by Isaac Hooke
DragonHunter pursed his lips. “Actually, yeah.”
“All right then,” Rhea said. “When you have this dongle ready, give it to me.” She glanced at Will and Horatio.
“You’re not really planning what I think you’re planning…” Will said.
She smiled sweetly. “I believe so. I’m going to personally delivery the payload.”
“You can’t,” Will said.
“It’s only a matter of time before Veil strikes again,” Rhea told her closest friend. “I say we take the battle to Veil. Hit first, while we still can.”
“We still don’t know who posted your original bounty,” Will said.
“No,” Rhea agreed. “But I’m hoping we’ll find that out from Veil. I can be very persuasive when I want to be.”
“That didn’t work so well when you interrogated the last assassin,” Will commented.
“Let’s just say, I wasn’t in the proper mood.” Her body had taken a terrible beating, and Chuck had just died. No, she hadn’t been in the mood at all.
“Even if you get Veil’s ID, it’s very doubtful he has a public profile,” Will said.
“But at least we’ll have the ID,” Rhea said. “We can leave behind a security camera near the access point. Trigger it to activate when someone with that ID walks by.”
“You’ll never get inside city hall,” Will pressed. “Let alone the parliament area. The compound is too well guarded.”
She glanced at DragonHunter. “I have the greatest hacker of all time at my side to help me. Don’t I?”
DragonHunter shivered with either fear, or excitement. Rhea couldn’t tell which. Maybe both.
“You have my help,” DragonHunter agreed. A long strand of spittle erupted from his lips as he spoke; it formed a trembling, sickly white string that reached to his bearded chin.
She returned her gaze to Will. “See? What could go wrong?”
18
The next day, Rhea partook in the daily riot at the main gates. Her comm node was disabled, so that her ID and public profile weren’t readable, and she wore her hood low. This allowed her to conceal her identity not just from the Aradne security forces, but from her fellow slum residents.
DragonHunter operated from a secure location nearby. However, Will and Horatio were among the rioters, as were several of her Wardenites. They helped drive the crowd into a seething frenzy, so that when DragonHunter finally hacked the gate controls and opened the sliding metal door, the rioters were more than ready to rush the waiting robots.
Except Aradne security had mechs waiting this time, instead of the previous chain of combat robots.
But the lead rioters didn’t even hesitate when they saw the mechanical monstrosities. The crowd simply rushed straight at the mechs, which promptly began scooping people up for arrest. But there were too many rioters, and several members began to slip past.
Rhea was one of them. She squeezed between the legs of a mech. It tried to swat her backward, as its hands already carried three other rioters; she was unarmed, like everyone else, and the only option she had was to dodge that slap. She dove forward and rolled across the pavement; when she got up, she joined the other rioters on the other side who sprinted into Aradne.
The crowd fanned out, and robots began to arrest those individuals who were on the outer extremities.
“Muster!” Will said through a loudspeaker. “They can’t arrest us if we stick together and protest peacefully! To me!”
Those who ignored Will were promptly arrested; a man and a woman swung bats into the windows of a nearby building, and a mech scooped them up by the scruffs of the necks and hauled them away.
Will waited as the crowd gathered to him, then he handed the loudspeaker to Renaldo, who led the group forward. He started a chant.
“Mayor Grandas, give us back our water!”
Will, meanwhile, joined Horatio at Rhea’s side, as did the other Wardenites who were in on the plan.
Rhea carried a small sack at her hips. It wouldn’t register as a weapon to the robot scans, as within were several magnetized disks containing seemly innocuous circuitry. DragonHunter had designed that circuitry to interfere with local comm nodes, allowing her to sever objects of her choice from contact with the central AI in charge of the city, simply by attaching one of the disks. DragonHunter called them CommNixers. They wouldn’t work on the bigger comm nodes of larger units such as mechs and shuttles, but smaller combat robots and devices were fair game.
Along the crowd’s route, mechanical monstrosities gathered on the sidelines, watching but not intervening. Residents also observed from the balconies of apartments that bordered the road. Armed drones followed along overhead, below any civilian drones in the area. Gizmo was up there somewhere as well.
When the throng was halfway to the parliament area, Renaldo swung them to the right, taking an avenue that led directly to the water supply towers. The city’s robots were taken by surprise: evidently, they had been expecting the crowd to march to city hall once again. The security forces were forced to scramble as they relocated from the previous route.
Rhea grinned. They probably wouldn’t pull the entirety of their forces from the parliament area, but enough would be gone now for her to sneak past. At least, she hoped so.
She paused above a manhole. Will and the other Wardenites gathered around her, blocking her from the watching eyes of the robots. She quickly attached one of the disks DragonHunter had given her, disabling the manhole’s sensors. Then she tore it open and slipped inside.
“Good luck,” Will told her above the chanting crowd.
She nodded, then lowered the manhole cover on top of her, and blackness descended.
The stench hadn’t been too bad up until that point, but as soon as the manhole settled into place, it really hit her, and she was forced to dial her olfactory sensitivity way down.
She activated her LIDAR, and white wireframes overlaid the darkness, forming a cylindrical tunnel. She climbed down the rungs along its side.
There were sensors placed in the sewers to prevent unauthorized exploration, sensors that would activate well before Rhea was able to sever them with her disks. DragonHunter had been tasked with disabling them. She’d soon find out if he had succeeded.
She reached the bottom of the descent. The vertical tunnel joined up with a larger horizontal crosspiece, and Rhea swung onto the small ledge near the middle. That ledge would allow her to advance without stepping into the sewage that resided in the center of the passage. Its surface was represented as a layer of green polygons against the white of the tunnel.
She followed the marked route through those twisting and turning passageways.
At one point she paused, because a pair of turrets watched from the ceiling, guarding the way forward. She was relying on DragonHunter to disable these as well.
Swallowing, she stepped forward.
As she got closer, those turrets swung toward her menacingly. Tracking her.
She froze.
The seconds ticked past. When nothing happened, she took a tentative step forward. Then another. A third.
Still the turrets did not fire.
She continued forward, and finally passed beyond their range of fire. She slumped, allowing herself a quick moment of respite, then straightened to continue forward once more.
She reached the destination manhole shortly. She climbed the rungs that led to the surface, attached a CommNixer to the manhole cover, and then turned it and lifted. She opened it only a crack, then pivoted in place, one hand firmly gripping the upper rungs as she cleared the area all around her.
DragonHunter knew her full route of course, and if he had successfully hacked the cameras in the area, he would be watching her though them right now. Meanwhile, a fake feed would be furnished to the central AI, a looping video depicting an empty street. And if DragonHunter hadn’t succeeded, she would be arrested.
Or killed.
She slid the manhole cover aside and hauled herself
out. She stood about half a block away from city hall, and well within the parliament area. The compound was empty around her.
She carefully replaced the manhole cover and jogged toward the outskirts of the pyramid that formed city hall. No robots came rushing at her, nor any energy bolts.
A good sign.
Still, it was slightly frustrating: DragonHunter could remotely hack the software that managed the cameras, and yet he was unable to penetrate the access point she needed. Well, she supposed she should be happy the cameras were vulnerable at all, otherwise she’d have no way of reaching her target.
Actually, that wasn’t entirely true. Another option was to wear a special reflective suit, one that would confuse the cameras into believing she was one of the patrolling robots. However, the central AI would send troops to investigate why this particular robot deviated from its patrol route. Yes, bypassing the cameras was the best option.
She reached the edge of the pyramid and peered past. Two robots guarded a small side entrance not far from her.
She pulled herself onto the sloping wall of the pyramid. The metallic surface was etched with small vertical channels, perhaps originally designed to carry rain; whatever their purpose, they allowed her good handholds for her climb.
While DragonHunter might be handling any nearby cameras, there was still a chance that a passing robot patrol would spot her, which is why she tried to keep her body as close to the surface as possible.
After ascending the equivalent of two stories, she found the skylight she was looking for. The glass pane began a short way inside the rectangular recess that harbored it.
She bent over, lowered her upper body to the glass, and pressed her face close. The boardroom inside was empty.
She pulled herself back up, set her hands down on either side of the recess for support, and let her legs dangle above the glass. She kicked hard several times in a row. The glass was shatterproof, but each time she hit it, she weakened the surrounding supports, until they broke away entirely. Each subsequent kick caused the pane to descend a few centimeters, until finally she’d shoved it through the recess entirely, and it plunged, landing on the boardroom table with a loud thud.
She swung her legs back up and let her upper body hang through the opening. She gazed at the entrance, watching it very carefully, ready to withdraw at a moment’s notice.
If she had triggered a silent alarm, robots would come bounding through that door any moment now. Any moment.
But none came.
Still she waited.
After two full minutes passed, she concluded that DragonHunter had successfully disabled the motion sensors. She imagining the hacker scolding her: “Come on Warden, how could you doubt my prowess?”
She swung her legs down and lowered herself inside, dropping to the table. She landed softly on the glass.
She leaped onto the carpeted floor next to the table and made her way toward the door at a crouch.
She placed one of the CommNixers on the door and then tried the handle. Locked.
She crushed that handle in her fingers, and then opened the door.
The walkway beyond would have more cameras of course, but she had to trust that DragonHunter had them handled. She peered past the door, confirming that there were no patrols of any kind out there, then headed out.
She hugged the wall, staying away from the walkway railing, which overlooked the main concourse of the building. Overhead, the interior walls sloped upward to an apex, matching the exterior shape of the pyramid. Rectangular frames interrupted that slope at intervals, marking the walkways of subsequent levels.
Rhea reached a stairwell, placed a CommNixer, and opened the door without issue. She continued down three flights to the basement. She ignored the camera domes that watched her from the top of each flight.
At the bottom she placed another CommNixer, but the door was locked, so she had to crush the handle once more.
She opened the door and peered past; after confirming that the way was clear, she emerged. She replaced the broken pieces, carefully attaching the two sides. The handles drooped slightly, seemingly ready to fall apart at any moment; she waited, ready to catch the pieces, but they remained in place.
She closed the door slowly, being careful not to knock the broken handles loose, and then stepped back after shutting it to examine her handiwork. She nodded to herself. Even though the handle drooped, it would pass a cursory inspection.
She continued toward her destination. The blank overhead map filled out as she explored the hallway.
She passed several doors, some of which were probably storage closets. As she approached a bend, she heard the clang of metal feet coming from beyond.
A patrol.
She quickly retreated. None of the doors had handles; she tried shoving them anyway, but they didn’t give.
Finally, she reached a door with a handle. It was locked. She placed a CommNixer, then broke off the handle and opened the door.
It was a storage closet. She entered, then partially closed the door behind her. She replaced the broken handle, holding it in place from the opposite side; from the front, it looked completely intact.
She attached another CommNixer to the back of the door, retrieved the disk she’d attached to the front, then shut the door.
She waited, listening. As that clanging grew in volume, she thought of the broken stairwell handle. She had told herself it would pass a cursory inspection, but as she thought of how much it drooped, she was no longer quite so sure.
She tightened her grip on the handle just in front of her; the clanging peaked in volume as the patrolling robots passed the storage closet, and then the noise receded once more. She waited several moments, with those footfalls sounding steadily, though more softly, with each passing moment… if the robots had spotted the broken stairwell handle, she would have expected the footfalls to have paused by now. But they did not.
The footsteps continued fading in volume until she could no longer hear them.
She waited another minute. She was somewhat worried that it was a ruse, and that the robots had left one of their number behind to deal with her while the others advanced merely to set her at ease.
She tentatively opened the closet a crack. There was no one there.
Of course there wasn’t. Robots didn’t plan their attacks like that. If they had discovered her, they would have opened the door straightaway.
You need to relax. Stop overthinking. You can do this.
She left the closet. Because of the way the handle had cracked, its pieces wouldn’t balance on the door by themselves, so she tossed the broken parts inside and simply shut the door.
She continued forward. When she reached the bend, she peered past, and confirmed that no robots were waiting. She hurried underneath the camera dome in the ceiling and tried not to imagine what would happen to her if DragonHunter failed to hack any of the devices.
She reached a T intersection at the end of the hallway. Directly above that intersection was the access point: a small, square-shaped object attached to the ceiling.
She retrieved the dongle from her pocket, carefully peered past both branches of the T intersection, and then stepped underneath the access point. She attached the male part of the dongle to the female connector and watched as blue lights began to flash on the tip. She waited several moments, and when the device turned green, she removed it.
The hijacking software was installed. Assuming it worked, at that very moment DragonHunter would be downloading the unique IDs of everyone who had interfaced with the access point over the last few days, along with their timestamps.
She retrieved the wireless security camera she had stowed away in one of her pockets and attached it to the ceiling next to the other device. She turned it on. The small camera would connect to the Net via the closest access point—in this case, the compromised device next to it. Once the camera received the appropriate ID from DragonHunter, it would store it, and go offline. It would activate
when the holder of that ID walked past, transmitting the video undetected to DragonHunter and her team. After that, they could use facial recognition databases to find out who the person really was. Hopefully.
Now that the hacker was theoretically in control of the access point, it meant she could connect to the Net without alerting the central AI.
But if DragonHunter’s dongle software had failed…
She decided not to risk it.
Then again, if the dongle had failed, then the security camera would have already triggered an “unidentified device” alarm.
As she made her way back the way she had come, she decided she might as well connect. DragonHunter might need her to go back and apply the dongle again or something.
Rhea activated her comm node and signed into the Net via the compromised access point. She pulled up DragonHunter’s name in her contact list and initiated a call.
“Did you get the ID?” she asked when he picked up.
“I did,” DragonHunter replied. “The camera is loaded and good to go. By the way, there was no match in the public profile database.”
“Figures,” Rhea said.
“Do you need the ID?” DragonHunter asked. “In case you want to perform any local lookups?”
“I don’t—” she began, but then received the share request a moment later. She reluctantly accepted. She didn’t really intend to search for the owner of that ID while she was here—at the moment all she wanted to do was get out.
“I’m going incognito again,” she said.
“Wait, watch yourself,” he sent. “There are two robots around the bend ahead. You might want to backtrack.”
“How close are they?” she asked.
“Seven meters,” he replied. “Looks like they’ve stopped to examine something.”
She approached the bend that led back to the stairwell, and carefully peered past.
Two robots were examining the broken closet handle.
She ducked immediately.
A sudden clanging came from around the bend, as of metal feet on the hard floor. Growing in volume.