‘It’s me, Frankie,’ said a voice in her head. It was Doctor Xenox speaking through their link.
‘Yes, it’s with us,’ she said, relaxing and walking forward to meet it. The side door of the van opened up to reveal Xenox.
‘Get in,’ he said. ‘That was some crazy flying up there, you know.’
‘You saw that?’ Frankie asked.
‘Of course, it is hard to miss. Come on, the plane is fuelled and waiting. The director wants to get out of here.’
Everyone climbed into the van and the doll driver started to speed back to the main complex. Frankie went and sat beside Janus, remembering that she hadn’t actually spoken to him. He had no idea who they were or what they wanted, other than they had helped to save him from the Corporation forces.
‘Janus, we didn’t talk much back there, but we need your help if you’re willing to work with us,’ Frankie asked.
‘Who’s us?’ he asked.
‘We’re a small task force, assembled to take on the Corporations, and we’re interested in the virus you recently created. So, we were wondering, with our resources, whether you might help us?’
‘The virus? You want it?’
‘We want to make it better and to make it work, and we think we can do it, but we need you to make it happen. Time is short,’ Frankie said.
‘Well, I can’t stay here,’ Janus said. ‘Where will we be going?’
‘Neo-London,’ she said.
‘Now?’
‘Now, yes,’ Frankie answered him. ‘Look, I know you don’t know us. Arriving unannounced like that while you were getting shot at by the Corporation forces was probably a little confusing. But we have all suffered at the hands of the Corporations. We all have stories to tell, and we all want to change the way things are. We want to make the Corporations accountable for what they have done. This will be a long road, but if we can get your virus to work, we will have struck a hammer blow for freedom and liberty, and you will have been a key part of it,’ she said.
‘Well, when you put it like that, how can I refuse?’ Janus asked.
‘Hopefully, you can’t,’ Frankie smiled at him.
Janus smiled back. ‘Take me to London,’ he said. ‘It’s not as if I can stay here, anyway, as I’ve obviously been compromised.’
‘Kalypso?’ Frankie asked. ‘Will you be joining us, too?
‘Oh, I’m coming with you,’ she said.
‘Okay, then, Frankie said.
Ω
‘Well, I’m not sure I really like the idea of working for the government, but if it means I get to give a big middle finger to the Corps, then I guess I’m in,’ Janus said.
They were all sitting in their biggest briefing room and had just finished explaining who the A.C.T. was to Janus and what their mission was. Frankie and a few of the others had told him of their personal reasons for hating the Corporations as well, to give him some context.
Frankie sat opposite Janus with William between them at the head of the table.
‘So, you were close to releasing your virus a little while ago, what happened?’ Frankie asked.
‘The Corporations happened, that’s what,’ Janus said. ‘They found out about us and hunted us down. I was the only one of my team to escape with my life. I’ve been on the run ever since.’
‘But how did they find you? I take it you were being careful?’
‘Of course,’ he paused. ‘Look, I wanted the virus to affect all the nanobots in the world, but I just couldn’t do it. The big four producers of them were just impenetrable to us. We could get the virus to infect all the bots from the smaller Corps because their security and programmers were easily bought, but the big four were a nightmare. The rest of my team wanted to release it anyway, but I resisted. It was my virus, after all, so we hunted for the way to do it,’ he said.
‘Did you figure that out?’
‘Oh, yeah, that was the easy part. All we needed to do was to kidnap one of the lead programmers of the bots from each of the big four, that way they could give us what we needed to bypass the bot’s current security. But, as you say, it’s time sensitive, once the Corps figured out our plan, they’d just change the security and we’d be back to square one. In the end, we just didn’t have the resources to travel to the relevant cities and kidnap these guys or steal the info we needed from them. Then, finally, one of my team, I’m not sure who, sold us out. Everyone was killed, though, so, he got his comeuppance, the jerk.’
‘So, to make this work, we only need to kidnap or hack the brains of four programmers from the four leading Corporations who produce these bots, right?’
‘That’s right. So that’s Nobori Nano, Psytech, Duplex Neural, and Nano Technic,’ he said.
‘Well, shit,’ Frankie muttered to herself. She could hear intakes of breath from others around the table as well. These were some of the biggest Corporations in the world, with investments and interests everywhere, and one of them, Nano Technic, also had a personal connection to her because that was where her parents worked. The idea of stealing something from their Corporation not only scared her, but also thrilled her. She’d strike back at the Corporation which had caused so much grief for her over six months ago.
‘Do we have any leads on these programmers?’ William asked.
‘I know one at Psytech who should know the right codes. Her name’s Brenna Preston. She used to work with me on the nanobot side of things and was a high flyer back then,’ Xenox said.
‘I think I know one in Nano Technic,’ Frankie said. She’d worked holidays and summers at the Corp with her parents, who were part of the nanobot team, so she got to know the names of many of the people who worked in that field, including the programmers, and one name stuck out in her mind as the person to go for. ‘Her name was Angela Böhmer. I don’t know much else beyond that, though,’ she said.
‘Excellent, that’s two. Anymore? Janus, did you find any in your research?’
‘I did. Angela was one of them, actually,’ he said to Frankie. ‘Also, at Duplex, Zhou Tan in China, and at Nobori, Rin Akiyama.’
‘I know Zhou,’ Xenox said. ‘He used to work for Psytech, but was headhunted by Duplex. He’s a good choice. In fact, I know that both he and Brenna have little love for the Corporations, so if we can get them out of there, then they might be willing accomplices,’ Xenox said.
‘Then why the hell do they work for the Corps?’ Frankie asked.
‘They’re forced to. The Corporations who employ them won’t let them leave without taking everything from them. If they wanted to abandon their jobs, they would have to leave their entire lives behind. That’s not an easy thing to do,’ Xenox said.
‘I understand,’ Frankie said. If she’d thought about it for a moment, she would have figured that out for herself. It was obvious, really, when you knew what the Corporations were really like.
‘Who did you say the other one was?’ Dion asked. ‘Rin, was it?’
‘Rin Akiyama, yes,’ Janus said.
‘If it’s the same guy I’m thinking of, then he’s an avid gamer and is quite well known in a VR game I’ve played before. He’s always online, jacked into one game or another,’ Dion said.
‘Get him while he’s online, hack his cyber brain. Maybe he won’t even know we were there,’ Frankie offered.
‘I like it. Okay, so we hack Rin, we extract Zhou and Brenna, and Angela?’ William asked.
‘Don’t know,’ Frankie said. ‘My guess would be she’s more in line with the Corporation's way of thinking from what I know, but I don’t know for sure. I suppose it makes sense to prepare for the worst, though, so, let’s work on a snatch and grab.’
‘Agreed.’ William said. ‘Do we know where they all are?’
‘I can find that out for you,’ Kalypso said. Since getting back, Isaac Hughes, the Foreign Secretary, had been in touch, saying he was assigning Kalypso to the A.C.T.. She was a highly trained MI6 operative and would be a valuable asset to the taskforce as well as givi
ng them a link to the intelligence community that they could leverage. It looked like this would be the first test of that relationship.
‘Thank you, Kalypso,’ William said. ‘Okay, I think we know what the basic plan is. As soon as we have more concrete information on the whereabouts of the targets, we can make more detailed plans. In the meantime, I suggest you all get some rest. Meeting adjourned. Thank you, everyone.’
Ω
Frankie pulled on the wetsuit over her swimsuit, zipping it up before pulling on the floatation backpack that would keep her and her heavy cyborg body from sinking to the depths of Hong Kong bay.
It had been two days since that first meeting with Janus back at the A.C.T. base where they had chosen their targets, and when Kalypso had come through with the information they needed, they made their plans and headed for China.
Frankie stood in the hold of a flyer, hovering over the waters of the bay, the city lights twinkling in the darkness a short distance away. Gibson and Kalypso were also suiting up, putting on their breathing apparatus and floatation devices as both were heavier due to their own augmentations, although, not to the extent that Frankie was.
Their personal motorised submersibles sat ready on the ramp at the back of the flyer.
‘So, you know the plan, guys. Zhou is meeting you on Mazhou Island, it’s a ship building facility in the bay on the Chinese side of the border. You need to get in, find him, and bring him back,’ William said to them over their comms. He was back in Neo-London, but was being kept up to date on everything by Dion, who was managing their mission comms from the flyer.
Veronica and Cole had travelled with them, but they were staying with the plane. This mission needed to be kept low key, so as few people as possible were on it.
‘I have reports coming through on the police bands that there’s an intruder on Mazhou Island,’ Dion said through their neural link.
‘That will be Zhou. Looks like he’s been spotted. You need to get there and get him out, quickly,’ William said over the link.
Frankie snapped her mask into place. ‘Copy that, we’re on our way,’ she said, and picked up her submersible from the ramp. ‘Let’s go,’ she said to Gibson and Kalypso before jumping into the cold black waters below the hovering flyer.
2.14
The cold of the water didn’t bother Frankie. She wasn’t really inconvenienced by it, but she could feel it and registered the temperature. The floatation device on her back was connected directly to her cyber brain via the jacks at the nape of her neck, meaning she could control it almost subconsciously, telling it to make her float or let her sink as she needed. She had such fine control over it that she could get it to hover a meter below the surface and stay there.
Once in the brackish waters, she fired up the personal submersible, which was basically an engine you held onto and drove through the water. The propellers spun up to Frankie’s chosen speed, sliding her through the water like a shark.
Amidst the icons in her field of vision, she had a map which showed their position in the water relative to the flyer and the island they were heading for. The nighttime waters of the Hong Kong bay were murky and black, giving them no visibility whatsoever. They also could not use their lights as that would give away their position to anyone watching for their approach.
‘How you doing down there?’ Dion asked over the neural link.
‘Everything going to plan so far,’ she said.
‘Good. You’ve just passed into Chinese waters, so you’re on your own, now,’ Dion said.
‘Thanks for the confidence boost, Dion,’ Frankie answered, deadpan.
‘Any time, boss,’ Dion shot back at her.
Frankie shook her head and concentrated on the task at hand and glanced back to check on her teammates. They were difficult to see in the water, but she could just make them out, one to either side of her, their yellow subs almost entirely hidden in this dark water.
They proceeded the rest of the way without issue, and she knew they were very close now. If she had been on the surface, she was sure the island would be looming above them in the night sky.
‘You’re a few meters out from the platform,’ Dion said.
‘Any update on the police situation? Have they taken anyone into custody?’ Frankie asked.
‘Not that I have heard through the police band I’m monitoring, no.’
‘Okay, let’s surface guys,’ she said to her teammates. With barely a thought, her floatation device adjusted itself and seconds later she rose to the surface. The huge artificial island, little more than a factory on the water that made ships, loomed over her, its main surface a few meters above her held up by massive dirty looking metal pillars that the water slapped against. Frankie scanned the platform edge but saw no one. There were lights on, illuminating the cranes and cargo crates that she could see above her, and to her left, she spotted a ladder that led up to the platform above. She moved towards it and the half-built ship just beyond it.
Catching hold of the ladder, she looked back and saw Gibson and Kalypso close behind her.
Frankie lifted the mask off from her face and tasted the salty, freezing cold water for the first time. It was not a pleasant taste.
‘Did either of you spot him?’ she asked.
They both lifted their masks off as well and shook their heads.
‘No, not yet,’ Kalypso said. ‘I got confirmation that he was on the island, though, so he can’t be far away. British Intelligence has been speaking with him for months about an extradition, so I know he wants to escape China and return to the west.’
‘Okay, we proceed as planned. Gibson, you wait here, mind the subs. Kal and I will go and see if we can find him,’ she said.
‘Understood,’ he said.
Frankie climbed the first few rungs on the ladder before removing the face mask from her head entirely and attaching it to her waistband. She then drew her waterproof pistol with its attached suppressor and continued on her way up the ladder. At the top, she moved slowly, bringing her head up over the edge of the platform just enough so she could see if anyone was around. There were large cargo containers set back away from the brink of the platform, leaving ample space between them and where Frankie was. She guessed this was a roadway, an access way for vehicles and other machinery to move around the edge of the island. There were a few smaller crates closer to her and other bits of dockside furniture scattered about, such as a large metal cylinder that the nearby ship was tied off to, to keep it from drifting out to sea.
Seeing no one about, Frankie hopped up to the platform and ducked over to the metal cylinder, her gun pointed down, as she watched the vicinity while Kalypso climbed up and joined her on the island. Water dripped from both their wetsuits, pooling on the metal floor beneath them.
‘Any ideas?’ Frankie asked. ‘Wasn’t he meant to meet us here?’
‘He was. But maybe he’s been held up or is hiding from the police if they’re looking for him,’ she suggested.
‘The longer we wait here, the more chance there is that we’re discovered,’ Frankie said. ‘I say we go hunting.’
‘Fine with me,’ Kalypso said.
Frankie nodded at her teammate and looked around again. Still, she saw no one. Close by, there was a vehicle-sized gap between the containers and a metal building with dark windows. Another roadway that led deeper into the island, she guessed, and as good a place as any to start looking for their target.
Keeping in a slight crouch, moving smoothly with her knees bent, she crossed to the containers, put her back to them and watched the area while Kalypso followed suit.
With her gun ready, she moved towards the roadway, moving carefully to remain as close to silent as possible.
Reaching the corner of the last container, Frankie edged around it, her gun up and ready while Kalypso watched her back. The road went deep into the island, with more buildings, cranes, and materials yards littered along its edges. She saw no one on the road for the time being, but
she did spot a little movement in the buildings much further down, though, where a few interior lights burnt brightly in the night. People working late, she guessed. But there was also no sign of Zhou.
‘Anything?’ Kal asked from behind her.
‘Nothing. I can’t see him.’
‘Keep going?’
‘Why not,’ Frankie said. She rounded the corner and quietly made her way along the edge of the container, watching the windows and doors of the nearby buildings in case anyone should appear through them.
Sudden movement, two containers further along, snapped Frankie’s attention forward as she saw three figures emerge from amidst the storage they were creeping along next to.
‘Get to cover,’ Frankie sent through their neural link and moved between the two closest containers with Kalypso on her heels.
With a moment to pause and watch, she saw that two of the three figures were police officers, while the other one matched the photos of Zhou and the description of what he would be wearing tonight. He was a smallish man with a mop of black hair and data ports on the sides of his head.
‘It’s Zhou, and he’s been found by the police. He’s cuffed, and they’re leading him away,’ she sent through the general channel on her link so Dion and William would know the situation as well as she and Kalypso.
‘He can’t be taken in by them. You have to get him out of there,’ William sent through the link.
‘I know, sir,’ she sent back.
‘This is about to get interesting,’ she whispered to Kalypso, who was also watching Zhou get led away.
‘You have to do this quietly, Frankie. You have my permission to do what you need to do to these two officers, but I would prefer it if they lived, at this point. Use your own judgement, though, we’ll deal with it either way’ he said.
‘Copy that,’ Frankie replied through the link.
‘Moving,’ Frankie said to Kalypso as she raised her gun. The officers had their backs to Frankie and Kalypso and were further up the row now on the other side, so Frankie jogged quietly across the roadway, followed by Kalypso. Moving up towards the men, keeping close to the buildings opposite the containers, Frankie was careful to remain unseen as they passed by windows and doors. She could shoot them now, but she hoped she could get closer, not fire her gun at all and take them out in hand to hand. Although, she did have a suppressor on her weapon, they didn’t make it totally silent, and it would likely be heard by anyone close by.
Promethean Files 2: The Prometheus Gambit Page 15