Paine grinned. “Professor Sanha there is not a zealot. He wants to live. No reminder needed.”
Suddenly, Paine planted one of his powerful, heavy arms on Samantha’s chest, digging with his clawed fingertips into her collarbone, causing her to scream out in anguish. “Now, tell me where the A.I. is...if you want to live.”
22
“Samantha, tell him what he wants to know!” Aldous urged as he watched his wife’s desperate plight through their mind’s eye connection. Simultaneously, three men with suspicious expressions were reaching the top of the escalator, each one of them eyeing Aldous directly. Aldous was already on his feet, ready to meet them.
“Can I help you?” asked the elder one in the trench coat—a man with a mostly bald head, save a few wisps of white hair clinging to the sides and back. His face was so badly worn that he appeared to be wearing a saggy, tired, flesh-colored mask. The two younger men that accompanied him didn’t look much better, but it was clear from their garb that they were security.
“Are you the optometrist?” Aldous asked.
“Yes,” the man replied. “I’m Dr. Lindholm. What is your business here?”
Aldous eyed the security officers. “I want to talk to you privately. I need your help.”
Lindholm scoffed. “I know what you need,” he replied with disdain. “I traveled a long way to get away from people like you. If you want to see my facilities, show me a warrant. I won’t tolerate spies.”
“I’m not a spy,” Aldous protested. “I don’t work for the government.”
Lindholm nearly laughed at Aldous’s assertion. “Is that right? You have that baby face, but you’re a local? Tell me, then, what is your secret? Why is it that the fallout is killing the rest of us but leaving you baby fresh?”
“If you give me a moment in private, I’ll explain.”
“I don’t need your explanation,” Lindholm snapped back. “I know where you’re from. You’ve lived your whole life in one of those government bio-domes in California! You’re a petulant little boy, and everyone knows it, so you’re trying to prove that you’re a man by volunteering to be a spy in this frozen, Godforsaken Hell! Well, if you wanted to have a chance in Hell of fooling us, you should have taken a radionuclide polonium-210 pill and removed the shine from that pretty face of yours. As it stands, your mission has failed. You were detected immediately. Go back and tell your superiors to shove it up their collective baby-fresh asses!”
While Lindholm ranted, Aldous watched his wife crying as Colonel Paine continued to dig his claws into her chest. “Samantha, for Christ’s sake, tell him!”
Lindholm and the two security officers exchanged quizzical expressions as they watched Aldous’s exchange with a person that only he could see. Their suspicions suddenly shifted from government affiliation to schizophrenia. Either way, they wanted nothing to do with him.
“Get him out of here!” Lindholm ordered the two guards.
Aldous waved his hand through the air in front of him, green energy flashing from his hand and dropping the two guards instantly, leaving them unconscious. He looked up at Lindholm. “Open the door now.”
Suddenly terrified, Lindholm fumbled to remove a security ID card from his wallet, his hands shaking as he swiped it over the lock, the glass door immediately clicking open. “Wh-who are you?” Lindholm asked.
“Help me get these two men inside,” Aldous said, ignoring the question.
Lindholm acquiesced and bent over, grunting as he grasped one of the two men under the arms and began dragging him inside his office.
“I’m sorry I don’t have time to be gentler about this,” Aldous began to explain as he dragged the second man through the threshold, “but I’ve run out of time. I need you to help me save my wife’s life.”
23
Craig watched helplessly as the bow of the Titanic slammed head on into the iceberg. The iceberg and the ship suffered equally in the collision, each one seemingly crumbling at the point of impact. As ice exploded in a thunderous percussion, cracking off the side of the iceberg and spinning into the ocean and onto the deck of the Titanic, so, too, did the wooden deck of the Titanic explode into a shower of splinters, a portion the size of a basketball court peeling itself back as though some massive invisible can opener was at work. The outer hull on both the port and starboard sides crumpled, folding accordion-like as the entire weight of Titanic collapsed upon the ship’s front before both the iceberg and the ship threw each other off, each one bouncing back from the other, bobbing violently like children’s toys in a bathtub as waves more than a meter high radiated out in every direction.
“I’ve established an auditory connection, Craig,” the A.I. Informed, “just in time to catch the violence of the collision. That was far more violent than the collision that occurred in our own timeline, but hopefully the hull will have kept its integrity. How does it look?”
“It looks...bad,” Craig said, barely able to blink as he watched the world’s largest ship bobbing in the ocean as though it were God’s plaything. “We may have just done more harm than good.”
“We should investigate,” the A.I. suggested. “Stand by for a moment. I think I am close to establishing a visual connection. I can help you look for holes in the hull below the waterline.”
Craig nodded as he continued to pant, breathing heavily as the adrenaline rushed throughout his body. “I’ll stand by. I don’t really have anywhere to go.” He suddenly remembered how cold he’d felt just minutes earlier, but the adrenaline had sent his heart racing, warming him quickly. “How’s my body temperature? Am I going to be okay?”
“It’s rising,” the A.I. replied. “I’ve managed to tap into some of your nans’ systems and was able to facilitate a warming process by having the nans artificially produce extra adenosine triphosphate. That, along with your high heart rate and increased cortisol levels, had your body temperature rising. The nans broke down a lot of glucose to generate the extra ATP, so you’d better grab something sweet to eat when we go back onboard. You need to replenish yourself.”
“Heh. I was wondering why I was so hungry. Thanks. Hey, if I have all these nanobots in my body, then why wasn’t I able to stop breathing earlier when I did the Freitas test?”
“Freitas? You are referring to respirocytes?”
“Yes.”
“You do not harbor any of those at the moment. Respirocytes were a first-generation nanobot technology. In fact, it is a bit of stretch to even refer to them as nanobots. Each one, in essence, consisted of eighteen billion atoms arranged as a tiny pressure tank, filled with oxygen and carbon dioxide. The nans you currently have in your system are far more sophisticated.”
“Well, excuse me, but I liked respirocytes, and I sure as hell coulda used ‘em to breathe for me when I was stuck underwater going through useless set-up screens.”
“I understand your frustration. I’ve logged your complaint, and I will take your concerns into consideration in future iterations of the system setup.”
Craig looked up at the stars and shook his head, disbelieving. “Amazing. I’ve got tech support in my head, and I’m still getting brushed off. Hey, why don’t you put me on hold and blast me with some elevator music?”
“Elevator music?”
“Never mind.”
“Craig, I’ve established an optical connection,” the A.I. said, a hint of excitement in his voice. “I can see the Titanic.”
“Look at the damage we’ve done!” Craig said as he flew to the bow of the ship and let the A.I. get a closer look at the hull’s rippled surface. “I don’t see how she’ll stay afloat now.”
“In 1907, the German liner, SS Kronprinz Wilhelm rammed an iceberg and suffered a crushed bow, just as the Titanic has. She was able to complete her voyage unaided. As I said earlier, the Titanic was, and is, a much sturdier ship than people realize. It was the fact that it hit the iceberg with a glancing blow and suffered several small breaches of her hull as she passed by, filling too many of
the water-tight compartments, that led to her foundering. Unless there is a massive hull breach below the waterline, she should be fine.”
“Okay. So I guess we should have a look?”
“Indeed. With your permission, Craig, I am ready to take control of your flight systems.”
“Permission granted,” Craig replied, “but how will I get air once I’m encapsulated in that energy cocoon without respirocytes?”
“The suit you are wearing is lined with microscopic pressure tanks that will do the job better than the respirocytes ever could. You have several days worth of air in your clothing, and it self-replenishes.”
“Ah. I wish I’d known that earlier.”
“Are you ready, Craig?”
“I’m ready.”
The A.I. ignited Craig’s cocoon once again, and they dropped like a stone down into the dark abyss.
24
“Even if you’re able to produce forgeries of the devices, the procedure would be irreversible!” Dr. Lindholm protested as Aldous desperately worked to connect his mind’s eye to the antiquated computer equipment in the optometrist’s office.
“I can reverse it,” Aldous replied, barely paying attention to the protests of his hostage as he worked feverishly to connect to the Internet so he could begin his search for the information files he needed.
For a few moments, Lindholm was dumbfounded. He rebooted his line of argument. “Even if that were the case, do you realize how long the recovery time would be for such a procedure?”
“Probably about twenty minutes once I reactivate my nanobots,” Aldous replied dryly as he continued working.
“Nanobots?” Lindholm reacted, his back suddenly straightening as though he’d been kicked.
The two monitors atop the desk suddenly flashed on, mirroring Aldous’s mind’s eye. One monitor displayed the ghastly visage of Colonel Paine as he held Samantha above him with one hand, his fingers continuing to slowly burrow into her collarbone. Lindholm gasped when he saw the scene, his hands suddenly clasping on his temples as he heard Samantha’s blood curdling screams. “Ach mein Gott.”
“That’s my wife,” Aldous said. He turned to Lindholm. “She’s being tortured by that Purist government super soldier, and if I can’t rescue her soon, he will kill her.”
Lindholm nodded, his breath caught in his mouth as he tried to speak. “And you’re a...post-human.”
“That’s right.”
“There were rumors. I couldn’t believe them.”
“We’re real—or at least we were. For all I know, there may be only a handful of us left,” Aldous replied. He turned back to the other screen, which displayed the information from Aldous’s Web search.
“How are you controlling the computer?” Lindholm asked.
“With my mind—a device we call the mind’s eye. I’ll teach you more about it once we’ve dealt with more pressing matters.”
Lindholm’s eyes widened as he studied Aldous’s side profile. “You—you’re related to him. You’re related to Aldous Gibson, aren’t you? Are you his son?”
Aldous shook his head as he continued to search through the Web with his mind, his wife’s cries for help continuing concomitantly. “Not his son,” he replied. “I am Aldous Gibson, Herr Doktor.”
“Dear lord. Dear lord, you’ve really done it. You’ve achieved immortality, as you always claimed you would.”
A sudden shriek from Samantha, far worse than any of her previous wails, snapped Aldous’s attention away from his research.
Paine threw Samantha down with a frustrated grunt; she remained attached to the board on which she’d been tortured, and it crashed, along with her, on its side. She’d been through more physical pain than any human could endure and survive, her post-humanity now working against her, cruelly repairing the damage as though she were Prometheus, ready for the eagle to peck out her ever-regenerating liver once again.
“For the love of Christ, Samantha,” Aldous said, exasperated and near tears, “I told you to just tell him. It will buy time.”
“She can hear you?” Lindholm asked. His question was ignored.
“Never!” Samantha suddenly belted at the top of her lungs, her eyes wild with animalistic hatred as she bared her teeth and screamed at the cyborg monstrosity before her. “Never! NEVER!”
Paine smiled. “You see? Zealot.” His smile suddenly melted, replaced by a frightening determination as he strode to her and sank his claws back into her chest. She shrilled.
“Oh Christ!” Aldous cursed, his eyes unblinking. As he watched the horrific spectacle through his wife’s eyes, Sanha’s unconscious body suddenly came into view. “Sanha,” he whispered to himself before switching out of Samantha’s mind’s eye and establishing a connection to Sanha, but the screen was blank. “Sanha! Wake up! Sanha! Wake up!”
A strip of light appeared briefly and vanished before it reappeared and Sanha blinked awake.
“Sanha! It’s me, Aldous! You have to stop him! You have to stop him!”
“I-I can’t,” Sanha whispered in return. “We’re no match for him.”
Paine suddenly stopped, his head cocking as the extraordinarily sensitive microphone in his aural implant picked up Sanha’s words. He craned his neck, his golden irises falling on Sanha. “You say something, sport?”
“Oh no,” Sanha whispered.
Paine dropped Samantha once again, his eyes never leaving Sanha. “You got a rider in there?”
“No. Please!”
Paine strode to Sanha and reached down with his hellish talons, yanking Sanha up and thrusting his back against the wall. Paine’s face was now only inches from Sanha’s as he looked closely into his eyes, searching for signs that Sanha was using his mind’s eye. “Who are you talking to?”
“Tell him, Sanha,” Aldous said.
Sanha remained silent.
Paine suddenly grinned—a sadistic victory pulling his lips taut, curling them back to reveal yellow teeth. “I bet I know who it is. It’s the devil himself in there, ain’t it? Hello there, Professor Gibson.”
“Tell him, Sanha,” Aldous repeated.
“It...it is Aldous Gibson,” Sanha blubbered, terrified. “You’re right.”
Paine nodded before dropping Sanha to the ground. He put his hand under Sanha’s chin as though he were a father filming Christmas morning, setting his camera on a tripod. “Don’t take your eyes off this, sport. I don’t want the professor to miss a second.”
“Oh no,” Aldous whispered. “Sanha!” he shouted. “Tell him where the A.I. is!”
“But I don’t know where it is—”
“The Planck! The Planck! We sent it through the Planck! Tell him!” Aldous shouted back frantically.
Paine had already scooped Samantha up with one arm, holding the back of the board and displaying Aldous’s wife like Christ on the cross as the hand on his other arm began to spin like a drill. “You like to watch, professor?” Paine shouted over the sound of the drill.
“The Planck! They sent it through the Planck!” Sanha screeched.
Paine’s face suddenly went white, and he stopped the spinning of his hand, dropping Samantha a second afterward.
She thudded onto the concrete, the board falling on its side once again. Aldous could see her clearly through Sanha’s point of view.
“What did you say?” Paine asked Sanha, his voice suddenly icy.
“The Planck,” Sanha repeated, his chest heaving as his heart raced. “They sent the A.I. through the Planck. That’s why we couldn’t find it before. They sent it through.”
“Planck?” Paine said, his expression filled with a rare display of fear. “As in Planck energy?”
Sanha nodded, surprised that the brutish Paine knew what Planck energy was.
“As in, you unimaginably stupid bastards have sent an artificial intelligence into another universe?”
Sanha didn’t respond. He was stunned that Paine was versed enough in the technology to immediately guess its use.
Aldous was stunned too. Paine, besides being extraordinarily cruel and remorseless, also defied Aldous’s expectations for a Luddite. Only a small handful of people worldwide even knew what Planck energy was, let alone its possible implications.
Paine shook his head as he stared downward at his boots, thinking through this latest development. He paced for a moment as he continued to mull over his options. After his short internal deliberation, he nodded and turned back to Sanha. “Can you operate the Planck? Can I send a team in after the A.I.?”
Sanha remained silent for a moment, waiting for Aldous’s advice.
“Tell him you can,” Aldous said.
“Yes,” Sanha replied.
Paine noted the delay and shook his head. “Professor Gibson doing all your thinking for you now, sport?”
“No,” Sanha replied, more quickly this time. “No. I can operate the Planck platform. If they sent the A.I. through, the platform would have gone with it, but we have older versions of the platform that are safe. It will just take me a little while to make them operational.”
Paine’s expression remained frozen, the sadistic joy he seemed to take in torturing Samantha now at an end. “You better not be lying to me, sport. If you are...” Paine retrieved Samantha once again, lifting her as he had before, displaying her for both Sanha and Aldous. His other hand suddenly moved aside, a ten-inch serrated blade jutting out in an instant from his wrist.
“Go to Hell,” Samantha spat.
“After you.” Paine swiped at her neck with such preternatural speed and force that he decapitated the love of both Aldous’s and Craig’s lives in one swift, cruel motion.
“No!” Aldous shouted as he jumped to his feet, his eyes disbelieving.
The screen went blank as Sanha shut his eyes.
Post-Human Series Books 1-4 Page 13