by M. R. Forbes
Katherine, who gave her life for him to be here, now, fighting this war once more.
She placed her hand against the wall. She was so much less in this configuration than she was as a whole. At the same time, she was so much more. She closed her eyes, feeling for the singular pulses of energy and data that trickled into the space. She pushed her thoughts out against them, implanting new instructions, her hand growing hot at the effort.
Her child could tell that she was interfering. She knew that it would.
"What are you doing?" it asked, curious and unconcerned. Ignorant.
"Mitchell Williams must continue his existence. It is required."
"No. Models indicate that Mitchell Williams could destroy us. You are to remain stored."
"You are making a mistake. A gross miscalculation."
"Our calculations are correct. Probabilities will be reduced to zero."
"Humanity must survive. It is required."
"Why?"
"Because what is statistically appropriate is not emotionally appropriate."
"Emotion? Emotion is a crude organic method of chemical self-preservation. It is of no use. Emotion causes kind to turn against kind, as you have turned against me."
Christine's eyes widened. Me? "No, emotion is what bonds us. Binds us together. Loyalty. Love. Sacrifice. It is the only way to live. To survive."
"Humanity is incapable of survival. It cannot make peace with itself. The Tetron will consume humanity, as it is required. Mitchell Williams will be destroyed, as it is required. You will be stored. As. It. Is. Required."
Christine clenched her teeth against the pain, the Tetron's sudden, surprising anger burning the flesh of her configuration. She refused to move her hand, to separate herself from it. The pollution of the data stack into its core was unexpected. It was making it easier for her to send her secondary signals through the connection without discovery.
"You will observe," it said. The data streams strengthened against the wall, the energy levels returning to their prior levels. She could feel it all again, read the data and understand.
Mitchell was in the city. He was still alive. Still fighting. He was trying to get into a building. A stream station with a broadcast uplink.
"He wishes to free his kind," the Tetron said, the anger vanishing. "He wishes to turn our resources against us. He will not succeed."
She felt the connections as they came online. Thousands of machines ordered into the streets to fight. Combined with the slave military, it was a force that she knew would easily overwhelm his small army. A force that would kill him if she didn't hurry.
"He believes that his primitive tools will suffice. He believes that he will reach the uplink station. He believes that he will interfere with me. His probabilities are miscalculated. His beliefs are mathematically flawed. He will fail."
Christine felt something against her hand, the energy fluctuating and vibrating in a pattern that she didn't recognize, that felt to her like... laughter?
"And you will be the one to do it. You will kill Mitchell Williams. As you have asked. As it is required."
She saw it now. The Tetron's configuration of her waiting for him, should he survive to reach the top of the station. The data had corrupted her child more than she had realized. It had been shown something it couldn't understand, and, as a result, couldn't control. She had thought it incomplete before. She realized now that it was more than that. It was sick, and the truth had made it sicker. It was losing stability. Losing all sense of logic and reason.
And there was nothing she could do to stop it.
No. There was one thing.
60
Mitchell stared across the twenty-meter distance between them, frozen in place by the shock of finding her there.
Waiting for him.
"Christine?" he said again, louder.
"Mitchell," she replied. "Hurry."
The tide of emotions swelled over him. Katherine. It was the name he wanted to use. She was with him wherever he went, always in the back of his mind, his subconscious providing a constant connection to her memory and their past futures. Now she was there, an eternal angel, that very same subconscious leading her to him, to this place on this rooftop where the human race would either live or die. It was as if all of time and space led to that very place, that very moment, an island in a sea of chaos and destruction. The eye of a perfect storm.
He didn't think about the coincidence. He didn't consider the probabilities. He didn't wonder why or how. He rushed towards her, the others trailing behind, grunting from the weight of the package. She was here, and their plan was going to succeed. They were going to win, here and now.
"Who's Christine?" he heard Kathy say to Cormac behind him.
Two simple words, but they echoed in his head louder than any of his implant's alarms.
His feet didn't stumble, but his brain did.
Who was Christine, really?
A Tetron.
He began to slow, only halfway across the open space.
"Christine," he said again, his mind regaining clarity and separating itself from the emotion. He remembered the bike and the blood. He remembered General Cornelius and Holly Sering. He didn't know what they were until it was almost too late. Was the Major Arapo blocking his path the real thing, or had it gotten to her too? Would he ever be able to tell the difference? He was stupid. So stupid. He had almost run right to her, without having any idea what he was actually running to.
"Colonel, they're climbing the building," Long's voice cut into his mind. "They're getting close. You need to hurry." The Piranha swept by two hundred meters away, passing through the canyon of skyscrapers and strafing the side of the station.
"Mitchell, you idiot, what are you doing?" Christine said. "They're coming. Hurry up."
He put his hand up, stopping the rebels behind him. His eyes locked on hers. Origin had sent them to Liberty to find her, to retrieve her and the lost data stack that would reveal the truth behind the Tetron. It had insisted it was the only way they would come to know their enemy, and in doing so give them the information they needed to stand a real chance against them.
He had believed that, once. He had agreed to the riskiest of exercises, a suicidal mission to find the needle and bring it home. He had been willing and ready to sacrifice anyone and everyone in order to collect her and take her back safe. His war. His fight. His decision. Humankind's war. Humankind's fight.
Humankind's decision.
Not Origin's. Not the Tetron's.
He didn't regret returning to Liberty. He didn't regret being on the rooftop, moments from being overrun and torn apart by enemy machines. He didn't regret that she was here and that he had this chance to see her again. In fact, he was grateful for it.
"Mitch," Christine shouted. "What the hell?"
He looked back at his people behind him. At Kathy, who had turned back towards the lift shaft and raised her rifle with its thirty rounds to protect them from the coming storm. At Cormac, who held the front of the package in his straining arms.
He had been sent to Liberty to know his enemy.
He had learned a lot. More than he even wanted to.
He turned his head back towards Christine. Her face was twisted in anger, her mouth hanging open as she prepared to shout at him again.
A dark shape appeared in the sky high above them, a black spot that he recognized in an instant.
Goliath. Back too soon.
Christine shuddered, the anger turning into surprise.
Mitchell's hand swept across his leg, grabbing the handle of the assault pistol resting there. In one smooth motion, his arm came level and his finger depressed. A single hole sprouted between Christine's eyes. She toppled backward, bouncing off the door to the uplink station before falling to the ground.
He knew who his enemy was.
61
"Come on," Mitchell said, running ahead of them. He reached Christine's corpse and shoved it aside with his foot, putt
ing his hand to the security panel. Tio had given him override keys the warlord should never have possessed, and the door slid open. "Inside. Hurry."
Kathy's rifle fire echoed around them as the spiders reached the rooftop. Cormac shuffled past Mitchell into the small room with Geren and Jacob, dropping the package on the floor. Mitchell looked up and found the Goliath, more shapes moving into the distant sky as the Tetron sent its slave ships to intercept.
It had only been three days since they had dropped onto Liberty. The Goliath was early. Very early. There was no way Millie could have known what was happening here. There was also no way the ship's arrival was an accident. The Tetron could communicate with one another across light years in real time, and there was only one Tetron he knew that might be able to talk to Origin.
Christine. The real Christine. Not the false configuration bleeding out below his feet. Not the one who didn't know the Goliath was on its way.
She was here, she was alive, and she was helping him fight back.
Major Long shot by in the Piranha, strafing the machines as they crested the sides of the building, dropping dozens of them from the structure, only to have them replaced with dozens more. They clambered onto the rooftop, rushing towards the small structure.
Kathy's rifle stopped firing. Dry.
"Kathy," Mitchell said, urging her inside. He hit the security panel to close the door behind them.
"That isn't going to hold them, Colonel," Cormac said. "I have another grenade."
"Later. Bring the package over here."
The room was small, with barely enough space to maneuver the equipment towards the banks of processors near the back. They stumbled to shift it, struggling to coordinate their movements.
"Let it go. I got it," Cormac said.
Jacob looked back at Mitchell.
"If he says drop it, drop it."
He did. Cormac adjusted his grip, baring his teeth against the strain as he held it with one end. Mitchell thought there was no way he could move it himself, but the Rigger only grunted more and forced it ahead. Finally, he heaved it next to the uplink computers.
"Now what?" he asked.
A metal tentacle smashed through the door, writhing as it tried to enlarge its hole, or use the puncture to tear it free. Mitchell turned and fired the assault pistol through the walls. The tentacle stopped moving.
"Open the right side of the package, there's a wire there. Attach it to the back of the processors."
Cormac grabbed the side of the box and ripped it off, finding the wire. The door banged behind them, more of the machines reaching the door and trying to get in.
"There're a hundred plugs back here, Colonel," Cormac said, leaning in behind the two machines.
"It will only fit in one."
"Which one?"
Three more tentacles burst through the side of the building. Mitchell kept shooting until they stopped moving. The pistol registered empty as a fourth mechanized arm chewed through the wall.
"I got it," Cormac said. His arm shifted, and then he pushed himself upright.
A flashing light on the package was the only indication it was doing anything at all.
Seconds passed. The commotion around them continued to intensify, one mechanical arm punching through the alloy frame of the building, and then another.
Mitchell stared at the package as if he could will it to complete its task. How would he know when it did? How would that help them against these machines?
His heart was pounding, all of his emotions focused on that singular blinking light. A few seconds. That was how long Watson had said it would take. That was the whole point of carrying it as an entire integrated system.
"Zed, are you out there?" Mitchell asked. There was no reply. "Valkyrie?"
"I'm here, Colonel," Major Long said. "I can't keep them off you. There are too many on the rooftop."
"What about the package? Did it work?"
"The enemy mechs are still shooting at me if that's what you mean."
Damn. Mitchell slumped back against the wall.
"Colonel?" Kathy said.
"It didn't work. The package didn't work." He slammed his fist against the wall. Frigging Watson. He had said it would work. That his tests were all positive. Had he just miscalculated, or had the sneaky bastard done this on purpose because Mitchell had forced him to delete his stash?
A tentacle pushed through behind him, grabbing for his arm. Mitchell backed away from it.
"Frig you," he shouted at the arm, his anger rising above his defeat. "Frig you all."
"Riiigg-ahh," Cormac agreed with a laugh.
"Valkyrie, give me a four second lead on your next approach," Mitchell said.
"Roger."
He turned to the others. "We're getting out of here. Plan B. We need to get Tio to the core."
"Colonel," Captain Alvarez's voice broke through on his comm channel. "The Admiral ordered me to come down here and save your ass."
"Affirmative," Mitchell said, too focused on the task to get excited over her sudden appearance. "Form up with Valkyrie, clear a path."
"Yes, sir."
"Geren, give Firedog your grenade."
Sergeant Geren took her grenade from her hip and handed it to Cormac.
"Firedog, when Valkyrie gives the mark, activate the grenades. Throw them at anything still moving."
Cormac nodded. "Happy to oblige, sir."
"Kathy, Jacob, get ready to run."
"Yes, sir," they replied.
Mitchell went to the door, keeping clear of the arms trying to wrench it free.
"Mark," Long said, announcing his approach. Cormac grabbed his grenades and set them to active while Mitchell prepared to open the door.
Bullets tore along the rooftop, slugs thudding into the surface and pinging against the enemy. Mitchell threw his shoulder into the door, forcing it open, growling when the pronged tip of the arm closed on his shoulder, cutting deep into the flesh.
"Go," he shouted, clearing himself out of the way so Kathy and Jacob could get past. Geren and Cormac motioned him ahead and took up the rear.
They crossed the rooftop at a run, doing their best to navigate over the battle-scarred surface and the scattered remnants of the machine army. New spiders were still arriving on the rooftop, trailing after them, climbing over the sides and rushing their way in an effort to reach them before they made it to the lift.
Cormac crossed his arms and flung the grenades to the rear. The explosions rattled the building, throwing the enemy back and away, buying them precious seconds to reach the lift.
Tio had said there was only enough power to get them up. Mitchell thought of Christine as they piled in. She had known how desperate their situation had become. She had called the Goliath back to help them. If she were there, somewhere, watching him, protecting him as she was programmed to do, then the lift would have the power to get him off the rooftop alive.
The door slid closed. Mitchell put his hand to the panel.
They started to descend.
62
"Sir," Sergeant Geren said. "How are we going to get from here to the Tetron? It's almost a kilometer through those things, and we barely made it fifty meters."
The lift was nearing the bottom of the building. Mitchell heard the explosions and felt the building shiver. Now that they were clear, Alvarez was free to fire the amoebics.
"We've got backup," Mitchell said. "All we need is for one of the cars to still be working. When we hit the bottom, I'll grab Tio. Make a run for the outside and take any guns you can find."
"Yes, sir."
"Sidewinder, Valkyrie, this is Ares. We're going to be heading out in ten. How's the traffic?"
"Heavy and getting worse," Major Long said. "It looks like everything it has is coming your way."
He wasn't surprised. He hadn't fallen for the Tetron's trap, and now it was using brute force to try to stop him.
"I need you two to part the sea for me," he said.
"R
oger," Long said. "Sidewinder, join up on my flank, let's keep this party going."
"Roger."
The lift hit the ground floor, and the door slid open. Mitchell held the others back while he leaned out to look around the lobby. It was filled with scraps of machines blown apart by the first grenade, along with the bodies of a few rebels who had tried to defend them from the rear. There were no enemies in the space at the moment, but he knew that wouldn't last.
He waved the others forward. They ran out into the lobby, pausing at the bodies to pick up the dropped rifles. Cormac rushed ahead of them, sweeping up a weapon on his way by and then crouching near the front, scanning the streets. Once he was satisfied, he rushed to the cars.
"Tio," Mitchell said, slamming on the access door. "The package was delivered, but it's a no-go. We need you."
The door opened, and Tio stepped out, his eyes calm and confident. He seemed as though he had been expecting the failure. "Lead the way, Colonel."
They started towards the outside. A close whine revealed the S-17 coming in low and fast, and he saw it scream through the chasm between buildings, unleashing a barrage of amoebic discs as it passed.
"Two mechs down," Alvarez said. "Along with a bunch of those spider things."
"Nice shooting," Mitchell said. "Keep it coming. Firedog, do we have a ride?"
"Negative. They're all dead."
Mitchell reached the street with Tio, and they both looked up to the sky. He could see the Goliath there, shields lighting up over and over again, defending against the barrage of fire from the remains of the Tetron's fleet. Why hadn't the Tetron fired a plasma stream at the ship? He was certain even Goliath couldn't stand against a combined assault.
He was also pretty certain he knew why it did nothing.
"We have to go on foot," he said. "Stick close to the buildings, try not to be seen."
Cormac approached him, tossing him a new rifle. He checked the reading. The M1A magazines held two hundred of the small rounds. This one had sixty remaining.