“You can read that? What language is it?”
“I can’t exactly read it, but I know what it says. It’s Italian, and it’s from Dante’s Inferno. It’s what’s written over the gates of Hell, and you probably recognize the English translation: ‘Abandon all hope, ye who enter here.’”
I hit “OK” on the prompt and take another crack at the password. The screen updates: “Wrong Password. 3 Tries Remaining.”
The doc looks at me sharply. “Dan? Did you just try ‘Inferno’ as the password?”
“Yeah, but it didn’t work.”
“Of course it didn’t work! The ‘hint’ was just him telling people not to look for help in the password hint field. He’s not going to build something this revolutionary, this...this world-shaking and then protect it with a seven-letter dictionary word!”
“Well, what if he had? It didn’t hurt to try. See, we have three attempts left.”
“Dan.” The doc’s tone suddenly drops from agitated to deadly serious. “Do not, under any circumstances, lock the account on that computer.”
“What do you think will happen?”
“Maybe nothing. Probably nothing. But if he’s paranoid enough, it could wipe everything. The research, the controlling program, maybe even the nanos out in the wild.”
“Wait, so you think locking this out might fry our nanos? Then that’s perfect!”
“Yes, unless ‘fry’ is a little more literal than you’re thinking. Remember what I showed you in the lab, where I activated the nanos?”
“Yeah, and then they burst into flame—ah. Okay, no remote wipe through lockout. Got it.”
“I don’t think he’d do that by preference. But if he has offsite backups of his files, and he was concerned that he was going to be exposed...well, we know he’s unscrupulous. I wouldn’t like to gamble with your lives on this.”
“No, check, I’m with you. Finding another way in.”
I don’t care what Doc Simmons says, though: even geniuses make stupid mistakes. Once she turns away, I take a quick look under the keyboard in case he has the password written down there. There’s nothing there, though, and a check of the underside of the counter’s lip also turns up nothing. I do a thorough investigation of the surrounding area, but come up completely empty-handed. Why does this guy have to be one of the rare ones who doesn’t write his passwords down?
Still, this terminal is only half the battle. There’s a server rack on a wall behind me, and it’s doubtless running most of what’s going on here anyway. This computer is just an interface for everything in the rack. I’m going to try going direct.
The rack’s screened door shields what looks like at least a dozen servers from view, but I can see their lights blinking merrily away. I tug on the door, but it’s locked. This, at least, is a problem I can solve. I work my pinkie finger in the narrow gap between the door and the frame, just barely touching my nail against the metal bar of the lock, and focus my loathing. It takes almost a minute, but then the door swings open freely, and I have access to the servers.
Of course, that only does me so much good. Now instead of looking at a screened door protecting a bunch of blank computer fronts, I can look at the blank computer fronts directly. There are no convenient labels to tell me what anything does. I could start pulling cords free at this point, but since I really have no idea what shutting the system down would do, that seems a bit ill-advised.
On the other hand, instead of removing cords, I could try adding them. The computers have front-facing USB ports, places where you can plug in interface devices. I trot back over to the counter, unhook the monitor and keyboard, and carry them over to plug them in.
The first two servers I try present me with login screens. The third is simply black, and even when I connect the keyboard and press keys, it won’t respond. But when I connect the monitor to the fourth one, it displays several windows open in a fairly standard graphical format. I freeze, afraid to touch anything.
“Doc? Doc! I’ve got something here!”
The doc hurries over. “What have you found?”
“I have no idea. Look, what is this?”
“It might be a file server. It’s hard to say by the names of the folders, but...” She looks around in frustration. “Is there a mouse? I can’t navigate this with the keyboard.”
I hurry back to the counter to disconnect the mouse, but as I’m detaching it from the computer, there’s a loud scraping sound from across the room, and suddenly the entire lab is flooded with light. I whip my head around to see the plywood moved aside and there, towering in the doorway to the lab with his hand on the light switch, stands Ichabot.
- Chapter Thirteen -
“Why, Dan,” Ichabot says with false pleasantry. “This isn’t where you asked to meet at all.”
My eyes dart around the lab, seeking a place to hide, a weapon, or both. With Ichabot staring directly at me, a hiding place is probably a lost cause, but there are plenty of things around here to use as weapons. The lab is full of heavy throwable objects, breakable glass beakers, scalpels, syringes and more. I drop the computer mouse and make a quick move towards a scalpel, grabbing it and pointing it threateningly at Ichabot.
“Yeah, something came up and I wasn’t going to be able to make our meeting. You didn’t get my text?” I ask, putting a mocking tone into my voice.
Ignoring the scalpel in my hand, Ichabot paces slowly into the lab, closing the distance between us. He looks over my shoulder, and I turn my head to follow his gaze. He’s caught sight of the monitor I’ve attached to the server rack, which is still displaying the contents of the file server. What he can’t see from his angle, though, is Doc Simmons crouched down behind a counter. She’s moving steadily towards the far edge, clearly aiming to keep the counter between them as he advances. I don’t know what her plan is, but any advantage right now is a good one, so I’ll back her play as much as I’m able.
“And now I find you going through my personal items. That’s very rude, Dan,” he chides.
“Well, you know. Couldn’t find paper and a pen anywhere and I wanted to write a ‘sorry I missed you’ note. I was gonna erase the whiteboard and write it there, but it looked like it might be important.”
Ichabot breaks into an insulting chuckle. “As if you can comprehend a single notation on there. You’re a toddler trying to read a graduate-school textbook.”
“I got the joke in your password hint pretty easily,” I tell him, gesturing to the computer and keeping his attention away from the doc’s hiding place. “And I figured out a way into your ‘secure’ system, too.”
“Very good!” exclaims Ichabot. “You’re right, I’ve underestimated you. You’re a kindergartener trying to read a graduate-school textbook.”
“Unkind,” I tell him, waving the scalpel. “And unwise. I’m armed, and you’re not. Seems like you might want to tone down the insults a shade.”
With my tiny sword held protectively before me, I advance slightly on Ichabot, circling around to his right so as to force him to turn his back to Doc Simmons. The maneuver works, although the intimidation seems to be failing. Ichabot turns to keep facing me, an amused smile on his lips.
“Or what, Dan? You’ll stab me? You’re not a killer. Besides, then how would you ever find out how to stop your friends from trying to murder you?”
“I’m already in your computer system. I can sort it out.” Doc Simmons is creeping up behind him now. I still don’t know what her plan is, but presumably it involves him not noticing her, so I’ve got to keep his attention. I decide to try a taunt. “You seem like the sort of guy who likes to leave copious notes so that history can understand how great you were. I bet it’s practically a step-by-step guide.”
“There’s that kindergarten can-do attitude again, Dan! I appreciate your optimism, I really do. Why, without—” Ichabot stops mid-sentence as Doc Simmons, rising silently up from behind him, stabs a syringe into his upper thigh. She presses down on the plunger, and I
see liquid splash out in all directions. The doc pulls back the syringe, looking dismayed, and I can see that it no longer has a needle at its tip.
Before the doc can backpedal, Ichabot lashes out with one gangly arm and grabs her around the neck, hoisting her to her feet. “Really, this was your plan?” he says, addressing me even as Doc Simmons struggles in his grip. “You know my nanos are activated. You really should have assumed that I could dissolve would-be weapons on contact. You’ve watched Vincent do it, after all.”
He tightens his grip on the doc’s neck and, with only a small amount of apparent effort, lifts her off of the ground one-handed. “I’ve been testing the abilities on others, but I’ve been implementing them in myself. I’m really quite superhuman at this point.”
Ichabot grabs the doc’s right shoulder with his left hand and, in a movement almost too fast to follow, whips her over his head to hurtle against the metal roll-up door we crawled in under. Simmons barely has time to scream before impacting the door headfirst, denting it severely. She crashes to the floor in a crumpled heap and lies still.
“Doc!” I shout, rushing to her side. I kneel down and touch her neck for a pulse. My own heart is hammering so hard that at first I can’t find her heartbeat, but after a second I feel it beneath my fingers. There’s a clear red handprint around her throat from where Ichabot gripped her, and it’s already starting to bruise. Her breathing sounds okay, though, and her pulse is strong, so I’m guessing that she’s more or less all right.
Ichabot is laughing, a hearty and sonorous sound which seems out of place coming from his matchstick frame. I look up in disbelief, and the expression of outrage on my face only makes him laugh harder.
“You should see yourself!” he manages between laughs. “Like a kicked puppy. You don’t get it at all!”
“Enlighten me,” I growl, rising to my feet.
“Oh, I’ll do one better,” says Ichabot, calming down. “I’ll show you, so that you can actually understand it.”
He rushes at me, covering the dozen feet between us in an eye blink. Before I’ve even really processed that he’s in front of me, he has my head in both of his hands and is slamming it into the corrugated metal door repeatedly. My skull rings with the impacts, and the next thing I know I’m staring at the concrete floor from extremely close range, blood pooling gently beneath my face.
With a major effort, I push myself up to a kneeling position and look around. Ichabot is halfway across the room, reconnecting the monitor, keyboard and mouse to the computer I’d borrowed them from. He types something brief on the keys, then pauses.
This is it. He’s logged in. If I can just get him away from the computer somehow, even if it’s only for a second, maybe I can figure out what to do to shut everything down safely. The doc’s still down, though, apparently out for the count, and simply getting up to one knee took just about all I had left in me. I didn’t come this far to bail out now, though. I’ve got to make the effort.
I summon up my final reserves and, leaning heavily on a nearby shelf, manage to regain my bipedal status. The makeshift rubber shoes I still haven’t had a chance to take off might actually be helping me here, by giving me a broader base of support on each foot. I think it’s the first time they’ve been anything but a hindrance. Not the purpose I’d designed them for, but I’ll take it.
I do my best to strike a dramatic pose, despite how much everything hurts. Taking a deep breath, I point my scalpel at Ichabot and intone, “This ends now.”
“How right you are,” says Ichabot, typing in a swift command. Abruptly, every muscle in my body seizes up.
Think about a charley horse, or pointing your foot until it cramps up. This is like that: the same feeling of complete tension, the muscle becoming a rock-hard and unbending rod. Except instead of just being in my foot or calf, it’s everywhere, all at once. My feet, my legs, my back, my arms, even my jaw and eyelids. Everything locks up completely, radiating discomfort and pain. I’m frozen like a statue, scalpel extended, unable to move an inch.
“Bet you didn’t know I could do that!” says Ichabot. “It’s the same principle that allows the nanomachinery to augment your muscular strength, actually. In this case, rather than amplifying your muscle movements, I’ve seized them up entirely. So you see? It’s all over. The only question here is what to do with you.”
“I’ll kill you,” I say, or try to. Due to being unable to move my lips, jaw or tongue, what comes out is mainly vowels, sounding more like “Ah hih you.”
Ichabot seems to get the point, though, judging by the new bout of laughter that grips him. “Oh, really? How? Shall I come impale myself on the end of your scalpel?”
He walks over and presses the tip of his index finger against the scalpel blade, which dissolves. I’m left holding just the stainless steel handle. “Oops! Well, so much for that plan. I’m sure you’ll figure something else out.”
I glare at him, although this is largely a mental feat since even my eyes won’t move. Ichabot paces back and forth in front of me, tapping his long fingers together.
“So, how to get rid of you? I could just prop you in a corner, leave you like this until you die of thirst. It’s definitely a simple answer, although it lacks a certain elegance. Hm.”
Suddenly, the roll-up door behind me rattles. I try to turn to look, but of course it’s to no avail. I have a brief moment of hope that it’s someone here to help me, but no sooner has the thought flitted across my mind than it is banished by an animalistic howl sounding from outside. The howl is accompanied by a screech of metal and a crash of falling shelves as the barely-opened door is grabbed and hurled upward along its track, opening the entire wall behind me. I’m facing the wrong direction to see for sure what’s going on, but from the howl and the brute strength I know what must be happening.
Peterson’s awake. And he’s right behind me.
“Ah!” exclaims Ichabot, a look of delight on his face. “Now here’s a nice solution. I could just let your friend take you apart!”
- Chapter Fourteen -
I hear a low growl as Peterson moves in close behind me. I try to flinch away when I feel his breath on my neck, but I can’t even do that. I’m stuck here like some ridiculous statue, one arm pointed outward, frozen in my final dramatic and useless gesture. I’m a monument to my own folly. Unable to defend myself, unable even to turn to see it coming, I brace myself for the pain about to come as Peterson finishes the job he started out in the street a half an hour ago.
But after several seconds of breathing down my neck, Peterson steps away. I hear wet footsteps against the concrete floor, and then he moves into my field of vision, slowly pacing past. His eyes are on mine, and I attempt to say something, to appeal to his reason, but with my jaw locked all I manage is “Eeur huh!”
I’m not positive that there’s reason left to appeal to, anyway. Peterson looks bad. And not just “has been lying unconscious in a puddle in a cold rain” bad, although obviously he’s been doing that. Even in the short time that’s passed since I last saw him, the nanos have continued to reconfigure his body. He has a thicker brow ridge, a more pronounced stoop and a rounder spine. His shoulders have broadened, judging by the fact that his jacket is now split almost completely in half in the back. The sleeves dangle loosely from the few remaining threads still attaching them to the shoulders, and through those gaps I can see that the shirt beneath is tearing apart along the seams as well.
The fact that he’s not just mindlessly attacking me suggests that he hasn’t yet gone fully along the route of the other ape-men, though. Either one of them would have torn me apart as soon as they made it through the door. Peterson’s taking his time, considering things. Of course, he’s currently pacing like a caged tiger, which means that what he’s considering is probably just how best to kill me, but it’s something. It’s a small thread of hope, but if Peterson’s still in there, then maybe there’s still a way out of this.
This hope promptly vanishes as Peterson wa
lks over to a nearby shelf, grabs one of the metal crossbars and tears it free. Brandishing the three-foot length of metal, he stalks slowly back over toward me. Behind him, Ichabot laughs delightedly, but Peterson’s attention is on me. His pacing carries him behind me again, and I don’t need the look of anticipation on Ichabot’s face to warn me of the blow that’s about to fall. I brace myself as best as I can without being able to move, which really isn’t very well at all.
The first strike is overhand, cracking down across my shoulder blades with a meaty thud. It’s followed by another, diagonal to the first, then a horizontal strike across the left side of my lower back. Tears form in my unblinking eyes and run down my face as each hit causes my cuts to reopen and my broken bones to rub painfully together. Peterson works his way around the front, landing hits as he goes, one after the other in rapid succession.
And yet, oddly, it doesn’t hurt as much as I’d expect. I mean, it’s agonizing, and I’d be screaming if I had the muscular control to make that much noise right now. But he was doing more damage with his hands when we fought on the street. Although these hits hurt, he’s not breaking anything new, and even the areas he’s striking seem to be chosen to absorb the hits. He hasn’t struck me in the head or any limbs. It’s all been center of mass, and even then I think he’s pulling his hits as much as he can without making it look obvious.
Ichabot hasn’t noticed this, and is loudly cheering Peterson on. “Go, monkey, go! Let’s see that blood!”
He sees the tears running down my face, notices me struggling for breath, and grins. “In fact, let’s loosen the nanos a bit, so we can really watch him suffer. It can’t be much fun hitting something that doesn’t even react.”
For a moment, I think that this was Peterson’s plan: count on Ichabot’s sadistic streak to let me go to more properly showcase the pain, and then we can both team up on him. As Ichabot turns his attention to the computer, though, it becomes clear that Peterson’s plan was nowhere near that complex or cooperative. The instant that Ichabot glances away, Peterson roars and hurls the metal bar at him like a javelin.
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