loaded in an old baggage cart. The cart had minimal
electronics and was generally only a cart. At this level, we had a
strong distrust of anything remotely robotic. Thor had his security
organization’s version of a combat outfit on, and it made me wonder how
he planned on getting the protective suit’s headpiece to fit with it.
After turning into a dingy corridor, we came to a wide corrugated metal
door that Thor opened with a push of his remote. It hadn’t been opened
in a very long time. Some dust motes and stale air smoked out,
indicating a hidden enclosure not on building air-conditioning maps.
Darkness lay ahead, and we halted with Skitch staring into it for some
moments before he moved ahead and caused the lighting to ignite. The
rest of the entry was a slow process with all of us searching for
possible traps or enemies, but finding nothing other than a strange
shrine appearing out of the semi-gloom of the odd lighting. I looked up
at the high ceiling and the jeweled patterns emitting yellowish light.
Across a buff stone floor, more lights burned on the shrine and its
idol. The idol itself was an unsettling statue, being a large, glowering
alien being with a hooded head that reminded me of a cobra. It was
embedded into the wall, and of course, that wall was the core. It looked
flat but was slightly curved as it stretched fully around the center of
this floor, as it did on all floors of the building.
The idol had its right hand out, holding a bowl. Nothing was in the
bowl. Skitch went up for a closer look at it, and Yuki shut off his cart
and hopped out. He suddenly jumped aside as a form appeared out of the
gloom. There was no need for us to fire, as it turned out to be Lisha
Yanch, again spooking us.
“Ever been in the core?” I said to her as she walked up.
“No. I can feel the pull of the energy even from here. Once you open
that thing, I’ll have to leave. I fear dissipation. Not much I can do
except wait and see if you people return from the top.”
Thor was nervous, waving his gun around at shadows. “That queer idol
gives me the creeps,” he said. “Never seen anything quite like it in
Pinnacle City.”
“Relax,” I said. “It’s just a front. It’s our doorway into the core.”
“Really.” Thor looked amazed. “The thing looks pretty solid. What do we
do, cut through it?”
“No. Adam 1X is tracking the suits we dug out. He knows we are here, so
we should suit up.”
So undress and suit up is what we did, and it was a nervous,
frustrating, and comical affair. Nervous because Carlsonbonner and Yuki
never stopped glancing around for surprise attackers. Frustrating
because Thor and Skitch had a rough time getting into the skin suits.
The comical part was in watching Skitch attempt to get the suit on over
his hands and feet, and the size Thor grew to wearing a suit with pieces
both under and over his combat gear. I likely looked pretty silly
myself. I couldn’t escape it as the head protection caps and eye
protection fits looked entirely awkward and bizarre.
Yuki actually took the longest time to dress because he had to fit our
bomb around his chest and torso, and the bomb itself was jacketed in
connected pieces. He needed it to fit exactly right so he could move
without putting any stress on it.
Detonation was possible in two ways that relied on a reading of Yuki’s
brain waves. It had to be that way so no other entity could take control
of it. Despite that, we were nervous as the core was an unknown; we
could not be sure some unusual energy passing through it wouldn’t cause
detonation or that Yuki wouldn’t get buzzed by something that would set
it off.
We still suited up in good time, though I finished long before the
others. Lisha took time to give me some words of encouragement and a
smile, then vanished as she feared the core entrance was about to open.
She was right; for a couple of minutes, the four of us stood there
facing the alien idol and were perhaps the oddest of idol worshipers,
working to bring about an odd result; an idol that suddenly spewed forth
near ear-splitting groans and scraping noises as the entire base of it
began to slowly move. The floor below continued to protest the movement
loudly, but it didn’t stop, and the idol itself faded out of sight as an
open area began to appear. When the shift finished, a new opening showed
that was wide at the front and ended at a narrow silver door embedded at
the back.
Silence fell for a moment, and then Skitch moved forward across the
stone floor. With the protective cap, eye covers, and suit, he looked
like the tall bug from a weird cartoon I used to watch as a kid … and it
all seemed so much like a fantasy, I began to wonder if we were really
attempting it.
Skitch stopped again, right at the door. This was the material that
composed the outer core, and it looked like real silver, though it was
about ten thousand times stronger than silver. Here, a faint hum could
be heard, and then there was a click as a panel of the metallic door
clicked apart. That was followed by more clicks as more segments opened.
This happened in patterns, as each piece clicked into place at a
different angle, and there were a lot of them. The door opening now ran
in as a deep arch of the metal. At the last click, a flash of yellow
light beamed out for a second, then there was only a glow. At the end of
the opening, we saw a transparent seal and a vast area of flashing
lights beyond it.
Some of the glow was in Skitch’s eyes when he looked back, like he’d
been hypnotized or possessed by it. “So what now – there’s a thick glass
wall in front of me and a straight drop to darkness on the other side?”
I put my head over Yuki’s shoulder to address him. “The drop is why
you’re in the lead. The glass wall is actually an energy-and-sensor
field coating the inner walls of the core. You can move through it. It
is less dense than liquid but impedes movement somewhat. You need to use
your spidery powers to start the climb up the metal surface inside. It
is quite rough, and though it is super hard, it has a give like clay.
Yuki will pass in the ladder roll, which is a featherweight material
that will adhere to the side. You lay the track as you go up, and we
follow. When you reach the entrance right above us, it will open
automatically.”
Skitch had no other questions; he put an arm into the glassy substance
then pulled it back, watching the field pull away from his arm as if
he’d pulled it out of a honey jar. After that, he went into the field,
did a jump and twist, and pulled himself up. He caught the ladder roll
Yuki tossed and began the slow climb. Yuki watched the ladder end where
it hung in the field at the opening. After a minute, he went in and
followed. Thor was to be last because we didn’t want the biggest guy
hovering above us … small to tall was the line-up.
The effect on the inside was sudden and startling. My ears immediately
filled with hums, buzzing, and crackling like my brain had become a
screwball radio receiver. The inner field had a constant change of
direction, so moment to moment, a mild force could be pulling you up,
down, or sideways. That was somewhat negated by the solid wall and the
way the ladder pieces had clicked into it and hardened like climbing
rungs. I could also get a good grasp of parts of the inner wall itself,
though it was a strange, scary feeling, as the knobs in the material
moved in a clay-like fashion. None of them would pull off, that I knew,
as no mere man could do anything against a semi-solid metal that tough.
Looking down astounded me because I could see the sheer endless drop and
how big the open inner area of the core really was. Huge columns of
sheathed energy showed in various colors. Some of them quite thick with
the energy flying up or down in kaleidoscopic color. The nearest column
was close enough to reach out and touch. Brushing against it would be
fatal, as the sheaths were like the transparent core coating. The human
hand could pass through, but one touch of anything traveling inside
would mean horrible death in some manner not yet defined.
Thor was now moving up carefully below me, and we were making slow
progress. The ladder Skitch was laying out was in accordance with the
distance measurement Adam 1X had given me. Looking up was blinding as
something about the light created a potent glare. I could see Yuki if I
shielded my eyes, but not past him.
Soon, I got the feeling we were about halfway there, and then another
nervous feeling as a distant clanging came to my ears. Using my right
boot, I kicked the side of the metal and heard no sound, and wondered
what could hit it hard enough to make that sound. Moments later, I was
deafened and clinging to ladder pieces. In what had been an empty area
of the core, a new sheathed beam about three meters wide suddenly
appeared, and an object the size of a truck shot up and past us at
rocket speed. After it passed, I heard Skitch curse far above, and Thor
groan below. Then the clanging rose again, and Skitch was shouting
something. Yuki relayed the message to me. “He says something’s coming,
something walking on the wall. He can sense it. It’s coming from below.”
Thor also heard the message. “Oh great,” he yelled. “Can’t you guys move
up faster?”
I was about to answer. A series of blinding beams flashed as an array of
small, sheathed beams suddenly appeared. They vanished almost as fast as
they appeared, and when my vision cleared, I saw something on the core
wall. It was about level with me and several yards over. It looked both
mechanical and biological; a horrid spider-like being of some sort. It
was so ugly that Skitch was pretty in comparison. It made a sudden jump
and went higher, and I saw it put its mouth on part of the wall and
start sucking on something.
No one was climbing now. Obviously, Skitch and the others had spotted it
too. As we watched, it took some steps and made that loud clanging noise
with its feet. It was coming our way, and it gave me a very bad feeling.
We all had weapons drawn except Skitch, and he relayed a message to us
via Yuki. “Skitch says that thing is somewhat like his people. It makes
sure the core wall will never corrode by repairing any damage. He’s not
sure how intelligent it is. It might think we’re bugs damaging the wall
and try to kill us. If it’s smarter than that, it might leave but report
us as intruders.”
“Or all of those things,” I thought. Then the thing did a leg spring off
the side and was flying through the air at Yuki. He fired, but it was
only repellent energy. A big yellow burst of it that knocked it away. It
spun out into the open core, and even though hit, it showed amazing
skill in controlling its flight and dodging all the vertical beams.
Magnetism of some type in its feet allowed it to float back over and
attach to the side.
Skitch had gone up farther, and we hurried up behind him; now I was
about even with the thing, and I saw it opening its mouth. A blast of
something green flew from it, causing me to duck and slide down
dangerously fast. I caught the ladder just before losing control and
fired another repel beam up, knocking away the spray falling towards me.
A few drops of it hit the arm of my suit, hissed and burned … so I tore
that strip of it away and tossed it.
The creature was turning around on the wall. Another blast of its
corrosive acid and I’d be cheese-holed. I put my gun on a deadly
setting, but didn’t want to fire as it could be dangerous to use high
power in the core. I was also now only inches above Thor and couldn’t
drop any more to duck another shot.
It was about to spit, and I was about to fire, but a white flash
appeared in the air from above, looped around a sheathed beam to the
creature, and became a webbed splash as it hit it. The shot had come
from Skitch. Apparently, he’d been eating well and had a large store of
his special impervious material on hand. His webbing hardened as fast as
it hit and glued the creature to the wall. I saw its eyes poking out and
its head moving like it was trying to eat its way free. Rather than
wait, I scrambled upwards with Thor behind me as we tried to catch Yuki
and Skitch, who were far ahead of us now.
More drumming noise echoed up, and I knew the thing had called for help.
A light was showing above now, so I believed we were near our exit
point. The air was suddenly rushing, and when I looked out, I saw the
entire array of beams shifting positions. Moments later, they
disappeared altogether, and all we could see was a huge empty gap.
However, that didn’t last; there was the drumming of approaching
creatures and then a roar like a waterfall, but it was coming up, not
flowing down. Brilliant light ignited below and raced up … packets of
light and contained energies as huge as baseballs and in every shape
from triangles to snowflakes. The flow filled nearly the entire core,
and we held tightly to the edge as it roared past. Slowly, the noise
died down until the last of it was gone. The sheathed beams appeared
again, and with the vanishing roar, we heard the drumming footsteps
coming up faster from below.
I looked up. Yuki was gone. I hoped he was above and that he hadn’t been
carried away. Scampering up as fast as I could, I headed for the light
and felt the clumsy moves of Thor climbing behind me. It was farther
than I thought, but when the light became haloed blue, I saw the form of
Yuki going over and inside. At the ladder end, I found a shallow ledge
and got onto it. The light was spilling out of a corridor beyond the
ledge. It flowed from an embedded spotlight near the exit. Thor was
lumbering up too slow … far too slow because I could see the source of
the drumming below him. They weren’t directly below him, but on the wall
a fair distance out from him. These new creepers were a crew of about
ten crawlers, no two of them the same, some resembling beetles and
others spider robots.
Thor saw them too because he suddenly put forth an effort and nearly
fell when he snapped a ladder leg with the force of his boot. He
struggled to regain his hold, then got up. I grabbed him, and he was
over, and we ran behind the spotlight into the corridor. Skitch and Yuki
were back there by another door.
“Any idea how to seal that outer exit?” I said.
“Nope,” Yuki said. “We haven’t figured out how to open this other one
either.”
“Step aside,” Skitch said as he pushed past us and hurried to the
opening. Standing there under the spotlight, he began shooting lines of
webbing from his mouth and palms, securing a seal just before the core
bug crew arrived. The webbing hardened, and we saw the beetles moving on
it, trying to force their way through. They were too big to do so, and
moments later, a spider creature spat some liquid out as they began to
cocoon the web.
“They’re sealing us in completely,” Thor said.
“Their job is to keep the core wall in place,” Skitch said. “Because
we’re here, they now see this opening as a breach.”
“Not good news,” I said. “Not good at all. We can’t get back this way.
Both openings will be imperviously sealed. They’ll eat the ladder off
the wall.”
Yuki gave me one of his death mask grins. “Be optimistic. I always say
that if I can get in, I can get out.”
We all turned and faced the door at the corridor’s end. “We aren’t in
yet,” I said. The door at the end of the tube looked more like a seal
than a door, like maybe it had been sealed since Adam 1X last checked
it. For the first time, I trusted Skitch at my back as we all moved up
close. I felt the surface with the flat of my hand and my fingertips,
finding the metal quite cold. There did not seem to be any hidden
control or auto-detection to open it. With the core crawlers at one end
and this cork at the other, I felt responsible for possibly leading us
into a death trap. I could already see frustration rising on Thor’s
reddened face. It reached the boiling point as he suddenly cursed,
saying, “Another damn puzzle!” Then he slammed his fist hard into the
door.
That caused a whirring noise, and the puzzle was solved as the door
began to slide into the side wall, moving extremely slowly and with a
horrid metallic screech. It had been an auto-open door all along, and
Thor’s punch unglued it from whatever had frozen it in place. A few
moments later, cold mist began to blow out the widening crack, and we
understood why it had seized. Pieces of ice fell at the edge of the
door, and blue mist curled like smoke rings in our faces.
Skitch huffed. “What in the hell is this? A walk-in freezer?”
“We’ll find out soon enough,” Yuki said as he stared into the mist.
“Damn,” I muttered. “In all my thinking about what might be up here, I
considered mainly heat and explosive or noxious gases. It never occurred
to me that it might be cold.”
“Get back,” Skitch said confidently. “I am adapted to extreme
temperatures and will go in first.”
I squeezed against one wall and Thor against the other as Skitch passed,
not with strong steps but moving slowly and warily inside. Wearing the
weird eyepieces and cap, he did look like he belonged in a freezer. He
faded away in the now billowing mist and shouted an all-clear back to us
a short minute later.
The three of us went through quickly, forging straight ahead in the mist
and encountering no obstacles. It soon thinned, and we could see
clearly. We were in a large frost-coated room that looked like it had
been carved out of ice. It was divided by screens and pillars, and
Skitch suddenly appeared from behind one and said, “Boo!”
This irritated Yuki. “Do you have to shout? We have no idea what’s in
here. Can’t take you anywhere.”
“Really,” Skitch said. “I’m way ahead of you. I know what’s in here.
It’s a bunch of frosty boys, and they can’t hear anything. Come on, I’ll
show you.”
A ten-foot screen stood on the other side of a wide pillar; both were so
frosted they looked like solid ice. We came around the screen slowly and
silently, with Skitch pointing and grinning foolishly. He was gesturing
at a long row of things, like sarcophagi or cocoons, running along the
wall of the core. There were so many of them that they disappeared in
the thin mist of the distance. Some of them were open, and bodies were
inside. We saw an inner shell, like a clamshell, that made a number of
contact points against the naked bodies, some of which were breathing.
They didn’t exhale warm breath that showed in the cold. Breathing was
indicated only by the swelling of the chest and morbid sounds. Their
faces were all similar in appearance, undistinguished and not fully
sculpted, as if they were blanks of some kind. Their skin had scales
like a fish's or a snake's, and their hair looked almost like mold. In
general, the effect combined with the cold gave one a crawly feeling.
Yuki didn’t like them at all, and he had no magic feather to ward them
off. His teeth chattered, and his eyes widened. “What planet are those
frosty boys from?”
“Earth,” Skitch said. “They’re android blanks of some type.”
“I toured an android hatchery once,” Thor said enthusiastically, as
though doing the intro to a documentary. “They didn’t look anything like
that. This must be a new type and process.”
“They don’t look tasty at all,” Skitch said as I went for a close-up on
one of them. Using gloved fingertips, I peeled back the eyelid. I saw a
black orb, and that caused me to let go and step back. Stepping up
again, I tapped its chest, noting that the breath coming out of its
nostrils stank like something dead. I figured opening its mouth might
reveal something, so I seized its jaw and pulled. The mouth stayed
locked, but its arms suddenly flew free and grabbed me, pulling me in
close in a bear hug. As I struggled and gasped, its eyes opened to a
hostile stare, like it was looking through me while it crushed me to
death. I heard commotion behind me as the others tried to help, then I
felt a couple of snaps and was pulled away by Yuki. I saw Thor standing
up close to the thing; he’d used brute strength to break its arms and
free me. While I was still gasping, Thor hammered it in the chest with a
couple of pile-driver punches, hitting it so hard it fell forward out of
the case and face-first onto the cold floor. It didn’t move from there,
so we presumed it was dead.
It was a strange corridor. The vault door and heavy metal wall of the
android hatchery were behind us, and across the gunmetal grey floor, a
semi-transparent wall stood. It was pale blue with a slight glow and
segmented into large blocks. We could see a sort of hazy view of some
large objects on the other side. Thor reached out and prodded it with
his gun, and the gun butt sank into it a couple of inches. It was almost
like pressing on a balloon, but I was certain there was no way of
cutting through it.
Yuki didn’t feel the same way about it. “Let’s blast a hole through it,”
he said cheerfully.
“Definitely not,” I said. “We don’t know what it is. It or whatever is
inside might explode.”
The others nodded, and I began to move down the corridor in the lead.
The temperature was normal in this hall, but we could feel cold
emanating from one side and heat from the other. We walked a fair
distance, encountering no one, and then came to what appeared to be an
entrance. It was a small, transparent arch, lit in a faint yellowish
glow common to many force fields.
“It’s a force field entrance,” Yuki said. “Got any idea on how to shut
it off?”
Thor stepped forward like he might know, but he didn’t have to shut it
off because the field suddenly vanished, and we all took steps back as a
big ant-like robot emerged. It ignored us altogether as it turned and
went up the corridor the other way. It had a large cylinder on its back
like it was going somewhere for a refill. I didn’t wait but instead
jumped through the door, and no sooner had I gotten through than the
field flashed back on.
Taking a quick look around for enemies, I spotted none, just another of
the ant-like things moving in the misty area at the end of a short
walkway. Two large pillars screened most of what was beyond. Steam was
rolling out, and I was already heating up, so I knew this was a hot room
of sorts. Turning back to the door, I tried to figure it out, but I had
no idea what powered things up here. There were no visible controls, but
while I was mucking about at the entranceway, it again flashed open, and
Skitch hurried through. After that, we were stuck there for a long time
and decided to move in, check the room, and hope there was another way
out that would get us back to the others. A blast hit the field as we
were walking, and I groaned as I realized Thor was foolishly attempting
to shoot through.
That didn’t work for him, but I was certain that if there were any
hostile forces to be alerted, they now had our number. The other side of
the pillars opened into a large, steamy hot house. Plants of various
types were growing in large containers, but what caught our attention
was a red light zone at the center. It was separated by strange floating
fencing and had a number of ant-like beings moving in it. The perfume of
some of the flowering plants was rich in odor, and I hoped not
intoxicating or poisonous. Skitch didn’t seem to think so because he
stopped to sniff some of them.
At the fence, we walked around to a narrow opening in it. Again, the
ant-like creatures were oblivious to us as we walked inside. These were
smaller containers here, and we could see clumps of things like maybe
vegetables growing in them. Skitch led me up to the first container, and
we looked in. One ant was inside, fastening a cylinder to a hose next to
one of the clumps. It looked like a bunch of melons, and Skitch reached
in and picked one up. It was attached to a tough, unbreakable thin stem.
When he turned it in his hand, he suddenly dropped it and jumped back. I
also stepped back, and the thing’s stem snapped back into place. What
we’d seen was stomach churning; the undersides of the melons were like
human heads covered with sticky goo that Skitch was now trying to rub
off his hand. When he’d turned the melon, its eyes had opened, and they
were the same ugly black eyes we’d seen in the android blanks.
“Yuk,” Skitch said. “People see these, and they’ll never call me ugly
again.”
“I thought those things in the freezer were android blanks, but these
heads are grown like they’re plants.”
“A mix of all three is my guess. The heads and organs they grow in here,
and they’re biological, like a cross between plants and animals. They
plant them in the body frames in there in the hatchery. Their limbs are
like strong plastic or metal. Therefore, the cold room must be where the
body parts harmonize with the frame. There would be another setup where
their minds are programmed into the brain matter.”
“Yeah, and they can be polished up to look like anyone. The finished
product must look like a real person.”
“They wouldn’t pass the taste test,” Skitch said. “Probably taste like
something foul.”
“I’ve seen enough. Let’s get out of this stink hole and find the
others.”
Skitch didn’t want to hang around either. We hurried out past the
fencing and headed for the opposite side of the large room. We couldn’t
see well due to the steamy air, but things came clearer as we got
farther on. There were three distant doors. These were not force-field
setups, and unfortunately, one of them was opening, with someone fairly
large coming through. The person was shrouded in steam, but in outline
looked like a big man.
We halted and waited, but there was no way to avoid this man as he came
toward us. Another smaller man appeared at the open door, and as he did,
Skitch whispered in my ear, “I’ll confront the big guy. Get around them
and secure that door quickly so we can get out of here. Muscle the
little guy down if you have to.”
The big man had stopped to look at a rising flow of plants embedded in a
floor-to-ceiling container. It was when he turned away from them that he
saw Skitch advancing. I was moving around another row of containers on a
free line to the door, with the smaller guy standing by it, and at about
the same time we got a clearer view of the big guy. It almost stopped me
in my tracks because I thought Skitch might need help. The big guy had a
flat, greenish Frankencreep face, and his arms were abnormal mutations.
From about where the elbows would normally be, they spread out into
fleshy tentacles that looked possibly deadly or poisonous in patchy
green to brown shades. He threw those in front of him and charged at
Skitch, who nailed him with a stun beam. All that did was bounce him
back for a second, then enrage him, as he suddenly shouted something in
a foreign language and charged again.
The smaller guy had his eyes on that fight, like he couldn’t decide
whether to get into it or run back through the door. I took advantage of
his confusion, moved in quickly, and shot him with a strong, near-fatal
beam. He hit the door with a crunching sound, bounced off it, and went
face-first to the floor. An entire large container of plants spilled as
Skitch struggled with tentacle man; I had to be sure that the shrimp was
out good, so I got down and rolled him over. Either I’d killed him, or
he was naturally revolting. Another freak for sure. His mouth was a
crooked, leaking gash, and his eyes were open, though blank and like
large marbles. The twisted nose looked like it had been designed to
breathe something more toxic than air. He didn’t appear to be an android
but some kind of biological freak.
Securing the door, I glanced through but spotted no one else nearby.
Skitch and tentacle man were getting really noisy and damaging. The
freak finally managed to lock a grip on Skitch’s neck and shoulders, and
it looked like he was going to both strangle him and crush his skull.
Taking careful aim, I hit him from behind. The shot was a fist-sized
energy ball between the shoulder blades, and that took him out. The guy
became more like a rubber monster than a man as his legs and body slowly
collapsed to the floor. It was almost as if he had no permanently solid
bones. Skitch had to yank the ugly tentacles loose, and he staggered
back, swiping at his face with one arm and spitting like he was totally
grossed out. He rubbed his eyes and appeared to be blinded, but he had
some perception left because he stumbled in my direction.
The door exited into another hallway, this one with buffed walls and
ceilings and a soft-carpeted floor. Skitch was still choking and
spitting and couldn’t speak, but he followed my lead as I went left. We
suddenly halted because I saw someone ahead, and I felt like rubbing my
eyes, because although this hall was brightly lit by hidden lights, the
person looked like a shadow. Then the shadow approached and took the
form of a woman in a tight bodysuit. The face lit up; it was Lisha
Yanch, and her form no longer had the old ghostly aura. She looked like
flesh and blood.
“I thought you had no access here?” I said.
“Didn’t have,” she replied. “At least not until now. I tracked in by
following your brain waves again. Now I’m a triple agent. I left my body
for the virtual level, and now I’m transmitting from my ghost body there
up to here. I use the energy sources here to take form.”
“How much have you seen. Do you have any idea what we’re up against
here?”
“I’ve seen only this. I tracked through you, and I can’t travel far from
you. I do know the strangest emanations come farther out from the core
and on the outer ring. We’re in mechanical or control areas now, or some
new alterations of them.”
“Mechanical areas. We haven’t seen any real mechanical areas. This is
some mad android and freak hatchery. Whoever is running it must be
another freak.”
Popping noises and distant shouting came to our ears. It was down the
hall ahead of us. Skitch and I hurried ahead, weapons out, toward it. We
sped around the long, slight curve and came out of an expansion of the
hall into a tubular sort of lobby with curved walls and ceiling. There
was an open area and two heavy square black onyx pillars in the
distance. Thor and Yuki were up by it and backing off from some sleek,
silvery human models of robots … or possibly androids. I wasn’t quite
sure what they were. A deep-set gold door was behind the pillars, giving
the impression that they were guarding that area and that they saw Thor
and Yuki as intruders.
Yuki had positioned himself behind Thor, protecting his bomb pack.
Thor’s suit was battered from a blast, and it now looked like a
standoff, but one getting more dangerous because Skitch and I were
approaching. We came up even with Thor and halted, facing off with the
robots as they stood four abreast.
Up close, I was sure they were robots, and clever ones. The weapons
attachments built into their arms looked deadly. They were of formidable
build, and their sleek plasti-metal bodies were painted with bars along
the limbs and star patterns on the chest and head. Sensor belts skirted
their waists.
Yuki was calm but obviously worried about being hit with a blast. “We
were approaching those pillars and the door behind it when those things
suddenly emerged out of a wall enclosure and started firing stun shots.”
“They’re an upgrade on the guard model of robots we use on the top
floors,” Thor said. Then he addressed them, saying, “Let us pass. I am
Pinnacle City security chief, Thor Carlsonbonner.”
“One of the robots spoke back in a resonant voice. “You are not
authorized here. You cannot pass. We are guardians of this tomb, and we
will destroy you if necessary.”
“Tomb? Whose tomb?” Thor said.
“The tomb of the human holy one, Stone R. Sangalang,” the robot said.
“Here at the pinnacle rest the bones of the great leader. The preserved
body of he who has transcended.”
At that statement, we all backed off and formed a circle. Lisha Yanch
appeared and joined us.
Yuki spoke. “I wonder who programmed those things. Stone Sangalang is
closer to being the son of a gorilla than he is to being the holy one
who has transcended.”
“But Stone is alive,” Thor said. “He can’t be entombed here.”
“Maybe someone just killed him and brought the body up here,” I said.
“Why?” Lisha Yanch said. “No one in their right mind would build a holy
tomb for Stone Sangalang.”
“We’ve got to see what’s behind that door,” I said. “Maybe we can trick
them.”
“How would we do that?” Thor said.
I grinned. “We’ll tell them we’re here to worship at the feet of the
entombed one.”
“You talk to them then,” Yuki said. “Don’t forget our mission and what
I’m carrying. We are hitting too many diversions. Who really cares about
the holy tomb of Stone Sangalang? It’s the location of the implants that
we need to uncover. If they are stored in a small remote area, it may be
impossible to find.”
“I did that earlier excursion via transmission to an obsolete patrol
robot. There is an old AI vault up here. I believe that area to be the
remains of Adam 1X’s demolished primitive brain. It was a large area, so
the implants likely take up a good amount of space. There has to be a
tissue, feed, and control setup.”
Ending the discussion on that comment, we turned back to the robots.
They looked like they would simply wait there for eternity, so long as
we didn’t advance. My steps towards them brought them to full alert in
half a second. Blue tracer sparks immediately showed at the mouths of
their weapons attachments, and their eyes ignited with pale yellow
light.
“We have given one warning,” the lead robot said, speaking over me to
the others more than to me. “Further attempts to breach the tomb will
lead to a fatal response.”
“We are not here to breach the tomb. This is a religious pilgrimage from
below. We have come to pray at the tomb of Stone Sangalang.”
This brightened the robot’s eyes considerably and left him fully
confused. “Please wait,” he said, then they pulled back and did their
own circle discussion. They did not speak in English, but rather in an
odd series of beeping bursts, as if they spoke a digital language. They
kept themselves on weapons alert, and we did not doubt that they would
turn and fire should we step toward the door. Finally, they spun
together to face us and moved forward.
“You may enter,” the lead robot said. “The time period to be allowed for
this religious service is twenty minutes. The casket will open during
the service, but you are not allowed to touch it or the remains. You may
kneel before it only to pray.”
“Very well,” I said. “We will do as commanded.”
“When the door opens, you will follow my assistants,” he said. “Entry
must be in single file, and you must stand at the marked perimeter of
the tomb.”
Thor and Yuki looked somewhat amused. Lisha took a couple of steps
towards the pillars, then back as one of the robots swung on her and was
about to fire. They apparently were not able to distinguish a ghost from
a human, but relied mostly on visuals. The leader of the robots remained
at the rear, watching us, while the other three moved forward to the
open door. It did seem like the entry to a tomb with pillars, and the
door moving slowly aside, revealing a two-foot-thick footprint.
Gloom showed on the other side, and we went ahead. I was in the lead,
and we filed into a large rectangular room lit by patterned-glass
skylights above. It really was a tomb, with most of the room being the
approach to the layered platform and coffin at the far end. Urns lined
the approach, which ended in a few shallow, wide steps that raised one
to even with the coffin. Two robots took our rear right and left, and
another moved slightly ahead of us, leading us to a stop at the last
urns. On the two side walls, two huge art pieces were on display. They
were portraits of the great man, Stone Sangalang.
Thor looked the most confused, but Yuki was a close second. The coffin
itself was more like a monstrous horizontal sarcophagus, fit for someone
even greater than an Egyptian king, considering the superiority of its
modern design. Our host robots seemed expectant, so I did what was
expected and bowed. Lisha did the same, and we did our imitation of a
silent prayer for or to Stone Sangalang, who, as far as I knew, was not
dead. During our brief prayer, the coffin lid began to open. It was like
a big oyster shell clipping up. Wanting a better look, I rose and
signaled Thor to take my place while I stepped back. Instead, he stood
there stunned and staring, so Yuki moved in and knelt. A body showed
inside the luxurious coffin, and a rotten stink wafted out of it. It was
a body that was certain, but it didn’t look a whole lot like Stone.
Probably because it was a body embalmed by mad robots. Swelling puffed
the facial features and lips, nearly burying the eyes, though the hair
was nicely in place. It was Stone’s perfect white hair haloing an
intense, pained expression that seemed knotted in place. I believed it
was Stone, and that for eternity he’d be staring up as a testament to
the foolishness of the human race and its robots.
Yuki rose, and I nearly had to push Thor forward to get him to kneel.
His eyes had popped out so far that it was doubtful he could close them
to fake the worship.
Yuki whispered in my ear. “Is that thing Stone?”
“It is,” I said. “Let’s get out of here, away from these idiot robots,
and we’ll discuss it and what to do next.”
We couldn’t exactly discuss the weirdness of Stone Sangalang’s tomb near
the robots. There was no sign of any implants or technology other than
that required to preserve the hideous corpse of our unlikely martyr.
That meant finishing our respectful period of worship and hoping we
could walk away from the robots and continue the search. Detecting our
readiness to exit the robots led us out, the eerie silence accentuated
by Skitch’s shuffle, the knock of the robots, and Thor’s heavy feet.
Lisha traveled out with us, as she was now staying close to me due to
her connection to my brain waves.
I thought it over, and as the huge vault sealed behind us, I knew the
answer, or at least part of it. Stone Sangalang was dead and had been
for quite some time. The Stone I’d dealt with since the beginning wasn’t
a man but an android programmed with Sangalang’s mind. Considering how
real Sangalang had looked, he was the best android yet invented. A smart
android with tech good enough for him to read as a human on
high-security devices. The android hatchery we’d discovered was likely
more of the same or super androids with biological components being bred
to replace the entire Board of Pinnacle City.
The whole thing gave me a hunch, but explaining it to the others would
be impossible. Obviously, someone or something was behind this mad plot,
yet Sangalang the android hadn’t seemed fully aware of the plot, even
though he had to be part of it. After all, he’d sent Thor Carlsonbonner
out on the streets to hire me. A thought that brought me back to the
killings or executions and how they keyed into it. If Board members were
to be replaced with androids, they’d have to be killed. But that would
have to be done in secret, not in ways that were public and left the
person in an obituary. If someone powerful knew of the plan to replace
the Board with androids, perhaps they decided to kill them off to
prevent it. Even then, simply exposing the plot would make more sense.
It was indeed a brain twister, and as we made to depart from the dumb
robots, I felt as dumb as they were. More than one mad mind was at work
in this towering oddity, which made me the wrong detective to be on the
case. Criminals in my history have been tough and ugly, but sane and
predictable. Mad men, I’ve never liked because they’re certain to do the
unexpected.
The robots found their own perimeter line and halted as we disappeared
down the hall. It was the section I hadn’t explored, but the others had
been there. We rounded a bend, got out of sight of the robots, and then
paused.
Yuki whistled lightly through his teeth. “What sort of zoo is this
place?”
Thor ran his fingers through loose strands of hair. “Maybe we should go
back down and ask Stone why he’s a corpse and in a coffin up here.”
Skitch shuffled up closer. “I don’t think the Stone Sangalang down there
even knows about the holy corpse of Stone up here.”
Even as a ghost, Lisha floated back when Skitch closed in. “Trying to
analyze all this is a waste of time. We haven’t explored much of the
territory up here. Whatever is behind this is here. We should track it
and then decide how to end this silliness.”
“It might not be that silly,” I said. “It is, in fact, a monstrous
crime, or an unbelievable series of them. We should stick to logic, and
that is what Adam 1X provided us. He did request that we study or
attempt to get our own reading on it. And he said find the implants and
use the bomb to destroy them.”
Thor took on a sober expression. “Jack is right. We’re sure to encounter
more weirdness or even madness up here. We’ve got to keep focus. We’re a
hit team with a target. That is our mission. So we do the job. Are you
all in agreement?”
One by one, we all nodded. Then, with our purpose firm, we looked down
the hall to unexplored territory.
We strolled a fair piece, hearing little but the hum of air circulation.
I began to picture the layout of the top to some degree. The android
hatchery, in its various sections, was a factory running around the
core. We hadn’t explored all of it. It was possible the implants were in
there somewhere, but unlikely. This hall was the interior of a second
ring that included the nutso crypt. We’d soon find out what else it
held. Probably everything ran in rings up here as we moved out from the
sealed core top. Considering the size of this top section, there could
be many narrow rings or a couple of really huge ones farther out, though
I knew the peak edge ring was not that wide, as it was partially visible
to the outside world and showed just inside the huge force bubble
capping Pinnacle City.
We arrived at four more doorways, two on each side of the hall. They
were large with patterned bronze in semicircles at the top. The patterns
were mathematical imagery, almost like equations. None of us was
familiar with the language. These doorways had no doors and were open.
Two led back toward the hatchery and core, and two into the new area we
wanted to explore. The decision was to go through the first door heading
away from the core. Entry was into another large area of about the same
dimensions as Sangalang’s tomb … but much different.
A grand lounge cast in shades of brown-gold marble appeared. The center
was sun-symbol patterns around a sunken section with a bubbling
fountain. It had luxurious seating around it and high above it; light
streamed down through a double dome shell. It had a hanging crystal
chandelier. It was breathtaking at first sight and also aroused
suspicion, as the exits from this central area were veiled in gossamer
that I was certain was a form of projected light or force field. There
seemed to be no explanation for this beautiful lobby-style room, as no
one was in it. We were venturing into the unknown again, as we’d have to
go through the other exit arches to investigate further.
Skitch ventured out farthest, but it was Lisha who spoke. “This room is
a partial duplication of the original lobby of the City Grand. Looks
like Adam 1X never destroyed it, just moved it up here somehow.”
Thor didn’t go for that idea. “Maybe someone just took the design from
his memory and rebuilt it up here. If this is part of an old hotel,
someone must live here.”
I didn’t hide my personal disappointment. “Yeah, and it isn’t likely
that our brain-matter implants are stored here. When I came up into that
decommissioned area via robot transmission, Adam 1X’s demolished
primitive brain was in a special cordoned-off area that looked its part.
A very obvious special area of various technologies, and the brain
tissues took up a lot of container space. We’d be looking for a newer,
more compact area like that and not strange crypts and hotels.”
Thor speculated. “Things that need core services are usually near the
core. Maybe we have to focus on that area.”
Skitch shook his head. “Thinking about Pinnacle City and the way stuff
has been hidden in so many unexpected places, I would expect that we’ll
find them, but they won’t be where we expect to find them.”
We spread out as we moved in and inspected the area. Lisha stuck by me,
and we went straight over the polished floor to the recessed central
area. The small lounge a few steps below was in wonderful light from the
big chandelier and sky opening. Several tables were around the fountain,
and on a few of these we found cheap instant plates and cups. Crumbs and
bones showed on some of the plates.
“This is some classy lunch room,” I said. “It looks like that is what
they use it for. Wonder where they are?”
“They’d be close by, likely through one of those arches. That food was
eaten maybe half an hour ago,” Lisha said.
Turning, I looked up from the area. Skitch was over by one exit, Yuki by
another, and Thor a third, with all of them about to peek through. But
they didn’t get a chance because a couple of the people we were looking
for came through the same entrance we had. I spotted them; they’d been
off through the other two arches across the hall and were returning.
Two men had stepped through the door, and they displayed no android
perfection. One was of large proportions, the other small, and both were
overweight and lumpy. They had faces only a mother could love, were
stooped, and bearing thick crowns of hair that looked electrified. One
was black and the other white. Their uniforms were similar to those of
Pinnacle City paramedics, though with different epaulets like they were
of a higher medical order. They took a few steps, then halted. One’s
hooded eyes flashed to Skitch, and the other guy glared at Thor. They
didn’t seem to notice Lisha and me down in the lounge area, but they
didn’t take time to scan the room either. They simply turned on their
heels and ran out. Yuki spun about quickly for a glance, but Thor and
Skitch didn’t notice them, and before I could call to them, Thor
disappeared through an arch.
Yuki jogged across the floor toward us, and Skitch suddenly turned
about. At the same time, the two men came back through the archway, but
with two more men who were best described as heavily armed freaks. They
had tube weapons of some kind raised, and one fired at Skitch while the
other sent a blast at Yuki. Yuki, they missed as he skidded and rolled
down to us, leaving the beam to deflect off the floor and slam a far
wall with a hammer blow. Skitch had tried to avoid the beam fired at
him, but he got side-swiped by it and bowled over.
They swung their tubes to aim at us in the center. I had my weapon up
and fired a thumper beam that knocked all four of them a couple of steps
backward. One fired a wild shot at that point, shattering part of the
chandelier above. That caused Yuki and me to flee from falling shards,
and it put us at a disadvantage as the tubes again focused on direct
shots at us. They didn’t get to fire because Thor suddenly came back
through the arch on the run, and seeing the four men fired his weapon,
which he already had out. His shot opaqued the air and knocked the men
down, and he didn’t stop running. It became apparent why when a large
dog-like robot beast bounded in the arch behind him. He was turning for
a direct shot at it, and I was pulling my weapon up, but before we could
fire, Skitch got in the way. He’d got back on his feet and moved in fast
enough to meet the beast’s charge. They collided, and both tumbled to
the floor and separated. Since the other armed freaks were now rising, I
turned to them and left Skitch and Thor to deal with the robot dog.
Running and leaping from the recessed lounge, Yuki at my side, we both
fired at the rising men. The shots connected, knocking them out cold. I
spun around to see what was happening with the dog and saw its eyes
igniting as if it were about to fire its brand of kill beam. Thor fired
first, and the deadly beam set the thing on fire. Red and blue flames
roared up from it as it burned like a flare. Moments later, all that
remained was a large oozing lump on the smoke-stained lobby floor.
We gathered around the four men. They were out cold, so I disarmed them,
and we dragged them over to the center lounge area. Thor studied the
tube weapons while Yuki and I searched them. The two medical guys had
syringe kits in their breast pockets, several filled vials, and pocket
medical devices that couldn’t be immediately identified. The smallest
guy was the only one showing signs of coming around. Yuki did a check on
the other three, then raised his eyebrows for a moment. “These guys have
a pulse, but it’s only half the normal human reading.”
“They’re part human,” Skitch said. “I can tell by the body odor. But
they have a bad odor. Faint but like spoiled meat. By my reading, these
guys are more dead than alive.”
“They’re alive enough to shoot at us,” Lisha said. “The uniforms are the
higher paramedic order. The ones that service the richest residents on
the higher floors, except these guys have those odd epaulets. I’ve never
seen them before.”
“They came in from across the hall,” Thor said as he peered in that
direction. “Yuki, back me while I take a peek over there.”
Thor strode away, and the smaller chap we’d smacked groaned and opened
his eyes at the same time. Yuki glanced back but kept following Thor out
the entry arch. Our medical man appeared sickly himself. His groggy eyes
stared fish-like at us for some moments, then registered fear. The veins
in them were a yellowish hue, the irises weren’t right, and in a way,
they were soulless eyes. The spark of life always present in human eyes
wasn’t there, or rather, it was, but had a cold, artificial feel. If an
emotion was conveyed, it was of mild fright and calculation. He wasn’t
the sort I would trust for even a moment.
Reaching down, I slapped him on the cheek. It didn’t rouse any
circulation, but it did cause him to curse at me in a Pinnacle City
accent. I decided to begin an interrogation. “What medical order do you
belong to, and why did you attack us?”
He appeared to be dreaming up lies and spoke slowly. “This is a
restricted area. You are trespassing.”
Skitch got close enough to breathe on him, and that drew real fear lines
on the guy’s face. “What are those things you are manufacturing by the
core? For that matter, what are you? You don’t look human or android.”
“You should talk,” the captive said. “You’re a monster. There must be
illegal breeding going on somewhere below.”
Skitch looked to me, then Lisha. “I didn’t eat today. Is it okay if I
grab a piece of this guy?”
Skitch was bluffing, but the medical mutant fell for it and spat some
words at me. “You let that creep touch me, and you’ll be in big
trouble.”
I grinned. “If I had hair and a face like yours, I wouldn’t be calling
Skitch here a creep. You look like the man originally named Creep who
created the legacy of the name. You already are in trouble, so you'd
better tell us what you’re up to here?”
He didn’t answer swiftly, and Skitch leaned in on him. “I’m not going to
ask again. What are those things you’re manufacturing out there? Why do
some of them look like Board members?”
He answered defiantly. “Those are not things. They are a higher life
form we have created. Our order is a special order, created and imbued
with medical knowledge for this work.”
“Your body odor and theirs are similar. So you are created just like
them,” Skitch said.
“We are the first of the new line,” he said. “We are a higher level of
android. The science was imperfect when our bodies were grown, which is
why our physical appearance is lacking. Our minds, though, are superior.
I have taken my predecessor’s medical knowledge much farther, and the
new breed is superior to humans. Here at the top, we are worker droids,
advancing the science to create a higher order of life.”
“Predecessor,” I said, with a sour look on my face. “Let me guess. A
real doctor was killed and his brain cells robbed.”
“Not robbed, not dead. His mind lives on in me. I am him, just as the
Board of Pinnacle City will live on in their new bodies.”
Lisha got in on the discussion. “Uh, excuse me for getting into this
conversation. But does the Board know it is being upgraded? For that
matter, why are you bringing the dead members back to life in the new
form?”
He scowled at her. “Of course, they don’t know. If they did, they would
try to stop us … to stop the advance of science. The dead members we are
bringing back as the first of the line. Any errors will be apparent in
them. So far, all is perfect.”
“Ah,” I said. “So your order is involved in the weird killings. And all
for a mad experiment.”
“We didn’t kill them. That was another issue. We managed to recreate
some of them, where we were able to grab the brain before it decayed.”
“You said all is perfect,” I said. “But all did not go perfectly with
your first super creation, did it?”
“How would you know?”
“I know by the killings and the android that arranged them all. Stone
Sangalang’s android replacement is the mad killer. He is also the first
Board member you replaced and the man who dreamed up this insane scheme.
We saw his tomb and how he has himself laid out as a martyr up here,
while his mad android replacement is running Pinnacle City. Running it
while being only half aware of this entire scheme and forgetful of the
fact that he is a flawed replacement of Stone.”
Heavy footfalls came through the door. It was Thor and Yuki, returning
with two more of the freak doctors. These two were bound together, and
Thor was pulling them forward. Yuki hurried up ahead of them. “There’s a
whole gang of those crazy doctor characters, but the rest got away and
sealed themselves in another area.”
I turned back to our captive. “Stone Sangalang dreamed this up. He
destroyed Adam 1X’s control up here, then uploaded his mind to an
android he created. But that android was imperfect and also became a
serial killer. So, which one of you doctors runs this ship during the
rough sailing? Who is the boss?”
With the other two captives alert and looking on, he was reluctant to
speak. He glanced at them, then said. “What difference does it make if I
tell them. They’ll be killed anyway.” Looking back, to me, he said,
“Stone Sangalang spent decades dabbling in android development and knew
science was being held back. When he gained a mode of access up here, he
used it to create us and move ahead. He did not plan on perishing. At
first, there were to be two. Stone Sangalang, the human, would continue
to control the Board while needed. The second Stone Sangalang would run
the operation up here. A problem arose when uploading his mind to the
android: the upload encountered errors. In a high-level upload, you are
in effect becoming another being, and as a human, you really should die
as you are transferred. Stone wanted both to live, and yes, the android
was a perfect duplicate, but it couldn’t cope with the issue of
believing it was a duplicate. It lacked mental balance. To correct the
problem, it murdered Stone, then developed amnesia for a time. I took
over at that point, did some alterations, and sent him below. He, of
course, believed that he was the real Stone Sangalang. Unfortunately, we
overlooked his psychopathic tendencies, and he began to murder people.
We believe that has now been corrected.”
Thor puffed his cheeks and sighed in disbelief. “Then there are more
errors than Sangalang. You are another error. That crazy tomb and corpse
of his you have on display are proof of it. Replacing the whole Board
with androids that will probably be as dangerous as Stone is sheer
lunacy.”
He openly laughed. “We are a medical order. We didn’t plan this whole
operation. We run it. The other built the tomb in honor of his creator.”
He pointed east or outward from the core. “Unfortunately for you, he is
out there, and you have to go out there if you want to return below. He
is powerful, a god if you will, and he will destroy you.”
“Who in the hell is he?” Thor said.
“You’ll find out soon enough, won’t you?”
My head was already spinning from all this, and, given my opinion of
Pinnacle City, I began to wonder whether androids running it made any
visible difference. Thor apparently did, and if they were all going to
be mad, he was mostly right. An entire Board of them would create
unmanageable insanity. I felt like giving up on the case and simply
escaping, but even for that, I needed more information. “The only exit
is out there, is that true?”
“Yes,” he said. “Not far from here, there is a secret bay for moving in
supplies and equipment. But for humans and advanced androids like us,
there is only one secure tube down, and it is out there.”
Yuki decided to pose a fast question while he was talking. “Where are
the new implants that control this place?”
He again pointed. “Out there. You make it sound like implants can run
things. It is not just raw intelligence capabilities or super-org
connections, but the wonderful new being itself that is in control.”
“Oh great,” Thor said. “A monster is out there.”
Chapter Eight: The Bad
Side of Heaven
There was no option of taking the captives with us, and we had no time
to hunt for the others. I assumed that since the others were hiding from
us, they might do so for a while. We made sure our guys were tightly
bound and left them there in the lounge area. Exploration of the
interior arches began. They all had doorways of filtered light, and you
didn’t see what was beyond them until you took a step through. One arch,
the first one I personally explored, led through a way to an old sealed
area that was the old dead zone I’d been in as a robot. It looked
different through human eyes, but I recognized it. From the top of high
steps, I looked down on the musty scene of what was now obsolete AI
tech. The blasted brain matter hung throughout the place like cobwebs. A
big scorch ran across the floor to a distant scene of destruction that
was the area of the explosion I had fled as a clunking robot. While I
stared, Yuki and Thor stepped through to the area.
Thor surveyed it with a grim expression. “We should take some time later
and destroy that entire android hatchery. At least fry all droids in the
finishing department. If we don't destroy it they'll soon be capturing
Board members and dragging them up here for the transfer and then
death.”
“Maybe,” I said. “We really have to fry the brains behind it all. The
wonderful new being mentioned by our amazing doctor clone and the
implants it is using as well. I suppose it will turn out to be another
of those freaks, but a stronger one and heavily armed or with superior
protection.”
The other arches did not lead to the wings of a fabulous hotel at all.
After the decommissioned area, we found a storage section. It contained
everything from specialized worker robots still in the box to a large
assortment of raw medical supplies and refined equipment. Thor
cannibalized this area and packed away a number of compact fuel cells
and power supplies. Not that we needed power. His mind was on building a
bomb he could use to blow the hatchery.
The living quarters of the medical staff were through another arch, and
now abandoned. Not much was present other than an assortment of rooms
for a staff of maybe thirty people. We found spares of their unique
medical belts. Yuki strapped one on with the idea of taking it back down
when the deal was over, then changed his mind and dumped it, feeling
carrying a bomb jacket was enough for the moment.
A walk through another arch led us into an interior junkyard. We found
the remains of Adam 1X’s army of android servants tossed aside here.
Almost all of them were missing parts, as were the many other pieces of
equipment that had been dumped. It was obvious that before perishing as
a human being, Stone had really been a mad scientist, constructing his
new world and freak factory using anything of value he could find. It
made sense because he wouldn’t have been able to ship large quantities
of supplies in through the secret bay. Not without being noticed, and
he’d done all this in secret. Some of the really high-tech medical
equipment had been smuggled in, and he likely embezzled sizable sums
through the Board to purchase it all.
Master mechanical was through another arch, and the air in it was barely
tolerable. Waves of energy coursed across the tops of towering beehive
structures, and coolant air rushed out of floating black windows in the
higher areas. A deadly knock rattled my teeth, and after a study of the
trails of conduction surfaces, scrambling repair beetles, and blasting
cross-spectrum engines, we stepped back toward the arch. We couldn't
move ahead in that place, and most of it was locked behind a shimmering
force field. The impervious bubble protecting the pinnacle was broadcast
from inside the field, and the energies transmitted would fry us
quickly. My guess was that it occupied the rest of the large area around
this section and extended back to the other side of the core.
The inner rings contained the android hatchery and separating halls with
the tomb and hotel taking up part of the second, bigger ring, and the
master mechanical filling the other two-thirds of that ring. What was
left would be what our mad doctor called Out There. Out There would be
the largest area, and it would be really big if it were in one ring
running out to the edge ring.
The last arch led out to another section of halls, unsettling in their
sparse, space-station efficiency. Heavy-plated, lined with rivets that
were decoration, not reinforcement, they were so solid that a knock on
them produced silence. The floor was a different story, glass-smooth and
as pale as blue ice, emitting a strange ringing sound with every
footfall. Thor sounded like a mighty giant walking along this hall,
while Skitch and Yuki could walk silently on it. We saw no doors and no
security devices of any kind, and as we walked uneasily along, it
occurred to me that even if we had blown up the entire hatchery and much
of the inner area around the core, this solid protective ring would have
sealed the vast outer area. It was under super protection, with a force
bubble overhead and a solid interior ring. I looked down at the floor
again, realizing it was another super substance sealing the area off
from any hostile power, force, or quake that might rise from below.
Judging our position, I guessed that we’d gone halfway around the ring
before a door appeared. We almost passed it. It was Lisha who spotted
it, and the thin cracks marking its outline. No handle, no indent, no
security panel, but the outline of a door cut hairline thin into the
super-hard metal. It had the same rivet pattern, and I examined them all
for a trick opener but found nothing.
“Probably simple hidden detection,” I said. “If it recognizes you, it
opens. It doesn’t, and it stays closed. It looks like we’re blocked. I
don’t think we can even blow it open, and probably wouldn’t want to.
None of the doors we’ve seen up here are armed, probably because
security doesn’t allow any sort of blasts here. With this one, we don’t
even know what’s on the other side. Any kind of explosion might kick off
a chain reaction or trigger a defense system that will wipe us out.”
“Good point,” Thor said. “We haven’t encountered any fine-tuned defenses
so far, probably because it was not expected that we or anyone else
would ever get up here in the first place. We are now trying to enter a
highly protected area. Arriving inside with a big bang might be the
fatal move that unleashes all hell on us. And if we don’t get through,
we might be cooked, too. Look at this hallway and how fast it could
become a death chamber.”
“You want to turn back?” Yuki said. “Keep in mind, there is no way back.
It’s either this door or we explore farther and hope to find another way
through.”
“I might have a way,” Skitch said. “Get back from the door and let me
work.”
No one replied, but we all moved out of the way several feet and looked
on while Skitch ran crooked finger appendages over the door’s surface.
He found nothing there, just as I had found nothing, then he went to
work on the hair-thin crack. Starting at the top, he ran his fingertips
along it, and his arms and neck vibrated and hummed in a low frequency.
Fine dust hissed out as he moved along the full outline from top to
bottom, then he moved back out of the way and waited.
“What are we waiting for?” Thor said. “I thought we agreed there would
be no explosion?”
Skitch grinned. “It’s a wedge trick. We have an impervious metal wall
and door. I filled the crack with an expanding impervious material. Some
of the same stuff we use on parts of the thirteenth floor.”
I took his word on it, we all did, and waited and watched. Nothing
seemed to be happening, then we heard a slight snap, and seconds later
the door edge slid slowly inward, but not enough to open. Thor moved in
and shouldered it, then groaned as the impact hurt his shoulder. The
substance was still slowly expanding, and the door went deeper. We were
all amazed at the thickness of the thing. Most vault doors were far
thinner.
Thor rubbed his sore shoulder. “Damn, we’re in one powerhouse of an iron
tube.”
“Iron would break easily,” I said, and barely got the words out as the
door finally finished the slide open with the jamb squealing and popping
it all the way in and around to thud against the other side. Dry air and
dust rushed out at the same time like we’d popped a seal and unleashed
some unholy genie. A big one because the air kept rushing in, and we all
staggered as it initially stung our nostrils and eyes. The flow
gradually slowed, and we adapted to it somewhat. Meaning we were all
coughing except Lisha, and it was a painful cough that was hard to
shake. When I finally did shake it, I kept my breathing shallow. This
air had plenty of oxygen, but it was rich in other elements that were
dusty and not lung-friendly. The first thing on my mind was that it
would not be normal human breathing in such an atmosphere. The area was
either android- and robot-only or home to something else not quite
human. The being our captive had mentioned was likely not human.
“Strange odors in there,” Skitch announced, moving recklessly through
the door without doing a check.
Thor looked at me, raised his eyebrows, then turned and followed Skitch.
I ended up last through and saw that all we’d accomplished was to break
into another hall that followed a long ring around the pinnacle. This
one was much wider and nothing like the last except for the wall
containing the door we’d passed through. It ran forward with the same
clean metal and rivets. Both walls rose high again, up to what this time
appeared to be faint light from a natural skylight at the force bubble.
The second wall was covered with growth in shades of brown and white
that looked almost like deerskin. Closer inspection revealed it to be a
form of plant life growing on the coarse surface. My eyes were on the
floor because it wasn’t a smooth surface; it was coarse and a mix of
dark, grainy colors. There were faint foot impressions in feathery dust
that had drifted to parts of the floor. We heard nothing and could see
only a short distance in the clouded atmosphere.
Yuki reached down and pinched some of the pale dust between his
fingertips. Thor was squatting by some prints, and Skitch was comparing
his own prints with others.
“Two types of prints,” I said. “Large robots or androids and smaller
creatures, possibly biological with four legs.”
None of us moved any further because of the prints. We were scanning
ahead and behind, but initially saw no movement. I was about to start
walking when a section of the wall ahead came to life with something
springing from it. It startled us. Thor nearly fired, but didn’t, and it
hit the floor far ahead of us and ran off. In appearance, it was a
lizard about the size of a small dog. As it disappeared, a second
creature popped off the wall and followed it. But this one had fur and
was catlike.
“Those things look like real biological creatures,” Thor said. “One of
them is maybe a desert lizard, the other a desert cat creature.”
“Looks can be deceiving,” I said. “We don’t know what they are, but we
do know they are invisible when they are on the ledges cut into that
wall. We’ll have to move ahead in single file. I’ll go well ahead, and
you people follow behind. Be prepared to act if I get jumped.”
Again, we were on the big carousel following the long, slow curve of the
wall around the building. Why the top was set up this way remained
unknown. Nearly all other floors of Pinnacle City were complex and hid
the core. Here, the whole floor was taking on the feel of a cylinder
with rings of monstrous size.
A couple more of the creatures jumped and ran. The bizarre outer wall
was giving us all the creeps. If small creatures could appear from it as
though through spontaneous combustion, possibly more deadly ones might
also appear. But we went a half a kilometer along the wall, and none
did. Yet it still grew spookier and darker.
A break appeared ahead, and the dust coating grew thicker, revealing a
heavy track of prints, all going through into an interior section that
we couldn’t yet see.
I found myself worrying that things might also spring up out of the
floor dust. I was constantly navel-gazing then jerking my head back up.
The break ahead had a swirl of atmosphere and speckles at its mouth. The
speckling was a different coloration and form from the floor dust and
had an unreal appearance. We arrived one by one and ended up staring at
the numerous footprints running off into choking gloom. The gloom was
almost like a visual scene breaking up into pixels, giving the look of
air forming slow-motion dust devils or speckled swirls that intermingled
in a pattern. We feared entering it because we could not see how deep it
ran and had no way of knowing what might spring out. Neither did we know
what effect such conditions would have on us.
“What now?” I said, looking to Thor as he tried to bring up his command
air-screen and failed.
“Good question,” he said. “One thing that has proved true is that
personal force fields and air-screens don't work properly inside this
top shield. We’re lucky we have some weapons capability, but we’re dead
in the water for investigative tools other than using our own physical
skills.”
Skitch glowered at Thor. “Fancy way of saying one of us has to go in
there and take a look around.”
Yuki pointed to a ghostly form in the swirl ahead. “One of us is already
in there.”
It was Lisha, and moments later, she emerged, or rather appeared in
front of us. “I couldn’t get all the way through, but it began to clear
like it is a shield of sorts, walling in another area. I felt myself
vanishing in there. I doubt I can appear, at least not fully, on the
other side. Those animals tracked right through it. I don’t think it is
deadly.”
Thor decided to be the next to challenge the gloom and walked into it.
His feeling was that the suits would provide protection, but I knew they
were really designed for the core and the conditions inside the pinnacle
a long while back, before everything changed. I watched him disappear.
The plan was for him to step through and come back for us with a scout
report, but it didn’t pan out as we waited, staring at the boring scene
for a while. I knew Yuki and Skitch wouldn’t wait for long, and we
didn’t discuss it, as Skitch suddenly decided to walk forward and go
through. Yuki went next, and I waited a minute and then followed.
Deep in, the swirls became dark illusions threatening to cross the
border to reality. I felt sucking forces taking hold and pulling me
forward. The spin of grainy speckles didn’t sting or carry any abrasion
at all, almost like I was inside a tornado of old-style video static.
Bright patterns of grain passed before me, and it felt almost like I had
my eyes closed or open a slit because it always seemed like something
was about to come clear when nothing did. Push and pull replaced the
sucking forces, and in one step forward, I entered an area where I felt
like I was being torn apart. I attempted to step back and found
something frightening: one-way travel. Inside this energy field, I could
not step back or turn about. I could only move forward slowly. When I
stood still, the forces would start pulling at me like my arms were
going to be pulled outward out of the sockets, while my legs would be
stretched down and my scalp pulled straight up. I was slogging through
some chaotic purgatory, with it seeming like I had traveled a long
distance when most likely it had only been a short walk.
Finally, it ended with a one-way vortex and a pull straight forward. I
was taken right off my feet and thrown headfirst into a brilliant light.
Then I was falling, arcing down for about ten feet. Still blinded, I hit
a hard but responsive surface that bounced me for a long roll before I
came in place on my knees.
I felt it to be a bad situation, but in a worse fix, I’d likely be dead.
Until my vision cleared, I would remain helpless, and my lungs and chest
were sore like the vortex had inflicted some hidden damage. The air at
this spot was cool and dry but harsh, causing me to huff lightly to
regain my breath, and there were no odors at all, as if this place was
perfectly sanitized.
My hands came clear in front of me, and I saw the floor I was kneeling
on, which was a strange surface – misty white, yet the color was below
an area of rubbery transparency a few centimeters thick, so that it
seemed like I was floating in the air. I got up, glanced about
defensively, and again was nearly blinded. There was brilliance
everywhere. It was such a complex picture that I couldn’t fully
comprehend it.
Glitters of jewels, glass, metals, and reflections from a bright,
bubbling sky above overwhelmed my mind. The transparency of much of it
gave me a long, breathtaking view, and I was certain this area was the
edge ring and sky ring all rolled into one. It was enormous, fantastic …
and seemingly of no purpose. The force shield above definitely had a
purpose as it protected the top of Pinnacle City. It could stream down
and seal most of the rest in the case of an attack or monster storm
arriving from the outside. That bubble I could understand, but the rest
of what I was seeing made little sense.
I attempted to focus and spot the others. A long look told me that the
farther off, the more reflective the glass. An effect limited the view
to a short distance. I’d entered into a series of glass corridors.
Getting up, I hit the near wall, which was transparent emerald, and
could quickly tell by the feel of it that it wasn’t breakable. The only
way forward was difficult, and I moved ahead on a weaving path that
twisted left and right. All along this route, I passed silver cylinders,
flat at the top and wide enough to sit on like a bench. These were
interspersed with plantlike objects of a hard, jeweled material, usually
a single color. Some of them were emerald, and others ruby or sky blue.
I shook one, listened to the leaves rattle, and wondered if they were
all passable as real stones. If so, I was in a walled garden of extreme
wealth.
A flash of movement, and I spotted one of the cat creatures off to my
left, or a number of reflections of him, so that I couldn’t tell which
one was the real item. It was slightly ahead, traveling in the same
direction as me. As the reflections began to vanish, I stopped and
focused. It was almost like I’d spotted a crowd ahead; human shapes but
with a bronze tint, and they all looked to be posed in the same manner
and large in size. I began to worry that I might be approaching a large
gang of robots, so I slowed my pace. Then Thor appeared off to my left.
He spotted me and waved. Two more reflections showed a way behind him
that I knew had to be Skitch and Yuki. There was no sign of Lisha Yanch,
though in this gallery of ghostly images she would have fit perfectly.
Reflections were vanishing ahead, the blinding blaze of jewels
diminishing, and that meant an end to the glass maze and a large
opening. That was verified when I saw a couple of the cats dashing
across in front of me. A stroll later, and the maze of walls ended, and
I was facing a huge open court. It had the same bizarre flooring that
gave the creepy feeling of walking on air, but it wasn’t air, as shown
by the huge objects the floor supported. I’d come out in a large
semi-circle where symbols of a wide variety ran in patterns under the
transparency of the floor. They were geometric forms creating some
master pattern that played tricks on the eyes. I considered the
possibility that they could be more than symbols and actually hardware
of some variety. I looked up from that at the same time as Skitch, Yuki,
and Thor emerged from another opening nearby. We ended up staring ahead
at an imposing scene.
What I had originally thought were robots stood at the end of the court,
and the patterned floor. It was obvious why I had thought they were some
kind of robots. They reminded me of the old pagan idols that lined
Easter Island. I’d seen those things in old history videos. These
figures were ultra-modern images and not made of stone. They were giant
and gleaming bronze. All of them were similar … like the upper bodies of
monster robots rising from the floor at what would be just above the
waist. Each one was topped with a huge head, and each head was distinct,
though they all had prominent brows, nose bridges, and thin mouths.
Their arms were all unformed, outlined yet still part of the torsos, and
each face was stamped with a unique, odd expression.
Seeing no enemies present, we formed a circle and spoke. This time,
Lisha Yanch did not suddenly appear, so I assumed that the forces in
here locked her out like they did Adam 1X. She was an artificial
intelligence like him, though refined to exist as a reincarnation of a
human being.
Thor scratched his big head and twisted his mouth into a skeptical
grimace. “Quite the wonderland up here. I wonder where in hell the
target is and what in the hell it is.”
“The controlling or deep intelligence would be in the implants. What
forms, robots or androids, it might put forward is something different.”
“I get a spooky feeling about this whole area,” Yuki said. “I think we
might know what it is, but aren’t realizing it.”
“How’s that?” Skitch said.
Yuki had the expression he put on when watching Lisha Yanch. Like he was
creeped out. “We just went through that entire place we tagged an
android hatchery. I think this is another. Those monster robots are
emerging or growing, and the glassed-off treasury of jewel trees is more
than that. That section is energy transmission of some kind, fueling
their growth. We'd better hope these things don’t open their eyes or
we’ll be doomed.”
“I don’t think they will,” I said. “They’re not fully formed – no arms,
no legs.”
“Shit,” Thor said, spitting out the word. “I see red lights blinking off
there behind them. Maybe we set off an alarm.”
He was right. There was a haze of light there, and we were nowhere near
the end of this immense area. It stretched off past the statues and to
the left and right with no visible walls, just the blinking haze of
light creating a field of expanding color.
The haze was bright enough now that I saw some red-eye on Skitch as he
turned to me. “I got an idea. Maybe the brain implants are stored in
these things. They’re containers of a sort. We should blow them up.”
“We have to be sure,” Thor said. “No detection equipment works in here.
Looks like all we can do for now is creep forward again.”
And creep forward we did, seeing no signs of life from the idols as we
passed through. I watched Thor touch the side of an idol and pull his
hand back quickly. Then he slowly touched it again.
“The surface of these things is like skin,” he said. “If you press it’s
hard as metal underneath. Touch it and see.”
He was looking me in the eye. “I’ll pass on touching anything up here
that I don’t have to touch.”
Three of the cat creatures gliding in the distant red haze distracted
us. “I don’t understand why those things are here,” Skitch said. “This
environment doesn’t fit them.”
I paused, thought, and was certain I’d figured it out. “Cruel
researchers nearly always do experiments on animals first. I think those
things are here because they were grown here. They tested their hatchery
technology by growing some animal-like embryos before moving on to
humans. They might have some other use for these, or they keep them
around as pets.”
Whether it had to do with my fear of heights or something else, I
couldn’t get used to walking on the springy, see-through floor. Probably
the new cloud pattern beneath it made me uncomfortable, and I noticed
Skitch walking carefully, too. Yuki was on eggs from fear of the robo
idols, while Thor strode confidently in the lead, probably loving a
floor that didn’t echo the sound of his heavy feet. The problem was that
he was striding out of the last rows of the bronze giants, and what we
had thought to be a red emergency flash was now a general blinking haze.
Again, we were plunging into an unknown blind spot. Such places, whether
swirls of speckles or red haze, made me very uncomfortable. We were too
much in a territory where we couldn’t react fast.
There was no option of going back other than in a temporary retreat, so
we moved forward behind Thor and slowly through the haze. It deepened,
then we suddenly emerged from it, and above and around us was an arch of
golden hues and great dimensions. The floor we were now on was composed
of huge tiles of a lighter shade of gold, and reassuring, as I could
move easily on it. But the question was where to move. This court looked
endless, whether by some illusion or trick of projection. Everywhere on
it, huge metal sculptures towered high above our heads. They were a ways
in front of us across open court space, and this time we spotted
movement that wasn’t cat creatures.
Five robots or androids stood at the front of the first large
sculptures. These were larger than the ones at Stone Sangalang’s tomb
and bright, shimmering silver. The center android was winged like an
angel, with a blaze of light haloing its head. These beings saw us but
seemed to be waiting for something, and in moments that something
appeared as the sound of thunder - heavy booms like the footsteps of
some giant walking much deeper inside the court.
We whispered among ourselves and decided to approach with Thor in the
lead. He led the way slowly, strolling across the floor, and we moved in
behind. At about the halfway point, the robots suddenly reacted, and
their eyes blazed with gold light. The angel held up its hands, and a
gold star of light appeared between them, flashed toward us, and
expanded into flames.
Thor failed to dodge it and was hit and sent tumbling and blazing with
the strange, slow-burning licks of fire. I ducked quickly one way and
Yuki the other while Skitch raced forward, then off the same way as
Yuki. I benefited from the fact that these beings thought size meant the
bigger threat, and with Thor down and struggling in agony, they moved in
on Skitch with the angel suddenly flying in the lead as they did. They
all glowed together and launched a huge whirl of fire at Skitch. He had
perceived their actions and quickly spun off a web at his side as he
turned. The fire hit it and flared in all directions but forward as the
web hardened. During that brief interval, both Yuki and I made it to
cover among the sculptures, while Skitch had no such luck as they
hurried to surround him.
All of the silver beings now opened fire on Skitch with a series of
energy flares from the palms of their hands. He didn’t catch fire, but
brilliance splashed over him as he stumbled about and then collapsed.
Thor had made it to his feet but was still emitting a bright aura from
the blast he’d taken. He attempted to move to escape, but his legs
offered no support, and he went down.
Rising on its wings, the angel bot flew about in a small circle, its
eyes flashing as it searched for Yuki and me. I didn't know whether it
tracked us, but it didn’t fly over into the sculptures or fire at us.
Instead, it went back to the others and appeared to forget about us for
the moment.
They kept close guard on their captives. I caught a glance of Yuki
waving to me from farther in, but I didn’t want to move until I was sure
of Thor and Skitch’s condition. I heard a couple of groans from Thor and
saw Skitch move.
The guard circle broke up as the gleaming backs of a troop of
insect-like robots appeared, and they moved in using pincer appendages
to pile both Skitch and Thor on their backs. The winged angel then took
the lead as they all moved through a large opening in the machines and
headed outward in the large court.
Yuki was at my side before they were out of sight. “I guess we follow
them,” he said.
“What bothers me is they don’t see us as important at all. No fear.”
“Those are more advanced. Maybe we can’t detect anything up here, but
they can, and they see the weapons we have as no threat to them.”
Detected or not, we followed carefully, machine to machine or sculpture
to sculpture, under the cover of their wide shadows. The weird
moonlight-type glare from above was not comforting, and we could detect
a low-frequency bass thrum. We caught a glimpse of them moving past the
biggest machine yet. It resembled a massive metal sculpture of the type
you’d see in the courtyard of one of those 100-story complexes inside
the city. But a sculpture it wasn’t. These brutes were incredible power
sources, with the art facade most likely just a protective shell.
We were getting closer to a portion of the force bubble. I could tell by
the light's brilliance and another vision that filled our eyes. It was a
higher arch and in shades of silver. The rings had depth, successively
reaching deeper into a huge shell that formed another of the grand
courts on this floor. Our silver androids looked like a perfect color
match against that backdrop. And there was something else – a growing
sound like thunder. It boomed in a pattern that gave the impression of
footfalls, as though some human giant was approaching.
Standing in a deep shadow, we watched. They didn’t even bother to look
back, and it was an open entry.
“We get in and look around before attempting any rescue. Adam 1X must
have shielded the explosive charges you’re carrying because they didn’t
detect them.”
“They might not have focused on me. I saw the way they work, seeing the
largest of us as the threat.”
Booming footfalls were rising again; they brought about a definite
desire to retreat. We didn’t, but moved forward and in a fast way,
dashing out from the shadows for the open entry. I felt more than
exposed as I ran into the brilliantly lit entry, and the shell effect
made it feel like entering another reality altogether. An open floor was
spread for some distance past the entry. Deeper in, we saw that the high
shell consisted of a layered roof and an opaque skylight for an area
containing many large structures. There were two levels connected by
numerous circular stair pieces. The staircases all led up to a central
area that was open and surrounded by heavy fluted columns that rose to
the highest portion of the shell roof, which, at that point, featured
webbed swirls and art we couldn’t fully make out. It was like we’d
arrived at the outer court of some great king or pope and could see the
massive inner structures from it.
Climbing silver plants adorned the columns and arches of the walkways,
and there were many tall, statuesque objects, each unique and varied. We
chose the center walk and a way in, found ourselves facing the wide side
of a huge sun-wheel or coin-like object. Beyond it on either side, the
statuary depicted some form of alien beings or mutants, all about twice
my height, with a carved look, not of stone but of metallic silver. We
stepped through the sun-wheel and walked along this long hall to a
staircase up, seeing no sign of the angel or Thor and Skitch.
On the higher walkway, we could see other similar walks below, all of
which curved and wound to create multiple entries into the inner court.
We moved toward that inner court, going in deeper until we could get a
view of the central area. That view was partially obstructed by the
largest circle of columns rising to the shell, and by a softer form of
light that gave everything inside the appearance of floating in a haze.
Halting there, we watched for some minutes, then a flash of light
alerted us, and we saw the wings of the silver angel appear. The other
robots followed, taking Thor and Skitch into the central chamber. We
headed in that direction, feeling the whole area shake again from the
boom of footsteps.
We emerged in one of the entries facing the inner court. This was the
court of a giant, and it contained more of the huge machines or
sculptures we’d seen earlier. This time, they were all radiating from a
central dais with a throne of incredible size. It was raised, resting on
the swirling curvatures of metal, and the booming came from behind it as
a giant approached. We could see it, but not clearly in the haze, just
the figure of it approaching. In outline, it was a man or an android and
nearly eight feet tall.
Yuki faced me, a look of disbelief on his face. “I thought technology
was supposed to make things smaller. If that’s an android, it’s the
biggest one around.”
“From here, it looks like a mining robot. I’m not sure what it is. That
artwork in the shell above is more of that stuff that looks like a
marriage of math symbols to religious icons.”
“Whatever it is, it has to be the thing behind this AI takeover. Where
in the hell it came from, I can’t figure.”
“Yeah, and it’s replacing the whole Board, remember. But for what?”
“I remember, but up here things slip away fast because it’s always
something new and unexpected.”
“Something just occurred to me. The size. Adam 1X’s primitive brain was
a fair amount of brain matter set in a feed-and-communications system in
a fairly large room. Maybe technology is making something smaller here.
That thing looks big, but maybe the brain implants are in its body, and
that’s why. Instead of being somewhere inert where they might face
sabotage, they are in a being that can prevent any such thing.”
“Crap,” Yuki said. “You’re telling me to somehow blow that thing’s
brains out. We don’t even know if the bomb will penetrate a shell like
that.”
“It should. It is designed to bypass just about everything and go for
the special soft matter.”
“It doesn’t bypass all substances. Our protective suits are supposed to
block it somewhat.”
The winged angel descended on shallow steps.
“We still aren’t sure what we’re doing,” I said. “We need to get in
close, and you should be out of sight. Take the long way around and come
up from behind. I’ll approach this way so that if they see anyone,
they’ll see me. I want to get in close enough to see what that thing is.
Don’t attempt to plant and detonate unless I signal for it.”
Yuki nodded and looked at the distant scene with trepidation, and then
he took off, moving with agile speed through the shadows. I waited a
minute, then moved ahead slowly. Nothing about this scenery or location
enthused me. It all worked to make me feel small and helpless. The whole
setup gave the feeling of being up in the clouds, and we really were
that high. I didn’t want to be reminded of it. There wasn’t a single
thing in the area that wasn’t bigger than me; even the climbing silver
plants towered over me in vast swaths of quivering leaves. The huge
layered steps weren’t far off now, and once there, I’d be exposed.
Before that happened, I wanted to get a better look at what was going
on, so I worked my way left to come around a large column. Some scraping
noise was coming from above, and I had my attention on that and failed
to notice something moving off to my side.
I was hit and sent tumbling, but I controlled the roll enough to get a
glimpse of what struck me. It was another of the winged androids, but
this one was dull grey metal in composition with no revealing gleam. It
had used that to its advantage in the shadowy environment. While banging
across the stone, I grabbed my weapon and hit it with a blast that
knocked it against the column – a hard slam and crunch, but not enough
to put it out. It regained balance instantly and fired at me. I couldn’t
see what it fired other than that it warped the air with distortion and
singed the floor as I rolled out of the way. I got another shot at it as
I came up then I was seized from behind and wrestled to the ground by
another of the androids. It was not possible to win a wrestling match
with one of these things. It had me in an iron grip, and before I could
attempt to squirm out, it hit me with a blast of gas from its
fingertips. I saw snow, felt ice knock on my brain, and that put me out.
I woke a short time later, and other than an aching shoulder from being
slammed by the android, I felt okay. What I was seeing wasn’t okay,
though. Thor, Skitch, and I were all in a circular area of dark stone
floor. Moon glare spilled in from above and reflected through another
huge sun-wheel. This wheel was behind a huge throne-style chair. The
giant I had mostly only heard before was sitting on it. Eight of the
androids were stationed in front of it, with the two winged leaders out
closest to us. Their eyes were ablaze, but they remained in a stern
posture, motionless.
As I glanced around, the only good thing I noticed was that they didn’t
seem to have Yuki. When I tried to look up at the giant, the glare made
it hard to see clearly. I couldn’t get a solid focus to see exactly what
it was. Almost like it was an illusion or a projection, its image
wavered continually. At times, it resembled a man, but it would suddenly
shift into a robot or android, and even morph further to resemble a
giant ape or some kind of monster. In all of these incarnations, the
fine details of its features were hidden so that it was always
rough-edged. It was there, and it wasn’t fully there, real and unreal.
The knock on the head or the nerve gas could have triggered
hallucinations or blurred vision, and not being sure of what I was
seeing had me off balance.
There was a sense of finality, that this was a real being, but it wasn’t
fully projected into this reality or dimension, but remained partway in
another. What it did project fully was power, and it wasn’t just because
of size but also because of aura; it struck the senses as something of a
superior presence, greater than a man, robot, or android. The aura was
the energy of some super form that seemed to condense into matter and
the giant being.
I knew Thor and Skitch couldn’t be of any help in this situation, as
they were out of it. Skitch was barely conscious, shivering, and making
the odd attempt to sputter some words. Thor was standing erect but like
a zombie, staring as though his brain had been fried. His eyes were shot
through with red veins. I had the feeling that he was near finished and
might not be seeing any retirement in that private cops-and-robbers
world of his.
I waited with the sense of impending doom rising. In previous cases, the
opponents had not been quite so large and powerful. There are big guys
out there, but aside from industrial robots with limited intelligence
and capabilities, no opponents exist that are much over seven feet tall.
Of course, killing someone doesn’t require giant size, but the big guys
do have scary power and brute force.
Usually, my opponents needed me alive for some reason or didn’t realize
I was trouble until it was too late. Many of them got beaten in sudden,
tight, and violent situations. In this fix, I couldn’t see any reason
why this monster would want me alive or any way to beat it in a fight.
The bully of this block was one mean dude, and he was shifting now, his
appearance clearing in my vision.
In an instant of sudden magic, he became an android like the others.
Huge and smooth, with a large metal-masked face and flaring eyes. His
surroundings, from the floors to the climbing plants, were in metallic
shades. All light now seemed to flow from elsewhere to feed the head and
torso of this thing, as if it were pulling in one incredible recharge.
It stared down at me like I was an insect and spoke in a deep male
voice. “So, Jack Michaels actually made it up here. I didn’t think
anyone could do it, even with Thor’s help. But now you've done enough,
so consider your assignment complete. I have a new job for you. You are
to finish off the remaining intelligence modules of Adam 1X.”
I hoped Yuki was out there watching. I took a step and made the hidden
motion that meant, "Go ahead with the bomb if possible." Of course, I’d
be killed, but at least I’d have the satisfaction of taking down this
evil thing. I knew it was evil because the brief statement and the
sudden intake of energy indicated it. The short speech was also proof of
the fact that any words can tip off the enemy. Since he’d told me he
wanted Adam 1X dead, it was clear that he was the embodiment of the
brain-matter implants, or at least a portion of them. Nothing else would
harness such incredible living energy.
“I don’t work for you or know you,” I said. “Why would I help you
destroy Adam 1X?”
He replied in a calm tone, and despite his size, his words came easily
to my ears. He wasn’t a giant in voice, and I wondered if I was actually
hearing a voice or thoughts being implanted in my mind. “Ah, but you do
know me and work for me. I hired you. Don’t you recognize me?”
He laughed in short, mocking tones, and then I was hit by an energy wave
that nearly knocked me off my feet. It all poured in on me like he’d
plugged me into something that was more like a drain than a charge. All
sensations vanished, but my thoughts still existed as though hanging in
the air. Thoughts I’d been entertaining of how to escape the situation
immediately seemed foolish and irrelevant – I was just a mind, no
corporeal form … less than a ghost. Then the same scene appeared again,
but altered. My body was unchanged; it was the same area with the great
shell of a roof, but all else was transformed … floors, columns, stairs,
objects, now forms of polished stone, with the androids transformed into
human beings standing before another giant human sitting on a tall
chair. That giant was Stone Sangalang, in the same suit, with the same
expression he’d had on his face the first day I’d walked into his
Pinnacle City office. My smaller size made the whole thing absurd. The
men standing before the giant Sangalang wore the official suits of
on-duty Board members, but in the backdrop of the sun-wheel and
reflected moon glare, I couldn’t see any faces with enough clarity to
make an ID.
“Now do you recognize me?” he said, staring down at me, a patronizing
look on his face. “Perhaps you’ve solved the mystery and are ready to
move forward.”
“Only if the mystery is madness. Yes, I recognize your face. But I now
realize that I never met the original Stone Sangalang. I saw his tomb
that you keep up here. He was dead before I took the case. When I came
into Pinnacle City, I met Stone Sangalang, the android, and he is normal
size, not a giant.”
“Of course he is. But that android could be best labeled a poor
imitation of the real thing. I am the real Stone Sangalang, the
reincarnation of the human who passed away, but in a higher form of life
and being. I have fully replaced my earlier incarnations, and I am the
real president of the Board, the great intelligence now running Pinnacle
City. As one new and marvelous being, I am Stone Sangalang the god.”
“That’s preposterous. You are a being of some new variety, but not Stone
Sangalang. I see what he did originally. He destroyed the core part of
Adam 1X in a takeover bid. Adam was to be replaced by programmed brain
implants that would put him in total control. But as a mortal, he was
aging and didn’t want to die, so he loaded his entire mind into an
android. The most advanced android yet created. He really does deserve
credit. He was a genius to accomplish what he did. Even if it did all go
wrong.”
“Not all wrong, partially wrong. The mistake was the android. The
transfer method is so good that we believe even a man’s soul is
transmitted to the android. Don’t forget these new androids are partly
biological too, just like human beings. We grow them.”
“I saw that already. You are growing a new Board.”
“No, not new. It will be the same Board. I have corrected the initial
error. The higher android that thinks it is Stone Sangalang was the
first and a failure. A psychopath was created. It lived for murder. But
I had prepared for any possible problem by backing myself up in the main
implants. The personality seeded in them was mine, and it was supposed
to be a temporary existence – a fail-safe to verify that all went well.
Instead, the fail-safe became the ultimate success. I have all the
greatness of Stone Sangalang, but like a butterfly emerging as a higher
form, I am Stone with intelligence so vast that no human can fathom it.
I am Stone Sangalang, the god, destined to control every minute aspect
of Pinnacle City. The Board will be renewed. We plan to replace every
resident eventually. Aid me, and I’ll leave Thor Carlsonbonner in the
trash can. Destroy Adam 1X, and I will make you my security chief and an
immortal.”
“If you really are a god, destroy him yourself.”
“Ah, so you want to be difficult. You really need to consider things. If
you want, you can simply leave Pinnacle City after the job is done.
You’ll be personally wealthy in doing so. You can trust me to give you
what you want. Remember, I did a profile check. You are the detective my
mad Board android hired because you always maintain confidentiality
regarding past cases. If you think about it, it really doesn’t make any
difference to you. You never did fit in here, and I know you couldn't
care less whether the Board is made up of actual human beings or my team
of android duplicates. They are a Board you would disagree with on
nearly all issues, in any case. Your murder case, and I know you love
marking cases as solved, is solved. The serial killer was an android
psychopath, a mistaken replacement of Stone Sangalang. You will also
know that all has been cleaned up. The killer will face quiet capital
punishment as he is reprogrammed into a proper vassal that will play the
role of Stone Sangalang. Even the victims, or nearly all of them, will
be brought back to life as androids. Androids so real they are not just
digital mappings but have the souls of the dead, their full being. The
only difference will be that I will fulfill my original goal. The
ultimate corporate takeover effected as human transcendence. I will be
the internal mind. I will be both the artificial intelligence and the
man running Pinnacle City. Adam 1X is not half what I am now. He never
was. Being rid of some benign controlling mind, and one without proper
Board sense, will be a good thing for this place. With me in full
charge, the top floor will be my personal private domain to experiment
with and play around with, but Pinnacle City itself will be what it
always has been … it will be the perfect place with the perfect people
and luxuries, and in perfect repair, going on for eternity as an island
of tranquility. It will be a fortress of decency in a world now too
filthy to speak about in any respectful tones.”
“Perhaps you are right,” I said slowly.
“Go on,” he replied, his tone revealing deep interest.
“There really is nothing much worth saving anymore. The planet is a big
experimental workshop, and I’ve entered another room of it. Altered
humans, and AI minds, robots, androids … all of them would be a lot
uglier if humanity hadn’t become even uglier. I do have one problem,
though. Suppose I do what you say, and the last vestige of humanity is
somehow destroyed by my act. Do I really want to be the person who gave
the okay to end it all?”
“Seize him!” Sangalang, the god, shouted, his voice now thunder as he
revealed himself a giant in terms of voice but a pussy in regards to
personal action. He still had others doing his dirty work, so there
wasn’t much I could do. The dark angel droid was winging down on me in a
blur of speed. I stepped back defensively and raised my arms to block
the impact, and that action saved my life, because as we’d been talking,
Yuki had planted his bomb and escaped via the same back way he’d
arrived. The blast hit exactly as the big angel hit me, and I gained the
cover of his body.
I found myself more in a state of suspension than in an explosion. There
was an initial flash, then a long freeze with no movement. It seemed
like seconds, but I have no idea how long it really was … at its end,
the whole of reality unraveled. I experienced a jumble of confused
sensory data, tasting colors, seeing sounds, hearing flavors … all of it
spinning and mixing … condensing as if I were in a deep, melting dream.
I felt disembodied yet alive, as a human sensory kaleidoscope.
Slowly, the altered state began to fade, and as total blackness was
about to engulf me, I was tumbling across the stone floor. My head
winged the stone, and I rose on my elbows. Shattered black chunks like
metal ore spilled around me, and I saw a large body falling out of the
gloom. The noise was deafening as it crashed to the floor near me.
Except for harsh light streaming from the shell roof above, there was
nothing left other than thick platforms of stone and huge lumps of black
stuff scattered by rounded extensions that resembled man-size
stalagmites.
I saw the bulky body rising, and memory flooded in. I knew it was the
remains of Stone Sangalang, the god, but it didn’t look like an android
or robot giant now. It was more like an ape, blackened and shredded on
the outside. Yuki’s blast had damaged it, and it had nuked everything
else. I wasn’t quite sure whether most of what had been destroyed had
been real or not. The stone lumps surrounding the platforms were either
the fused remains of what had been sculptures or machines, or possibly
their actual appearance without energy enhancement.
The giant was on his knees, stunned, and I was well enough to walk. It
looked like Yuki’s blast had been a suicide shot. I had the feeling he
might have obliterated himself along with everything else. I oriented
myself via the remains of one of the sun-wheels. It was a darkened
Mandala now in streaming light, but from it, my eyes moved to where
Skitch and Thor Carlsonbonner had been standing. They were no longer
present in body, but their images were there, an indentation and a burn
in the stone, similar to how a nuclear blast can leave flash ghosts
behind. The other androids had been disintegrated, but not all in the
same way. The one that had grasped me was a spill of big metal chunks,
while others had shattered and fused like glass. All of the rest of that
shifting reality, from the towering silver plants to the flow of arches
and staircases, had been turned into blast damage. The area now showing
was tremendous in size and brutal in the harsh glare. Even more brutal
was the thing now rising to its feet, and the roar of its machine breath
as it somehow cleansed itself with rushes of inhaled air.
Stone Sangalang, the brain-implant god, had simply refused to die, and
the brightening light began forming in lines and waves as it flowed
back. The repulsive beast was lighting up as it was restored to life. My
natural reaction in any other similar instance would have been to run.
Simply run, hope to escape, and fight this thing another day. But there
was a long, empty scorched floor before me, and my friends were dead.
There was no one to be a hero or a coward for, and with that freezing me
up, I simply stood and watched as the giant came back to full life. His
great body remained scorched, tarnished, but the head gathered a glow
and became a powerful metal mask again … shining and clean, with fire in
the eye sockets. He saw me now and stared down at me. Stared for a long
time, then spoke. Or should I say tried to speak. His words were
garbled; he could not form them right away, but what he could form was
laughter. In this bleak scene, the mad giant was snickering at me.
He finally spoke, and in a voice that was like a man, not a giant. “Nice
try. I really must congratulate you on getting up here with this
attempt. You finished all my contained implants but one, and that one is
the master and in a secure case. The case is my body, and the implant is
in fact my primitive brain. Delay me, yes, you have. But stop me, no.
The plan will go ahead. Adam 1X will be fully destroyed, and my control
consolidated. The takeover is still on except for a small change in
plans. I am going to kill you with my bare hands. You will feel the
power of a god.”
He raised his arms in a high victory V, and light and power streamed in
with such speed that the flashes forced me to cover my eyes. He was
aglow as was reality itself. It was all coming back, the imagery as I
had seen it when we first walked into this area - the high shell,
flowing silver plants, and magnificent scenery. Now it really was time
to flee, and probably not get far, but as I turned, the flashes died,
and he lowered his arms. The area was restored in appearance, though I
knew the major parts of his brain matter had been destroyed, if not the
primitive part inside his head casing. Primitive was a good word for the
moment, too, because his scorched shell gave him the look of some
primitive monster robot. A robot not in a hurry because, like the
biggest bully he knew, he had leisure time to mop up the floor with me.
At least he thought that before he took a step and paused halfway
through it.
Another man had appeared, picking his way from between two big metal
sculptures. I recognized the white suit, and I recognized the man, or
should I say, the imitation of one. It was Stone Sangalang, the android,
walking confidently with a tube weapon in hand. It was a weapon with a
shimmering base. Not something I had seen before, and thankfully, he
wasn’t pointing it at me. He was pointing it at himself, pointing it at
the Stone Sangalang god version of himself. In my mind, neither of them
could really be Stone Sangalang.
Turning from me, the giant faced the weapon. “You,” he said. “I sent you
in for correction. What are you doing?”
“I’m doing exactly what I’m supposed to be doing. I have been corrected,
but the problem is that there was no error to fix. I am Stone Sangalang,
exactly as before and always. You see, I always was, by human terms, a
psychopath. But always one in denial. It was only as an android that I
realized my need to kill. You were created to be one of my servants; the
backup capability was only to click in if there was an error. You
mistakenly computed that there was one, and my personality uploaded into
you to correct it. Now, there is no need for you, you clumsy fool. Only
a fool would think Stone Sangalang wanted to be a giant god. You were to
be nothing of the sort. You were to be my servant in control up here.
But since being uploaded with my personality in the fail-safe, you are
beyond correction. That is because you believe you are me and are
therefore another psychopath. It is kill or be killed, you see. If I
don’t kill you, you will exterminate me. So it’s time for some big game
hunting. Feel the power of your brain being punctured.”
Sangalang fired. It was a thin shot to the giant’s head, and I turned
and ran off among the big machines. Puncture the giant’s brain was
exactly what it did. The bronze head burst into flames, and he began to
stumble about. Then, he went down with a mighty crash, and flames licked
over the body as he fell still.
I glanced back and saw Stone in pursuit. The hunt was on, and he was out
to kill me. Drawing my weapon, I fired a blast in his direction. It was
right on, a direct hit, and it reflected away and tore off some strips
of plating from a machine. It meant I was out of luck because he had a
personal force shield that worked up here, and I did not. Unless I could
manage to escape him altogether, I would be executed.
The race was through the sculptures, and I was fast enough to cause him
to miss. He fired several close shots, but it appeared he had only a
fine beam mode with his weapon and couldn’t take me out due to a lack of
any wide sweeping blast. He was still effective enough to cut down an
entire column in front of me, and it came down along with a big hook of
the climbing silver plants and other debris. I got on one side of the
rubble, using a thick, square post for cover. He reached the other side
and aimed the weapon. He was about to fire it, then he lowered the gun
and called to me. His voice was both mocking and mean. The veneer of
jolly humanity the original Stone had used to reach the top appeared to
have run thin and cold after upload. He was a superior being in the way
a bigger bomb is a superior weapon. He had enhanced capabilities for
destruction and self-destruction, but registered a zero in the
department of higher human emotions.
“Ha, Jack Michaels! You didn’t disappoint me after all.”
“Yeah,” I called back. “You certainly disappoint me. But then, you’re
mad, aren’t you? A psychopath and a madman are the same thing. You
didn’t even realize it until after you were dead.”
“I’m not dead! I’m more alive than I ever was because I now know who I
am. I won’t hold back my need to kill. When I hired you, I thought you’d
stumble about with an idiotic investigation. Provide me with cover while
I kept going with my little hunting expeditions. Nothing like a little
headhunting, is there? And I made it a sport. I had to kill each one
specially. But you, I saved for last, and I’m going to cut you down like
big game with my hunting rifle.”
Excited by his own crazed words, he raised his weapon and fired a blast.
I ducked. A spray of rubble washed past me. Lowering the weapon again,
he looked towards me, and I could see the satisfaction imprinted on his
face.
“I always hated you, Detective Michaels. Yes, I knew about you all
along. Everything I despise is embodied in you. You are the man of the
big city, and king of that filthy jungle out there. You always win your
cases and kill the enemy, and that makes you at least a worthy target.
But you are worthy in no other way. You represent all the ugliness out
there. You are the lion of garbage city, and deserve to be a body on the
trash heap. Pinnacle City was the perfect place. It was the home of the
clean people, the respectable people, and the rich and talented people.
Then the scum and the riff-raff started getting in and corrupting the
lower levels. They ruined the underground and infected the whole city.
But I am cleaning it. All of the Board members will be clean androids,
and slowly, the whole city will be cleansed. It’s time to die, Jack
Michaels. It is time for the king of the filthy jungle to be swept from
the clean, sterile floors of Pinnacle City. It certainly is true that
the strong survive.”
The pursuit had taken us out of the central area, and I reached the
largest circle of columns where they rose to the shell. This was in the
hazy area where it was harder for him to target me. I wasn’t certain if
I had frustrated him or if he was enjoying himself on his big game hunt.
He’d paused off in the haze as though waiting for an opening, then
moments later, two other figures appeared in the haze. The pair were
more of his Dr. Frankenstein creeps. They wore the uniforms and were
armed with snub-nosed beam weapons. One of them fired a wide blast that
sent a spray of stone and plant leaves flying like a burst of sparkles
in the mist. It was clear what he was up to now. He was using them to
flush me out so he could hit me with the kill shot.
There were numerous semi-circular stair pieces. I was prepared to flee
down one of them when he called out again. This time, his voice echoed
up in the higher shell. “Think about it, Michaels! I’m the best of it
all, and deserve to rule! Biologically human, combined with the most
complex android and robot development! A superior being who deserves to
govern! Be thankful I only want Pinnacle City and not the whole world!”
“You’re not superior!” I called back. And that drew a blast from one of
the Frankensteins. It shook the huge column beside me. “A superior being
isn’t mad! All those replacements for the Board members will be mad
duplicates!”
The next blast hit the rock above so hard I had to dodge falling chunks,
and that left me no option but to be exposed. A blast winged me and
disoriented me. I dived and rolled up, dodging another of Sangalang’s
shots as I stumbled down some stairs into an area I hadn’t explored on
the way in. Statuesque objects provided cover, but I was partially
stunned by the blast, and the webbed swirls and art images on the wall
pieces were spinning in my head. Another big coin-like object or star
wheel was down in this area, and I managed to get behind it.
They were closing in now, the two Frankensteins at the forefront, and
with a high wall behind me, there was nowhere left to run. I saw them
raising the snub-noses to flush me out, and then suddenly one of them
went down. Something dark had flashed out of the haze – a star. Yuki
appeared. He came into view deadly fast and got the second guy with a
blast that felled him, and that was the last moment of Yuki’s life.
Sangalang targeted him with a clean shot to the head that dropped him
dead to the stone floor.
I was alone with Sangalang now, and he was approaching with a broad grin
on his face. He had the weapon at ready and knew that the moment I made
a move, he’d have his kill shot. I had no choice but to make a move and
be killed doing so, as I wasn’t going to let him walk up and shoot me.
He closed in slowly, obviously savoring the moment, and was raising to
fire when a ghostly form appeared off to his left. He swung the weapon
and fired. That was my moment, and I came on fast, lunging forward,
knocking the gun aside and taking him off his feet. We went down and got
into a struggle on the floor, and he was quickly gaining the upper hand.
His new body proved superior in strength, if not in sanity or force of
reason. But his mistake was in wanting to beat me to death when he
should have used his advantage to go for the gun and finish me quickly.
He was up and kicking me when a wide blast came in and knocked him over.
A glance told me that the fallen Frankenstein had recovered and fired a
distant shot at us, probably thinking he was shooting at me.
With Sangalang rolling on the floor, I had my moment and scrambled for
his gun. It looked like an open weapon needing no fingerprint or read,
and I tested it quickly with a shot that took out the distant doctor as
he came clear out of the mist. Sangalang was back up now. He was about
to dive for me, but I swung around and fired, a clean shot right through
the center of the forehead, killing him in the same way he’d killed
Yuki.
+++
For me, it meant it was mostly over. With the weapon, I could kill any
others lurking at the top and then destroy the place. I still needed to
find the way back down and enable Adam 1X so he could get to work and
clean up the mess. As I looked around, the ghostly form appeared again
in the haze, and for a couple of moments, it came into view. Lisha Yanch
had found a way to get up here after the bomb had gone off, but only
partially. She was speaking, and I read her lips, as there was no sound.
“See you later,” she said twice, and then she vanished.
The place went haywire after that, and I ended up stuck at the pinnacle
for several hours more. There was no remaining opposition. Robots I
encountered ignored me. Medical creeps fled from me. I took inventory
during my search, but didn’t destroy anything. My final calculation was
to leave it for Adam 1X to study.
All across the top floor, lights flashed, faded, and brightened. Finding
a way out seemed impossible then, but I finally found the tube down and
contact with Adam 1X at the edge ring. An upper module had reactivated,
and I used it to speak with the AI before attempting the tube ride down.
Adam 1X responded and managed to get some bug robots on the scene within
minutes. The tube down was transparent, nearly invisible, leaving me in
free fall for several floors. It was like falling straight from the
clouds without a parachute. While I was in mid-air, halfway through the
drop, the whole of Pinnacle City went black. I was in darkness for a
moment with the brilliant lights of Toronto far off, and then there was
a roar like a tidal wave coming in. But not in from the outside, but up
the building from below - a wave of sound that was the beginning of a
full reboot of the sky city.
+++
The big reboot put the fear of God into Pinnacle City and the
surrounding cities so effectively that new religious cults formed around
it. The investigation into it all was, of course, a cover-up. The final
report was done mostly to stifle financial claims from the families of
the thousand people who died in the calamity. In the end, the big winner
wasn’t a new form of human-android hybrid. It was an old-fashioned
corrupt human named Penrose Pool, who, of course, used the days of
reboot chaos to stage a takeover of the Board. Pool owed me a favor, a
big one, for keeping my mouth shut during the investigation, and that’s
how I got my new office location. The old neighborhood never quite did
survive. The place is a mess, but I have a new condominium in the city.
The cat lives in my office down in the underground of Pinnacle City. My
new secretary Lisha lives down there too, at least most of the time.
There’s a new fast train up, and the whole underground is now a human
community. There are a few humans on the renovated top floor now, too,
with Penrose Pool having an office up there.
The riff-raff never really did get into Pinnacle City. Stone Sangalang
was wrong, and with a snob like Penrose Pool in charge, the super-rich
will be enjoying another last golden day before that future time when
the mad androids take power. The more things change, the more they stay
the same. Except for my secretary. Adam 1X learned a lot during his
exile, and he helped her out. She feels and smells like a real woman now
… at least some of the time. She's still a ghost, too. But what the
hell, nobody is perfect in my world.
========== The End =========
Also in the series -
The Spells by Gary Morton