Code Breakers: Delta

by Colin F. Barnes

  “Where do we go from here?” Holly said.

  Gerry smiled. “Don’t worry, I’ve got a map.” He tapped the side of his head and led them out of the so-called vault. Petal folded the paper and placed it safely into an interior pocket of her jacket.

  With Gerry by Petal’s side, he led them out of the labyrinth. By the time they came outside into the jungle clearing, it was approaching 05:00. Another couple of hours and the sun would be up. Petal stifled a yawn at the thought of all the hours they’d been up and ignored the feelings of tiredness in her bones.

  She knew it to be psychosomatic. Her full memory making her brain feel sluggish. But with the truth exposed and the codes in hand, she at least felt more confident about getting Jess back.

  “We need to head east of here,” Gerry said, pointing into the thick darkness of the trees. The silvery moon and starlight turned the scene to monochrome.

  “What about all them?” Jachz said, pointing to the hundred or so mutant clones gathering around their filthy shacks.

  “We leave them be,” Gerry said. “They won’t cause us any problems now Endymion’s gone.” Gerry stopped, drawing up short. “But wait, they can help with something, Jachz. A job for you. Try to get the rest of our supplies from them. We’ll need the other two rifles, pistols and ammo packs.”

  “Okay,” Jachz said after a pause. Petal sensed there was something going on with him but couldn’t quite place it. Perhaps the electro-stun treatment had fried some of his processors…

  “Petal, Holly, can you wait for me here for a moment. I just need to do something,” Gerry said.

  “Wait,” Petal said. “Where you going?”

  “I’ll be five minutes, I promise. I just need to go thank someone.”

  Petal understood as Gerry dashed across the dark clearing to the bunker, grabbing a flashlight from one of the clones as he passed by. It must have been Chaos, the old dude, who gave Gerry the access code.

  While Gerry was dealing with that, Petal helped Holly check over their weapons. Jachz eventually returned with the other firearms and the ammo. “Where’s Gerry?” Jachz asked.

  “Tying up a loose end,” Petal replied. “Listen, Jachz, dude, what the fuck’s up? You’re being strange.”

  “Oh, am I? I didn’t realise. I’m sorry.”

  “What happened in there? With those two people in the terminal room.”

  Jachz stared at her, his face not betraying any emotion. Seems his AI had learned not just to feel, but to also hide those feelings. “They were going to torture me, strip me for parts,” he said. “I guess I’ve learned the power of self-preservation.”

  “Are you still good to finish this mission? Can we rely on you if it comes to it?” Holly said, clearly picking up on his change too.

  “You can,” he said. “I want to stop the viroborg as much as you do. I didn’t escape the Family to have my life extinguished so soon after arriving. And well, I feel responsible. I want to fix this.”

  “Good to hear it,” Petal said.

  Jachz nodded and turned to attend to the backpacks of supplies.

  Holly leaned in and whispered, “Do you trust him?”

  “Not one bit.”

  “Me neither.”

  “I’ll keep an eye on him. Don’t worry.”

  Jachz looked over his shoulder and locked eyes with Petal for a brief second before turning back to organising his pack. Petal thought about putting a bullet in his brain right here right now, but then she’d be no different than the Family. He’d been nothing but helpful throughout this ordeal, she couldn’t just go around killing people—or AIs—on suspicion alone… could she?

  Chapter 22

  Gerry switched on the flashlight and entered the bunker. Rats scurried away into the shadows as though the beam were lethal. Tracing his earlier steps, he found the old man, Chaos, still huddled in the corner.

  “You’re back,” he croaked.

  Gerry shifted the flashlight to the side to avoid blinding him. His eyes were milky white with untreated cataracts. “I’m back.”

  “What do you want now?”

  “Answers.”

  “You have them all,” he said. “I gave you the code. That you’re here now tells me you survived and dealt with Endymion. Did you find what he was looking for? The vault?”

  “The vault was a lie, but you knew that, didn’t you?” Gerry said, kneeling down to the old man’s level. “And so is your name.”

  The old man turned to face Gerry, his eyes staring off into the distance. “If you know everything, why are you here? The answers are all there, in the data, the software, the codes. Do you need me to spoon-feed you like a baby, eh?” He laughed then, and Gerry knew his intuition was correct. That smile, even that voice, altered by all the years of silence, chimed a bell of recognition.

  “You’re not a clone, I know that much,” Gerry said.

  The old man stopped laughing, the silence confirming the truth.

  “And you’re not chaos. None of this is chaos. It’s all very deliberate, and that’s what hurts the most, isn’t it? You, stuck in here, too scared to leave this place, unable to face what you did.”

  “The ties that bind, guide the blind.”

  “And you guided me all right,” Gerry said. “And now I see. I understand.”

  More silence.

  Gerry shined the torch on his face, illuminating every wrinkle, every liver spot. He didn’t turn away from the light. Couldn’t even see it, his blindness absolute. Even under all the effects of ageing, the sallow skin, the sunken eyes, Gerry saw.

  Gerry was no longer blind.

  “Well?” the old man said. “Who am I?” His voice grew loud as he shouted. “What’s my name? My name, boy, what is it? What’s my name?”

  “Your name is… Father.”

  The old man slumped back with a smile on his face and nodded his head slowly. “Now you see.”

  “Your name,” Gerry continued, “is Nolan Kirino. The first Nolan Kirino. The Family’s patriarch.”

  “Ahh,” Nolan said, tears streaming down his face. “You speak the truth, you see it, understand it, and know it. In all these decades, so many decades of sitting here in the dark, I’ve waited for just one of you to return and to see.”

  “Why?” Gerry said. “Why any of this? The cloning, the wars, the endless struggles.”

  “That’s for you to discover, my son, but my time has finally come to an end.”

  Gerry grabbed his wrist. “No, you need to explain a few things first.”

  “What is there to explain? You know everything there is to know: I am the first, yes, the one you found in the vault was the first clone, the ones that came after went their separate ways, but one… one remained, took my position as the head of the Family along with the clone of my wife, your mother, Amma. It was they who instigated the war and imprisoned us here. It was they who populated City Earth.”

  “Wait, so I’m just a clone of someone before the war?”

  “Not just someone. My son. My real son.”

  It made sense to Gerry then—why they brought him back after dying in his battle with Jasper, and why Enna now had the technology to bring him back from the data Petal had held. He rocked back on his heels, feeling a sense of age and immortality that this DNA he shared with this old man’s son had traversed so many iterations.

  And that’s where the recognition came in.

  Even through the layers of age, Gerry saw himself staring back at him with blind eyes. His DNA, his father, creator. Gerry eased his grip on Nolan’s wrist. A sudden wave of pity hit Gerry. How hard it must have been for this man, this pioneering genius, to have spawned the evil that carried out atrocities in his name, in his form.

  “What happened to your wife?” Gerry asked, his voice now trembling with the weight of the truth.

  Nolan raised his hand and pointed into a corner. Gerry raised the flashlight and saw the pale yellow bones reflecting back. Rats scurried over them, darting into the sha
dows. Gerry closed his eyes and wished he hadn’t looked.

  Nolan reached up a shaking hand and with his delicate fingers traced Gerry’s features.

  “You’re a very special boy,” he said with what sounded like pride. “Amma would have loved to see what you have achieved. But your work isn’t done. You still have time to atone for the sins of your father.”

  “What do you mean?” Gerry said.

  “The girl, taken by the ’borg… save her, save the human race. And destroy those codes. Destroy all the data, all of it. None of this can ever happen again. Do you understand? It all must die.”

  Nolan took his hand away and reached into his filthy robes. He pulled out an old pre-war revolver. With a shaking hand, he handed it to Gerry. “Please, it must start and end here.”

  At first Gerry refused, but Nolan pushed the gun into his hand. “Son, please, end the pain; I’ve waited for so long. I only ask you this one mercy. Let me be with your mother.”

  Gerry stood and dropped the flashlight. The gun weighed heavy in his hand. Tears streamed down his face. He felt the full weight of Nolan’s pain and grief. But this act…

  “Son, you are me, we’re the circle. Let it come around. End the old cycle, and start a new one, with peace. End my pain, son, please.”

  “I can’t… I’ve just found you!”

  “And you know it must be done.”

  ***

  Petal flinched at the sudden sound of a gunshot from the bunker, followed by a pain-filled wail. She grabbed her rifle and rushed through the throng of clones to the doorway. Before she reached it, Gerry staggered out, his face sodden with tears and speckled with blood.

  He collapsed to his knees and buried his head into his hands.

  Petal dropped her rifle and cradled him.

  They said nothing as he gripped onto her and let the tears flow.

  Holly and Jachz rushed over, asking what happened, but Petal tuned it all out as, via their VPN, Gerry explained what had just happened. It was all she could do to hold back her own tears at the tragic story and the shocking truth. She managed to drag Gerry away from the onlookers, which now, given the truth of the matter, took on a frightening new level of horror. How many of those mutated faces shared the same DNA as Gerry or Nolan?

  Walking with Gerry through a jungle path, they discovered an old rusted hangar.

  “Where are we?” she asked, the first time speaking aloud since the news.

  “Wait and see.” Although Gerry was trying to put on a brave face, Petal could tell he was still hurting inside. But that was one of the things she loved most about him: his sensitivity and ability to empathise. She imagined that many would have killed Nolan before any of the truth came out, and many would have killed him anyway regardless and felt nothing for the act, considering it justice.

  But Gerry could see beyond the black and white and the immediate facts. He looked beyond and into the person. Which is probably why Nolan had him do what he did.

  At least he was at peace now. Petal knew it would take Gerry some time, but right now she could tell from his body language that he had compartmentalised his emotions and was focused on recovering Jess and stopping the ’borg.

  Which was what they needed right now. They’d need Gerry in badass mode for as long as he could maintain his rage before the grief and weight of all he had learned took over. For when that happened, she’d be there to help pick up the pieces and make sense of all the madness.

  After all she had lost after the battle for Libertas and losing Gerry to Elliot, albeit temporarily, she’d be able to relate and help him through it.

  Petal followed Gerry around the hangar until they came to a door. Gerry entered the code and walked in. He flicked a switch, and the lights stuttered on. The place stank of rusted metal, dust, and damp.

  A variety of vehicles under tarps filled the hangar.

  At the far end of the hangar were two giant H-core refining funnels.

  She pulled the tarps off two quad bikes in white and grey Family colours. Under other tarps she found EV-scrambler bikes with thick, knobbly tyres. Still other tarps covered larger vehicles: cars, trucks, and a very early Jaguar-like craft.

  Gerry, on the other side of the hangar, saw her looking at it.

  — Ground vehicles only, remember?

  — Got it, boss.

  She was relieved that he had turned to humour. Even if it was just for now.

  — So what are we here for?

  — The EV-bikes. We’ll need them to get through the narrow jungle paths. It’s about fifty miles to the old dome. They’ll be our quickest option. The air-defence system is still active, so flight really isn’t an option.

  — Sounds good to me.

  Petal cleared the tarp completely off the scrambler and threw her leg over the seat.

  She flicked the switch on the handlebar dials, and a small green arrow flashed on the holographic display. A battery icon indicated it had approximately fifty-percent capacity with a range of a hundred and thirty-eight miles.

  Plenty enough juice to get them where they were going, and back again.

  And with a purely electric power supply, there was no worry about another H-core engine malfunction. She’d had enough of those to last a lifetime.

  Petal turned the engine on and gently twisted the throttle to ease the bike out through the maze of other vehicles until she reached the end of the hangar.

  Gerry followed and joined her by the doors. “Let’s go get the others and get these bikes loaded up. I don’t want to stay around any longer.”

  “Got it,” she said. “Are you okay, though? Are you sure you don’t want some time?”

  Gerry leaned over and kissed her passionately. “Quicker we get this done, the quicker we can go make a home.”

  “That’s a convincing argument.”

  Petal kissed him back and helped open the hangar door. They took the bikes back to Holly and Jachz and returned for another two.

  A few minutes later they were all ready: bikes loaded, weapons loaded, and the populace calm. Gal had taken a leadership role and promised that he would look out for this strange community—and that they would stay put. Gerry and Petal had promised them that they were safe here—and they were—and that they ought to just live their lives as best they could.

  Looking back at them, Petal felt a pang of grief grip her heart.

  These poor people didn’t deserve the fate that had befallen them.

  But at least they were now free, to an extent, to live without fear or threats.

  “Good luck!” Gal said, waving to them. The other clones waved them off too before filtering into their shacks and dwellings.

  Petal turned to Gerry.

  — You ready to finish this?

  — Let’s do it. One more time.

  With an expression of grim determination, Gerry turned to face the small path cut into the jungle trees. The bike’s lamps cut a tunnel through the gloom of the trees as he engaged the throttle and sped off. Petal gunned the motor and caught up. She looked in her mirrors to see Holly and Jachz following close behind. Holly stood up on the bike and, with a broad smile on her face, navigated the ruts and tree roots like a natural.

  Petal returned a smile and just hoped they all made it out of the fight alive.

  Chapter 23

  Gerry leaned into the wind and rode like there was no time at all left, and the truth was, that might well be the case. For an hour they sped through the jungle, following the path. It ran parallel to the fence and those huge arcing towers that powered the defence system.

  The first pink rays of dawn broke through the dense canopy of trees, giving the day a sense of new hope, the sins of the night forgotten for another twenty-four hours. But Gerry would never forget about any of this, least of all Nolan.

  A rage built within Gerry for what he had to do. A rage for what Nolan’s clones had done to him and the world. That he was a product of that cycle too only made it worse. How many of his clones had d
one evil deeds?

  Thoughts of his DNA haunted him. Did it too harbour the mental aberrations that caused his family to do all these terrible things? Maybe. But he had to put that aside for now. He slowed down, noticing he was leaving the others behind, and allowed himself to focus.

  He rode in that focused state for a further hour until finally they broke through the twisting, turning path, and before them, lit up by the full glow of dawn, rose the first dome. He slowed the bike to a stop. The smell of overheated motors mixed with the humid breeze of mulched vegetation and damp soil.

  The dome’s structure seemed to blister out of the earth.

  Trees didn’t grow for a fifty-metre perimeter around it. The metal lattice structure was the colour of dried blood, and the panels were misted and clouded by condensation and age, the materials clearly not as advanced as those that built Libertas.

  Petal, Holly and Jachz finally caught up and pulled up next to him.

  “So this is it, then,” Holly said, getting off the bike and wasting no time in slipping the backpack over her shoulder and lifting the rifle off the bike’s storage hooks. She moved easily, showing no fatigue from the ride.

  Gerry hopped off and felt the pain in his thighs and sit bones.

  “Yup, this is it,” he said. “I can sense the network. Using the data I got from the archive, we’ll need to head to the main control room. The layout is similar to Libertas, so once inside, we should be reasonably oriented.”

  “What’s the plan?” Jachz said.

  “Plan? There is no plan, there is just find Jess and kill the viroborg,” Gerry said. “No hesitation. Fire on sight.”

  “How do we approach?” Holly asked. “It feels a little exposed.”

  “Head on. There’s no other way inside. Any direction we approach is going to be exposed.”

  Gerry took his pack of supplies and placed the straps over his shoulders. He took the rifle off the bike and checked the ammo was seated and the safety off. Although he didn’t have all the targeting protocols from the Family’s last upgrades, he was still confident he’d be a decent shot if needed. The adrenaline was already flowing, concentrating his mind into a hyper-focussed state.