by Rob Dircks
I raise my hand. “Brick. May I say something?”
“Sure. Of course.”
“We should leave Wah behind. We don’t need him.”
Wah looks wounded. I kneel beside him. “Wah, you’ve had a lifetime of adventures, and you’re only fourteen years old. You have many yet ahead. You don’t need this one. Stay here. Stay safe.”
He laughs. “No way. Who’s going to prop you up and remember everything for you, old man?” Taps my cranium. “And besides, what could…”
“Don’t say it, Wah.”
“…possibly go wrong?”
< 74: Arch >
I was sleeping, you idiot.
Oh boy. Something is definitely going wrong.
Even from my cell, I can see units sputtering around like expectant fathers, bumping into each other, shouting instructions. Yeah. Something’s not right.
Good.
I can feel little rumbles here and there. That means it’s time. Sarah’s people are on the move. Ness’ people are on the move. It’s time for CORE to pay for what it did to me. To Ness. To all of us. Bring it on.
Wait. Ness. I look over. “Psst! Hey! Ness!”
Nothing. Oh God.
“NESS!”
She starts. Groans. “Hey. I was sleeping, you idiot.”
“Sorry. Couldn’t see you. You weren’t responding. I was worried about you. Jeez. You’re welcome, by the way.”
“God. Do you ever shut up?”
“No. Hey listen, looks like the two teams are starting to blow up shit. Lots of hubbub.”
More rumbles. Klaxons blaring. Ness jumps to her feet. Falls back to the bed, wincing. Man, they really did a number on her, those fucks. Her eyes are still swollen practically shut. Don’t worry, Ness. If CORE even has eyes, I’ll be gouging them out while I yell your name over and over again and laugh my ass off. “Pssst. Hey. Looks like we’re a low priority for them at the moment. And really, it doesn’t matter if they can hear us anymore, now that judgement day is here. So tell me. What’s my son’s name?”
She rushes to the window so fast she groans in pain. “Your son?”
“Yeah. The kid. My kid.”
“Oh my God. He’s yours? Huh. I’d say he looks like you, but you look like a melted candle. Nobody looks like you.” She laughs. “Sorry. Couldn’t help it. Is Wah really your son?”
“Wah?”
She laughs again. “Wah. The boy who walked the world and awakened the Iceman. His unit named him Wah. Said he cried a lot when he was a baby. A LOT.”
We both chuckle. I vaguely remember all those years ago, cramming the poor kid into that incubator, listening to him scream his head off, and thinking: well, unit, you’ve definitely got your work cut out for you. And wouldn’t you know it? The fucker did it. Good unit. “Yeah, he’s my son. I can’t wait to meet him.”
She points to the pad outside my cell. “Good luck with that.”
“No luck needed.” I hike up my pants leg, raise my left calf to the little food platform, dig in, pull out the tip of the circuit board’s cable.
“Gross. You’re gross.”
Struggling to stay balanced, I’m thinking why didn’t they put these goddam things in my forearms?, and I reach around with the cable and wave it in front of the pad.
Click.
I exit – now seriously for the last time, it goddam better be – and open Ness’ cell.
“Like I said before, you’re welcome. Now… you coming?”
< 75: Arch >
Ripple. Flash.
As the units scurry here and there, doing whatever scurrying units do in an emergency, me and Ness make our way from hallway to hallway, unlocking doors, ducking into rooms, temporarily fucking up security cameras, making ourselves as invisible as possible. She’s in pretty rough shape, I have to practically carry her, but she’s got guts I guess. And she’s quiet.
I whisper. “Hey, what’s that over there?”
“I don’t know. A bathroom?”
We’re peeking around a corner, and across the hall, there’s a line of units waiting to enter a room. One by one they go in, about a minute apart. They don’t come out though, and I’m pretty damn sure units don’t need to piss. Hmm.
Then I see it through the little window. Ripple. Flash.
It’s the teleportation chamber.
Not the same one I remember, I blew that room into teeny little pieces. But it’s definitely teleporting units. About a minute apart. Recharging quickly with such a small distance to cover, getting the units just right outside the Wall.
Outside the Wall.
Wait. I have an idea.
When the last unit goes into the room, ripple, flash, I head over to the door, Ness bringing up the rear. Yup. I see the admin unit through the little window, pretty harmless, running the teleporter, I guess waiting for the next batch of units to come.
Oh shit. And here they come.
Down the hall. About twenty more security units. Fuck.
No time to think. We click open the room, and before the admin unit can even think about warning CORE, I’m on it, twisting its head so fast it comes clean off.
Ness manages a smile. “I never thought I’d say this about you Arch, but… I’m impressed.”
“No time for compliments. As much as I deserve them. Get over here.”
She backs away. “Is this the part where you get frisky and I have to kick your ass?”
I grab her arm, pull her to the pad. “Look. You’re no good to me here. No offense. But you’re slowing me down. And you don’t know anything that can help me. So stay right here on the pad. I’ll teleport you outside the Wall. Try not to get shot, and put someone who knows something useful back in your spot. We only have a minute.”
Ness looks at me like she wants to punch me in the face. But she knows I’m right.
I run over, confirm the location they’re sending the units, and tap the red button.
Ripple.
Flash.
Ness disappears.
Okay, I’ve got a minute.
Fifty-nine.
Fifty-eight.
God, a minute is a long time. Gives me time to notice how bad I smell. I’m ripe.
Damn. Those units are almost here. I can hear their footsteps.
Now or never.
I reverse the teleporter phase, slam my hand down on the red button.
Nothing.
Goddammit!
I look down.
< ERROR: Recharge not complete. Please try again in thirty seconds. Thank you. >
I don’t have thirty seconds!
I run over to the door. They’re right here!
Hold it closed. Hold it closed? Solid thinking, Arch. Yeah, this is going to work out just fine. I’m sure of it. You against twenty security units. Just hold the door closed. Smart.
The first one keeps passing its hand over the outside pad, pushing the door, expecting it to open. Push. Push. It’s getting persistent.
Think, Arch! Think!
Ah, fuck it.
I lunge from the door over to the table, smashing my hand on the red button as I crash to the floor.
Ripple.
Flash.
As the units raise their guns to kill me, and trash my only shot at ending this whole fucking nightmare, I see the most beautiful vision I’ve ever seen, in slow motion: a tall woman, in full combat fatigues, covered in body armor, arms out, with a gun in each hand, firing ten rounds from each, with a smile on her face.
Twenty heads burst open. Twenty units drop to the floor.
I look up. “I– I–“
The vision woman blows a wisp of hair off her face, still in slow motion. “You must be Arch. Ness told me you were ugly, but wow. You gotta stay out of the sun more often. Oh, where are my manners? I’m Olive.”
It’s official. I’m in love.
< 76: Arch >
Sarah who?
Sarah who?
I’m kidding. Of course. Sarah will always be my love.
But man oh man, this Olive.
She taps her two gun barrels together. “Exploding rounds. They’re tiny, too. I’ve got two hundred in each of these right here. Like bee-bees. And nearly silent. Amazing, right? Nothing like a unit’s exploding head to put a skip in your step. Brought a couple of extras for you. Hey, you going to say anything?”
Snap out of it, Arch. “Yeah. Yeah.” I get up, offer my hand. “Arch.”
“Arch. Are you just happy to see me, or is that a cable poking out of your calf?”
I don’t know why, I shouldn’t give a fuck at this point, but I’m embarrassed. I tuck the little nib back into my leg as casually as I can and shake my pants leg down. Walk over to the door, push all the bodies inside, click it locked. Hopefully we have a minute before the next wave of certain doom. “Yeah, it looks stupid. But it comes in handy. Now – tell me anything I can use.”
“Well, our crew was frozen eight hundred and fifty years ago, and–“
“A little tight on time. Just the usable stuff.”
She grins. “Right to the point. I like that.” Holsters her guns. Like a boss. “Okay. We’re the decoy mission. Lots of fireworks. And it looks like you’ve got a pretty kick-ass team on the inside making some serious noise too. But the real action is happening…” she looks over at the map, strides to it, eyeing it up and down, uses her fingers to zoom the image in close, taps a spot. “…here.”
Running just west of CORE, inside the CORE Perimeter. I know where she’s headed. I shake my head. “Sewer pipes. Coolant pipes for CORE. Yeah. They’ve tried blowing it up, damming it, everything. For centuries. Impossible. Way too well protected. It would take an army and a miracle to get through there. It’s a dead end. Shit.”
She hands me two of her many guns. “Well, we might not have an army, but we do have a miracle. And ironically, they will be covered in shit.”
< 77: Heyoo >
Covered in feces
Ick. This is disgusting.
It reminds me of the first time I saw Wah. As a feces-covered infant. He still has the same face, the little dimples that he will never grow out of. The bluest of blue eyes. Though he no longer cries – even though his name is Wah. At almost fifteen years old, he’s already more of a man than most human men I’ve met.
Our journey up the river was uneventful, at least. Once Oscar was able to torch a small opening through the protective underwater grate at the mouth of the Delaware, we motored upstream, two meters below the surface, inside the Sanctuary, undiscovered. The distraction of the northern attack covered our approach as planned. And a simultaneous attack, we presume by forces that somehow were aware of our approach, has further distracted CORE’s forces. So our devices glided in silence at a quick pace, getting us to the mouth of the target sewage pipe in under five hours.
And here we are. Crawling like infants ourselves, in our own feces. Ironic that my last moments with Wah will be just like my first.
“Heyoo. Come on,” Wah whispers, as he pulls me along the massive pipe, two thirds of a meter deep in sludge.
“I’m coming.” It must be obvious that I’m trying to slow us down, put off the inevitable, my dramatic sacrifice. Ugh. It’s just that I’ve actually come to enjoy this life, to find purpose in Wah, and in the humans, to feel that I finally belong. That I’m human.
Such a strange thing to be: a fabricated unit that forgets it’s not human. One that feels, sleeps, and dreams. And yes, as sentimental as it sounds, one that loves. Is it so bad to want to continue that life?
“I want to live!” I blurt out, before I can stop myself. It echoes down the pipe. Everyone stops in their tracks and turns around.
Wah laughs. “Good. So do I.”
“I mean… the upload…”
“The upload won’t kill you. It’s a one-way thing. You’ll be fine. Now come on, keep up.”
Ahead. Something in the muck.
A small unit. Floating towards us. A monitor unit.
Brick whispers, “Everyone, under.”
Oh God. I know two seconds ago I was waxing about wanting to live on, but I’d rather die than submerge myself in this excrement water. I won’t do it.
So Wah does it for me. Plunges my head under. Wonderful
Silence.
Just the little motor of the unit gliding along above us, unaware.
I wonder if this is what it will feel like when CORE takes my life. Like drowning in feces.
Pleasant thought.
< 78: Heyoo >
BOOM
After three more close encounters with monitor units, and a mouth full of god-knows-what, I’m finished. “Sorry team. If another one of those passes by, I’m surrendering.”
Brick’s turn to laugh. “No you’re not. We’re getting close.” She raises her flashlight to her laminated map. “Wah and Oscar, start getting your explosives ready. In another–“
BOOM!
An explosion. Down the pipe. Perhaps fifty meters north.
“Looks like someone stole our bomb idea.”
Two figures running towards us. Not units. Humans!
“Olive!”
Brick runs, half limping, splashing human waste everywhere, into Olive’s arms. “How–?”
Olive grins wide. Points behind her as a strange man steps into Brick’s flashlight beam. “This guy knows how to work a teleporter. Got Ness out and got me in. His name’s Arch.”
Oh my God.
Arch.
From the teleportation chamber! Fourteen years ago!
I approach him. “How can it be you? You died! I was right there. I saw it.”
Arch smiles. “The unit! The one we teleported! It’s you! Long time, no see!” He flips up my eye patch, looks me over. “Man, you look like shit.”
“Have you looked in a mirror lately?”
He laughs, pats me on the back. “I knew I liked you. Even though you were the wrong one.”
And he leans down to Wah. “Hey kid. Know who I am? I’m your dad.”
Wah takes my hand, steps back. “No you’re not.”
Awkward.
< 79: Arch >
Good looking kid.
Ouch.
Kid’s got a way with words.
He does kind of look like me though. Well, like what I used to look like. Underneath the layer of shit he’s covered in. Good looking kid. Except for the missing ear.
But before we can get a chance to iron the whole thing out, and I can punch Wah’s unit in the head for being too good of a surrogate dad, Olive takes charge.
“Sorry to break up the reunion folks. I’ve got good news and bad news. Good news is we found a shortcut to the firewall without using the coolant pipes.” She pauses.
The other woman motions to her, like are you really going to make me ask what the bad news is?
“Bad news is that about a hundred units found it too.”
And right on cue, those units start pouring out of the breach created by our blast.
“Here they come!”
Olive, me, and the new people return fire, picking off the units as they emerge. The units aren’t an accurate shot, especially in these conditions, so it’s like fish in a barrel. I like shooting security units. I smile and look over at Olive for a second. She’s got a shit-eating grin on from ear to ear. “I just got two with one round. Try that.”
Meanwhile, the kid and one of the others are mashing together some kind of mini bomb. The kid knows how to make bombs? Badass.
They hurl it down the pipe into the mass of units.
The kid yells, “Fire in the hole!”
We all dive under the sludge.
BOOM!!
I get up from underwater. I can’t hear a thing. I don’t think anyone can. But the units are gone, atomized. Olive motions us to follow her to the cleared opening. She’s screaming something, but all I can hear is a buzzing.
The kid, Wah, passes me, right behind Olive. He says something to me, I can’t hear it, but I think I made it out: keep up, old man.
Man, this kid’s got an attitude.
< 80: Arch >
The first hundred was fun…
The shortcut me and Olive found wasn’t on the other woman Brick’s old map. It runs alongside the coolant pipes inside the tunnel – a narrow passage with a catwalk. It’s so narrow we have to walk in a single file. I offered to lead the way, but Olive’s got the armor.
And thank God – because coming from the other end of the passageway are the units. Their rounds are bouncing off her armor and exploding a few feet in front of us. They’re coming at us only one at a time, it’s so narrow, but they’re endless. They just never stop. Every time Olive explodes a head, there’s another one behind that takes its place. She shouts over the din of gunfire, “Arch! The first hundred was fun, but this is getting a little ridicul– Damn!”
She’s hit. Between the armor plates. A round exploded against the railing and a piece of shrapnel from one of the rounds. Right in the side of her gut. Fuck. It was only a matter of time, I guess. She keeps marching forward though, firing round after round, even with the injury. Now that’s fight. “Arch! Just going to tell it like it is here! Don’t know how much longer I can hold up! There’s too many of them, and I’m bleeding! Any ideas?”
We’ve stopped making progress. I can see in the distance a glowing blue grid ringing the tunnel. The firewall. We are so close. Maybe thirty-five meters. But I don’t see a way past these fucking units. CORE’s pulling out all the stops.
I feel something in my hand. Look back. It’s Wah. He just handed me some putty. With a detonator sticking out of it. “Throw this. As far as you can. Now!”
Kid’s fucking crazy. We’re all going to die if there’s an explosion down here. I hesitate.
He glares at me. “Heyoo would have done it.”
Oh, for Christ’s sake. Dad guilt? Really? Now? This kid’s good. “But you’re gonna get us killed, kid! What’s the point?”