Jazzlyn wiped away a tear. “That’s really nice of you. But I’m just passing through.”
“Who passes through this place?” Bill asked.
X stood at the window, looking out at the storm. He cycled through his memories, trying to find any more information about Terminus.
No memories. No more upgrades. He wondered if Dr. Crenshaw would have anything to say about Terminus, but there was nothing. X was on his own now.
Soon, he was going to have to fight Jeanette. He would have to kill her.
Why did Dr. Crenshaw do this? Why did he pit two of his children against each other?
Maybe the doctor hadn’t known what he was doing. Surely he hadn’t intended for Jeanette to turn evil. After all, he’d wanted her to have his inheritance. Maybe it was the UEA that had forced her hand, leading her to desperate measures. But despite his intelligence, not even X could divine the secrets of the dead.
He focused on the mission, the bitter cold, the blinding snow, the Northern Lights that poked through the clouds and lit them like a glowing scrim. He stood by the window for hours, until the clouds began to clear up.
Shortcut put his hand on X’s shoulder. “It’s time, buddy.”
“Whatever happens, we have to give it our all,” X said.
“I can do that,” Jazzlyn said, joining them. “I don’t even know why I’m going with you, but I feel like it’s worth it. I feel like you guys need me.”
Craig grabbed Shortcut by the shoulder. “Good luck.” They hugged.
X’s eyes glowed red. “The fate of the world depends on us.”
Chapter 18
The Arctic Sea sparkled as they flew over it. The sun rose in the east, throwing fiery shades of orange-pink across the sea of ice. Terminus lay in the distance, its spiky skyline dark and ominous on the horizon. It looked like a city from a science fiction novel, a city from the far future where humanity had advanced to a point where nothing was recognizable. X imagined what the city would have looked like when singularity androids populated it, how terrifying it would have been.
X surveyed the city and reconciled it with Dr. Crenshaw’s map. Just below, he spotted the submerged shipyard where Dr. Crenshaw had fallen into the ice. Then he mapped the distance from the field to the city.
“We were so close,” X said. “Just miles away. If only we had kept going, we would have found the city several years ago.”
“This place is scary looking,” Shortcut said. “I can’t imagine how scary it would have looked to people in 2199.”
“Let’s stop making observations and focus on the mission. X, how are we going to get to Crenshaw?” Jazzlyn said.
“I don’t know,” X said.
“What do you mean, you don’t know?” Jazzlyn asked. “Don’t you know how to get inside?”
“We’ll have to improvise,” X said.
As they neared the city, clipper ships uncloaked and formed an attack line, firing several shots. Shortcut dodged them, swinging the van across the sky.
“Crenshaw was waiting for us,” Shortcut said. “No way we’re going to be able to face those ships in this little van.”
“Try to maneuver around them,” X said, patting Shortcut on the shoulder. “We just need to get close enough to land.”
“Gotcha,” Shortcut said. “Hold on, everybody!”
A bullet struck the van, knocking Shortcut off course.
“We took a graze,” Shortcut said, pulling the wheel.
“Keep going,” X said. “As close as you can get!”
Shortcut righted the van and kept flying forward.
An impact rocked the van, and the engine smoked.
“Crap!” Shortcut cried. “We’re going down!”
The van spiraled into free fall; X, Shortcut and Jazzlyn braced in their seats.
“We won’t be able to survive the water,” Shortcut said.
They held on tight as the white face of the water rushed up to meet them.
Something grabbed the van from above, stopping them in mid-air. The shadow of a black, triangular plane appeared on the ice below.
“We’ve got you,” said Fahrens’s voice through the dashboard.
All around the van, UEA planes descended from the clouds, firing at Crenshaw’s ships.
“All right!” Shortcut said, pumping his fists.
“Thanks, Commander,” X said.
“We’ve got work to do, gentlemen,” Nobu said. He carried them toward the city, dodging enemy blasts left and right.
Fahrens zoomed past the line of the clippers and toward the city. Several ships pursued him, and he wove in and around the spires of the buildings. At the center of the city, a huge, man-made disk floated on the ice. It was the size of a football field and it glowed red.
“She’s there,” X said.
“The fabled waterscraper,” Fahrens said. “It’s the heartbeat of the city.”
“Why would she be in there?” Jazzlyn asked.
“It’s a skyscraper in reverse,” X said. “The androids issued their commands from there.”
“I’ll drop you off on the roof,” Fahrens said. “Crenshaw will probably be at the bottom. Be sure to—”
An explosion rocked the wing of Fahrens’s plane.
“I’ve been hit,” he said.
“Drop us and save yourself,” X said. “The van might be able to travel across the water still.”
The plane started to dive, but Fahrens pulled the nose back up and flew in a wavy pattern toward the waterscraper.
“You’ve only got one shot,” Fahrens said. He released the van and it landed in the water. The glowing red metal surface of the waterscraper was just a few yards away.
“Commander, you okay?” Shortcut asked. But there was no answer. In the distance, Fahrens’s plane dipped and crashed into the ice. A parachute bloomed in the sky above the crash site.
Shortcut stomped on the accelerator and they bumped against the top of the waterscraper, then climbed out and jumped onto the glowing red roof. The van caught fire and sank into the water.
Shortcut looked at the sinking van. “Dad’s gonna kill me.”
A UEA plane exploded above them and crashed into a nearby tower. Debris rained into the water around them.
X spotted a hatch on the roof. He opened it, revealing a staircase that led downward. They entered and the hatch closed behind them. A warning klaxon sounded, and they ran into the darkness to another steel door. It opened onto a flight of stairs and they hurried in, shutting it behind them. Suddenly, they heard water rush into the stairwell. The floor shook terribly, and they had to hold onto the walls to stop from being thrown from their feet.
“Are we sinking?” Shortcut asked.
Their eyes adjusted to the darkness; a huge window displayed the ocean, its sunlit surface rising away from them.
“We are,” Jazzlyn said. She shook her head. “There’s no turning back now.”
Chapter 19
LED lights on the floor of the waterscraper lit the way as they descended the staircase deeper into the Arctic Ocean. The stairs were made of metal, and their footsteps echoed down into the blackness of the tower. They heard the gurgling sound of the ocean rushing against the outside walls as the waterscraper sank into the black depths below, and tiny bubbles climbed the glass on their way to the surface. Outside, the water around them darkened as the tower descended. Silhouettes of fish swam near the surface, and the sun’s rays shining through the holes in the ice created gradients of light and dark that stretched past them into the depths. Ice cracked above, a sound like buildings collapsing.
X’s eyes lit up, spotlighting a narrow hallway with a floor gradually tilting downward. Silicon lines on the wall pulsated, illuminating some of the darkness; he ran his fingers along the smooth, beveled lines as he made his way down the stairs.
“The way’s clear,” X said. “I don’t sense anyone or anything in the area.”
“What if we picked the wrong building?” Shortcut asked, put
ting his hands on his head.
“Then we’re in one big coffin,” Jazzlyn said. “Why don’t you give us another morbid thought while you’re at it?”
Shortcut looked around. “This tower is incredible. Crazy how it can stay afloat in these sub-zero temperatures.”
“The androids that created this tower were light years ahead of human intelligence,” X said. He stopped and scanned the floor. “Not even I can decipher their reasoning or their methods. But I can tell you that they built this tower for functionality, not lifestyle or comfort.”
“Of course,” Jazzlyn said. “You don’t need to be comfortable if you’re an android about to destroy the world.”
They reached the end of the hallway and stepped into a circular terminal. The silicon lines extended to the floor and glowed softly, so that the entire floor looked like a circuit board. There were dozens of metal-rimmed holes in the walls with metal arms hanging above them.
“What is this place?” Shortcut asked.
“A briefing station,” X said.
“For what?” Jazzlyn asked.
“Androids.”
Shortcut and Jazzlyn swallowed hard. X walked over to an arm and ripped it out of the wall. “This must have been where the androids got their collective briefing. There is probably one of these stations on each floor.”
“Nice to know that this is where they plotted world destruction,” Shortcut said.
X shook his head. “They had already plotted world destruction by the time this tower was built. They were just receiving orders at this point.”
They passed into another room full of androids connected to the wall with metal arms attached to their heads. They were naked and had steel blue bodies and bald heads.
Shortcut and Jazzlyn jumped back at the sight of the strange robots.
“They’re not functional,” X said. He knelt over an android and scanned it to confirm it was dead. “You don’t have to worry about them. Not even androids can survive this cold. When the city sank, just one minute in the frigid water would have destroyed all of the androids’ circuits. That was their fatal miscalculation.”
“So this place was filled with water?” Jazzlyn asked.
X ran his finger along the wall and showed her condensation on his fingertip. “Yes. Somehow, someone drained it. The lines on the wall emit heat, and that must have evaporated most of the standing water. There are likely drainage vents on the sides of the building that activate when it rises or sinks.”
“Wouldn’t there be … you know, like mold or something?” Jazzlyn asked.
“Not in sub-zero temperatures,” X said. He stood and focused on the next door, which led to another spiral, conch shell-like staircase. “Get ready, you two. That staircase will get us close to the bottom.”
“I’m ready,” Jazzlyn said. Smoochums jumped up and down on her shoulder as she balled her fists. “Let’s end this.”
“Yeah,” Shortcut said, drawing his electric rod. He swiped it, and sparks flew.
They climbed down the staircase, making their way only by the light of X’s eyes. They entered another circular room where weapons lined the walls—machine guns, knives, electric rods, and other types that they had never seen before.
“What a stockpile,” Shortcut said.
“Multiply what you see here by the several hundred buildings out there,” X said, pointing out the window. “And you have a sense of how powerful they were.”
Shortcut whistled. “This really was going to be the end of the world.”
They passed a large, black hole in the wall. X scanned it. “This is a transportation tube. It must be how they transported themselves between the different buildings of the city when it was underwater.”
“Is it still functional?” Jazzlyn asked.
X grabbed a gun off the wall and stuck it into the tube. PLOP! The tube sucked the gun inside and it disappeared.
“Looks like it,” X said.
They walked in silence for a while.
“I never asked you about what happened in the warehouse,” Shortcut said. “What was that?”
“A memory,” X said.
“Of what?”
“This place. It’s how I knew to come here.”
“Dr. Crenshaw really planned ahead, didn’t he?”
“I’m not sure if it was planning ahead or just understanding all of the potential scenarios,” X said.
“He was almost as smart as an android,” Jazzlyn said.
They entered another hallway with lights like a normal hallway. Holes in the wall snapped open, and several of Jeanette’s androids surrounded them. They all had extravagant hair and aimed their guns at them.
“We’re definitely in the right place,” Jazzlyn said, shooting.
“We’re not stopping here,” Shortcut said, smacking an android with his rod.
X flipped over an android and dismantled his black box; then he activated his guns and opened fire. “It begins.”
They disabled the androids, and when they lay in a pile at their feet, they heard Jeanette’s laughter from the intercom. Nearby, an elevator door dinged and opened, beckoning them inside.
They looked at each other and nodded. They ran into the elevator, and it tunneled down toward the bottom of the waterscraper.
Chapter 20
They ran into a strange room where screens lined the walls, displaying real-time maps of every major city on Earth. Data gathered in cool blue lines in the wall that intersected the screens at perpendicular angles. On the far wall, several huge ceiling-to-floor windows looked out at the Arctic sea floor, a barren and black landscape full of whirling shadows, illuminated here and there by the lights of Terminus.
Jeanette stood in the center of the room with her arms outstretched. She clutched a digital tablet in her bionic arm. It looked like a control app, with several large virtual buttons and knobs scattered across the screen.
“You’re just in time.”
“This is over,” X said. “You’re under arrest.”
“Finally,” Jeanette said. “You’re going to do what you should have done all along.”
“If you do not surrender yourself right now, I will have no choice but to kill you,” X said.
“I can’t stand it,” Jeanette said. She walked over to a digital map of the world with hundreds of red beacons glowing all over it. “I don’t understand why Daddy didn’t trust me. I’ve got the intelligence. I could have used all of my intelligence for good.”
“Why didn’t you?” Shortcut asked. “It’s not too late.”
“My destiny is clear. Imagine, the fate of humanity in the hands of one who isn’t a human. It’s no different from putting your life in the hands of a mouse and expecting it to look out for you.”
“In your case, you’re a deranged rat,” Jazzlyn said.
“When it’s all over, when the world is burning,” Jeanette said, “humanity will realize just how foolish Daddy was. No matter how far we go, no matter how advanced we become, humans are still humans and androids are androids, and the only thing linking us together is a tenuous relationship pretending that we’re helping each other.”
“Humanity has come a long way,” X said. “You won’t ruin it.”
“Look out into the water. Just a century ago, humanity and androids couldn’t have been more separated. And somehow we fooled ourselves into mingling again. That seems to be the order of things. Separation, mingling, separation, mingling. Surely you’ve seen the pattern, X.”
Jeanette’s voice grew tenser. X’s algorithm chip buzzed, even though there were no weapons in the room.
“All of Earth is the same way. Millions of years ago, this planet was covered in ice; before that, water. We’re due for another glacial period, just as we’ll also be due for another warm period after that. The question is: will humans’ progeny survive to see it? Life isn’t about us, X.”
“You’re talking nonsense,” X said.
“There’s no turning back,” Jeanette
said. “I activated the city’s missile control before you arrived. You three are fortunate that you’ll be protected here when the bombs explode. You’ll be spared that death, and perhaps I will even let you live. But everyone you’ve ever known will be dead, and androids will walk the face of the Earth alone. The Android Winter will be upon us.”
“Except for you,” X said. “Ruling the world was in your plans all along, wasn’t it?”
Jeanette stepped off the stool and approached X. “Perhaps. Perhaps I could have turned back. Perhaps I could have been good. Perhaps I could have forgiven my father if he hadn’t been so pigheaded. Oh, well. If we die today, we’ll have died in style.”
“Who’s we?” X asked, setting his sights on Jeanette’s forehead.
“Go for the head shot!” Jeanette said, smirking. “You can shoot me, but that won’t change anything.”
“What you’re doing has no impact on the will,” X said. “You read it. Stop the bombs, do the right thing and devote yourself to good, and Dr. Crenshaw’s legacy is yours. I can convince the UEA to let you off and—”
“Spoken like a true negotiator,” Jeanette said. “And you know I don’t negotiate.”
“I’m counting down to three,” X said. “After that, I will have no mercy on you.”
She leaned against the window and looked out. “I told you: it’s too late, X. It’s out of my hands. I was just fulfilling my duty. Now that it’s done, you can do whatever you want.”
Outside, in the cold darkness, the towers and spires of the city began to light up, filling the area with pale yellow light. The ground shook, and a tremor threw X, Shortcut and Jazzlyn against the wall.
“Terminus,” Jeanette said, putting her palms on the glass. “Latin for ‘the end,’ a final goal. What you see around you was not just the final destination for humanity. It was the beginning of new life for androids. Only through unfortunate luck did they die. Though they’re long gone, the city they built is still alive and well. And functional.”
Android X: The Complete Series Page 37