It wasn’t until people started getting hurt that the city realized something was wrong.
Gantz tried to piece together the timeline. It had been a long day escaping the Spire and driving out to The Fringe only to be turned back by a horde of synthetics. While they had been running for their lives, so too had any resident who looked remotely like Cam, Cyn, or Gantz. Those who resisted rarely escaped without injury. Some hadn’t escaped.
He looked down into his beer, watched the amber liquid swirl at the bottom of the glass.
Civilians being murdered by synthetics. Kessler was dragging Perion Synthetics into the mud with her manhunt.
Gantz tilted his head back and closed his eyes.
Synth J wasn’t above killing—Gil had found that out all too well—but his motivations were solely business-related. Gil had company secrets going back for years. Cynthia had seen things in the depths of the Spire and would have told the world about them. Could still tell the world…
And then there was Cam.
Gantz winced at the memory of the aggregator’s head rolling along the floor. Had the real Cam met his end too? If not, where was he in all of this?
“I don’t think I’ve ever met a woman like that,” said Holmes, stepping out of a back room that doubled as his apartment. When Cyn had found out there was a shower nearby, she’d asked to be taken to it immediately.
“You two were back there a long time,” said Gantz, pushing the empty glass across the bar.
Holmes tossed the tumbler into the sink and filled a fresh one. “She had me guard the door while she showered. Then we talked for a bit about Molly and Umbra and everything that’s been going on.”
“Who’s Molly?”
“My first wife,” said Holmes.
“I didn’t know you were married before.”
“You never asked. No one asks the bartender anything.” He filled his own glass with whiskey and took a sip. “After she passed, I sold everything I had and moved to the PC. I bought this place, met Ashley a few months later.” He looked around the bar. “Strange sometimes where we end up.”
“And what would she think of your new life?”
“Molly? She’s dead, Bob. She doesn’t think anymore. But if she were alive, I’m sure she’d smack the tartar off your teeth for letting this happen.” He pointed to the vidscreen. “You’re the Chief of Police. It’s your job to prevent this.”
“I’m pretty sure I stopped being the Chief of Police when I put a bullet through James Perion’s head.”
Holmes stopped mid-sip.
“Don’t worry, he was a synthetic. It’s a long story.”
“Long piece of stringy bullshit, maybe,” said Holmes. “I don’t care who you say you shot, these people were depending on you. Still are.”
“You know who’s depending on me? Joe Perion.” Gantz nodded to the bench by the entrance where Joe lay stretched out, his feet propped up on one of the arms. “And James Perion, who told me to look after his son after he was gone. I delegated that job to Nico Shaw, but evidently he can’t keep his brain in this reality long enough to get that done. The future of Perion Synthetics is that man right there.”
“Is that so? Can he design synthetics? Can he build one himself?” Holmes shook his head. “Perion may have been a visionary, but it took real people to make his vision come true. And right now those people are dying in the streets like animals.”
“Thirty-eight deaths is hardly a slaughter.”
Holmes smacked the bar with his palm. “One is too fucking many! You know that.”
Gantz shut his eyes and tried to tune out the world.
In the grand scheme, were the deaths of thirty-eight people enough to put the safety of Joseph Perion at risk? Gantz shook his head. Holmes could usually be counted on for good advice, but in this matter, he just wasn’t seeing the bigger picture.
Opening his eyes, Gantz looked to the ceiling again. “What would you have me do? I’m one man against an entire army of synthetics.”
“Seems simple to me,” said Holmes, finishing off his drink. “You even the odds.”
“Kill a hundred and fifty thousand synthetics? You got a nuclear warhead back there under the boxes of stale pretzels?”
“Don’t be simple, Bob. Someone is telling those synnies what to do.”
“Yeah, but we don’t know how.”
Holmes frowned and slapped the vidscreen. He flipped through the channels until the Spire appeared. “Really? Look at that. Look at all of those dishes on top of that thing. And you say you don’t know how the orders are reaching all the synnies? The Spire is one big antenna.”
“Those are for satellite uplinks,” said Joe, from the entryway. “There’s some localized broadcast stuff up there, but nothing capable of sending out a mind-control ray. The synnies have an open connection back to the hub, but it’s for software upgrades only.”
“And what about the PNR?” asked Holmes.
“What about it?”
“How do the synthetics receive that signal if they only have one connection open?”
Joe sat up and swung his feet to the floor. He looked across the bar at Holmes. “What are you talking about? The PNR is a line in the sand.”
“The hell it is. It’s a signal and I can prove it.” From his pocket, Holmes produced a small plastic square and placed it on the bar.
“What is that?” asked Gantz. “And what time machine did you use to go back and get it?”
Holmes tapped the smooth skin on his wrist. “It’s what we had before slivers. This thing pulls radio signals out of the air.”
“Do go on,” said Gantz.
Joe stood and limped to the bar.
“See for yourself. Turn it on, tune to a station, and walk back to the PNR. As soon as you cross that line, the interference makes listening impossible. And the signal gets stronger the further into the city you go.”
“You never mentioned this before,” said Gantz.
Holmes shrugged. “Like I said, no one asks the bartender anything.”
Gantz turned to Joe as he pulled up a barstool. “That’s not how it works, is it?”
“That’s not how it was explained to me,” replied Joe, “but then Dad didn’t always care to know exactly how something worked, only that it did.”
“So that would make the PNR not a fence but a leash?”
Joe folded his hands under his chin. “An electric fence will keep people in or out, so long as there’s power. The PNR circles the entire city. That’s a long chain with a ton of individual links.”
Holmes nodded along as if this were all old news to him.
“I see,” said Gantz. He stood as if to leave. Laughing, he wagged his finger at Holmes. “I see what you did there.”
“What did he do?” asked Joe.
“It’s sneaky, but I wouldn’t expect anything less from you, Holmes.” Then to Joe, “It’s a double-edged sword.”
“What is?”
“The idea of more signals. You say there’s only one signal and that it’s for upgrades. Holmes says there’s another to keep the cattle on the ranch. If we accept that idea and open the number of connections to two, there’s no reason there can’t be three or four or forty. Then you say, well, the signal turning all of the synthetics into zombies is coming from the Spire. So what is the only course of action?”
Joe spread his hands.
“Tell him, barkeep.”
Holmes backed away and leaned against the sink. “Smash the grid. Stop the signal.”
“Of course,” said Gantz. “So that means we head back into the city and not just to any old place, but the goddamn Spire. I flash my badge at the door and we take a nice elevator ride up to the comm room. I’m sure there’s a little hacker sitting at a keyboard up there telling all of the synthetics what to do. And in the name of the former Chief of Police of the City of Perion, I’ll command him to cease and desist. Bob’s your fucking uncle and we all live happily ever after.”
“May
be I should cut you off,” said Holmes, reaching for Gantz’ beer.
Gantz turned to Joe. “If we run in there with guns blazing, something or someone is going to get blown to hell. Maybe we shut down enough equipment to kill the signal, but then guess what happens.”
Joe’s mouth fell open. “If we kill the PNR signal…”
“Yeah,” said Gantz. “A hundred and fifty thousand synthetics take an acid bath. Billions of dollars in experimental product and prototypes are incinerated at once.”
“It would set us back a decade,” said Joe. “It would put the entire city out of work.”
“At least they’d be alive.” Holmes slung a towel over his shoulder and crossed his arms. “You two knuckleheads are forgetting the value of human life.”
“I think you’ve lived too long on this side of the PNR,” said Gantz. “You forget why we’re all here.”
“You got that backwards, Chief.”
“Fuck you, Holmes. The company must survive!”
“Gantz,” said Joe.
His voice was too calm. Gantz tried to steady his breathing, but all he wanted to do was jump the counter and pummel some sense into Holmes’ head.
“What?”
Joe stood and put a hand on Gantz’ shoulder. “Is Perion Synthetics my company?”
“Yes, but…”
“So if I’m in charge, then I can do whatever I want with it, right?”
“Your father wouldn’t have wanted this. He never would have thrown everything away.”
“He doesn’t have to throw everything away,” said Cyn.
Gantz turned to the aggregator; she had a towel pressed to her damp hair.
“Great,” said Gantz. “Now the Umbrat has an opinion. Tell us, what plan of action has the augmented princess decided is best?”
“I would say it’s obvious,” she replied, “but that word means different things to you and me.”
Gantz took a step forward; Joe slapped him in the chest.
“Holmes is right though,” continued Cyn. “We have to stop the signal. And that may mean we cripple the Spire’s comm equipment.”
“Thus killing everything synthetic in the city,” said Gantz.
“No, we set them free.”
Gantz tried to relate the word free to synthetics.
“Assuming it’s even possible, how do you suppose we do that?” asked Joe.
Cyn eyed the vidscreen as it scrolled between the various feeds.
“You think Perion is the only one who can broadcast a signal?”
48
It was past ten before they finally got back on the road.
Joe was behind the wheel of Holmes’ ancient beater whose black paint had turned to rust over the many years. The Civic only had a fraction of the horsepower of Joe’s GT-R, but at least its engine block wasn’t completely melted by synthetic offal. The windshield, though splintered in a few places, kept the wind at bay as they cruised Loop Six at a strenuous seventy miles per hour. Having control of the vehicle put Joe at ease; maybe he thought that at any moment, he could whip the Civic around and head back to Pure or out to some other remote part of the city.
For now, the PNR still provided a measure of safety, but if they were able to pull off the plan they had so intricately laid out on a paper tablecloth, then that neutral zone, that home base of oh-no-you-can’t-touch-me would go away in an instant.
Then Joe Perion would not be safe anywhere, and neither would the rest of the world.
Cyn had claimed the back seat for herself and used the extra room to stretch her legs. In her lap, she fiddled with the shotgun she had taken from Holmes. He had been reluctant to part with it, especially considering the potential tidal wave of synthetics that might be walking out of Perion City if things went right, but after some sweet-talking by Cyn and a recollection of a scoped rifle hanging over his bed, Holmes had handed it over without further protest. Now, Cyn’s pockets bulged with extra shells. The smile on her face came and went; whatever dialogue she had going on in her head was waffling between the good and the bad to come.
The closer they got to the city, the more Gantz tried to convince himself this was a good idea. His questions to the man upstairs had gone unanswered for the better part of the night, but there did come a moment when Gantz saw the totality of Perion City’s population as one great oil painting, showing them marching into the streets only to be gunned down by stone-faced synthetics. There was no telling how far Kessler would push or how long she would keep the synthetics in the streets with no payoff before ordering them into warehouses and businesses.
And eventually, homes.
Protecting Joe was his job, but saving an entire city felt like true purpose.
Though Gantz knew God had not phoned him up and told him to fight against Kessler, he did not reject the possibility that through his own introspection, he had been helped to the path by divine intervention. Some force out there had set him on the road leading them back into the city, speeding along the side streets under pockets of orange light, ever pushing towards the white spike someone had buried upside down in the ground.
Are you coming with us, Gin-slinger?
Holmes hadn’t even answered, had instead thrown his towel on the counter and walked away, turning off the Blue Moon beer sign as he went.
“He would have just slowed us down,” said Cyn.
“It’s not that,” replied Gantz.
Joe gave him a glance. “He can take care of himself. He agreed with the plan.”
Gantz wanted to reply it wasn’t so much the plan that was the problem; on paper, it made perfect sense and there had been an ease with which Cyn enumerated the various stages, but back here in the real world, it still had to be executed to perfection. Gantz would have to fire true, Cyn would have to push the limits of her various augments, and Joe would simply have to stay alive long enough to pick up the pieces of his father’s ruined empire. If all went to plan, someone was sure to get hurt.
If all went to plan…
Gantz watched the streets scroll by.
“No synthetics,” he said. “Slow it down, Joe.”
The Civic lost speed, removing the blur from the front windows of the buildings they passed. Ever since setting out from Pure, Gantz had been expecting to run into a wall of synthetics at some point, but the streets had remained empty.
Gantz narrowed his eyes to see better in the dim light.
Shadows moved between the buildings—people hunched over as they moved from cover to cover, trying to avoid the halogen beams of Holmes’ car. The human population of Perion City was still there, still venturing out despite the graphics on the public displays announcing a curfew in menacing red letters.
As the Spire loomed, Joe cut the headlights and used the ambient lighting to see. He slowed them down to parking lot speeds for fear for hitting a resident darting across the darkened street.
In the back seat, Cyn chuckled.
“Care to fill us in?” asked Gantz.
Cyn ran her finger down the barrel of the shotgun. “The Siege of The Perion Spire,” she replied, “like it’s some kind of run and gun. There are some augs I know who would give their left tit for this kind of action.” She tapped her wrist. “If I could broadcast what we’re about to do, it’d put Lincoln Continental on top for good.”
Joe raised an eyebrow.
“Aggregators,” said Gantz. “Always looking for a story. Can’t even take ‘em to bed without a play by play showing up on the feed the next morning.”
“A night with Robert Gantz,” said Cyn. “I took off my clothes. He blew his load in his pants. Later, breakfast.”
“You’re hardly my type, princess,” he replied.
“Oh, I know,” said Cyn, drawing out the word.
The Civic paused at a stop sign.
“Where to?” asked Joe.
Cyn leaned forward between the two front seats. “Stage one, we storm the castle.”
“You mean, storm a castle guarded by a con
tingent of synthetic soldiers of unknown size or distribution,” said Gantz.
“Alright, stage one, assess the defenses.”
“There’s a helipad on the roof of Southpoint with line of sight to the plaza,” said Joe. “I bet if we got up top we could get a good look at the number of synnies we’re dealing with.”
Gantz imagined how the dealership would look at this time of night, but his mind’s eye was drawn to the two-story building next door. He nodded in agreement.
Joe turned left down Eckles Street and then hung a right onto Harris Parkway. Halfway down the street, Gantz pointed to the curb.
“Pull up right there,” he said.
“What is this place?” asked Cyn.
“The WG,” said Joe. “Something like a church. Dad was a big believer in freedom of religion, even though he didn’t care for it himself.”
“The first feed,” said Cyn, nodding. “Imagine if you always had God whispering in your ear day in and day out. It’d be worse than listening to Banks or Coker.”
Gantz wanted to argue the point, but his eyes had fallen on the open doors of the Spiritual Center. There was splintered wood at the top and bottom, as if someone had tried to break them down. It was all the encouragement Gantz needed to jump out of the car and rush the stairs. He ignored Joe’s questions as he entered the auditorium, gun drawn.
He waited for his eyes to adjust to the low light.
On the floor in front of the altar, a body lay face down, a pool of liquid surrounding it.
Gantz took his steps slowly.
“Padre?” he asked.
As he got closer, he noticed half of the figure’s skull was gone, removed by some explosion or blunt force. Gantz thought of Yates’ assistant, Truman, the altar boy who wasn’t programmed to hurt a fly. How could he have done such a thing?
“Is that you, Robert?”
Gantz swung around as Yates stepped out of a darkened confessional.
“Thank God,” said Gantz.
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