H+ incorporated

by Gary Dejean

  Jake slides off the wall, jumping and grabbing a lamp-post before swinging to street level. “Jake!” Chloe calls.

  Feeling relief at last, the boy runs to his friend and hugs her at waist high, like he would his mother. Chloe is surprised, moved, taken aback by his justified anxiety. He’s tall as a child now; she pats him on the head, a little awkwardly.

  Chapter 10

  Hovering silently above the station, the dropship shines its two searchlights on the train parked below. Passengers are being escorted out while a swarm of agents invade the track. Angelo zooms in on the situation; he and the Major, eyes peeled, are focused on the reticle stuck between two wagons.

  Harnessed inside their combat suits, the troopers are awaiting orders; they’ve opened their helmets to breathe the comparatively fresh air of the dropship’s interior. Impatient, Patti is trying to get ahead of oncoming developments. When struggling, she asks: “Permission to speak, sir?”

  Undisturbed, the Major replies: “What is it Bravo Three?”

  “Why are we going after this kid?” the young woman questions. “I thought our target was Morgan Zhu.”

  Having encouraged critical judgment during their training, the Major lays out the facts in a placid voice, without looking away from the screens: “He’s going to her. We track him, we get them both.” His parsimonious choice of words leaves Patti thinking. Apparently, the Major as well, she observes, when he prompts: “Archangel, bring me every plane, ship and train leaving the city in the next three hours.”

  “On it, sir.” Angelo executes the order, quickly starting to compile data.

  On the monitors, agents finally emerge from between the wagons. One of them is holding Jake’s shoe and cellphone, which he brandishes high for his colleagues to see. Their pride stung, Angelo and the Major both refrain from any comment, as the means of transportation away from the country amass on the screens one under another.

  Malcolm drives Chloe and Jake along the road leading to the floating harbor. As they pass the sunken city, public lighting goes dimmer, giving them a vague sense of security in an otherwise horrendous night.

  When they reach the harbor, Malcolm drives his vehicle off the road and through a hole cut open in the fence by their biker friend. They remain out of sight from cameras, slowly driving between interminable rows of containers until they meet David and Bill leaning over one of them. All around, automated cranes and driverless trucks coordinate to deliver the containers onto the massive freighters that come and go, at all hours of the night. Everywhere, corporate logos are dancing the ballet of wild capitalism, the only few workers on site locked in distant air-conditioned rooms.

  When the car approaches, David gets agitated. Jake exits first, running to his father and hugging him with all his might. Chloe and Malcolm gather with Bill, moved by the reunion. “Tell me you’ve ditched your phones,” asks the biker. The young woman and her rasta friend nod in reply. The circumstances are dire for each and all of them, and they remain silent for a while, their hearts still racing.

  It’s David who breaks the silence: “Is anyone going to explain to me what’s going on?” he exclaims.

  Chloe replies as best she can, herself still caught up by the events. “The spooks are after my mum, David,” she explains. “They’re using us to get to her. We need to go.”

  “What?” the father explodes. “This is crazy! What has she done?”

  Jake wiggles his shoulders, softening his father’s grip so he can look up to him. “Morgan can explain everything, Dad,” he says. “We really should go.”

  “We’re not going with them!” David bursts. “It’s all their fault!”

  Chloe turns to her friends, exchanging with them regretful glances. The three of them hardly know what they’ve implicated themselves in, and David’s objection might well be legitimate. They don’t need to speak to agree on that, having placed their friendship in front of their personal interest without thinking twice about it.

  Chloe sighs. “Fine,” she says, willing to hear him out. “Where will you go?”

  “We’re going back to tell the truth,” David replies, vindictive.

  “I don’t think they’ll listen, Dad,” deplores Jake, who’s been spying all the while on radio communications.

  “Shush, boy!” David spits, trying to assert his own conviction.

  “He’s right,” Chloe approves, “they’re not interested in you, they’ll use you and your son as bargaining chips.”

  “Listen,” Malcolm intrudes on the conversation, “we’re skipping town too. This is serious shit, David. You should go with Morgan.”

  Bill lifts up the metallic curtain of the shipping container. Inside, smart-cars fresh from the factory are waiting to cross the ocean and meet their new owners. Chloe walks inside, beckoning David and Jake to join her. “I want some answers too, you know,” she points out.

  “Come on, Dad,” Jake insists. “You should at least talk to her.”

  Stuck between a rock and a hard place, the father grumbles. “God dammit,” he mutters, reluctantly walking inside the elongated metal box.

  Bill pats Chloe on the shoulder: “Tell your mother she’s the craziest woman I’ve ever met,” he kids, with a deadpan tone.

  “And we’re going to miss her,” Malcolm adds, always the cheerful one. “All of you.”

  Bill pulls the curtain down, closing the container behind them, before the electromagnetic crane descends and locks its claws on the storage unit. A second later they’re lifted, and transferred onto a large automated freighter, stowaways on a ship conducted remotely.

  Left behind, Bill and Malcolm take a deep breath, proud of their principled stand. They look at the container until it gets out of sight, and turn to each other.

  “You wanna catch the fireworks?” the biker asks.

  Malcolm laughs at his friend’s perspicacity. “Get out of my head!” he chuckles. With a fist bump, they drive away in their respective vehicles.

  A little shaken and in utter darkness, Chloe, Jake and David listen to the noises surrounding them with anxiety. Jake turns on LEDs embedded in his face, lighting the obscurity with a faint glow, enough to outline the contour of their respective features.

  David is still catching on. “Bill is correct,” he proffers, “this is madness.”

  Chloe’s expression is that of someone afraid that the truth will sound ludicrous. “These guys were going to take you to a black site, you know,” she explains, marking a pause. “I’m not joking.”

  David can’t believe that, not at first. He exchanges a glance with Jake, hoping to reassure the boy who, unbeknownst to him, has been listening to radio chatter. Without a word, Jake nods in confirmation, sowing doubt in the father who simply drops the subject, flabbergasted.

  The automated system lands the container near the center of the ship, quickly piling another on top of it. The curtain gets pulled open by Morgan’s last drone. Across the alleyway, from inside another open container, the mother is waving at them. Chloe runs to her, while David and Jake tiptoe into the open, weary of the monitoring drones scanning bar-codes on freshly loaded containers.

  They close the units behind them, taking refuge in the cramped-up area of Morgan’s improvised cabin. Her van takes a large portion of the space, and she’s arranged a cot next to a chemical toilet. Weeks of food and water pile up along the walls covered in cooling fabric, shielding the interior from thermal detection while keeping the air breathable. Crates of H+ equipment have been arranged into a makeshift desk where, taped to the wall, a paper-thin screen is displaying video feeds from the freighter’s security cameras.

  Still using the rudimentary wheelchair assigned to her at the precinct, Morgan hugs her daughter with a shared relief. Once the wave of emotion passed, Chloe stands back up, siding with David and Jake. “What the hell kind of a stunt was that, Mum?” she entreats. “Did you really have to go that far?”

  Morgan looks down, ashamed to tell the truth. “I’m glad you’re all
safe,” she confesses. “David, I’m so sorry I’ve put you through all this. Giving myself up was the only way to get you out. These agents are out for blood.”

  David steps up, boiling with controlled anger. “What have you done, Morgan?” he asks through his teeth.

  “I’ve destroyed sensitive data,” answers the scientist. “And I’ve stolen a prototype,” she adds, crossing eyes with Jake.

  The boy looks up to his dad, awaiting judgment, but David needs a moment to wrap his head around the notion. “You mean?…” he gestures at the Little Blackjack; Morgan nods in reply, leaving the father breathless. “You’ve made my son an accessory to your crime!” he bursts finally. “That’s unacceptable!”

  “You’re right,” Morgan admits. “I let him use the prototype so I could escape. It was selfish.”

  “It was my idea!” Jake interrupts. “She only went in to get you out, it’s not fair!”

  Chloe gasps, checking David’s reaction. “Son,” he says, with a shiver, “you should’ve let her.” Fuming with rage, he turns to Morgan, adding with growing contempt: “These people have been using you.”

  Morgan stops Chloe from jumping to her defense with a glance. “Your resentment is justified, David,” she agrees. “You have a right to be bitter. But what’s done is done, and now we need to discuss our options.”

  “All I want is for you to take my boy out of that thing,” David answers immediately, prompting Jake to back away from him.

  “Dad, no!” the boy begs.

  “Enough!” bursts the father. “The adults are talking!”

  Chloe gulps in silence, letting Morgan lead the exchange. “I can do that,” the scientist replies. “I have a life-support device somewhere that we can use to house his brains. But I have to tell you, David: the NICA won’t stop until they’ve put me down. It’s how they operate. I’m a liability, and you’re a means to an end.”

  “I can talk my way out of this,” David rebuts, his confidence wavering as he utters the words.

  “If that’s what you want…” Morgan deplores, pointing Chloe to a crate behind her.

  The young woman extracts a device the size of a rice cooker, vital monitors covering its sides. When he sees the object, Jake scampers farther away, anxiously imagining himself deprived of any senses for an unknowable amount of time. He’s filled with horror at the notion of perpetual blackness, absolute sensory deprivation, a hell he has glimpsed into thrice before and emerged from, transformed, every single time.

  “Please, Dad,” he implores, “don’t put me in that.”

  Feeling guilty for the wedge she’s driven between father and son, Morgan interrupts, hoping an alternative will mend the relation: “This ship is headed for West Africa,” she informs. “There’s a giant dump over there, where H+ discard their older models. We can easily give Jake a new body, one that cannot be traced. Then, we’ll get out of your way, I promise.” She marks a pause, looking at Jake for a second before locking eyes with David. “You’ll never hear from us again.”

  “And live as fugitives?” David lets the question sink in. “I’ll take my chances with the cops, thank you,” he concludes with audible resentment.

  Jake doesn’t give them time to find an agreement. Overriding the automated van’s operating system, he opens the side door and locks himself inside, keeping his hold on the door mechanism. “You can’t make me!” he yells through the windshield. “If you wanna get off, just do it, but I’m staying with them!”

  Faced with the child’s tantrum, David and Morgan drop their conversation, the father moving to the vehicle trying to appease his son. “Don’t be stupid, Jake. If you stay on this boat, you’ll never see any of your friends again,” he tries to argue.

  “They’re my BEST friends!” Jake insists, pointing at the Zhus.

  David tries to forcefully open the van’s door, but the child’s abilities keep them both locked apart from one another. Seeing that the exchange is likely to go on, Morgan motions Chloe to sit next to her, and pulls out fresh bandages and gauze to clean up her implants.

  Now that most questions have been answered, the young reporter tries to tie up all ends. “Why the big showdown, Mum?” she asks. “You could’ve found a way to escape without wrecking the whole place.”

  “I’m sorry, Zuzu,” the mother replies as she takes off her daughter’s bloody bandages.

  “That’s it?” Chloe whispers so as to keep their conversation private. “You’re sorry?”

  Morgan throws down the dirty gauze, putting aside her sweet manners for a second. “Fine. I wanted payback,” she admits. “Is that what you want me to say?”

  Her face bears the traces of overflowing anger, the likes of which Chloe has only ever witnessed in herself. The young woman sits back, troubled by the fact she has nothing to object, and lets her mother apply balm and clean gauze on her wounds.

  The exchange between Jake and his dad grows louder. Morgan sighs with a heavy sense of guilt. “I should’ve destroyed everything on the spot,” she regrets.

  “Why didn’t you?” Chloe asks, still trying to piece out her mother’s sketchy strategy.

  “It won’t take long for my colleagues to recreate the work,” the hunted scientist argues. “I figured I could buy enough time to extract the override software, and leak it to antivirus developers.”

  “That’s genius, Mom!”

  “I’m not sure,” Morgan concludes, unable to distinguish between virtue and madness anymore.

  Forsaking any hope of making Jake obey, and having heard the last part of their conversation, David comes back to Morgan. “That’s what it’s all about?” he vociferates. “Some computer virus? You’re destroying our lives because of a program YOU created?”

  He looks down at Chloe, at her shaved head freed by lighter bandages. Understanding at last that her mask was a fake, he swallows his pride; the law-abiding family man can’t contain his anxiety, a feeling of entrapment closes down on him. Hyperventilating, he staggers to the chemical toilet and leans over it, certain he’s about to either throw up, faint, or do both at once.

  Inside the control tower of the humongous freighter, the ship’s captain and only human staff on board is preparing his station for three weeks alone at sea. Lewd posters on the walls, a duffle bag full of cracker packets at his feet, next to a cooler full of beer cans, and a virtual reality helmet filled with movies and video games are all he need to keep himself busy. His station overlooking the main deck, he pays little attention to the automated cranes loading the cargo area.

  Once finally the operating system of the ship signals it ready for departure, the captain selects a route on the touchscreen of his GPS. Connected to a cloud of meteorological and navigational systems around the globe, the ship departs with blaring horns, its hull heavy with hundreds of driverless vehicles.

  The captain sits back in his armchair, throwing his bare feet on the dashboard. He pops open a beer, before pulling down his virtual reality headset, delving deep into a collection of artificial worlds.

  Back at their headquarters, the task force has landed on the roof of their training hangar. Standing next to his console, Major Hanzo is checking ship manifests with Angelo. One after another, the young man brings up freighters leaving the country. “What about this one?” he asks. “Fully automated, left the docks fifteen minutes ago.”

  The troopers have gotten out of their suits. Right outside the transport, they have sat on the ground, stretching their legs while awaiting orders. A few steps away, Patti is pacing, impatient to settle the score.

  “Gotta admit, that’s not how I was planning to spend New Year’s Eve,” jokes the Indonesian.

  “You got a problem with this, Yuwono?” burst the squad leader, hardly able to contain the adrenaline leftover from the chase.

  “Come on,” interjects the Bravo team leader, “he’s joking.”

  Bautista doesn’t seem amused. “That Dr. Lady put twelve cops in the hospital!” he rebuffs. “This is no time for joke
s.”

  “Having a laugh doesn’t mean we don’t care, man,” mediates the Nigerian. “But we’re stuck!”

  Ocampo looks away from the group, at Patti walking in circles with her fists clenched to white knuckles. “Gillian sure is brooding,” she remarks.

  Her team leader looks over his shoulder at the obviously upset trooper. “Hey Gillian!” he calls. “These were your people down there. What’s your take on this mess?”

  Patti stops and stares at the precinct below, still bearing the traces of Morgan’s great escape. The Behemoth has been shut down, but it’s still standing tall, its grotesque silhouette a blatant reminder of their humiliation. “I’ll tell you what,” she replies between her teeth, “I sure hope I get to her first.”

  The troopers are nodding approvingly when the Major walks out of the dropship. “Gather up!” he prompts. Pulled out of their banter, they quickly stand at attention.

  “It’s not pretty out there,” he starts. “That old woman has put bleeding edge military hardware in the hands of a ten-year-old. I don’t know what she plans on doing with it, but we all know what she’s done so far.”

  His tone is grim as he continues his briefing: “The Secret Service and the cops are spread thin. Technically, we’re on standby, but I doubt we’ll be getting news from them anytime soon. Our targets have received outside help; right now, my guess is they’re either hiding under the city platform, or trying to get out of dodge.” Turning briefly to Angelo, he exchanges a glance with the overseer. “We’ve spotted a freighter about to reach international waters,” he points out. “I’ve passed the word, guess what they told me.”

  The tease is too obvious for the troopers, who await the answer with gleeful anticipation, but the Major disappoints. “They told me to stand by,” he lets go, his own frustration audible. “So,” he concludes calmly, his voice dimmer than they’ve ever heard it, “if any of you want to stay here and watch the light show, well… these are the orders.”