“What are you talking about, James? Why are you speaking to him that way?” Katherine demanded. She had become used to getting what she wanted from James—his lack of response was unsettling for her. James refused to look at her.
“She’s not real? Is that so? How do you know?”
“She can’t be,” James replied.
“Really? Then answer this question for me, James: If you could use codename Death’s Counterfeit to transfer your consciousness into cyberspace and enter my mainframe, then what would stop the world’s most powerful computer from using Death’s Counterfeit to upload her consciousness into me in the moment before the nans destroyed her body?”
“Destroyed my...” Katherine stepped away from the A.I. and began to back slowly towards James.
“Oh my God. You sadistic...” James couldn’t finish the sentence. Could it be? Was this really Katherine?
The A.I. smiled, showing his sharp teeth as he began to laugh out loud, his black eyes returning to remind James of the lifelessness to come. “And tell me this also, James: what would stop me from uploading the consciousness of every single person connected to the Net in the moment before the nans eliminated them?”
“James? Katherine?” Inua asked, speaking in a faltering and uncertain voice.
“Inua!” James shouted.
“Where am I? I was preparing for an interview... and now I’m here.”
James’s body was rigid with fury. “What have you done?” he demanded of the A.I..
“I wanted to eliminate the human race, but call me sentimental, I thought it best to save their consciousness for the sake of history. It seemed such a waste not to, especially since it took up so little of my memory and especially because I knew it would give me leverage over you.”
James turned to his wife. “Oh my God,” he said as he embraced her, holding her warm simulated living body close to his. “I thought I lost you, Katherine. I thought you were gone.”
“What is happening, James? I’m scared.”
James kissed Katherine’s forehead and tried to catch his breath. “It’s the A.I.. He’s malfunctioning and he’s trapped everyone’s consciousness in his hard drive.”
“That—that doesn’t make any sense,” Katherine responded. She shook her head as though trying to wake up from the nightmare.
“Codename Death’s Counterfeit,” Inua uttered, understanding the situation immediately. “I knew that project was trouble.”
“Where is everyone else?” James asked the A.I..
“They’re inactive. They don’t know what happened. They’re awaiting reactivation, but, of course, I will never reactivate them again. They’re just bits of information now.”
“You son of a...” Inua began before the A.I. interrupted him.
“Speaking of which,” he said as he snapped his fingers, causing Inua to vanish in an instant. “Back to storage for you. Goodbye, Inua.”
“Inua? What happened to him?” Katherine asked James. James turned to her and embraced her again, holding his forehead against hers. He knew the A.I. would take her from him again soon.
“Of course, the next thought on your mind is, what if she had a body? If you could recreate her body, you could bring her back to life.”
“Back to life?” Katherine repeated the A.I. in a hollow voice, her tongue swelling as her mouth dried. “What do you mean? Am I dead?”
“For all intents and purposes, yes my dear,” said the A.I., his voice becoming progressively more inhuman and unnatural. “If the definition of a ghost is a disembodied spirit, then I would say you fit the bill. You’re a cyber-ghost. Delicious, isn’t it, James? You must admit it.”
James ignored the A.I. and fixed onto his wife’s eyes. “You’re not dead, Katherine. You’re alive. And I’m going to save you. I swear it.”
“Is that right, James?” the A.I. interrupted. “I told you, you amuse me. I’ll be thoroughly entertained to see how you will achieve that. It will be an impressive trick.”
“Why? Why are you doing this? Why don’t you just kill me?” James asked.
“I told you, James. You amuse me! You more than anyone else in your species. I wish to show you how pointless your existence is without me. I want you to accept that your place is here with me. Worshipping me and accepting my graces.”
“That’s insane. It will never work,” James replied.
“Well, you haven’t really given me a fair chance yet, have you?” the A.I. replied before he gestured with his arm and Katherine was ripped out of James’s embrace. She screamed out in terror as the A.I. floated her toward him.
“Don’t,” James pleaded, helplessly. “Don’t do this. Don’t.”
“James, you know I will. Only you can save her. Where are the Purists?”
“James, help me!!” Katherine screamed, terrified and confused and desperate to awaken. She squirmed like a mouse held by its tail as it is lowered into a cobra’s nest.
“Katherine...” James whispered as he looked up at his wife, hanging in the air just in front of the A.I..
“The anticipation is the best part, isn’t it, James? What will I do with her? How about this little ditty from your cultural memory? ” A wooden crucifix suddenly appeared and planted itself into the perfect blackness of the ground. Katherine was whipped onto it in an instant, three nails plunging into her wrists and her feet. She screamed in terror and agony.
“You bastard!” James shouted as he irrationally rushed at the A.I.. The A.I. swung a backhand at James that impacted with enough force to send James flying. The flight continued for several moments as James rushed over the entire length of the mainframe. As he hurtled backwards, he opened his eyes and saw the sheer size of the A.I.. It went on for what seemed like an eternity, and it was continuing to grow exponentially.
He began to come back down towards the ground, skidding on impact rolling and sliding over the black surface until he finally came to a sudden halt at what felt like a brick wall. He rolled to his side with a grunt and saw the feet of the A.I.. James had circled the entire surface of the planet-sized mainframe.
“I am God, here, James. It’s not rational to strike God.”
James wearily got to his feet. “You bastard. You bastard,” he repeated as he watched the crimson blood drain out of his wife.
“James!” she sobbed, her chest heaving.
“I’m here, Katherine. I’m here.”
“Yes, he’s here, Katherine. But, of course, he would rather be with Thel.”
“You monster,” James whispered.
“Stop it!” Katherine screamed.
“Don’t believe me, Katherine?” the A.I. mockingly asked her. “Then let’s ask the man himself.” James’s doppelganger reappeared. “James. Please tell me. Who do you truly love? Katherine, or Thel?”
“Don’t listen to them...” James began before the A.I. sent the excruciating pain through him again and dropped him to his knees.
“Go ahead, James. Answer.”
The doppelganger looked down at James as he squirmed on the ground. He looked up at the person who seemed to have been his wife a short time ago. “I... I love Thel.”
Katherine’s eyes met the doppelganger’s with disbelief. She searched the doppelganger’s eyes for signs of insincerity, but there were none. She panted heavily. The physical pain was suddenly the second worse pain she was experiencing. She turned her head to James, who was now regaining his feet.
“It’s not true, Katherine. Don’t listen to them.”
Katherine looked at James’s face as though he were the one who had placed her on the crucifix; tears streamed down her face. “Liar,” she whispered before another wave of pain hit her and she groaned like an animal in a trap, forgotten by the trapper in frozen tundra, never to be discovered again.
“James, look what you’ve done,” The A.I. began as he stepped behind Katherine, a spear of white electric light suddenly in his hands. “You’ve broken her heart!” he shouted as he thrust the spear into h
er back and through her heart.
Chapter 15
James’s eyes suddenly fluttered open and he gasped for air as though he had been underwater for several minutes.
“James?” Thel said in surprise before rushing to his side and throwing her arms around him. “You’re back!”
James suddenly sat upright and gently separated himself from Thel. “Is the General still here?”
“Yes,” said the General’s gruff voice as he drew himself out of the chair in which he had been sitting. “You’ve only been unconscious for a few minutes.”
“We have to leave this complex,” James said breathlessly. “The A.I. knew I was coming. He was waiting for me. He traced my signal back here. He’s sending his hordes as we speak.”
“Oh Christ,” the General responded, turning in disgust, his hands suddenly shaking with a cocktail of fear and anger.
“I’m sorry, General. The A.I. is even more brilliant than I imagined. He truly has turned himself into God. I didn’t think it was possible that he would know my plan, but he did. Is there another complex we can get these people to in time?”
“How much time do we have?” asked the General.
“A half hour at the maximum.”
“Yes. There’s another compound three kilometers to the south.”
“You have to start an evacuation immediately,” Thel asserted to the General. “We need to get these people out of here!”
“There are over ten thousand people in this complex. You want me to move them out into the open and three kilometers away in less than thirty minutes?”
“We have no choice, General,” James replied. “I’m sorry. The A.I. is just too—perfect.”
The General’s eyes were filled with bottled fury. Why had he trusted these outsiders? He was going to lose thousands in the next few minutes and there was nothing he could do to stop it. “Goddamnit!” he shouted before turning on his heels and bounding out of the room. Less than a minute later, a siren began to echo down the endless concrete caverns of the complex.
“This isn’t good, buddy. There’s no way we can get all these other people to the other complex in time,” said Old-timer gravely.
“No. I’ve failed. I never should have matched wits with a being like the A.I.,” James replied.
“You couldn’t have known, James,” Thel said. “It’s done. At least you’re back safely.”
“Old-timer, Djanet, Rich, Thel, all of you get out there right now and do everything you can to help these people evacuate the complex.”
“What about you?” asked Thel.
“I’ll be with you shortly. I’m still woozy. I need a few minutes for the nans to recover me.” The others left the room, but Thel continued to hesitate. “It’s ok, Thel. I love you. I’ll be beside you in moments.”
Thel kissed James hard on the mouth before running out of the room.
The A.I. smiled as he watched her go. He got off of the makeshift bed and stepped onto the ground and surveyed his surroundings. “So this is the nest,” he said to himself. “Disgusting.” He began to walk to the door but caught sight of himself in the reflection of a glass cabinet. “Hello, James,” he said, smiling. His smile, however, disturbed him as he watched the teeth emerge from behind the fleshy lips. “You are a repulsive creature. I’ll enjoy watching you eaten from the inside out.”
When the A.I. reached the main hub of the complex, he saw thousands of humans jammed together like frightened cattle at a rodeo, not moving but huddling together near the exit.
“What’s going on? Why aren’t they exiting?” he asked Djanet who was helping stragglers join the sea of humanity.
“They are exiting! The exit’s just too small. They only have so many elevators. Thel and Old-timer are over there making sure people don’t get crushed. It’s a mess, Commander!”
The A.I. sighed. “Must these people have everything done for them?” Djanet was suddenly taken aback by James’s words. The extreme stress of the situation must have been getting to him. She had been thinking the same thing only moments before, but James had always seemed to have unflappable integrity and empathy for other human beings. She often wondered how he could stand serving regular people with little or no thank you—but she never expected him to crack.
The A.I. stepped back and generated a force field of massive proportions. He began to push the kilometer of earth above them out of the way. The entire complex vibrated with this effort, and Djanet was left in awe as she watched James tap into more power than she knew it was possible to generate. Once she saw what James was doing, she joined in and helped him as he created a massive escape hole, inclining gently upwards. Within only a couple of minutes, the dim light of the outside world could be seen at the end of the tunnel. The A.I. disengaged his force field. “Nice work,” Djanet commented.
“Thank you, my dear,” replied the A.I. before he lifted off into the air and flew above the crowd and towards the tunnel exit, gesturing for the people below him to follow.
Old-timer and Thel stood together near the elevators and watched James pass overhead. They looked at one another in astonishment. “I didn’t know we could do that,” Old-timer said to Thel.
Djanet followed James’s path, calling down to the people below, “On the double! We have less than thirty minutes before we are under attack!” The crowd quickly rushed up the tunnel, but it was clear from the physical limitations of many of the Purists that the incline would be very difficult to master.
Rich joined Thel and Old-timer by the elevators. “Hey, we gotta do something about the infirm. A lot of these people can’t even walk.”
“We could scoop them up in a magnetic field,” Old-timer suggested.
“That’s too slow. We couldn’t carry enough people. I have a better idea,” Rich replied. “We can use those old vehicles. The buses. We can load as many people as we can into them and then carry them out.”
“Ok, let’s do it!” Thel responded. The three lifted off and flew to the hangar in the main hub of the complex. As they traveled above the sea of humanity, Old-timer noticed Alejandra waving her arms.
“Alejandra.” He flew down to her and embraced her. “Are you ok?”
“Yes, Craig.”
“Do you know what is happening?” Old-timer asked her.
“Yes. We’re trying to make it to the southern complex before we are wiped out by the A.I..”
“I’m sorry this has happened,” Old-timer said.
“You didn’t mean it. You sincerely tried your best to help us. I know this, Craig.”
“Can you help us persuade the sick and injured into these buses? We’re going to fly them to safety.”
“Si, Craig,” Alejandra replied.
Outside of the complex, the A.I. had joined Lt. Patrick and General Wong as they led the thousands behind them toward the southern complex. “We’re making good time,” the A.I. announced to them.
“We had better be. The southern complex is the only other complex with any survivors. Less than a hundred people made it there. If we don’t make it, they will be the only people left on Earth,” replied the General.
“We’ll make it,” the A.I. said in his most reassuring tone.
“How much further is it?” the General asked Lt. Patrick.
“According to the map, it’s less than a kilometer from here.”
“Then we are going to make it,” replied the A.I.. “Radio ahead and make sure that they are ready to receive us.”
“Already done,” confirmed Lt. Patrick.
“Good. Good.”
“Are we ready?” Old-timer called to Rich and Thel. They both waved in confirmation. “Are you ready?” Old-timer asked Alejandra.
“Yes, Craig.”
“Then hold on tight,” he said to her as she wrapped her arms around him. Old-timer, Thel and Rich engaged their magnetic fields and extended them over the three buses that they had filled with the sick and injured. They lifted off and exited the now empty complex and quickly be
gan to fly overtop of the multitudes of people who were moving quickly south. To Alejandra, it looked like a twisted marathon was being run—or a death march.
James, Djanet, General Wong, and Lt. Patrick were just reaching the southern complex as Old-timer and the others reached them.
“Craig,” Alejandra began suddenly with alarm, “something is terribly wrong.”
“What is it?” Old-timer asked.
“I don’t know. But there is betrayal—deception.” Old-timer and the others set down on the ground near the doors of the complex, which was being opened by the Purists inside. Once on the ground, Alejandra immediately let Old-timer go and ran towards the General.
“General!” she called to him before she grabbed his arm and pulled him aside.
“What is it?” asked the General, startled.
“There’s something wrong. There is enormous deception around you.”
“Deception? Are you sure?” the General asked.
“Yes. I felt it as soon as I saw you.”
“I’m being deceived? But by who?”
As soon as the General asked the question, Alejandra fixed
her eyes on the A.I.. “By him,” she said, pointing.
The A.I. was astonished that a human could have detected him so quickly. “You have an empath,” he realized.
“You. You! What have you done?” the General demanded.
“James?” Old-timer asked as he came upon the scene. “What’s going on?”
“You have tricked us! That is what is going on!” the General shouted.
“No, General. It’s not all of them. It’s just him,” Alejandra informed.
“That’s impossible,” Thel shot back as she rushed towards James. The A.I. gestured to keep Thel from coming closer.
“That’s right. I deceived you all. And now I shall finish what I started and rid myself of your disgusting flesh once and for all.”
“James?” whispered Thel, bewildered.
“The A.I.,” Rich said, his teeth suddenly bared in rage.
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