Perfect Dark: Second Front

by Greg Rucka

  “You’re going to broadcast it?”

  “Of course. DeathMatch was always meant to be a spectator sport. To have it be anything else is to dishonor our father’s name, just as the Bitch dishonors it by attempting to be him.”

  “DeVries.”

  “The Bitch, yes,” Fan said.

  Jo glanced down at her still-empty plate, then out at the faces surrounding the table, watching and listening. She still felt dizzy, slightly light-headed. She looked at her hands, both of them bruised, the Nüe-Skin beginning to flake away.

  “You’ll dishonor your father’s name anyway,” Jo said to Fan. “When I defeated Mai Hem, I was at full speed, at full strength, just as you are now. But I’m not, Fan. I’m hurt. I’ve got broken ribs and a hole in my side that’s gone infected. I’ve got bruises that have bruises. Defeating me won’t be a triumph. It won’t bring honor. It’ll bring exactly the opposite.”

  Fan smiled, gently.

  Then she turned the Falcon in her hand, dug its barrel against the left side of her own belly, and pulled the trigger. There was a muffled report, the shot buried in her flesh, and an immediate, wet, thunk came from behind her as the round passed through and into the chair, a mist of blood trailing.

  No one at the table moved.

  Fan moaned softly, as if in the throes of ecstasy, and carefully pulled the gun from where she’d pressed it to her body. Blood and gunpowder peppered her hand. She pointed the barrel at Jo.

  “Now we’ll be even,” Fan said with a sigh. “Ke-Ke, take her to be prepared.”

  Before Jo could wonder what that meant, she felt something cold and hard being pressed to the base of her skull, saw the children all around the table quickly getting to their feet. Ke-Ling took hold of her shoulder with his free hand, pulling her out of the chair, and there were many more guns pointed at her now, and she knew that if there’d been a chance of getting away from this madness at all, it was gone now.

  With no idea where they were going or what would happen next, Joanna was marched from the banquet hall into the bowels of Zhang Li’s dead mansion, toward the labs.

  “The Change always hurts,” she heard Fan calling after her. “Try to enjoy it.”

  >DATADYNE ARCHIVE

  >>AUTHORIZATION: ZHANG LI ALPHA

  >>>SUBDIR: UNCONVENTIONAL ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH PROJECTS, CODENAMED “GRAAL.”

  NODE: 12973_291 > Encrypt 1

  FROM: FIELD 1

  TO: CEO 1

  RE: Unusual field samples from project site ASCENSION

  Message dated: 14 February 2019

  Message reads:

  Master Li—

  Preliminary lab analysis of the biologicals recovered from project site ASCENSION has been completed. In general the results and biomatter source are inconclusive; at this time, this department lacks suitable material for baseline comparisons.

  Initial Findings:

  Sample contains a small amount of nanoconstructs, of organic composition, originally found near the Tunguska, Siberia dig site. Sample taken by field team BRAVO, with appropriate decontamination and artifact-preservation protocols.

  Sample found inside small (8 cm high by 4 cm wide) artifact, apparently of stone, adorned with glyphs consistent with those recovered from the FUSION, NEXUS, and ALLIANCE dig sites.

  In lab tests, we have found that these nanomachines, which we are code-naming CHRYSALIS, possess a unique property. If exposed to an existing biosignature (through standard neural lacing, similar to DeathMatch VR biometrics monitoring and synchronization, q.v.), they can—if properly implemented—mimic in another host that same biosignature, for limited periods of time.

  In essence, sir, the nanomachines can allow, in lab animals, a test rabbit to transform into, for example, a test rat. The transformation is complete and profound—body mass, physical characteristics, even minor injuries, all seem to pass from one host to another.

  This process is not without pain—test animals appeared to be under great physical strain, and several of the smaller subjects did not survive. The process also appears to be “dosage” specific—smaller exposure to CHRYSALIS reduces the length of time that the altered form can be maintained. Currently, experiments are under way to determine how to prolong the period of transformation; human trials may begin as soon as eight months from now.

  Currently, transformation times last only 3–5 hours. With proper study, I believe we can extend that period to as much as 24–48 hours (though I anticipate this will cause considerably more pain and physical stress to the host).

  NODE: 12973_291 > Encrypt 1

  FROM: FIELD 1

  TO: CEO 1

  RE: CHRYSALIS project update

  Message dated: 14 March 2019

  Message reads:

  Master Li:

  Per your directive, I have discontinued all safety protocols and have begun, albeit reluctantly, to launch human trials.

  As many of the test subjects provided by procurement are somewhat damaged, the results are promising but not as successful as might be expected with proper study, safety precautions, and research.

  Currently, the CHRYSALIS transformation is a four-stage process, outlined below.

  Step one: Programming of nanomachines.

  Step two: Implantation of the nanomachines into the individual being “transformed.”

  After initial implantation, it takes 2–4 hours for the host to be fully transformed. The more profound the transformation (i.e., alterations of body mass, height, etc.), the more painful the process. There is a significant chance at this stage for the host to suffer from profound neurological and cardiac stress.

  Step three: Transformation. This can be maintained, given the size of dosage and concentration, for 2–18 hours; longer periods of time, but no more than 48 hours, require a longer incubation period for the nanomachines, larger dosage, and a longer, more painful transformation. In testing, some neurotoxins have disrupted the transformation to a limited degree, for periods of up to 30 seconds (after which the nanomachines react and restore the subject to the transformation template).

  Step four: Reversion. Similar to the transformation stage, and quite painful, as the nanomachines “repair” their alterations—which causes similar body stress to the host. Pain, fatigue, dehydration, and other debilitation is common.

  Finally, sir, I must respectfully request that, in order to maximize chances of success for this project, additional safety measures be implemented. While this will adversely affect the rather aggressive schedule required by your office, it will improve our overall chances of success.

  NODE: 12973_291 > Encrypt 1

  From: FIELD 1

  To: CEO 1

  RE: CHRYSALIS project update

  Message dated: 06 June 2019

  Message reads:

  Master Li:

  Per your directive, all CHRYSALIS materials have been packaged and delivered—via your personal security forces—to your research facility in China.

  Sadly, I must register my concern at this turn of events. While your desire to oversee the project yourself is commendable and understandable (particularly given the resources that have been devoted to the project), I am concerned that by removing myself and my team from the research efforts, the recovered samples may be damaged or destroyed.

  I respectfully implore you to reconsider.

  NODE: 12973_291 > Encrypt 1-1-2

  FROM: HAWK 1

  TO: CEO 1

  RE: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED

  Message dated: 07 June 2019

  Message reads:

  Sir:

  All ASCENSCION researchers and personnel have been sanitized, per your orders. Authorities believe explosion was accidental.

  -S

  Carrington Institute

&nb
sp; Motor Pool, Vehicle Bay I

  January 29th, 2021

  “I don’t know about this, Jon,” Calvin Rogers said.

  Steinberg finished checking the rigging on his combat harness, then switched his attention to the Fairchild he’d taken from the armory without Potts’s permission and—hopefully—without his notice as well. He popped the clip, checking the tension of the spring with his index finger, and, satisfied with what he found, began loading nine-millimeter rounds into place, one after the other.

  “Jon—”

  Still feeding the clip, Steinberg said, “I can’t fly, Cal.”

  “I know that.” Rogers checked over his shoulder, toward the entrance of the bay, and Steinberg guessed the pilot was trying to assure himself that they were still alone. Then Rogers glanced upward, and Steinberg figured that was to check if the security cameras were still in place and on. They were, but that wasn’t a problem for the moment, since Steinberg had convinced Grim to ghost the image of Bay 2 onto Bay 1 for the half an hour he had hoped it would take to get loaded and airborne.

  “The Old Man can’t see us, Calvin,” Steinberg said. “It’ll be all right.”

  “The Old Man’ll sure as hell see us when we take off, though,” Rogers said.

  “Not if you do it real quiet.”

  “It doesn’t matter if I have the bafflers on the jets or not, someone’s gonna see it!”

  Steinberg looked up from his loading for a moment. “It was a joke, Calvin.”

  “I don’t want jokes, I want solutions. I want, what I really want, is to not do this. I don’t think it’s a good idea, Jon. I think we ought to wait.”

  The clip loaded, Steinberg fitted it to the Fairchild, slapping it into place, and got to his feet. He placed the submachine gun with his other weapons inside the dropship, then turned to face Rogers, standing beside the pilot’s door.

  “I’m done with waiting, Cal,” Steinberg said. “We’ve been waiting for over a week, and for most of that time Joanna’s been out there drawing fire for us. She was supposed to check in a day and a half ago: she didn’t. She’s wounded, she’s alone, and I don’t give a good God damn what the Old Man says anymore, we’re going to Ankara, and we’re going to find her.”

  “Look, Jon, I know how you feel about her, but—”

  “What does that mean?”

  Rogers looked uncomfortable. “The same way I feel about Emily, Jon, c’mon.”

  “No, not ‘c’mon.’ Explain it. You have a thing for Partridge, you think that means I have a thing for Jo?”

  “I’ve seen how you look at her.”

  Steinberg moved alongside the dropship until he was standing directly in front of Rogers, looking down at him. “And how do I look at her, Calvin?”

  “Jon, man, don’t be like this. I know what you’re feeling, but—”

  “You have no idea what I’m feeling.” It came out as a snarl, far more than Steinberg had intended, and Rogers flinched slightly. “This has nothing to do with how I feel about Jo, whatever that may be. This has to do with loyalty, Calvin. We don’t leave our people hanging, we don’t abandon them. If it was you out there, if you’d crashed in Ankara or wherever, you’d sure as hell be expecting me to come and get you. This has nothing to do with Jo. This is what we do, because we’re the good guys, remember?”

  “It’s been almost forty hours since she checked in. We don’t even know if she’s alive.”

  “Grimshaw confirmed that her ThroatLink was still working as of this morning. If she was dead, it would be, too. He doesn’t know where she is, but he can tell she’s still alive. So we go to Ankara, Calvin, and we start looking for her from there.”

  Rogers met his eyes, then nodded, once, but that was all it took, because Steinberg knew he meant it. It was one of the things he liked about Calvin Rogers; the man didn’t waste his words, and the single nod was all it took. He was in.

  As if to prove it, Rogers turned and started to pull himself into the cockpit of the dropship. Steinberg reversed back toward the troop doors, was about to climb inside himself, when the radio on his belt squawked.

  “Commander Steinberg, Romeo Two, respond.”

  Steinberg hesitated. He’d kept the radio on more to make certain that, if the Old Man found out what he and Rogers was up to, he’d have some warning. He hadn’t counted on any of his people trying to raise him directly. Romeo Two, along with Romeos One, Three, Four, Five, and Six, were responsible for the front gate, the most direct and public access to the Institute campus.

  “Commander Steinberg, Romeo Two, please respond.”

  “Hold on a second, Calvin,” Steinberg said, and hopped back down from the dropship, pulling the radio from his belt. “Romeo, go ahead.”

  “Sir, we need you at Alpha.”

  “Why?”

  “There’s … there’s someone here asking for you, sir.” There was a pause, the hiss of static indicating that the line was open, the guard trying to formulate what to say next. “She, uh … she says you know her.”

  Rogers had swung himself about in the cockpit, his legs dangling out of the ship, looking at him curiously, and Steinberg found he was sharing the sentiment. None of the girls he’d ever met in London knew what he really did for a living, or where he lived. If he ever went home with anyone—and God knew he couldn’t remember the last time he’d had that much time or that much luck—it was to their place, never to his.

  “Sir?”

  “She give a name?”

  “She says her name is, uh … Verez? She says you know her, sir. At least in passing.”

  “Verez?” Steinberg repeated.

  “I’m sorry sir, no, it’s Velez. Anita Velez.”

  “Don’t let her leave,” Steinberg said, and he ran for the gate.

  “I assume I will get my clothes back?” Anita Velez asked, adjusting the bathrobe that Daniel Carrington had provided for her. It had been a grudging courtesy, and Steinberg suspected that, if he could have gotten away with it, Carrington wouldn’t have bothered. But he was a man of manners, if nothing else, and after all, Velez had come to them.

  “No,” Carrington rumbled. “You won’t. We’ll get you something else to wear.”

  “Sooner rather than later, then, if you please.”

  “I think we’d like some answers first.”

  “You interrogate everyone who comes bearing information in this fashion, Mr. Carrington? Mr. Steinberg? Or is this treatment reserved only for women?”

  Steinberg shook his head, glancing to where the Old Man was sitting opposite Velez on the couches in his office. Carrington leaned forward, using his stick to support himself, and rested his chin on his hands. When he spoke, it was as low and threatening as a waking grizzly.

  “The treatment is warranted both by the person and the situation. We’ve spent over a week preparing for the inevitable dataDyne attack, something your arrival conceivably presages. Further, we have reason to believe that either dataDyne or a dataDyne-affiliated force now has the ability to fabricate doppelgangers in one fashion or another, ones good enough to endure at least a close visual inspection. When I add to that, Miss Velez, the fact that you are the director of dataDyne CORPSEC and Dr. Cassandra DeVries’s personal bodyguard, I believe you can understand why I would take every precaution before granting you a personal audience.”

  “But your scans satisfied you.”

  “Our examination of your clothing and your person yielded nothing, but that’s not the same as saying that you’ve come to us clean.”

  Velez adjusted the bathrobe again, closing it further about her person. The slate blue eyes seemed to bore holes into Carrington, and when they flicked for a moment in Steinberg’s way, he thought he could actually feel the hatred in the look.

  If she hates us so much, why the hell is she here? he thought.

  “I assure you that I have,” Velez said. “As I told Mr. Steinberg when he had me handcuffed at the gate, I’m here because I need your help.”

  �
�Don’t whine,” Steinberg said. “You’d have done the same to me.”

  “I’d have shot you,” Velez corrected.

  “Well, there you go.”

  She looked to Carrington again. “I’m not here as a friend, I wouldn’t insult any of us by pretending to be so. I am your enemy, but that does not mean that I cannot be honest with you, or sincere in my request. I need your help, Mr. Carrington.”

  “An even more extraordinary thing for me to believe without proof,” Carrington remarked. “Perhaps you should begin to explain yourself, Director Velez.”

  “Former director,” she said. “Cassandra—pardon me—Dr. DeVries relieved me from duty early yesterday morning.”

  Steinberg looked at Carrington, and from the look on the Old Man’s face, saw that the news was as surprise to each of them.

  “You’ve been replaced?” Steinberg asked.

  “By Colonel Leland Shaw. I believe you know him.”

  “He’s the Hawk Team leader.”

  “Yes, Jon,” Carrington said, mildly annoyed. “I do know the name. Why?”

  “Ostensibly because Colonel Shaw succeeded where I failed.”

  “Succeeded at what?”

  Velez hesitated, looking away and frowning, and Steinberg tried to read the conflict in her face but couldn’t make much of it. She was good at keeping blank, and the fact that he could tell she was struggling with what to say next—or, perhaps, how she was going to say it—was a triumph by itself.

  “I regret to inform you that your agent, Joanna Dark, was killed in action in Ankara just past midnight the day before yesterday.”

  Steinberg grinned. “No, she wasn’t.”

  Both Velez and Carrington looked at him, Carrington with curiosity, Velez with something closer to reproach.

  “I am afraid I saw the video, Mr. Steinberg,” Velez said. “She was shot multiple times in the chest, then once through the head.”

  “Jon?” Carrington had arched an eyebrow, waiting for further explanation.