by Thom Parsons
Something beyond the walls of The White Room was heading straight for them, and Owen didn’t intend to hang around and see just what it was. With his hands still clasped tightly over his ears, he started backing away from the noise and towards the only door that led out of The White Room. Ethan immediately noticed what Owen was doing and then he too made a move, following Archer's lead towards the exit.
Out of nowhere, the noise stopped. Silence filled the void that the screeching noise of metal upon metal left behind. Owen was honestly terrified. This was it. This was the calm before the storm. And the calm only lasted a matter of seconds.
The red walls surrounding Owen and Ethan began to crack. Pieces of the wall fell forwards onto the red floor, allowing the two of them to see into the digital void beyond The White Room.
Through the cracks, came freezing cold, heavy bursts of wind which hit Owen hard, throwing his rough and matted hair backwards and forced his eyes to squint. On top of all that, there was the sound. The loud noise of metal upon metal had returned, albeit louder than before, forcing Owen to once again cover his ears in an attempt to shield them from the penetrating sound.
PRoGRaM was trying to overload his senses. He desperately needed to escape. He couldn't stay here, especially when The White Room was just seconds away from collapsing. Huge chunks of the walls were missing now, causing the wind to become impossibly strong. The entire room shook violently, throwing Owen off balance and dropping him down to the floor. The wind was knocked right out of him as he hit the ground. He watched as an entire portion of The White Room wall collapsed. There's no escaping this. Any second now the roof will cave in and kill me. I wonder if I’ll ever wake up from this one.
Unexpectedly, he felt a hand on his shoulder. Owen quickly turned his head and looked up, finding that Ethan was stood right there behind him with a hard determined look on his face. He reached out his hand, offering Owen a way up.
“We need to get out now!” Ethan shouted loudly at him, speaking up over the strong forces of wind. Owen quickly reached out and gripped Ethan’s hand tightly. Within seconds he was up on his feet and being pulled towards the exit of The White Room. As to where it leads? Anywhere but here and I'll be happier.
"Get out of here!" Ethan screamed as he pulled Owen forwards. Together, the two of them crossed the threshold out of The White Room. Owen couldn't help but look behind, and found himself staring at nothing but destruction. The White Room had finally collapsed in on itself. There was no going back now.
To Owen, it was clear… The only way that he and Ethan were going to get out of this alive was if the two of them worked together. The entire digital landscape of PRoGRaM had changed for the worse, and right now there was only one task on Owen’s mind.
Survive.
Chapter Sixty One
Date: December 13th 2035
Location: Owen’s Apartment, New York
“What the hell is going on Nick?” Kate asked with urgency. The three monitors that Nick had set up in front of him looked scrambled and unintelligible, even to someone as skilled as Nick.
“There’s something wrong with PRoGRaM,” he said as he stopped typing and turned to look directly at her. “I think it’s some kind of virus.”
“A virus?” Kate asked, unsure of the implications.
“Shit. Shit! Why didn't I see this coming before I put them in there?" he asked himself rhetorically. "I think Ethan did something to our PRoGRaM device. Something’s happening in there. Something’s going horribly wrong,” he continued as he turned back to the screens and typed away, trying desperately to get his system into the base code of the PRoGRaM devices.
“What are you doing?” she asked.
“I’m saving Owen,” he said confidently. “I’m saving both of them. I think I can re-write the code… Maybe.”
Kate turned away slowly, not wanting to disturb him, understanding completely that there was absolutely nothing she could do to help the situation. But on the inside, Kate was conflicting. What am I supposed to do now? Who's side am I supposed to be on here? Nobody will tell me what's happening anymore. Not since Eli…
A sudden thought crossed her mind.
A dangerous thought. But if Nick was to catch me…
Kate slowly and unsuspiciously walked away from Nick and headed towards the other side of the room, trying not to do anything suspicious that could draw attention to herself. Not that it was too difficult to pull off. Nick was drawn completely into his work. She walked across the main room of Owen's apartment and into the kitchen which still left her in full view of Nick, yet just out of earshot.
She kept her eyes on him as she pulled her phone out of her pocket and punched a number in that was committed to memory, before hitting the dial key. She brought the phone up to her ear and waited anxiously for it to begin ringing. It didn't help her impatience with the fact that she was calling a secured number. It took considerably longer to connect their phones together.
The phone stopped ringing as Kate heard a faint click noise. The boss had picked up on the other end of the line… but they didn’t say hello. They didn’t say anything. They were just listening, waiting for Kate to make the first move.
She held her breath nervously before plucking up the courage to speak. There was no point beating around the bush with this one. This wasn't Ethan she was talking to like usual. This was the guy in charge of everything.
“What have you done?” she asked quietly down the phone, talking just above a whisper so that Nick couldn’t hear her. She kept her eyes trained on him, watching what he was doing at all times. A modulated, unidentifiable voice spoke back down the phone, answering Kate.
“What needed to be done,” it said emotionlessly.
Kate wasn’t sure how to respond. She took a few seconds to think about her next question before putting it to her boss. “What do I do?”
“Let it happen,” the modulated voice on the other end of the line said. “We’re sick of playing games now. It’s not been an easy decision. It's time to end this.”
Beep. Beep.
The boss had hung up. They had said what they had needed to say and then cut the line. Simple as that.
Let it happen.
Kate knew what it meant. It meant stopping Nick from interfering with what Ethan had set up. “How’s it looking?” she shouted to him from the kitchen, raising her voice so that he could hear her.
“At the minute… well, I won’t lie, it’s not looking good," he shouted back to her without even turning his gaze away from the monitors. She walked back into the main room, holding two glasses of water which she placed down on the central table.
“What’s happening in there?” Kate asked as she walked over to where Nick was set up, genuinely curious as to what was going on in the digital world.
“I have no idea,” Nick said, still typing away at the keyboard in front of him. “It could be anything and everything by the looks of it.”
“Is there anything you can do?” she asked, probing him for information.
“I think I’ve got an idea,” he replied. “A way to kick the virus out of the system. It’s a bit radical, but it might just work… and save them both in the process.”
It was exactly the kind of answer that Kate was afraid of hearing. Nick sounded confident, like he knew what he was doing and that he could, in fact, save both Owen and Ethan. It meant only one thing for her.
It was time to make a move and stop him.
She stepped back slowly from Nick's base of operations, attempting to put a little bit of distance between the two of them before she pulled a gun out from a hidden holster on the inside of her jacket. Uncomfortably, she held it with both hands, finger on the trigger, and pointed it directly at the back of Nick’s head.
He didn’t have any idea what was coming.
Kate just stood there pointing the gun at him, knowing what she had to do, but at the same time, not wanting to go through with it.
Just as she was about to convi
nce herself to pull the trigger, Nick turned his head slightly to look at her. His eyes went wide as soon as he spotted the gun.
“Whoa! Kate!” he shouted in surprise. He stood up quickly at the sight of the gun and put both of his hands out in front of him, as if this would help him stop a bullet. “What are you doing?!” he screamed out at her.
“Sit down,” she said to him with no emotion in her voice at all. She flicked her weapon down towards the chair which he had just jumped up out of. Reluctantly, he followed her orders, but he never took his eyes off her, or the weapon in her hands. He carefully slumped down into the chair in which he had been sat only seconds before. He wasn’t interested in what was on the screens right now. All of his attention was focused on the gun pointed in his direction.
“Stay right there."
“You’re working with Ethan,” Nick spat at her, figuring it out instantly. “You’re the fourth person.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about Nick,” she said back to him sharply as she slowly began moving forwards. Nick watched intently as she edged towards him, gun tight in her hand. If she gets close enough, maybe I can disarm her…
“Don’t,” she said, immediately seeing the thoughts of resistance cross his mind. “This isn’t about you Nick.”
“Then what is it about?” he said back to her slowly, trying to figure it all out in his head.
“The one thing that it’s always been about. It’s about Owen.”
Chapter Sixty Two
Date: December 13th 2035
Location: PRoGRaM (CORRUPTION DETECTED)
“Move!” Ethan screamed at Owen as the two of them ran away from The White Room's imminent danger and out onto the streets of New York City. Has PRoGRaM really got no-where better to take us?
The world of PRoGRaM was different. Owen could see it and feel it straight off the bat. The sky was a dark shade of red, almost like blood in colour, giving an eerily tense vibe to the world. There was something not quite right about this place that they had entered. There was something different in the air. Something new. Something dangerous. But Owen couldn't quite put his finger on it.
Ethan ran forwards quickly. "Get in there!" he shouted as he pointed to a nearby convertible with its roof down parked on the edge of the sidewalk. He jumped into the car and dropped himself down into the drivers seat of the convertible, attempting to start it up as fast as he possibly could.
“Owen!” he called out loudly from the drivers seat. “Get in!”
Trusting this man stood against everything that Owen had been working towards, but right now he was at a disadvantage. Archer had absolutely no idea what was going on. Is Ethan telling the truth about the virus, or is this some sort of trick?
Owen didn't get a chance to answer his own question. Instead, his thoughts were cut short as an explosion rang out behind him. The door that he and Ethan had just left The White Room through exploded outwards, knocking Owen to the ground from the shockwave of the blast.
Disorientation.
Luckily, he was just the right distance away to save himself from having any serious injury, but wasn't quite far away enough to prevent the piercing noise that was now ringing out in his ears. Everything around him sounded slightly muffled, yet he could hear Ethan's voice shouting to him from nearby as clearly as anything.
"OWEN! GET IN THE CAR!"
He didn't need to be told twice. Considering his circumstances, he had no other choice. Not if he wanted to survive. There really is something wrong with PRoGRaM. He realised. There really is something in here that's trying to kill us.
Against his better judgement, he jumped over the door and landed in the back seat of the convertible. Under normal circumstances, he would never have been able to trust Ethan, but right now he had no other choice.
“DRIVE!” Owen shouted once he was in. Ethan wasted no time and the car lurched forwards as he put his foot down. The convertible shot out from the spot that it was parked in and fired at top speed down the deserted streets of New York City.
“Annie Archer,” Owen said to him as soon as the two of them hit the road, not wanting to waste time anymore. He grabbed a hold of his weapon and pressed its barrel into the back of the drivers seat. Who knows how long I have left?
“I admire your spirit Owen,” Ethan said, looking into the rear view mirror and into Owen's eyes as he spoke. “But now is really not the time.”
Owen didn’t respond. Instead, he raised his gun and put a bullet into the mirror in which Ethan was looking at him through. Ethan's reflexes kicked in as he panicked at the sound of the gunshot. He ducked, and at the same time accidentally jolted the steering wheel to the right, putting the car into a minor slide. With effort, Ethan regained control of the vehicle, lucky that there was nothing on the empty streets for him to smash the convertible into. He turned his head and shot Owen an angry glare.
“Annie. Archer,” Owen said again, looking right into Ethan's eyes this time. The man was testing his patience and pushing him to his very limits.
“Even if I told you the truth. You wouldn’t believe me,” he answered, turning his gaze back to the road.
“Try me,” Owen replied, his voice seething with held-back anger.
“I tell you what,” Ethan said. “If we get out of this alive. I’ll show you the truth myself.”
As if right on cue, some of the smaller buildings that they had passed only seconds before began to collapse into themselves. Glass shattered outwards as the buildings just seemingly fell apart from the inside. Countless small buildings behind them came down fast and hit the ground hard, shaking the floor slightly beneath them. Ethan gripped the wheel tightly and kept control of their vehicle whilst keeping his full attention on the road, constantly looking out for any sort of danger ahead of them.
Owen turned to see what was happening and what all the noise was about, but he was quickly greeted by a face-full of thick, choking dust that had been thrown out from one of the nearby collapsing buildings as it had hit the ground. Ethan sensed the immediate danger presented by this dust and put his foot down on the accelerator, causing the invisible G-forces to push him further back into his seat. He held his breath in so as not to choke on the dust that he was attempting to outrun.
Owen wasn't faring quite so well. Having taken in a huge lung-full of dust, he was almost choking in the back seat, but with Ethan putting the pedal to the metal, their car easily outran the huge, thick dust clouds and the smaller collapsing buildings, meaning that Owen could finally catch his breath.
He violently coughed up huge chunks of thick dust and sucked in as much fresh air as he possibly could as their convertible escaped the intimidating dust cloud. Both Owen and Ethan were lucky at the moment. They were on the outskirts of the city, and the buildings here were small, only ten to fifteen stories high at most. Who knew what carnage would endure when they made it closer into the centre of the city? The virus would soon adapt. It would soon catch up to them.
There was no turning back now.
“They can’t get us out of PRoGRaM from the outside, can they?” Owen asked, afraid that he already knew the answer. He just needed to hear it from somebody else.
“No,” Ethan replied, confirming Owen’s fear. “They can’t pull us out. There’s too much information coursing through our minds at this very moment. I know because I wrote the virus myself. It’s a real nasty piece of work. If we die inside PRoGRaM now whilst this virus is active, we die out there in the real world as well.”
Owen heard more buildings collapse nearby. The danger didn't seem so close this time around. It sounded a fair way off, but it was louder than before. Larger building are collapsing. This city is falling apart.
The virus was slowly catching up to them, and Ethan knew their luck wouldn’t last for long.
“How long does it last for?” Owen asked, trying to find some thread of hope mixed in amongst all the bad news that Ethan was delivering.
“Indefinitely.”
&nb
sp; “Then what’s there to stop me killing you right here and now?”
“I want to live Owen,” Ethan answered. “Unless we work together, neither of us are going to get out of this alive. The viral code that's taken over PRoGRaM knows that we don’t belong in here. The world of PRoGRaM will try and kill us by any means necessary."
“Nick can figure it out," Owen said, reassuring himself. He had confidence in his man on the outside. "Nick is the best guy I know with something like this.”
“I wouldn’t count on Nick helping you anymore. Not with Kate out there.”
The words that came out of Ethan’s mouth made Owen go cold. Shivers flew up his spine and the hairs on his arms stood on end. “What do you mean?” he asked seriously.
“You think that we did everything on our own? You think that we never had eyes on you the entire time? Kate was never truly a part of your team. She's with us, Owen.”
“Liar!” he growled quietly at Ethan from the backseat.
“Owen,” Ethan replied slowly and calculatingly. “Think about it.”
Someone knew exactly where to find Owen and his team inside PRoGRaM when Marcus was assassinated. Someone gave away the location of the New York PRoGRaM Analytic Base. Someone had attacked the van when they were inside the PRoGRaM Prison System. The more that Owen thought about it, the more that it made sense. Ethan must have been responsible for everything bad that had happened to their team. All of it was possible, only because of the information that Kate had provided.
“Kate…” Owen said disappointingly before suddenly and unexpectedly realising something. Out of nowhere, he quickly changed the subject of their conversation.
“You're going die in here too,” he said to Ethan menacingly.
Ethan sighed as the wind blew powerfully through his hair. It had picked up dramatically over the last minute, causing Ethan to have to raise his voice to speak.
“I was never supposed to be inside PRoGRaM when this all went down,” he shouted over the sound of the wind. His tone still came across as a little too casual for their situation. It was almost as if Ethan had expected something like this to happen. Maybe he's just another loose end that needed tying up…