Thread War

by Ian Donald Keeling

  “SecCore did a lot of damage to Wobble years ago,” Torg said, his hands moving constantly around the pillar. “Wobble needed him to tell him where the factory was. Maybe he didn’t remind Wobble about the room he built.”

  “Or he didn’t know about it,” Johnny said, the realization catching him off guard. “SecCore didn’t know about this room,” he whispered, following the thought. “Torg . . . what does this room do?”

  “I need more time.”

  “Pretty sure someone said we didn’t have that,” Dillac said blithely. When Torg glared at him, Dillac tilted his stripes. “What? That’s what the crazy disappearing lady-skids said, boz. Serio, what’s up with that?”

  “Torg,” Shabaz said, “can you give us your best guess?”

  “I think it might be a map. Of the Thread.”

  Johnny stared at him. “The whole Thread?”

  “They found the map,” Onna breathed. “Wobble said that right before he went into the repair . . . thingy.” Her stripes twitched. “Is this freaking anyone else out? ’Cause I’m a little freaked.”

  “You and me both, rhi.”

  “All right,” Torres barked. “Let’s give the man his time, whether we have it or not. I don’t know what good a map will do us, but anything we can get, works. Let’s go. Torg?”

  “I’ll let you know when I have something more solid,” he said, all three eyes on the holla-walls.

  As they rolled back out into the main corridor, Krugar floated down on his light-stick. “Sorry I’m late to the party. What did I miss?” They filled him in. “Huh,” he grunted. “Can’t hurt having a map in the long run.” He sucked on his teeth. “That’s the second time someone’s told us we’re running out of time. I’m not a big fan of psychics, but ignoring two warnings might be kinda dumb. Probably time to start making this place defensible.” As if on cue, the ground trembled.

  “How do we do that?” Torres said.

  Krugar jerked his head back down the corridor. “This place has more nooks and crannies than you realize. Near the centre, side corridors connect the big ones; further out, there’s a lot of twists and turns. I’ve got some stuff in my kit that can do some damage.” He grimaced. “I bet this place has a defence system, but without Wobble all we have is what we have. If that SecCore guy was right and he can’t hold off Betty, and she shows up with a few thousand Antis . . . even if Wobble wakes up repaired, I doubt he’s bringing friends.”

  “What if she can’t bring that many Antis?” Onna asked. “How many does she have, anyway?”

  “Who knows,” Torres muttered. “If she kicks SecCore out, she might have them all.”

  “Yeah,” Shabaz said. “But she might not be able to bring them here. It’s not like we’re that close to the Core, right?”

  Krugar grunted. “Like I said, lots of twists and turns. Anyone coming in has to go through the centre. We could lead them on a chase up the levels—up sucks for attack. We could do some damage.” He paused. “It would help if we had a rabbit.”

  “Is that like a Teddy Bear?” Kesi said.

  “He means give her a target to chase,” Torres said. “Draw her focus while the rest of us do the damage.” Suddenly, she chuckled, somewhere between a true laugh and a snarl. “Oh, snakes, Al would have loved this.” She swung an eye at Johnny. “Guess who gets to play hero again.”

  “Me?” Johnny said. “Hey, I’ll do whatever, but you and Torg and Wobble are the ones who’ve been a gap in her treads for the past three months.”

  Torres was already waving her stalks. “No. You saw what happened when we confronted her at the Core. I barely existed to her. It’s you. You’ve always been her favourite. Even when Al was around, it was still you first.”

  “Okay, hold on,” Shabaz said. “A) Torres, that’s not fair. And B) no one is doing anything against Betty alone. We can take turns leading her.”

  But even as she suggested the idea, Johnny knew it wouldn’t work. He didn’t like to admit it— which was amazing given how self-centred he’d been just three months ago—but Betty did fixate on him. Maybe if Albert was here he could’ve split the duties, but now there was really only one skid that could get under Betty’s stripe. He sighed. “Torres is right. It should be me.”

  “Johnny . . .”

  “No, really. I’m not saying she’s right to fixate on me, but she always has. Me and Albert. And Al . . . isn’t here. So it’s me. I’ll keep her attention, she’ll underestimate the rest of you and you get to do the damage. Until Wobble wakes up or Torg . . . I don’t know, maybe that room is a defence mechanism.”

  “All right, that’s the plan,” Krugar said, spinning on his stick. “Let’s get back to that centre hub and I’ll show you what we can do.”

  As they rolled back, Johnny saw Torres lingering in the rear and fell back. “Hey,” he said.

  “Hey.”

  He rolled in silence beside her for a minute, then said, “You know I don’t really want to be a hero, right?”

  She let out a long ragged sigh. “Yeah, I know. Well, no, I think that’s half treadgrease . . . but only half. And that’s fine. It’s not like Albert didn’t want to be a hero. Hole, he was a hero.” Her stripe grew pale. “No one should have to die like that.”

  “Yeah.”

  “No really. We’ve seen some pretty gruesome things out here, but that . . .” Her expression hardened. “If I could, I’d kill her.”

  He wasn’t really sure what he could say to that. He’d admired Betty for so long; he’d watched her save the sphere—sure, he and Albert and the others had been the ones to repair the damage and make it whole, but if Betty hadn’t put it in stasis, if she hadn’t saved all of them dozens of times, if she hadn’t led them into the Core, none of the rest would have happened.

  “Torg seems to think we need both her and SecCore.”

  “Torg’s in love,” Torres snorted. Then she winced and said: “No, that’s not fair. He’s thinking about her as clearly as anyone could. I don’t know who this whole thing was harder on—him or Wobble.” Her whole face flinched as the ground rumbled. “I just don’t understand. I get what the Vies are, I get SecCore and the Antis, I kind of understand the grey, but I don’t understand what happened with Betty. Why would anyone do that?”

  With all her brash confidence, with all the times she’d taken the lead since they’d returned to the Thread, it was easy to forget just how young Torres was. But hearing the anguish behind that last question, the complete inability to understand how someone so driven could get driven the wrong way . . .

  Johnny looked at her single orange stripe. Three months ago, she’d been a panzer. She wasn’t anymore, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t still too young to understand what fifty years of rage could do. Hole, Johnny was too young to understand it. “I don’t know,” he said, staring down the hall.

  They rode in silence past side corridors and empty pods. Then Torres pulled out her light-swords. “Here,” she said gruffly. “You should have these.”

  “Torres, I can’t take—”

  “Betty has them. If you’re going to taunt her, you might need them to stay alive. Take them.”

  Gently, he took the swords from her. He lit one, looked at the orange blade for a moment, then extinguished it again. “Thanks,” he said. “I appreciate it.”

  “You better,” she muttered. Then she glanced at him sideways. “We’re good, Johnny.”

  He felt a surge of affection for her, as the ground rumbled again. “I’m glad.” He held the look for a moment, then added. “Panzer.”

  “So’s your game.”

  They arrived back at the hub. “All right,” Krugar said, opening his bag. “We’ll try to keep drawing her up and away from Wobble. Those little alcoves you see every twenty pods? Those are lifts. Blue circle takes you up, clear circle drops you down. Now, the first thing—”

  The ground bucked hard to the left, throwing all of them against the walls. It was the biggest corpsquake Johnny had ever felt.


  “WARNING, LITTLE SKIDS,” SecCore’s voice boomed into the factory. “WE ARE FAILING. THERE IS A HIGH PROBABILITY BETTY CRISP HAS BECOME AWARE OF YOUR LOCATION.”

  Oh snakes. “SecCore!” Johnny yelled. “How long do we have?”

  “UNKNOWN. THE CORE HAS BEEN COMPROMISED. WE ARE FAILING.”

  “We need more time. You have to hold her there.”

  “NEGATIVE. BETTY CR—” the voice cut away “—AINED ACCESS TO CRITICAL ASPECTS. WE AR—” Another massive quake rocked the factory and SecCore’s voice cut away completely.

  “Okay, people,” Krugar said, grabbing his bag. “We move on the fly. Let’s go.”

  “Where do you want me?” Johnny said. A surge of fear shivered though his stripe. He half-expected a hundred Antis to come through the walls.

  “If she’s alone, keep her here. Try to keep them on this level as long as you can. If she’s in the centre hall, I have line of sight. When we’re ready, bring her up. We’ll hit and run for as long as we can.”

  If she’s alone . . .

  Johnny’s eyes swung up and he yelled: “SecCore! SecCore!”

  No response.

  He decided to take the shot anyway. “SecCore, if you can, prevent her from bringing Antis with her. Lock her out from what she can do at the Core.” Johnny had no idea if that was even possible.

  For a long moment, no response. Then, the ghost of an echo: “—IRMATIVE.”

  “Good idea,” Krugar said, nodding. “All right, people, let’s move.” He sprinted for the lifts.

  The others followed, each giving him a sympathetic look. “Don’t lose those swords,” Torres said, “they’re the only ones I got.”

  Shabaz rolled over, her eyes bright and wide with concern and fear. She bumped his treads hard. “I know,” he said roughly. “But you can’t. One rabbit.”

  “Yeah,” she said. She bumped his treads again, then kissed him full on the mouth, a long, hard kiss. “Don’t you vaping die, Johnny Drop. Or I’ll find your ghost.”

  He grinned back. “Okay.”

  The ground shook again. “Right,” she said, and spun on her treads.

  Leaving Johnny, standing in a vast empty hall. He wondered what was happening in the Core. “Too big,” he murmured. SecCore would have to take care of itself. Although, he did wonder what they were going to accomplish here. Even if SecCore kept everything but Betty out, even if Wobble came back repaired . . . they were going to defeat Betty? Johnny didn’t know how fast the factory could make Wobbles once it was running—certainly it looked like it could make a hole of a lot of them—but he assumed it wasn’t instantaneous. He wondered what Torg would find. He wondered if it would matter.

  “I wonder how long I have to wait,” he said aloud, tensing instinctively.

  Nothing happened.

  He’d honestly been expecting her to show up right then and there. Betty had a tendency to do things like that. There was a reason why there were a thousand stories of her in the sphere. There was a reason why she’d been the one to save it.

  “Snakes, Betty,” Johnny muttered. “What are we doing?” How had it come to this?

  Down one of the halls, possibly the one they’d used to enter the factory, a black and pink skid turned a corner. It paused, scoping his way, then seemed to bob its eyes and move in his direction.

  He’d already decided to wait and let her speak first. If the whole point was to stall for time, he’d take as much as he could. He swallowed, trying to ignore the queasy feeling in his stripe.

  She took her time. Stopped about ten metres from where he sat. When he didn’t say anything, she swung three eyes around, examining the centre hub, then each of the five corridors. Finally, two of her eyes came down and settled back on him.

  “So,” she said casually. “Here we are.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  “I see you found the Wobble factory.”

  “We did.” He considered staying silent, but this wasn’t about looking cool or establishing some kind of status. He wasn’t going to beat her at that. He was just thankful she was alone.

  She let her gaze wander. “We looked for this for over thirty years. I’d started to think that maybe the gearbox destroyed it all. We never came close to finding it. Of course,” she added, pursing her lips, “we never had help.”

  The ground trembled. Now, that was her style. “Betty—” he started to say.

  “Don’t.” She popped an arm. “I don’t care. How it happened, what your excuse is, don’t care.”

  She didn’t sound like she didn’t care. Her whole body was tense, her pink stripe so tight Johnny expected it to hum like the barbed wires sometimes did on Tunnel. “Your little ally is still fighting the good fight,” she continued, “but it’s only a matter of time. He’s going to lose. I’m finally going to vape that jackhole.”

  “And you really think that’s going to help?”

  She ignored the question, swinging an eye back to the corridor from which she’d come, then back again. “Neat trick keeping me from bringing any friends of my own. Seem to be missing a few other tools as well. It’s been awhile since I felt like this.”

  It’s been three months, Johnny thought. That was it: three months. Sure they’d all changed, but did she honestly think it had been that long? She’d been alive for fifty years, for Crisp’s sake.

  “Where’s the gang?” Betty said, her trail-eye wandering but the front two staying on Johnny. “Where’s Wobble?”

  His heartbeat spiked and he fought to control the wave of anxiety that rushed through him. He needed to stay calm. As casually as he could, he said, “They’re around.”

  She laughed at that. “Priceless. Still Johnny Drop.” She inched forward a tread. “You think you’re important. You think you still matter. Why? Because you saved the Skidsphere? That’s nothing. It’s a drop. Do you have any idea how insignificant the sphere is?”

  He stared at her. “You used to think it was significant.”

  “That was before I started fighting a war.” The ground rumbled again.

  She was doing it deliberately. Except, if the ground was shaking, then that was the Thread taking damage. She was damaging the Thread just to make a point.

  “I’m more impressed that you found this place,” she said. “Now, I don’t know what you’re doing to mess with my scans, but where are the others? Where is Wobble?”

  Her scans weren’t working? He was pretty sure they didn’t have anything to do with that. Still, it was a good question—where was everyone now? On a whim, Johnny opened his private com to Shabaz, praying it wasn’t a mistake. Betty might be lying about her scans being down. He found Shabaz on the third floor, moving—he had no idea if that was a good sign.

  “You know, I’m not a real fan of being ignored,” Betty said. “Or have you just gotten that slow?”

  Something in Johnny snapped a bit. Maybe she was his idol, maybe she could destroy him, and maybe he had gotten slow compared to her, but this was grease. Inching forward, he said, “You know, for someone who thinks she’s so vaping fast, you’ve spent an awful lot of time in the last two conversations we’ve had trying to put everyone else down. Afraid of something, Betty?”

  A cruel smile split her lips. “Really? You think I’m afraid of you?”

  “I’m just trying to understand why you’re talking this way.”

  “I am fighting—”

  “A war,” Johnny said, inching forward again. “Got that. Why? Why are you fighting everyone, Betty? Aren’t the Vies the enemy? Isn’t fixing what’s broken the goal?” He popped an arm and waved it around. “Who cares how we found the factory—isn’t the important thing that we found it? That we get it up and running? Why won’t you help us? SecCore helped us, for Corps’ sake, why won’t you?” A surge of anger and loss came welling up from deep inside. “Why would you kill Albert like that?”

  For a second, he thought maybe he’d gotten through to her. Regret flashed across her face, a deep mournful s
ense of shame. She had to see it, didn’t she? She was Betty, surely she had to see? But then the look went away, replaced by a pensive gaze.

  “Why don’t you have it up and running?” she murmured.

  His heart fell. She couldn’t see it. She wasn’t even thinking like that anymore. He remembered the time in Krugar’s sim, when she had Wobble vape one of the mems there, and Albert, furious, saying they weren’t going to do that anymore, even if the mem would get resurrected later. That was the Betty that was here. Krugar had spoken about what thinking big could do to you in the wrong situation, and here was proof: Betty could no longer see the small picture. She was lost in her grand vision. That, and her hatred for SecCore.

  One of the eyes focused on Johnny swung, and she spoke as if she were alone in the hub. “I’m not Wobble, but I’ve been around and this doesn’t feel like a place gearing up. The lights are on, but that’s it.” Her eye stopped. “That’s it . . .” The eye came back to Johnny. “That’s why you’re out here. Stalling. You don’t have Wobble for some reason. Where is he?”

  She rolled towards one of the corridors. As it happened, it was the one that had Wobble’s repair chamber. “Hey!” Johnny shouted.

  “You don’t matter, Johnny,” she said, still rolling. “All your little friends went and hid and they thought you could keep me from finding Wobble. Nice try.”

  If she hadn’t done what she’d done to Albert, he might have let her find him. After all, Wobble had been her best friend for almost forty years. It was inconceivable that she would do anything to harm the machine.

  But what she’d done to Albert was also inconceivable.

  “Hey!” he yelled again, as he quietly opened his com to Shabaz. Babe, this is going downhill fast. Are you guys ready? Betty still didn’t turn.

  A brief pause, then Shabaz replied, Krugar says we need another minute.

  Well, we don’t have one. Whatever’s going to happen, it’s got to be now. “Hey!” he yelled a third time. “You know how everyone says your name?”