“So, you’ve been the pest hindering my goal all this time,” the strange man said.
“I’m not a pest, you idiot! I’m Alikira Nguen. I’m humanity’s cyborg savior!”
He back-handed her across the face!
“You’re an insolent mistake we thought we could delete in Hong Kong, but you got away! Now, instead of killing you, I’ll use you to attack the survivors! Circumscriber will finally reprogram you to be our human extinguisher! You will kill most of them before they run. You probably have built up enough trust to destroy a good lot of them before they understand you’ve turned rogue!”
Alikira felt the sting from the slap, but more so the sting from his intentions.
“What you are about to try to do is insidious. What is your name? I like to know the name of the person I’m going to kill.”
He had a menacing laugh.
“You do have spunk. I think your attitude is what inspired me to hate you so. Since Circumscriber incapacitated you with the USB trap it knew you would try to hack with reckless abandon, I don’t mind you knowing of your executioner’s name.” He looked directly at the camera so Steve could hear with piercing clarity. “I’m Seth Cercian. Braniff Cerxcan’s illegitimate son born from a seedy affair with his head female Black Ops bodyguard, Lilith Rodriguez.”
Steve’s stamina to keep going dropped to the floor.
“Who is Braniff Cercian and why should I be frightened at a name?” Alikira aked.
“How do you live on this planet and not know of Braniff Cerian's infamy?! He was the virtu-tech mogul of the world before he shot himself! His affair was tawdry being with my mother, his employee, but he left me everything! I employed Ergon Samuels to create Circumscriber to wipe out the low life's of this planet without substantial monetary status, so we could have this planet to ourselves.” Then he walked up to her and stared a cold gaze of hatred. “The stragglers were supposed to be killed systematically, but there was a major problem in my goal at a utopia, you.”
Alikira finally understood what she was up against. It wasn’t the Program. Circumscriber was just a vile tool with no emotion. It was a human who caused this extinction. Her mindset changed drastically.
She began to laugh.
“Why could I not see this coming? The Program has no personality, so it could never initiate malice towards humanity. That’s the human flaw it could never possess. All of this was you and your stupid rich friends. You used Circumscriber to destroy everyone who wasn’t in your ‘club’. Do you even know how it works or what it can even do?”
“As I said earlier. My father was a computer-savvy freak. I don’t read manuals. I just buy the manual creator.” He snapped his fingers. “Ergon?!”
Another person came out of the shadows. He looked downtrodden but came to Seth.
“I told you, Seth. This cyborg is a renegade who knows Circumscriber intimately. She would fight till death before Circumscriber could augment her. I won’t corrupt my program to cater to your whims.”
Seth looked condescendingly at Ergon.
“I hired you to create Circumscriber. I own it and you have no opinion on what I can do with my own product! Now, shut your mouth and augment that cyborg!”
Ergon had kowtowed to Seth for years just for a paycheck. This was the time to rebel because engineering the end of humanity made his paycheck mythical with no one in existence to honor it, but his perfidious disingenuous uber-rich lot. It was time to act.
“Seth, you’re sad. You’ve destroyed the society you need just because you didn’t like other people. You never realized the people are the society you lived within. This is the shocking after-effects of megalomania. When you kill everyone you think is beneath you, no one will be alive to help you. I’m tired of you bastardizing my creation. Yes, you own it, but I created it. By your hand, there is no authority left to enforce your legal right anymore. I made it and I am not going to manipulate it for you this time.”
Seth was shocked at Ergon’s defiance. He never spoke to him that way ever. Everything made him regroup to achieve his goal.
“You do know I own everything, legal or no. As you just said, there is no authority here. There is only Seth. I can’t make you do what you don’t want to do for Circumscriber. You could add a bug I would never know about. But there is someone else.”
Seth tapped a fob in his hand. In a minute, Logan, Ergon’s assistant entered.
“Logan?! You’re supposed to be guarding the hub!”
“I could get any lackey to guard a secure covert area. I brought Logan because I anticipated your stupid defiance. I always come prepared,” Seth said.
“What, you think Logan can manipulate Circumscriber?! I trained Logan!”
“You don’t understand this time, Boy. Logan may not know how to do it right now, but he does have a stupendous computer mind and he’s loyal. Since you want to defy me, you can just leave.”
The door to the corridor opened and Seth’s automatons began to usher out Ergon!
“Your usefulness has ended. Run for your life with the rest of humanity’s sewer scum from this reprogrammed cyborg. It is rather ironic. In a round-about way, you will be killed by your own creation. I would say good luck, but we both know how state of the art you made Circumscriber. Goodbye Ergon.”
The automatons dragged him to the opened door and harshly threw him out.
As Ergon hit the floor, the screen retracted, the barrier dematerializes, and Steve ran to him.
As Ergon put up his hand for assistance, Steve began to kick him!
“You made that thing built to destroy us all, especially my squad commander?! You deserved to be broken!”
Snark, Mark, Nugget, and the rest ran over to subdue Steve.
“STOP IT, STEVE! We all just saw the same thing! He didn’t do it for sociopathic vengeance! He was paid by a mad-man! It’s not his fault!” Snark yelled at him.
“Stop beating the man who knows the Program intimately; he made the thing! He may be the only one able to counter Di’s brainwashing! You wanna save Di, right?!” Nugget yelled.
Steve stopped his attacking.
“I’m fine! Get offa me!” Then he grabbed Ergon by the shirt.” You better know how to save Di, or I will finish what I started!”
“My skills shouldn’t be your main concern right now,” Ergon said as they heard a siren blare “Those sentinels have just re-booted! We hafta get outta here NOW!”
Just as they saw the walls slide open, Steve went into squad leader mode.
“Everybody aim at the walls with your B-14s! Your Kevlex will protect you from the shrapnel! Egress now!”
They all began to fire at the emerging sentinels while leaving through the other end of the corridor! They were tagging them all in exploding metal and lubrication fluid. There were just so many!
They fought their way to the exiting corridor and up the stairs!
“Get back to the Yamato! I have a little present for these annoying robots!”
As they were leaving the facility up the stairwell, Steve shot enough sentinels to gain a proper buffer. Then he pulled out his D-18 and fired a Hadron singularity round Cavanaugh gave him! It imploded in the middle of the sentinels and began to suck them to a different dimension with many mini-black holes!
“Suck on that literally, you metal watchdogs!”
The lower level attackers were no more, but the upper level replenished and the fight was nowhere close to being finished. They had to muscle their way out of the building. Sledge saw them firing frantically at the sentinels.
“Where’s Di?” he asked frantically.
“In the belly of the beast! We’ll get her later! But for right now we have to GO!” Steve yelled.
Kathrine grabbed his arm.
“You heard the man, Sledge. We must regroup in order to win! This was a ploy, not the core battle!” They began to retreat to the Yamato.
Steve’s marksmen and the beast riders were their covers on the battlefield to allow Neo-Khaos
to escape. They all ran towards the Yamato.
“How are we going to rescue Di?!” Purge asked.
“We finally have the factor we’ve always needed in order to win!” Snark yelled as she shot three sentinels. “We attained some inside information! We just have to get back to the Yamato!”
Purge understood and all the beasts began to ravage the sentinels into mangled metal heaps.
The battle lasted until the twilight when Steve’s crew wiped those sentinels with a volley of D-18 incendiary rounds. They all regrouped on the Yamato. The battle was over, but the true war had just begun.
Chapter Nine: The Somber Epilogue
As Carlos was looking out for Alikira to return in victory, he saw a downtrodden Neo-Khaos crew coming towards the Yamato. He didn't see his girlfriend anywhere.
As they came on-board, he was anxious. As Sledge came on-board he asked.
“Was it a victory? Where’s my chicka?
“It was a misdirected ruse to capture Alikira. We made it out, but she was grabbed by those monsters. We aren’t fighting the Program anymore. We’re fighting narcissistic arrogant rich humans. They used the Program to wipe out the rest of humanity.”
“They took Alikira?! We have to get her back! I’ll take Steve and his crew to retrieve her!” Carlos was upset.
“Slow down, Fly Boy,” Steve interrupted. “The reason we lost her is because we had no inside information. I’m not going on a futile suicide mission with you from your initial hurt feelings, She’s alive, Carlos. They’re trying to reprogram her to take us all out. That will take some time, because we have their difference maker with us right now.” He gestured to Ergon. “Meet Ergon Samuels.”
“Who is Ergon Samuels?”
“He created the Program. He know more than Chip knows about it.”
Carlos realized he was in the presence of the man who designed humanity’s killing machine which killed everyone he once loved and snapped!
“He made the Program?! I’m gonna kill this puta basado!” He advanced toward Ergon.
Steve grabbed his advancing blind rage by the shoulders.
“Calm down, Carlos! He was paid to make it! He never had any animosity! Take it from me! I was gonna beat hin to a pulp too! He can save Di, so don’t kill him!”
Carlos calmed down and Chip came to him.
“We have more than they think about executing her rescue, Buddy. We’ll get her back. Ergon told us about their plan and we have time. Tell him, Ergon.”
Ergon stepped forward.
“They created a fallacy war zone by dissembling the Cercian building as the mainframe’s core. They are trying to make Di sequacious to their dark intentions.”
“He’s a Spanish pilot, not a transiton, so speak normally,” Chip said. “They tricked us into thinking we were about to take out the Program when it wasn’t even there. They captured Di and they’re trying to reprogram her to kill us.”
Ergon continued with a simpler explanation.
“The Program… Circumscriber has spread like a virus among the entire network. You can only destroy it from a primary location in which was never told to me, but I know where my connection console is. All we have to do is get there so Chip can upload a virus in the system to nullify it.”
Chip added, “We have time because they’re trying to reprogram Di with Ergon’s assistant who knows nothing of Circumscriber’s inner workings, vital transistor replacement Ohm count or even if he needs to replace it. He’s trying to open an impregnable combination lock without the combination; we have time.”
Carlos felt better. Then he asked Chip an important question.
“If this whole thing was a ruse to capture Di, they’re going to move her from that location, How will we find her?”
Chip produced Alikira’s albatross.
“With tech-link synergy. I implanted a homing beacon in Di’s arm, so her bird could find her anywhere. Their facility could be in a sublevel cave on the Galapagos Islands and we can sus her out.”
“We just need to stay here, regroup and replenish for our next battle. This one will be the real one. We’re getting back Di and stopping those callous sociopaths.”
Carlos looked to the shore.
“We’re gonna get you back, Baby and finally finish this.”
The Finishing Lube-job Final Touches
I told you the middle book would be a roller coaster ride. I didn’t want to do an all-out action fest. I’m hoping you got this to continue the story. A good story has more than the flimsy first coat of action. There’s personal conflict devastating loss, grieving, relationship situations, and different twists and turns. I think I did Empire this one.
Now that doesn’t mean book three will have total vindication by any means. I’m tired of the cookie-cutter formula, aren’t you?
For book three there will be a whole new player in town. I knew Seth was the main culprit before I wrote word one of the first book. I just had to have the discipline not to reveal the ‘bad guy’ in the first 50 pages.
Now the stage is set. We have all the players on the stage and we must find out how this story ends. Anticipation is hell, isn’t it?
I won’t leave you hanging much longer. I hated waiting for the next installment. I usually ‘binge’ all my stories I read or watch. Movies are different, they take too long to complete the series. Lord of the Rings began with Fellowship in 2001 and finished in 2003. I can’t even wait that long.
I just hope you can find something deeper in this story. I’m trying to point out everyday life in this tale. The only way science fiction lasts is if you can relate to the story. Star Wars™, Bladerunner™, Battlestar Galactica™, and Star Trek™ are memorable because you can relate to them. A writer strives for that particular concept while giving you a healthy dose of suspension of disbelief. Yes, you want to make a point, but your audience has to have fun while hearing you out.
Thanks for taking this new ride. The next one will have some loop-de-loops with the corkscrew. Thank you.
Kyle’s Amazing Fiction Amazon Library
Shameless Request: If you enjoyed this tale, I would love if you told somebody about it HERE. I wrote this story for everyone. There may be someone you know who can relate to a certain topic in the story, or you think it’s just entertaining. Write a review, please. Easy-peasy with just a click you can write it. It tells Amazon you liked what you read, and it might entertain others. You don’t have to be a Hemmingway. Just a few lines would be lovely. I read them all to make me a better writer, thanks.
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About the Author
Kyle Robertson was born January first, 1970. After he graduated from high school, he enlisted in the Army as an Aerial Intelligence Specialist. When he finished his tour in Stuttgart Germany, he returned to the United States and began a sales career. He sold luxury vehicles, and after became knowledgeable of over eight hundred electronic products, designed and engineered home theater setups. Then became a trainer of home maintenance equipment. He always had a warped imagination and was great at storytelling. He always had a dream to share his stories, so he finally took the chance.
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The Natural Selection Retaliation Page 16