Web of Extinction

by John Conroe

  The F-DOC loosened its hold on my neck and I wasted no time plucking it off. Popping open the medical waste access compartment, I pulled out the glass canister that now held a small black grain the size of a piece of rice, along with a few drops of my blood.

  Setting the glass bottle down on the tabletop between us, I looked up at first Cade and then Trinity.

  “Doesn’t look dangerous,” Cade said.

  “Device is out and contained. Clear for detonation,” I said, pulling my hands back from the tempered glass.

  “Acknowledged. Detonation in three, two, one,” Rikki reported in my ear.

  There was a sharp crack and the bottle spiderwebbed like automobile windshield glass, the inside now evenly coated with a sheen of blood.

  “Holy shit!” Cade said. Nobody in the studio moved so I wondered if it got bleeped. Probably an automated expert censor unit in the loop anyway.

  “Okay, that’s it for me. Gotta run, Cade. Trinity, I suspect you’ll have federal visitors shortly. Might want to call your attorneys,” I said, leaving the backpack but grabbing the big duffle bag I had left tucked along the studio wall when I first arrived.

  Less than four minutes later, I was outside the building and heading toward the back where the staff parked.

  The plain black drone that had followed me for days swept down from above, zipping toward me.

  “Halt, Ajaya Gurung!” it broadcast from its onboard speaker.

  Another black shape, this one much larger and shaped like an arrow, shot down from above, spearing right through the government watchdog, shattering it all to pieces like it was made of glass.

  Still running, I rounded the corner of the studio building, found the parking lot and, more importantly, found the black electric euro-scooter that Trinity had promised me would be there as part of my compensation for tonight’s show.

  The scooter came to life as soon as my fingers touched the handle bars, my name appearing on the data screen as it read my biometrics.

  “Incoming vehicles with government transponders moving at high speed. ETA less than three minutes,” Rikki said in my ear as the big Decimator took up station over my head.

  The scooter shot out of the parking lot, the electric motor accelerating like a gunshot. I had to hand it to Trinity: She didn’t skimp on the quality of the stuff she bought.

  We raced through the nighttime streets of Brooklyn, moving in a pattern that took us east like we were heading toward Long Island. Rikki kept up a running commentary in my ear, indicating which streets and alleys to take to best hide us from government surveillance. Even with his backdoor connections to the Zone Defense network, he couldn’t block everything indefinitely. And by now, they would know that their precious Unit 19 Decimator had gone completely rogue and was no longer under their control. In fact, we knew the exact moment when they figured it out.

  “Decimator self-destruct signal received. Successfully blocked,” Rikki reported about seven minutes after we left Flottercot Productions. The studio was in downtown Brooklyn, actually not all that far from York Street Station, but I didn’t want to head right there. Instead, we headed east, purposely went by two separate CCTV cameras to make sure we were seen before we swung back west to ditch the brand-new scooter. I locked the little bike’s security system open and parked it right in front of a group of loitering kids who were eyeing me like I was dinner. They didn’t see Rikki because he was hovering high overhead. A couple of them looked like they might want to approach me about my hefty duffle bag, but the rest were studying the still active scooter with disbelief.

  As I walked toward the Jay Street Station, I heard the soft purr of my shortest-owned possession as it took off somewhere behind me. It was pretty late but New York, as you may have heard, is the city that never sleeps. Lots of people were moving around, bars were still open, and street vendors were doing brisk business with food carts and souvenirs. Stopping in the shadows, I opened my bag, pulling on a jacket and ball cap. The duffle had pack straps in addition to the shoulder sling, so I put it on my back. Expert surveillance systems these days tracked distinctive body movements as well as all manner of body and facial measurements, so just changing my appearance wouldn’t really work all that well.

  But with my head down, and listening to Rikki’s directions on when and where to step, I avoided the city’s camera systems. Taking the station steps down, I had a bad moment when a pair of Transit cops started to come up from below on the other side of the stairs. But a group of pushy fellow New Yorkers came to the rescue by the simple act of rushing to get past me, pushing by so aggressively that I was blocked completely from view. The cops never even looked my way.

  Down in the subway, the same pushy group had backed up the security checkpoint. That was fine by me.

  My original plan was to release two small rat-sized bots that I had cooked up at home. Simple things that would cause a scare and a diversion. There were a few places where the security AI’s sensors didn’t have great coverage and I would slide the bag of gear past it while the humans were distracted. It was the weakest part of my plan and frankly had worried me as much as the rats.

  None of it was necessary. The Decimator suddenly dropped down from above and hovered alongside me while I was still on the stairs.

  “Load weapons container onto Unit 19 upper fuselage,” Rikki said.

  People were coming and going so I didn’t have time to argue, I just did it. The big drone shot back up to ceiling level, which wasn’t all that high and was pretty well lit. I took a few glances to try to spot it, failing completely, but gave up quickly because standing around, looking up among street-hardened New Yorkers was bound to give away my drone’s presence, not to mention running the risk of a camera catching me.

  Instead, I just worked my way through the line, used a prepaid card to cover my fare, and stepped through the Multi-Threat 604 Scanner. Pretty standard unit for sensing explosives, guns, knives, or dangerous chemicals of almost any type, none of which was now in my possession.

  On the other side, I waited for the train to York Street, casually looking around but not seeing any sign of my drone or my gear. The subway pulled into station three minutes later and after letting the disembarking passengers get out, I found a seat in the last car and prayed Rikki would make it through.

  Chapter 8

  The doors slid open and I waited before stepping out, letting the dozen or so passengers ahead of me clear the way. At the far end of the platform, stairs led up to the street. Immediately behind me was a door with the words No Exit. Authorized Personnel Only.

  I turned and headed for the locked door. It was warded with a decent electronic lock, but had an old-school keypad entry. No biometrics down here in the depths. The city upgrades as it can afford to, so some corners are always being cut.

  My understanding was that each such keypad in the transit system had its own code and a couple of master override codes. I entered a number. The light turned green and I slipped through. According to the computer logs, a duly authorized Zone Defense official had just accessed the locked area with one of the override codes. I held the door about thirty centimeters from shutting, waiting. Four sharp clicks sounded on the other side. Opening the door revealed the big Decimator hovering motionless on the other side, my bag of gear still lying across the top of it. As soon as I moved out of the way, Rikki shot forward two meters and stopped.

  It was hard to get used to the rock solid movements of the Decimator. Instant acceleration and near instant cessation of movement. The designers had outdone themselves with regard to all of Unit 19’s propulsion, weapons, and sensor systems, and they’d never stopped tweaking it. In fact, I suddenly realized I wasn’t fully sure of all of Rikki’s current abilities, an oversight I needed to correct as soon as possible. Like how had he avoided being seen by anyone in the subway?

  But now wasn’t the time.

  The first door led into a decently large maintenance area. At the back of the large space was yet anothe
r door, this one much more substantial, being constructed of hardened steel plate. And this door did have biometric scanners, a very state-of-the-art version. The sign above the door read MANHATTAN DRONE EXCLUSION ZONE. NO ENTRY. AUTOMATED DEFENSE SYSTEMS ACTIVE. LETHAL FORCE AUTHORIZED.

  Scary stuff. But without having the right face, nobody was ever going to have to worry. In this case, Rikki had already entered my facial scan into the Zone Defense system, using a backdoor interface, but with our cover blown, I didn’t know if it would work.

  It didn’t. I stepped up close and looked at the camera. The scanner buzzed angrily, a red LED lighting up on its surface. “Stand Clear. This entry is for Zone Defense authorized individuals only,” a robotic voice said.

  Then Rikki slid forward, extruding a twisting cable from a port just under his e-mag gun barrel. The cable snaked forward and found a tiny port in the door scanner. Four seconds later, the red LED turned off and a green one turned on. “Authorized Entry Granted,” the same voice said as heavy bolts magnetically disengaged. Servos whined and the door opened hydraulically, lights coming on to illuminate the space beyond. I should have said lights for some of the space beyond, because they only lit up the area near the door. Enough to reveal the automatic weapons platforms that stood guard against the absolute blackness of the subway tunnel beyond.

  Six electromagnetic guns were arrayed across the tracks. Three 10 millimeter antipersonnel and antidrone full automatic Mark 7s, two 25 millimeter general purpose Mark 2s, and a single 40 millimeter anti-armor M38 covered the space, with three complete fire control units to run them. A single fire control unit would be sufficient. Three was backup on backup.

  Rikki slid forward again and utilized the same cable interface a second time with one of the control units. Me, I grabbed the gear bag off his back and got kitted out in record time. Standing on the edge of that darkness, knowing there were maybe hundreds of thousands of rats in this tunnel alone, well, I needed my weapons.

  Stealth suit and boots, Kevlar gloves, assault vest with homemade bombs and military grade flashbangs on, rifle with suppressor and subsonic ammo loaded, pistol in holster, ammo and supplies all around, and headlamp on my brow. The last was different; as you probably know, I never bring electronic gear into the Zone. But damn it felt good to have a strong light piercing the darkness. I also attached a light to the equipment rail on my rifle.

  Rikki finished accessing the FC and moved up next to me. “Gun log indicates last weapons fire three months, two days, and four hours ago. Last drone incident four years, six months, and seventeen days.”

  “What did the guns fire at if there haven’t been drones in here for four years?” I asked, pretty sure of the answer.

  “Expert system triggered Mark 7 weapons when this station was attacked by a muroid swarm.”

  I had done my homework on rats, so I knew that Muroidea was the family of mammals that covered rats, mice, voles, and hamsters. Stepping forward, weapon ready, I shone my headlamp around the concrete floor and risers out in front of the guns. It was all chewed up, long streaks ripped through it by hypervelocity rounds, the old, dirty surface concrete torn open to reveal a lighter color, at least where it wasn’t stained red. Some of the red parts had grey hairs stuck to them.

  There was older projectile damage too, identifiable because it had darkened in the moisture of the tunnel over the intervening years, but still somewhat lighter than the original concrete.

  “What logic did it use to decide the rats were a threat?”

  “Loss of several sensor units in the tunnel due to chewing.”

  Great. Rats were eating the guards’ eyes and ears. I looked around some more, but other than bloodstains and hair, there was no sign of rat bodies or remains. Probably cockroaches cleaned them up. But the air smelled, bad. Like something was rotten. I hate the subway.

  “Weapons units will not fire on us. We are cleared for movement.”

  “What about Zone Defense control? Will they know we’re here?”

  “No alerts sent. Intercession successful.”

  “Great,” I said, not sounding the least convinced, even to myself. “Let’s go.”

  We stepped off the weapons platform and onto the bed of the tracks, walking forward into the dark. The air was still and dank, smelling like rot and mold. I’ve smelled worse actually, been in some basements and places where sewer pipes had broken open. But it wasn’t pleasant. And there was the sound of water dripping up ahead, because a bazillion rats aren’t enough, no, you gotta park the whole East River overhead too, ready to flood in on your head. Have I mentioned that I’d much rather have the drones of Manhattan overhead if it meant clear skies? I know, I know… suck it up, Ajaya.

  We moved on, with me taking steps smoothly and carefully. Faster than I would have moved in the open Zone. I felt the pressure to move it along, mostly because Rikki was running on batteries till we got out of the tunnel and the sun came up. I had two power packs in my suit pockets to juice him back up a bit, but they wouldn’t fully charge his systems. The big Decimator was a wonder of modern technology, with much superior flight characteristics, weapons systems, and sensor suites to Rikki’s old Berkut shell. But all that tech took more power, no matter how power efficient it was. So I wanted to keep us moving along. My own fear had absolutely nothing to do with it… nothing at all.

  We were out of sight of the guns before we saw our first rat. Just a single individual, about the size of one of those toy dogs people carry in bags and purses. All by itself. And it charged right at me like I didn’t outweigh it by seventy times or so. Leapt right off the edge of the tunnel side and met the flash hider of my rifle muzzle, face first. It fell backward and I snapped out my collapsible baton with my left hand, crushing its skull as it tried to scramble back to its feet.

  We made it another forty meters before the next ones showed up. A pair, both stopping to study me, neither of them paying any attention to Rikki. Drones are just part of their environment these days and they posed no threat nor were they a food source.

  One of the rats started to move forward but the other sat back on its haunches and opened its mouth. My subsonic 5.56 round took it through the chest, blowing it almost in half before it could squeak out a call. Instantly, the first rat turned around and fled back down into the tunnel before I could get a bead on it. Rikki made a high-pitched clicking noise and the rat froze. Snap! My hasty shot hit it from the rear and traveled the length of its body, tumbling it end over end.

  We paused for a few seconds to listen and feel. Yes… feel. In a tunnel as still as that subway, you can literally feel any air movement at all. Moving objects, living or dead, shift air around, enough for a reasonably attentive person to sense. Paying attention to shit like that can save your life.

  But other than the constant, unceasing drip-drip-drip, there was nothing. I stepped forward and Rikki slid ahead, lifting higher till he was just under the tunnel ceiling. From up there, he could use thermal and sonic sensors to scan ahead, looking to spot any more rats before I might see them. I took my time, stepping carefully and quietly, making as little sound as possible. We moved twenty meters, then forty more, without incident. I paused and listened from time to time. Even knowing that my drone was observing the way ahead with his superior systems, I still used my own senses. There were just too many small hiding places for a rat or even, possibly, a drone, to hide, allowing it to come out after the Decimator had passed it by. Been down that road before.

  The tunnel began a gentle slope downward. The floor under the rail tracks was at first damp and then began to actually glisten here and there with real wetness.

  We were a little over a hundred meters beyond the body of the last rat when I saw Rikki stop moving. I froze immediately. After a second, the drone swiveled in place and came back my way. Lowering itself to the track bed, he extruded his landing talons, short stubby little feet that could grip a telephone wire, power cable, railing, or the edge of a building roof. In this case, they gripped a
pair of loose bricks.

  Still frozen in place, I watched as he lifted up to my eye level, facing me. A green laser-generated hologram appeared just centimeters above his faceplate. Green words filled the empty air. That was new.