Reboot
Book Three in the Singular Series
Larry Buenafe
Copyright © 2019 by Larry Buenafe.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed “Attention: Permissions Coordinator,” at the address below.
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
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Pity the nation whose people are sheep,
and whose shepherds mislead them.
Pity the nation whose leaders are liars,
whose sages are silenced,
and whose bigots haunt the airwaves.
Pity the nation who raises not its voice,
except to praise conquerors and acclaim the bully as hero
and aims to rule the world by force and by torture.
Pity the nation that knows no other language but its own,
and no other culture but its own.
Pity the nation whose breath is money,
and sleeps the sleep of the too well fed.
Pity the nation—oh, pity the people
who allow their rights to erode,
and their freedoms be washed away…
―Lawrence Ferlinghetti
Contents
Prologue
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
Epilogue
Reassemble
Prologue
1
Other Books by Larry Buenafe
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Connect with Larry Buenafe
A Special Gift
Hi! I’m so glad you have decided to take a look at Reboot, the third book in my new science fiction series. I’m confident you will find it just as thrilling, thought-provoking, and entertaining as Singular and Forever, the first two books in the series. I would also like to offer you a FREE copy of When the Angels are Gone, the first book in my acclaimed Ferdie and The Seven urban fantasy series. I’m quite sure you will find it equally entertaining. Just click HERE for your free copy, and to join my readers group! Thank you!
Prologue
I n an underground room in an industrial complex east of what is left of San Jose, California, a group of people gathered for a meeting. These were not normal people, neither in means nor intellect; nevertheless, they did their best to stay out of the spotlight, and were content to let others masquerade as the important ones in their stead. Not that they were absent of ego, but more that they had realized that ego would hinder their plans, and they were determined to carry them out at all costs.
Most of the shadowy group were not present at the meeting, at least not physically; around a massive circular table sat thirty seats, many occupied by holograms rather than people. At the head of the table was a man in his early forties, short for an adult, coffee-colored hair in a grown-out buzz cut, and skin that looked as if it had not seen the light of day for quite some time. Although he spoke slowly, it seemed because of the extreme care he took in choosing his words, a necessity in his position as senior vice chair of the LFP.
“Our Director sends apologies and has asked me to lead today. We have seen our subject’s performance in the first real-world test of his system. What are our thoughts?”
Three seats to his left, a hologram of a tall, slender woman with intense, cerulean eyes and carefully straightened platinum hair, spoke with a pronounced German accent. “I believe we saw some acceptable proof-of-concept activity, but we have not seen the limits of the tech. Probably not even close.”
From across the table, another hologram, this one of a pudgy man with a pointy nose wearing a British flat hat, t-shirt, and vest, said, “Acceptable? Come on, luv, what this boy did was nothing short of miraculous. Single-handedly besting scores of armed and hardened terrorists, you call that acceptable? I wager you’re a tough one to please.”
Following a chorus of chuckles from the group, the woman with the German accent replied, “Typical British hyperbole, and you will never know how difficult I am to please. And don’t condescend to me. I am not your ‘luv’.”
This brought a louder round of laughs. The man at the head of the table cleared his throat and said, “Let’s keep our comments constructive, shall we? We have invested considerable time and resources in this project, as you know, so let’s not diminish it by bickering.”
Just to his right was another man in the flesh, rather younger than most of the others, compulsively tapping his feet and the tabletop with his fingers. “Considerable resources, that’s no joke. Billions and billions spent on fronting the Bright Hand, more billions spent on buying our way through the US government; it’s time for a payoff, and I don’t think any of us tech geniuses will come up with anything to match this kid. What we really need to do is pull the kid’s dad in. He drew the resources together and created that system practically out of the clear blue, went from blank paper to the most advanced thing ever created in five years. That’s probably an exaggeration, but not much. We let the Americans snatch him to manipulate the kid into taking on these trials, but now it appears that we may have trouble getting him back from them. As we all know, any control we have over the Americans is tenuous, and perhaps even specious. The faster we move forward, the better.”
At the far end of the table, a Chinese man with long, white hair spoke. “We need more data first. Need to see how resilient the power source is, how altitude and motion affect it, recovery time when he depletes the power source, what are its capabilities when submerged or in thin oxygen conditions. How it deals with extreme levels of stress. Much we must still know before we commit to this over other promising technologies.”
The hologram with the British flat hat responded: “Sounds like you want to bloody kill the boy.”
The man at the head of the table cleared his throat once again, and said, “We have all agreed that, although we certainly don’t want the boy to die, our real interest is in the system. If we can determine that it works as well as it appears to, and then if we can replicate it, it will sustain us far into the future, which again we have all agreed is our goal. Indeed, it is our mission statement: The Live Forever Project. Any other words of wisdom to wrap things up? All right, hearing no other comments, we will have our subject proceed to trial number two. We are adjourned.”
1
W e have a lot to do. Ava, my A.I., tells me that’s what you call an understatement. It makes me wonder if there’ll ever be a time when we c
an stop running.
It was about nine p.m. when I landed on the top of the Bright Hand hill, drew in my arm wings, pulled off my electric jet pack, and made my way to the bottom of the hill to the hidden entrance of the Bright Hand cavern. Although I was looking forward to seeing my friends, I wouldn’t have much time to spend with them. I only had three days before my next mission was to begin, and I would spend much of that time getting prepared. There were lots of questions to answer, new tech needs to identify and fulfill if possible, and above everything I needed to check on Cheri and see how she was doing.
It’s weird; she lost her right arm on our mission to Pakistan, and I can’t imagine how that feels, but because of the wreck my mom and I were in when I was nine, I don’t have any arms or legs. I guess that has something to do with having Asperger’s Syndrome; I’ve never been good at recognizing the feelings of other people. I think I’m getting better at it, though… maybe because I’m getting older, and maybe because as time goes by more and more of my brain cells are being replaced by artificial, nano-versions of brain cells. I know my mind works faster than it used to, and I’m understanding more complicated topics, that’s for sure. Now here I am almost six years later, with the world’s most powerful set of arms and legs, although they’re made of trillions of microscopic nano-machines; most of the rest of my body, too, even though I still just look like a fourteen-year-old, almost fifteen-year-old kid. Most of the time, anyway.
The hidden panel by the hidden entrance recognized me and let me in. I walked through the Bright Hand parking garage, through the concrete hall, and onto the platform looking out on the great cavern. Each time I see it, I get a shock at the size and… I don’t know, it just seems nearly impossible that they could have built it. The ceiling over fifty meters high, and more than a kilometer in width and length, with row after row of modular buildings filling the floor; I can’t think of anything I’ve seen that was more impressive. I gazed at the immensity of it all for a few more moments, then scrambled down the stone steps leading from the platform to our guest trailer, the first one in a long line below the platform. As I approached the door, I had a sudden wave of anxiety because, although I wanted to see all my friends, I knew that they were likely to want to hug me or pat me on the back, and that makes me uncomfortable. I took a deep breath, blew it out, and went through the door.
There they were, gathered around the little kitchen table. Cheri was at the head of the table, and the rest were turned in her direction. I guessed that she was probably telling them more about our mission in Pakistan, but when they saw me, everyone rose and approached, just as I thought they would. I must have looked panicked or something, because they stopped short, big smiles on their faces, and waited for me to enter. I noticed that Mr. Harutyunyan, the biggest, strongest man I’ve ever known, and also one of the smartest, was still limping a little from his time as a prisoner of the Americans, although his black eye had faded almost completely. The tall, slender Ms. Houng, her dark hair stylishly messy as usual, smacked him in the arm to get him to stop, saying, “Hang on, big guy,” in her distinctive accent.
Tarni Early, petite, beautiful, and energetic as ever, stood clapping her hands, and Benji… well, he couldn’t resist, even though he knew it would cause a little discomfort; he wrapped his dark, skinny arm around my shoulder and bumped the side of my head with his great bush of unruly black hair. “Oi, look mates, our wanderin’ hero has returned!” he roared, and then the rest of them lost their resistance as well; they rushed forward, patting me on the head and back, chattering happily. I held my breath, but suddenly realized I wasn’t feeling that much discomfort; in fact, I almost liked it.
Cheri remained seated, beaming. She looked exhausted, which was understandable based on what we had just been through and the trauma she had suffered. Her hair hung limply, a long-sleeved black sweatshirt covered girlish-but-muscular frame, the right sleeve pinned up just below her elbow, where her arm now ended.
I didn’t quite know what to do, but Ava spoke to me in that moment: “Just relax and go sit by her. She’s depressed, but covering it up. She needs some help to recharge her batteries.”
She doesn’t have any batteries… must be a metaphor…
I sat to her left, and she reached out her hand, took mine, and grasped it tightly. She was still smiling, but her eyes seemed a little wet, which was confusing, and she said in a low voice, “Hi, Lucas. How are you doing?”
“I’m okay. How about you?”
“Oh, I’m just trying to figure out how I’m gonna eat cereal with my left hand. I keep spilling stuff all over the table. Why don’t you tell us what’s coming next?”
“Ok, but first tell me how your arm is doing.”
She snorted with laughter. “Get to the point, right, Lucas? From what I’m told, some folks are working on a prosthetic, including Dr. Bhat, and Mardig, here. It’ll still be a couple of weeks before I can use anything, though. I have to let my arm heal completely first. Or, I guess I should say my stump. I’m thinking of getting a tattoo across it. What do you think it should say?”
I couldn’t think of anything, but Benji could. He bellowed, “How about this: ‘If you think this looks bad, you oughta see the other guy.’ That’d be bloody hilarious.”
Then, everyone wanted to get in on the suggestions. “I know. Have them write ‘Caution: Hazardous Materials’,” Tarni offered.
Mr. Harutyunyan, giggling almost out of control, said, “No, no. It should be picture of building partially completed, with sign in front: ‘Under Construction’. Is good, yes?”
“How about a picture of an actual tree stump?” I suggested, and they all roared. I don’t know why that’s funny… it just seems like that’s what you would put there… a stump on a stump… Oh, boy…
After everyone had their laughs, quiet set in. Finally, Cheri said, “Ok, Lucas, no more stalling. Tell us about your next mission.”
The rest of the group gathered around us, and I took another deep breath. “Have any of you ever been to Brazil?”
2
DIRECTOR’S NOTES
CONVERSATION WITH SENIOR VC
121151 14:05
-Timeframe?
-One hundred-sixty-eight hours total, Brasilia time.
-That almost seems like a joke. Which direction?
-He’ll go west to South Africa, then across to Brasilia.
-Taking the jet?
-He’ll have to.
-That thing is costing us a mint. It had better be worth it.
-If he succeeds, we’ll get it back plus a fair amount more. The Americans are just as interested in his success as we are, you know. If he’s not successful, then we won’t have to spend any more on him.
-What about the father?
-Very close. Should be in place within forty-eight hours.
-Have they tortured him?
-Just psych work so far. And a little waterboarding. I don’t think he’ll break, no matter what they do to him.
-Keep a close eye on it. If they go too far, he won’t be any good to us.
-What do we do if they get antsy?
-We might have to send the kid after him.
****
I spent the next hour describing the job I had to do and listening to all of them holler about how ridiculous it was and that I should refuse to do it. The only one who didn’t throw a fit was Cheri. “I sure wish I could go with you. I wouldn’t be much help, the way I am right now, though. I mean, I’m right-handed, and I don’t have a right hand.”
“Yeah, but maybe… there’s a lot more to doing these missions than just the physical part. You’re a lot better at the planning and that kind of thing than I am. Maybe you can come with me and help me with that stuff.”
Her eyes cast down as she said, “Oh, I don’t know. I don’t want to be in the way.”
“Well, just think about it. Ava says this will be a lot harder than the last mission. She said it’s not even close.”
Then Ava spoke t
o me: “She’s feeling sorry for herself. She will need a dose of tough love, but not right now. It’s time for a little history lesson on Brazil, so let’s go talk to Zoey Perez.”
“You think she’s the best person to fill us in?”
“I can give a general history, but if anything has happened in the last few weeks I’ll be out of the loop. She probably has some agents there anyway, and boots on the ground are better than a bird in the air.”
What the heck does that mean? Oh, boy…
I looked at all my friends, turning from one face to the next, and finally asked something that had been weighing on my mind since… well, ever since I woke up from my coma. “Um… this might seem like a weird question, like it’s coming out of nowhere. It has nothing to do with Brazil or missions or anything like that, but I was wondering… why do we never talk about my mom? I mean, I know I never talk about her, but… I don’t want to bring it up because I’ll feel sad, and I haven’t really had time for that since… plus, it’s not logical to think about things that you can’t do anything about… they’ll just make you feel bad, and maybe even angry, and you might not even know why. My mom told me about feelings… she used to tell me how things that would happen affected her, so I would know if she looked a certain way, or spoke in a different tone, or even if she was crying, that there was a reason for all of it. I used to stand in front of a mirror when I was little, when no one else was around, and try to copy her expressions… how it would look when she was excited, or unhappy, or how her face changed when she saw me or dad… I got to where I could make a lot of her expressions, and because we looked a lot alike, I got good at knowing what her expressions meant, but everyone’s different, so it didn’t work on other people… I know my dad kind of went crazy when she died, and he might be the smartest guy in the world, so she must have really had an effect on people, and not just on me… I’ve thought a few times that’s one reason he worked so hard to save me, because he would still have a little piece of her if he could… she was beautiful, too… dad used to say that he couldn’t figure out how anyone could be so pretty and smart at the same time… and she was smart, it seemed like she knew everything… she…”
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