by Korn, Tracy
"Guess it's what we're built to do," Liddick says with a shrug before rolling his chair back over to his station and reading the lines on his screen for the crew downstairs.
"How is Jax?" I ask, moving my hand toward the third cylinder, which is Arco's.
Liddick laughs, "He's a machine—all business, no wasted thoughts…grateful that Spaulding isn't much for chit chat."
"Oars up, locking onto course and launching in three…two…one…" Arco says just before the Leviathan pushes off. In a matter of seconds, everything outside begins moving by quickly. I imagine at this rate, it shouldn't take long to travel three leagues. Wait…
"How far is three leagues again?" I ask, raising my voice a little so Arco can hear me halfway across the cabin.
"About nine miles," he replies, turning over his shoulder. "Don't you have the NAV capture?" Arco asks. I stare at him blankly until Liddick answers.
"We have it," he says. Arco nods, then turns back to his controls.
"Seriously, you spent the whole time on plants?" Liddick asks under his breath, smirking after Arco turns around. I shake my head in disbelief at just how much I don't know about all these controls, and then remember why.
"Well, come to think of it, I kind of left my post just after we left port." I confess. "We went down into the core room, and not too long after that, we both got into the Stingrays."
"We?" Liddick asks.
"Vox and me," I answer, and a ball of lead drops in my chest as I sober to why we're all out here again. Liddick nods, then gestures to my main screen, no doubt to get my mind off of it.
"The capture Hart is talking about is Avis's screen. It's basically a real-time map of where we're going. You can access it with the little blue button in the right corner of the main display."
I push that button, and a screen with a numbered grid rolls out underneath the Emotive Resonance Mapper. 3-D terrain appears on top of it, along with an actual miniaturized version of our ship moving at a steady clip.
"Wow," I say, and try to touch the rock formations, but my hand starts to feel hot and pinched, so I yank it back. When I turn around to look out the window and see the real terrain passing by in comparison, a heavy feeling pushes against me. I look around the room for an obvious cause, but don't find one.
"Check your scopes," Liddick says, apparently feeling the same shift that I do. I turn back around to face the cylinders with the wavy lines, and find that the ones in Arco's cylinder are vibrating more quickly when I touch them. A feeling of worry passes through me, or maybe it's fear? But it's more than that…the fear of something imminent…it's dread. I also feel pressure, like I'm running out of time to make a decision, and most surprisingly of all, on the outskirts of this is optimism.
"What?" I say out loud to myself, trying to make sense of this last bit of conflicting input. Is this because Tieg is over Arco's shoulder in the Archangel seat? Why is Arco scrambling? I think, not actually intending Liddick to hear.
Liddick unlocks his chair and rolls over to me again. He puts his fingers next to mine on the center-right cylinder lines, looks at Arco, then at me. He moves his fingers over the lines of the far right cylinder, Avis's data, and shakes his head at the difference.
"Rig 2 is even—focused and a little anxious like Joss on Rig 1," Liddick says, nodding to Arco's cylinder. But he's running probabilities, and he's doing it like he has two minutes before something burns down, he thinks.
But what's this? Why is this suppressed? I ask, guiding his fingers to the lines that shoot a feeling of paranoia and dread through me. Does this mean he's hiding something? And this optimism here, is that him hoping something? I ask Liddick in my mind. A corner of his mouth pulls to the side as he meets my eyes and nods again.
Seems like it, he says, letting his fingers drop away.
What do we do?
Wait. See if something changes in a few minutes I guess, see if it spreads to either of the other two rigs or the AR seat. "What's the vibration at three leagues out?" Liddick finishes out loud, angling his chin toward the Emotive Resonance Mapper overlay on the capture of Avis's screen. I have no idea how to read it, but it's easy enough to see the miniature Leviathan's proximity to the target destination, as well as where the cave is just up ahead, which is clouded in a dark red aura with wavy lines inside it on the screen.
"Hopefully not like that," I point to the lines coming from inside the colored area surrounding the cave. "There's something in there," I say, and Liddick moves his fingers to trace them.
"Something angry…" he says, and I move my fingers in as he pulls his back.
"But not angry with us," I say, surprised again that I'm able to discern anything at all from a bunch of vibrating lines on a screen. "It's not Vox or Fraya, or—"
"No, it wouldn't be any of ours," Liddick says abruptly.
As we pass the cave, Arco's lines start to jump even more, and I run my fingers back over them. Whatever is making him so anxious and paranoid has compounded, and so have the scenarios he's trying to run through. The lines for Avis and Joss haven't changed at all, and I don't get any particular vibration from Tieg's. I look over at Liddick.
Can you ever get anything more than a general impression of what's going on for Tieg? I ask him in my mind.
No, which is strange, because I can read Dez a mile away. Pitt's not as easy, but he's nowhere near the vacuum his brother is.
Right, that's my impression too. Something has to be off because if he's over there with access to everything Arco has, and if Arco's levels look like this, how can his be what they are here? I ask, gesturing for Liddick to feel the lines for himself. He does, and narrows his eyes.
I'll go talk to him. My face in proximity to his fist should be enough to get something jumping, he says, smirking. You go talk to Hart before he gives himself a seizure.
Liddick rolls back to his station and locks his chair, then gets up to head over to Tieg. I walk down the aisle to the pilot's station and put my hand on Arco's shoulder. He flinches, and a jolt runs through me. He looks up at me, his eyes scanning and his jaw set.
"What's wrong?" he asks.
"I was about to ask you the same thing—your levels are wrecked on my readout back there," I say. His eyebrows pull together like he's going to try to protest, but then exhales, apparently realizing there's no point in trying to hide whatever this is from me. He swallows hard before punching something into his control panel and pushing the steering bar forward a few inches. The Leviathan's speed surges, and Joss and Avis quickly tap something into their consoles in response.
"Some notice next time, huh?" Joss barks without looking over.
"Sorry, but we have company," Arco says to everyone as he stands.
"There's no one else out here but us, Hart," Liddick says from a level up near Tieg. "Jazz and I would have picked it up otherwise."
"It's not a person, it's a code termite. I was trying to confirm before saying anything," he says, looking back at his screen, then slapping the back of his chair and cursing. "And there it is—already embedded."
"There can't be a termite. I scanned everything! Where did it come from?" Avis protests, scrolling through screen after screen.
"They used the Trojan code," Arco says after leaning over and reading the rest of the display, then clasps his hands behind his neck. "I caught the echo on our launch sequence right after we powered up. Once we downloaded the four routes for optimizing, it must have reconstructed the code from the initial imprint and then slipped in."
Liddick's hand pushes through his hair, and he shakes his head. "That means they knew before we ever left—they knew in the Boundaries room when I first loaded it…" he says. "They must have known the whole time."
"What's a code termite? Who knew before?" I ask Arco, then Liddick, and feel the anxiety in the room rising under my own.
"Crite, there it is!" Joss says, pulling up a second 3D screen to overlay the one displayed in the air in front of him. The glowing green lines show a small
blip moving steadily over the grid, erasing the lines in its wake. Avis, increase your thrusters from 70% to 100%, or we won't make the vent before it chews through to the system override."
"Aye, but I can only hold it under glass for about five minutes in the pressurization grid," Avis replies, hitting a series of buttons. The blip begins darting all around, but can't seem to get beyond a fraction of an inch in any direction. "Locked. It's contained for now, but it won't be long before it figures out how to burrow. Patch through to core engineering for evasive measures?" he asks, then looks to Arco, whose eyes are closed as he stands there clasping his hands around the back of his head with a pensive look on his face, and doesn't seem to hear anything at all.
CHAPTER 49
Containment
"Arco!" Avis shouts, waiting for his acknowledgment.
Arco's eyes snap back to his console. "Authorize! Sorry," he says, then looks over to me. "Jazz, go strap in and tell me if you see anyone—anything, near the vent once we approach. Tether, how far out are we?" he asks, resuming his seat and pressing another series of buttons before pushing his steering wheel forward another few inches. The ship surges underneath us again, and we all jostle.
"Still one league out," Joss answers.
"You trying to put everyone in the med-bay?" Tieg growls as he enters something into his console. "Activating surge stabilizers, two-second delay," he says, pushing one final button and then glaring at Arco. A low hum falls over the ship, and we seem to slow down even though the scenery outside doesn't.
"Stow it, Spaulding, we don't need—" Arco starts, but is interrupted as Myra and Dez appear at the top of the stairs.
"What's happening?" Dez asks, first looking at Tieg, then to me. "Your levels are everywhere, and Liddick's crashed through the floor about 10 minutes ago. What was that noise?"
"Get locked in," Arco says to them, keying in another series of buttons, which turns the light in the cabin from soft white to red. Myra takes her seat between Liddick and me, and Dez pulls the seat from the wall where Ms. Reynolt sat in our practice launch, then studies my face.
"The termite just burrowed. I can't catch it again. Trying to reroute its trajectory, but prep for hull breach and self-destruct in six minutes just in case I can't shoo it to the box…Jax, is it ready?" Avis asks over the comms, his voice straining as he frantically enters combinations on his console and flips through the floating 3-D screens in front of him.
"Five seconds, can you hold it?" Jax responds.
"That's all I can hold—barricades in place for medical, helm, life support, and logistics, and I've sealed the hole in the pressurization code. There should be nowhere else for this bug to go if it really is bent on a kill-all," Avis says, then raises his arm and wipes his forehead on his shoulder.
"Copy. Pitt, open the box," Jax says over the comms.
"Copy. Bait box is open," Pitt replies. "Stand by."
"There's another hole somewhere. I can't find it, but I know it's there," Arco says, desperately pushing, flipping, and sliding between screens.
"There's no hole. I just said I sealed everything," Avis insists.
"There is a hole! That's why it's not going to the core—see?" Arco says, pointing to Avis's screen. "Think like a bug…where is it dark…" he trails off.
"Where is it going?" Avis asks himself. "There's nowhere else it can go."
"What are they talking about?" I ask Liddick, half through my teeth.
"Did he say, kill-all?" Myra asks.
"OK…" Liddick says, hitting his thighs and whirling around to his screen. "Myra, Rip, you need to help me push this thing. I'm linking your screens to the code grid so you can see what's happening—the termite code is scrolling in the middle there and moving toward critical ship systems, so we need to help Avis reroute its trajectory. He's trying to chase it to the engine room where Pitt, Jax, and Ellis can isolate it and then wipe it from the rest of the programming. See the bait box here over the moon pool decontamination system on the left, and over here on the right where he has his chaser code in place?" He touches a glowing yellow rectangle that surrounds a block of code at the lower left corner of our consoles, and then angles his chin to another glowing rectangle on the lower right corner of the screen. I feel compelled again to raise my fingers to the lines of this one, and when I do, the block of code in the lower right corner morphs into the opening and closing jaws of a shark. I pull my fingers back in surprise, and the code block of symbols and numbers returns. I move them over the unboxed scrolling lines in the middle of the screen that are disintegrating the grid lines underneath as it passes over them, and they turn into solid lines of ant-like bugs running end to end that then start crawling all over my hand. I jerk away, the scream catching in my throat.
"Wh—?!"
"Jazz! Listen," Liddick almost shouts, "emotions…fear, even panic, it's just coded data. Everything has an input and an output that resonates, a cause and effect, understand? Those aren't really bugs, the code is just acting like bugs, and it's swarming like that to push you back so you don't interfere, but we have to interfere. We have to overcome the code's vibration and send it in the other direction before it eats the system infrastructure—just focus. Don't let it get in your head," Liddick says, placing his hand over the code on his screen, which turns into a swarm of bugs that covers his hand in seconds. My stomach lurches, and I physically recoil at the thought of having to put my own hand over the code like that too. "Jazz, Myra, now! You know how to do this, just follow the pull. Force the bugs in the direction of the chaser code—see where the jaws are steering? Push them that way and whatever you do, don't pull back no matter what happens!" he says, now through gritted teeth.
His bugs are swarmed so thickly now that I can no longer see his hand. I suck in a sharp breath and force mine over the top code block again, which immediately floods into a pool of dark, churning legs and bodies. I bite down hard and breathe through my teeth to resist the urge to retract my hand, concentrating on moving it instead toward the left where the shark jaw is heading. From the corner of my eye I see Myra's hand shooting toward her screen, then becoming almost immediately covered in her own swarm. She starts yipping and biting off screams, which I can still hear resonating in her throat. I have to stifle my own screams as the bugs start biting, and images of the skin and muscle on my hand being ripped away in little pieces start flashing in my mind.
They're just trying to push us…they're just trying to push us! I think as loudly as I can, over and over again until I almost believe it.
"It's working!" Avis shouts. "We have ten minutes before hull breach now!"
"That's enough to make it to the vent!" Arco says. "I still can't find the hole, but we just need to cover one league. Hold it!"
Myra can't keep her screams in any longer. They tear from her throat as she yanks her hand out and frantically examines it. Dez is up and at her side in seconds, grabbing her wrist and putting both Myra's hand and her own over the termite code. The bugs swarm again, and Myra starts pleading and sobbing.
"It's not real, Myra. It's not real!" Dez repeats, her voice thick with resolve, but Myra doesn't seem to hear her.
"Slipping!" Avis says. "We're back down to six minutes! Crite, five!"
"I can't hold it!" Myra cries against the self-destruct warning tone. "I'm sorry, I can't do it!"
"Myra! You have to!" I yell, feeling her panic rush the room like the ocean itself has crashed in, and my vision starts to tunnel.
"I can't do it!" she yells, and pulls her hand out, collapsing in a heap of gasping tears in her chair. Dez doesn't try to grab her wrist again because she begins losing the battle with holding back her own screams. Even Liddick's voice betrays bursts of fear as he tries to tell everyone to hold on. In this surreal moment, things become silent for me, and I realize we aren't going to be able to contain this. It really is going to win.
"One minute! Brace for hull breach!" Avis shouts, but it sounds so far away.
"We're almost there!
Hold it back!" Arco yells.
"It's branched—I'm losing propellants!" Joss echoes. "The hole is in the NIFE! It's heading for the NIFE!"
I try to look away from the swarm that's now crawling up my arm to focus on the blur of Joss's hands dancing over his console, but the biting sensations that pull and prick everywhere from between my fingers to the crook of my arm claw my attention back. I turn and see that the bugs have started crawling into Dez's hair just as the last of her reserve gives way to full blown terror. She screams, but it sounds muffled with my heart pounding in my ears against the blaring alarms and rushing chaos.
"Dez!" I shout to her. My voice sounds like I'm yelling underwater, and when she turns to me in a scream, the bugs cover her neck, then begin spreading over her face and into her mouth. She lets go, falling to the floor slapping and flailing.
"Hull breach!" Avis yells as jets of water begin firing through the side walls sending pieces of metal and debris flying toward us.
"SELF-DESTRUCT INITIATED," a woman's voice says over the comms system, and the red light in the room begins flashing as a muted, beeping alarm sounds. The last thing I see is Liddick's arm, head, and half of his torso covered in writhing bugs before the black pulls me under, and I see nothing at all.
CHAPTER 50
The Bubbles
We should have seen it coming. It was all too easy, just stealing a two-ton sub-aquatic ship with only a day's training on how it actually works. And cloning ourselves…like they weren't still monitoring everything we did the second Fraya and Vox went missing in that cave. I hear Liddick in my head, but can only see black all around me.