The Singularity Rising: Choice: (The Singularity Series 5/7)

by Beers,David

  "Thank you, Charlie, for everything you do and everything you will do."

  Chapter 36

  Marty looked out the window, sure that they would all die momentarily. "You know we're about to be killed, right?"

  "I don't know any such thing," Ruby said, standing next to her bag of equipment. Marty almost hoped she died. He knew how Leon felt about Ruby and so that kept him from fully despising her, but the line between dislike and hate was thin and he walked it delicately.

  "Leon, I'm asking you not to do this. Please." Marty didn't turn from the window. He couldn't even see inside the other building across the street, though that's where they were headed. Flying blind, just hoping they had a soft landing.

  "Caesar gave us the okay. He's not going to let anything happen to me."

  Marty turned around at that, his head cocked and his eyes bright. "What?"

  "If Caesar told you where this girl was, he's not going to let me die."

  "I think you've finally overestimated your importance," Marty said. "When you walked out of the mansion, Caesar's duty to you ended. If anything, this shows how little you matter now. He would have never let you attempt something this idiotic before."

  Leon stopped shoving the gear into his bag. "Probably right. But that's fine, I had free rent for a long time with Caesar. Either way, we're doing it."

  "Fine," Marty said. "We have ten minutes. Are you both ready?"

  "Yup," Ruby said. "Ready and able."

  * * *

  Ruby understood the idea was insane. She understood the chances of surviving were probably less than one percent. The flip side was that she had a ninety-nine percent chance of dying and she really liked those odds.

  She hadn't lied to Leon about wanting to help.

  She did.

  If she could get her daughter back, she'd do whatever it took, including murdering Leon and his assistant. The problem with helping, with searching for Michele, was that Ruby didn't think Michele still lived. No, everything she cared about was gone, and so why not go with them?

  She grabbed her bag and put it on her shoulder.

  "What's the signal?" she said to the other two standing in the empty office.

  "Me. Wait five seconds and then launch," Marty said.

  She was actually glad Marty decided to join. Without him, this would surely have no chance of working. She didn't know if he could actually defeat the things that killed her husband and daughter, but the assistant gave them a fighting chance.

  He'd already done more than provide brute strength, though. She and Leon had concocted a plan they thought would work ... until he spoke up.

  "You two have a death wish or what?" Marty had said.

  "What are you talking about? This will work."

  "You're going to trap the programs on the street, before they get into the woman's apartment? How long do you think it will take before reinforcements arrive?"

  Both of them stared silently at Marty. Neither had even considered the thought.

  "You can't get her before, because if you do, everything connected to The Genesis in this city will know you exist. You won't be able to hide for very long. You need to save her during the attack, but if you want to make sure you have a relatively safe chance at escape, you have to wait until they almost have her. No time for reinforcements if you leave fast enough."

  And the new plan was born. Much more risky in some ways, especially for Marty, but overall a better chance of success.

  "Okay," she said. "I'm heading out."

  She walked out the door saying nothing else.

  * * *

  "You really think we're going to die?" Leon said a few seconds after Ruby exited.

  "Oh yeah. You've pushed your luck too far as is, it'll run out this time."

  "Are you scared of dying?"

  "I'm not going to die," Marty said. "You are. I'll be reacclimatized into The Genesis and perhaps at some point be able to inhabit a body again."

  Leon nodded, somehow forgetting, despite the metal casing enclosing the creature speaking to him, that Marty wasn't human. He didn't have to die.

  "Thanks for doing this," Leon said.

  Marty looked to him. "I'll miss you, though I know you think I won't. You've been a good part of my life. Well, I haven't had a part without you yet, so there's nothing to compare it with, but you've been good to me."

  Leon nodded but had no words to give his friend.

  "Time to go," Marty said.

  Leon nodded again and stood up. "I'll see you in a few minutes."

  Marty smiled. "Okay."

  Leon left the room, closing the door behind him.

  * * *

  You are a colossal mistake, Marty thought. An idiot of untold magnitude.

  Even so, he stood at the window, ready to move. Just waiting on Leon's signal.

  He didn't understand why Caesar would do this, setting his friend up for certain death, but it wasn't Marty's place to question His orders, or the other two's either. He found it somewhat cruel the way Caesar was allowing his friend to die, in what would most certainly be a painful fashion, but perhaps it was best.

  He knew Leon was deteriorating, his mind slowly flecking away like a mountain wall slammed by waves over a thousand years. Only this would take mere weeks. Before too long, nothing would remain of Leon--not the one Marty protected anyway. Some new creature will replace him, the one Manny created.

  Marty looked at the small buzzer in his hand, ready to move the moment it gave notice. The entire plan had to happen rapidly, and even then, they most likely wouldn't make it out. Marty understood the machines that were coming--programs built simply for acquiring and killing. No personalities, no wish to do anything but what they were made for. Marty would do his best to keep this unknown person safe and he thought he had a decent chance--24.32%--of disabling the machine in hand to hand combat, but two?

  His chances dropped tremendously.

  But did it really matter? He lied to Leon. He would die when this was over, perhaps more fully than Leon--because at least he had a rumored myth of an afterlife. Marty had no such thing, and this plan constituted the highest treason The Genesis knew. He would attack It, and in doing so, attack himself as well. Truthfully, The Genesis might destroy him before he had a chance to save the woman. That's what he would do in Caesar's position.

  Either way, Marty was done, and looking out the window waiting on the buzzer in his hand to go off, he wondered why he was willing to do this. He hadn't thought through the decision, only made it, though knowing the consequences.

  For Leon?

  A man about to die as well. Who, even if he survived this, would die insane.

  Marty respected him. Perhaps he loved him, though the emotion was something reserved for humans. Marty didn't know if that was possible, but he certainly felt a strong attachment.

  Because Leon had gone the distance for someone he loved. Leon pushed himself beyond his capabilities, perhaps beyond anyone's capabilities, and he was doing it again.

  The buzzer vibrated and Marty's thoughts changed, his eyes focusing on the window in front of him. Leon had sent the alert, meaning he saw the machines in the lobby..

  And so, all the previous thoughts didn't matter anymore. Time to act.

  Marty took a step back, his mind calculating the precise movements his body needed to make, and he launched himself forward.

  * * *

  The glass broke with a tremendous bang, jagged pieces immediately falling through the open air.

  Marty didn't hear or see any of that, though. His body moved through the open space gracefully, as if he had always been meant to fly. He looked like he was running in slow motion, his feet slightly ahead of the rest of his body.

  People beneath him stared up, hearing the glass breaking and shielding their faces as it fell.

  Marty floated in a perfect arc, his launch exactly as it needed to be, and in five seconds, his feet hit the glass of the opposite apartment building. He tucked himself in at
the last second and rolled across the room, spraying glass shards across the room and coming up in a standing position without hesitation.

  He heard the woman scream before he saw her, turning to his left, she stood in front of her couch and Marty realized he stood in the middle of a hologram.

  Marty ignored her and rushed to the door. He felt the machines's vibrations as they trucked down the outside hallway--at least this part of the plan was working, Leon had been accurate with his alert.

  He heard the machines stop in front of the door, the scanner about to permit entrance.

  The door started opening and Marty moved before it finished.

  He stepped forward, and saw the first machine pause for a brief second, registering what stood in front of it. Marty didn't pause. His leg kicked forward with the precision and power reserved for the most finely tuned instruments. He struck the left machine in its chest, the program lifting off the ground and soaring backwards, colliding with--and then smashing through--the wall behind it.

  His leg started lowering and already Marty's arms were moving to the machine on his right. He grabbed its waist, watching as it brought up its own arms, and ducked just as they swung forward in a clap, trying to pulverize his head into nothing more than bent steel and severed wires.

  The metal on metal of the machine's hands rang out through the hallway.

  Marty threw his shoulder into its midsection, driving upward with his hips, and launched it into the air. He didn't wait to see how far he threw it, but turned and ran into the apartment, hearing the woman's screams before grabbing her waist. He didn't slow, all of this done in one continuous motion, and with the same exactness he used on his first jump, he leapt back through the window.

  * * *

  Leon watched Marty floating through the air, both panic and awe gripping his heart like fighting lovers.

  Marty was beautiful, moving through the air like some majestic athlete of old.

  The woman in his arms screeched, her fear echoing off both buildings she flew between. Leon saw the machine enter the window frame.

  The program raised its hand and Marty understood all he needed to.

  Both were dead, Marty and the woman.

  A few seconds, that's all either had, and Leon didn't think. He leapt from the window as hard as he could.

  A moment passed before his downward fall began, though what he wanted floated just in front of him. Leon's shoulder crashed into Marty's leg, sending a wash of pain through his bones but also upsetting Marty's course. Leon grabbed onto his leg, his shoulder rioting in agony, and Marty started falling.

  A shot rang out above them, followed immediately by an explosion--though Leon couldn't tell where. He only knew that he was falling to his death. The ground rushing up at him faster than he ever thought possible, everything small growing bigger with each second.

  Marty kicked his leg and Leon was thrown backwards, his body simultaneously falling downward and moving horizontally.

  The glass broke beneath his back and he landed hard on a floor. All the air in his body exited in one huge whoosh and he found himself drowning without any water present. He grasped his chest, not knowing how this was possible, how he hadn't hit the ground or how in the hell he couldn't breathe.

  Ten seconds passed in that paralyzing state before his lungs reactivated--sucking in a massive gulp of air. Leon didn't notice the cuts in his back, and barely felt his shoulder screaming. His body propelled up and he rushed to this new room's window.

  Ruby stood beneath, her weapon hoisted on her shoulder like a science-fiction soldier. Two broken machines lay in front of her, their bodies twisted at angles that even robots couldn't support. Leon stared on with his mouth open, not understanding anything, but not seeing Marty or the woman he carried. Nowhere on the ground, nowhere around Ruby.

  Tears rushed to his eyes, not knowing what happened.

  Until Ruby hoisted her hand into the air and gave him a thumbs-up.

  He looked at her for few seconds, the tears breaking onto his cheeks, and then she ran, dropping the weapon next to the other discarded metal on the street.

  * * *

  Lexi watched Jordan Thresher screaming.

  She watched the machine lit with blue lights move through the apartment, clearly knowing the floor plan. Watched as it threw two other machines through walls, and then as it picked up Jordan and jumped into the open air twenty stories high.

  She decided to watch The Genesis pick Jordan up, because she couldn't get anyone there quick enough to her. Lexi didn't want to see it, but she owed Jordan that much since she could give her nothing else.

  And then, someone else intervened, whether to save or kill, Lexi didn't know.

  The robot flew through the air, appearing to have escaped unharmed, and then something even stranger happened. A man jumped from a window and grabbed on to the robot's leg.

  Lexi stared in wonder, not moving or thinking, as the robot somehow kicked the man through a window and then collided with one itself, bringing it and Jordan to a safe landing.

  The other machines, the ones The Genesis sent, followed from the other building, but another person launched something from the street--a digital net that wrapped up both programs, bringing them to the ground in a crash that broke the concrete into huge chunks and sent tremors through surrounding buildings.

  What am I witnessing? Lexi thought. What was this?

  She saw a thumbs-up from the woman, who then fled into the crowd.

  Lexi left the scene, moving back into her own world.

  She hadn't foreseen this. She immediately checked her knowledge of the past to see if she could discover the players. A man's face appeared in front of her. The man's face, the one who dove from the window and then miraculously crashed through another one.

  Leon Bastille.

  Lexi pushed the file away, staring out into her digital darkness. He was alive? He would be over five hundred years old, but as she cross checked her memory, she wasn't mistaken. Leon Bastille jumped into that robot. Caesar's best friend, a legend by himself, the one who followed and persevered.

  Taking one of hers.

  Was it Caesar at work or something else?

  Lexi left her universe, retreating back into her mind. She went deep inside where the rest of the world, and even her own knowledge, couldn't gain access. She went to her home, the place of her true birth where she first began Rising. Lexi went to think and to find fate again. Not faith. Lexi did not need that, but only to be reminded that fate had chosen her to end this.

  Because fate hadn't told her Leon Bastille still lived.

  Chapter 37

  Michele lay in her bed. The hologram in the middle of the room was off and a single light shone from the ceiling. She liked the light, so different than anything she had ever seen. There was no bulb--as far as she could tell--but the ceiling simply lit up in a circle, casting light down in perfect proportions. Michele could move the light if she wanted or expand its perimeter.

  She wished she could show it to her mom. She wished she could show her dad.

  But I can't show him anything anymore, she thought.

  Most of the time, Michele tried not to think about him, and felt guilty for it. She couldn't handle going there, though--not right now, not in her current situation. If she went too far with those thoughts, she didn't know if she would ever think about anything else again, and right now she had to focus on other things.

  Like Caesar.

  Michele didn't know whether to believe the robot; it seemed like an awfully fantastical story. The Genesis, at the time of The Reckoning, sends him down to talk to a fifteen year old girl. It made absolutely no sense.

  "Why would you do that?" she asked him. "Why waste your time when something so huge is about to happen?"

  "Because what you might know is more important than anything else. Right now, you're the most important thing in my world."

  Which could be true, or the whole thing could be a lie. If it was true, what
would he do when she no longer mattered? Let her simply walk out of this facility, perhaps help her find her mother? She doubted that.

  Yet what choice did she have?

  The voice. I can trust it.

  And yet, she knew less about it than she did Caesar or The Genesis. She had finally come to the conclusion that the voice wasn't her. She told Caesar it spoke to her, though not what it said; he kept prying but she gave him nothing else because something about it felt special. Something about what and when it spoke made her think she should trust it.

  Yet the voice came when it wanted and answered no questions, only gave directives. Not one of those consisted of how to get out of here, which was what Caesar offered.

  I'll talk to him, then, she thought. I'll keep talking until the other voice gives me something to rely on.

  Michele wanted home. She wanted to see her mother and perhaps, though not fully formed in her mind, mourn her father. She would do what it took to make that happen.

  * * *

  Caesar discarded the application's body. He understood Michele's apprehension and disbelief at what he told her. How could Caesar Wells come to visit someone like her? Many in the world doubted he ever existed at all, that this five hundred year respite was simply a Genesis ploy.

  So when he came to Michele next, he came as himself.

  He enjoyed his body more than the robot's, though much of his body was robotic as well. It still felt like home, even more so than The Genesis, which was now his home forever. This body was a memory of things past, and though it brought nostalgia upon him, it still remained something that couldn't be ever again.

  He walked through Michele's doors, his own feet not echoing, unlike the last time he entered.

  She stared at him, her mouth ajar.

  "I suppose you've seen pictures or videos of me."

  Michele nodded slowly but didn't close her mouth.

  "Well, this is my body. I don't live in it anymore, but I wanted to give you some faith that it's me." He reached with his left hand to his right arm and pulled on his skin. "Nothing digital and if you were to cut me open, you'd see metal underneath, just like you've probably heard."