The SubVersion Complex, Chapter Eighteen

More surprises, as usual. Let me know what ya'll think, I love getting feedback on the new material.

Here is Chapter 18 of The SubVersion Complex. This book is intended for a more mature audience, so be advised.

╗ EIGHTEEN ╚

FATHER

Daniel glared at Mr. Vickers. “I only ever did to her what I told you,” he snapped. The older man glared back.

“Which was quite enough, if I recall. I never authorized you to blackmail this woman or anyone else for that matter!”

Anna's head spun as she tried to process what she was hearing, but in another moment she knew her knees were going to give way from beneath her and she fell into a nearby chair without being asked. Mr. Vickers knelt beside her and pulled a quilt from the sofa. “Here, wrap up in this, your teeth are hammering.” He tried to smile at her.

Daniel, now agitated, knelt on her other side and looked her in the eye. “You said you had some success with my numbers.” When Anna nodded he continued with more passion, “Well? Did you find them? Both of them?”

Anna nodded but couldn't say anything. She opened her mouth to explain but her voice died and she was left to move her jaw in vain. Daniel moved closer to her; Anna could again feel that masculine warmth and dangerous tension near her face and she retreated into the chair. “What did you find, Anna?” he asked. “Tell me!” Mr. Vickers attempted to pull Daniel away but the younger man shook him off violently. “Let me do this, Father!” he growled.

“Father?” Anna finally managed to blurt. Daniel ignored her and repeated his question.

“Tell me, did you find them?”

Anna nodded.

Daniel's voice rose. “The woman? You found the woman too?”

She nodded again, wilting.

“Is she alive? Dammit, tell me she's alive!”

Anna began to tremble from head to toe. Her breathing quickened, her heart pounded in her ears. “No,” she gasped out in a hoarse whisper.

A fearful transformation overtook Daniel. It was as if a bright fire in his eyes had been quashed and all that remained were the freakish charred remnants. His breathing turned ragged, and she could see him fighting back hot tears. “You're lying,” he whispered.

“I watched her die,” Anna replied weakly, her eyes filling with her own tears. “She was thrown into an incinerator and was burnt up.” Her heart felt near to bursting with grief for the poor man. “She's dead.”

Even Mr. Vickers was taken aback. He and Daniel exchanged appalled looks, then Daniel looked away, fighting a powerful maelstrom of emotion. Finally the younger man stood and paced the room while Anna and Mr. Vickers watched him warily, unsure of what to expect next.

“Are you sure she's dead, I mean could there be some mistake?” Daniel stammered brokenly. Anna shook her head.

“There was no mistake. Neville found her and sent her to the incinerator,” she whispered back. “He said she had been frozen one too many times to be of any more use . . . “

Daniel clawed at the air. “Neville, that sickening beast,” he exclaimed. Then he turned on her with a fierceness that truly frightened her. “And you did nothing to stop it? You were right there and you did nothing?”

Mr. Vickers turned to him. “You don't know that, Daniel.”

Daniel waved him away. “Let the bitch speak for herself, Father.”

Mr. Vickers stood, and his old frame shook with anger. “That's quite enough, Daniel.”

“Like hell it is,” Daniel replied. He pointed to Anna. “She's the reason for all of this, don't you see? Her work is what industrialized all of this horror, the Versions and the SubVersions and all of it!” His demeanor turned suddenly calm, but Anna knew better than to relax. She was proven correct when Daniel pulled his own pistol from his belt and dispassionately held it against her head. She stifled a scream and shied away.

“This whole damnable business is her fault, it's on her head. Would it not be just to take her head for it?” Daniel remarked coldly. “Eh, Father? You're always spouting about justice and mercy, you tell me what you think! Then perhaps I'll decide not to pull the trigger.

Anna saw to her surprise that Mr. Vickers had slid between her and the barrel of the gun. “Daniel, this woman is special to me. But even if she wasn't I would still stand between you and the commission of a grave crime against your own soul and this woman's body. She deserves to be shot just as little as you do.”

Daniel threw up his free hand in exasperation. “Is there no justice in this world? What would be so wrong about blowing her away for her crimes?” he cried. “She is HomoGen! She is the enemy!”

“Daniel.” Mr. Vickers voice was soothing but firm. “You are grieving. But you will not grieve with a gun in your hand, nor will you threaten Annalise with any more violence. You will not.”

Suddenly Anna found herself exasperated with Daniel. She astonished even herself by pushing Mr. Vickers aside, grabbing the gun and placing the muzzle against her forehead. “No, it's all right Mr. Vickers. Go ahead and kill me, Daniel. Go on, do it. Pull the trigger. Talk about me like I'm not here and have no say, blow my brains out. I am the cause of all your problems, I am sure. I'm not sure why I care to live anyways, go ahead!”

Daniel was taken aback even in his rage. “Why?” he asked.

“Because I've seen enough today to make me doubt there is anything good left here or in you or anywhere else. So pull the trigger!” Anna's voice exuded desperation.

“That's enough, both of you!” Mr. Vickers said, quietly but in a voice of authority. He gently grasped the gun and pointed it away. To Anna's dumbfounded surprise Daniel let the gun drop completely into the older man's hand and then walked away towards the fireplace.

She watched Daniel grasp the mantelpiece and put his forehead against the wood. What was passing through his mind she couldn't know, but she did see several tears land on the hearth below and her heart again went out to him. Her anger had been brief, and all the feeling she had left for him was sorrow. She then remembered Sonya and her pulse intensified. All was not lost. She cleared her throat. “Daniel?”

He turned slowly to glare at her. Nothing daunted, she continued. “Your daughter, Sonya. She's alive. She's alive, and I spoke to her.”

A change occurred immediately. Hope visibly returned to the grief-stricken face and he approached her cautiously yet with unmistakable excitement. “You spoke to her?”

Anna nodded. “After a fashion.” She swallowed. “They -they're using her for an experiment.”

Daniel stood still, waiting. Whether it was patience or pent-up fury that kept him rooted to the floor she couldn't tell, but he waited nonetheless. Anna continued fearfully. “It's the project that they originally hired you for, the reason they took your brain scans. They built a system that used your scans to interface with other human brains via a special computer. Except,” she swallowed again, “that the heart of the transfer computer is a person.”

“Go on.”

“Sonya. She is the computer. And I spoke to her through the interface.”

Behind the mask of his face Anna detected a hint of dismay, and Daniel stood for a full minute with his arms crossed, breathing slowly. He then roused himself, rounded the bend to the hallway and shut himself in the nearby bedroom with a slam.

Anna shivered and sighed a long sigh of relief. He was gone, at least for the moment, and now that she could relax a powerful exhaustion seeped into her bones. She closed her eyes and leaned back in the chair, pulling the quilt closer around her clammy body for warmth. The quilt smelled good, a kind of delightfully shabby grandmother type smell, and she buried her face in it and breathed slowly.

“That was my wife's,” a voice said, and Anna felt a warm hand on the back of her head. She tensed, then relaxed at Mr. Vicker's touch. Somehow his was the first touch today that she trusted, and she let his hand rest where it lay until she turned to look up at him.

“I'm sorry she's gone,” she whispered.

“And I as well,” Mr. Vickers replied, sitting down in the chair opposite her. He looked even older than usual today. He folded his hands in his lap and looked at them for a minute, then his eyes flicked back up to her face. “I can only guess the kinds of questions you have for me right now, and you deserve the answers to them.”

She did have questions, and they threatened to jumble together as she tried to decide which to ask him first. However, she decided to save the most obvious one for second and ask him the more burning one first: “How did you know?”

Mr, Vickers' brow furrowed. “How did I know what?”

Anna's pride suddenly threatened to choke off her explanation, but she forged ahead despite her discomfort. “You said . . . you've warned me for years that I would regret what I did one day.” She paused, hesitant. “Because I- I do regret it.” She stared back at him, straight into his soulful eyes. “How did you know? How did you know that . . . that I was not happy?”

Mr. Vickers looked back at her mildly, his only movement the rise and fall of his chest. Anna almost thought she saw a smile brewing deep inside him. He cocked his head at her and rubbed his forehead with his fingers. “Annalise,” he began, the smile that she suspected beginning to curl the edges of his mouth, “Annalise, I am old. I've watched many people grow and change, I've grown and changed myself. And if I've learned anything from my observations of people, young and old, that would be that I know when they are unhappy. When someone is unhappy it isn't usually difficult to find the cause, as long as one takes the time and the care to get to know that person.”

Anna frowned, unsure if he had answered the question. “But- but how did you know? Specifically?”

The full-blown smile appeared. “Because HomoGen's work, and Central Admin's work, are fundamentally untrue. You cannot be happy following that which is untrue.”

The concept was so foreign to her that she sat silently, trying to let the words penetrate. Untrue? Why was it untrue? Before she would have laughed in his face at such a suggestion, but now something in her soul resonated to the concept, though she didn't know why.

Mr. Vickers leaned forward towards her and he took her hands in his. “If you really want to know how I know, all you have to do is look around you, and think. You are unhappy because you know deep in your soul that what you do and what you've seen are troubling things. They are not good, they are untrue.” He released her hands. “There is no love in what HomoGen does, and there never will be. And you desire love. I see it with you and Jesse, I see it with your devotion to your job, I see it in everything you do. You want to love and to be loved.”

Anna's breath caught in her throat. One part of her demanded she rebel against his words, that she drive him away. She felt her desire for her work, her memories of HomoGen being pulled away from her and her body screamed that she resist. Then suddenly she heard the Secretary's words again: There is no love in this entire process, and it's about time the charade was dropped.

Adam knew that what he was doing was untrue.

The other part of her found itself listening to Mr. Vickers. “Jesse doesn't love me,” she blurted out. “He never did.”

“Probably not,” Mr. Vickers agreed.

“Did you know the SubVersion complex existed?” she asked, trying to change the subject.

“We had a pretty good idea that the part you saw did indeed exist, and of course Daniel is familiar with a certain portion of it. But we weren't absolutely sure what was going on there until this afternoon. You'll have to give us the rest of the details later of course,” Mr. Vickers said, leaning back again in his chair. “Which leads to your next question: why is Daniel in my house?”

Anna nodded.

Mr. Vickers shrugged. “He is Verité. So am I.”

Even though she had already begun to guess, the revelation still shocked her. “How could you be Verité?” she demanded.

“Because Verité was my idea.”

Now she truly gaped at him. “Your what?”

“Verité is the brainchild of none other than myself, your father, and your mother,” Mr. Vickers continued. “It exists now partly under my supervision and guidance.”

Anna's head spun. She struggled to hold her rising ire in check and she sat up straight, the quilt falling away from her shoulders. “You run Verité? And my parents used to as well? Then how in the world did Verité justify killing my parents? What sort of rationalizing did they have to do, did you have to do?”

Mr. Vickers shifted in his seat, less with discomfort it seemed than a kind of disappointment. “Annalise, why in the world would we have killed your parents? They were our biggest allies.”

Confused and faltering, Anna continued: “But- it was all over the news! It's what I've been told for ages, the Secretary even corroborated it!”

“And you believe everything the media and Central Admin put out?” Mr. Vickers eyed her. “The Party Secretary, he is a trustworthy and honest man? He has never lied to you before? Annalise, Central Admin denies that the SubVersion complex even exists. Their mission from the first day of Verité's existence has always been to discredit and destroy us, by any means possible. Back in the day a warning came to us, that someone from Central Admin knew that your parents were with Verité and within that same week your parents were dead.” He stared hard at Anna. “Killed with a weapon we didn't even possess at the time. I assure you, we had nothing to do with it. It wouldn't have made any sense.”

Anna shook her head; all of this new information was almost too much to bear. She felt a new anger now, the horrible thought that everything she had ever known was a lie and that she would never know the truth. Mr. Vickers' story rang true, but she felt afraid as her old opinions crumbled to pieces around her. Suddenly her anger could center on no one but herself.

Her next question surfaced and she decided to change the subject again. “Daniel called you 'Father.' Are you his father?”

Mr. Vickers smiled. “In a way, yes. I am a Catholic priest.”

The SubVersion Complex, Chapter Twelve

Here is the next chapter of The SubVersion Complex. Hope you all enjoy! If you missed Chapter Eleven, click here.

This book is intended for a more mature audience, so be advised.

╗ TWELVE ╚

DANIEL MARCUS

 

There had been no time to cry out in pain, no time to do anything other than simply collapse to her knees as her attacker held her securely from behind. The intruder's grunted warning into Anna's ear was entirely unnecessary; her brain was shocked and frozen in time and she felt she would have done anything he wanted had he merely expressed the desire.

The man behind her wasted no time. “Good. Get up.” He hauled her firmly to her feet, still pinning her twisted arm behind her back. She complied without a thought or a sound, and watched through a dazed semi-consciousness as he snatched her gun from the floor with his free hand. They both made their awkward way to her living room and the man pushed her to a sitting position on the sofa.

“You will sit quietly and listen, and I will talk,” he said as he flicked on the table lamp and began to strip her gun down to its component parts. She watched with growing concern as frame, slide, barrel, magazine, and spring came apart, and he pitched each piece unceremoniously to various corners of the room. The speed and efficiency of the act startled her, and she became even more alarmed when he did not pitch the barrel but instead kept it in his hand.

She had recovered enough to look at his face and was shocked to realize that it was the same man that had picked her up off the ground at the doctor's office. He stood even taller than she remembered, dressed entirely in black combat gear with his own firearm strapped firmly to his waist and various gear clipped to his belt. She had not seen his eyes at their first encounter due to his sunglasses, but now they were plainly visible: gray, piercing eyes glowing with a hunted fierceness, frightening in their intensity and danger.

Pain suddenly began to rage through her arm and her knees, and she moaned as they began to stab and ache. “You hurt me,” she mumbled almost incoherently.

The man didn't even glance up. “You'll live,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone. “We have more important things to talk about. You are going to do something for me.” He pulled open a pocket on his harness and began to fish inside it for something. “You have top security access at Central Admin and you are going to use it.”

Anna's brain began roiling with obvious questions. “How did you get into my house?” she stammered, disregarding his request. “I set my alarm, I locked the door . . . “

The man did not respond until he had found what was in his pocket, a small scrap of paper with writing scrawled on one side. “I used an access card, same as you would have when you get home at night.”

“But- but I didn't give you my access card!” she blurted out stupidly. “And you didn't steal it, I still have it.”

“I stole it after a fashion,” the man replied. “One doesn't have to take an access card to make it work. I copied it.”

“When?” Anna asked, bewildered.

“At the doctor's office. I was close to you long enough to copy it wirelessly. You really ought to secure your house better against intrusion if you don't want things like your code slicer stolen.”

Panic quickly rose into Anna's throat and threatened to suffocate her. How in the world did her know about her code slicer? How in the world was he standing right here right now? How in the world . . . Then an insane thought took shape in her muddled head. “Who are you?” she whispered, although she was almost certain she already knew the answer. Her suspicions were confirmed when he looked her dead in the eyes and spoke again.

“I am Daniel Marcus, and I know you already know that name. I'm not sure what you've been told about me and who I am, but I am really not in the mood for correcting back story that they may have gotten wrong.” He grasped one of her wrists and planted the crumpled paper he held into her own palm. “I need you to research these for me.”

Anna blinked incredulously at him for several moments before her eyes fell to the paper in her hand. She unfolded it and stared, then held it closer and stared longer with growing confusion. Its only contents were two sets of letters and numbers: SVC1001-1FX and SVC5403-1F. She looked back up at Daniel. “I have no idea what this is.”

“Each one is a serial number in your database,” Daniel replied.

Anna shook her head. “That doesn't help me at all,” she faltered. “I don't even know which database to begin looking in. How am I supposed to look them up when I don't know that?”

Daniel smiled at her, a cold and precarious expression. “Do you think I'm that stupid? In your orientation did Central Admin not cover the “Search All” option from the main screen on your desk computer?”

Anna gritted her teeth, her consternation rapidly growing. “Uh, they did . . . “

“Then use the damn system to do what it was built to do.”

In desperation Anna tried again. “What are these numbers even for? What do they mean?”

Daniel leaned against the nearest wall whilst keeping his eyes firmly affixed to his victim. Anna could hear his breathing become more labored, with sadness or anger she couldn't tell but she guessed some great emotional storm raged inside the man. Finally he crossed his arms and drew breath.

“The SVC stands for 'SubVersion Complex,' the middle numerals are the lot number, and the F stands for Female.” Daniel struggled with the words. “The 1 before it signifies that the female in question has no twin.”

Anna could hardly believe what she was hearing. In fact, it sounded so silly, especially coming out of such a serious man's mouth that despite her discomfiture she could barely contain a hysterical laugh. “Subversion Complex? As in, the Subversion Complex of urban legend? You cannot be serious! You are either a conspiracy theorist of the highest order or you are insane!”

Daniel lunged away from the wall and dropped to his knees in front of her so quickly that she nearly shrieked. She pulled her feet up onto the sofa and shielded her face from his eyes, which now burned only inches from her own. He had his hands on both sides of her, balled into fists and grinding into the cushions while his face floated so close to her own that she could feel the heat of his quiet fury. “I am neither, Anna” he growled, his voice shaking. “Some have speculated about the SubVersion Complex, others have fought to find out if it exists. It does indeed exist, and I know because I have seen a part of it. So do not ever give me grief over conspiracy theories and urban legends ever again. Do I make myself perfectly clear?”

Anna's hands and breathing shook as she nodded desperately. The immediacy of his tone had somehow managed to obliterate her doubt, at least for the moment. Daniel remained uncomfortably close to her, though, and appeared to have little intention of moving any time soon.

“You are looking for two females, and I need to know the status and location of both of them as soon as is practicable for you to get the info to me.”

“You keep saying females,” Anna asked, still cringing away from him. “Female what?”

“Female humans, Anna. Try to keep up.”

“Female humans? But what- what is the Subversion Complex?” Anna persisted. Her confusion grew ever stronger, and even her memories of the urban legends failed her in the details. The Subversion Complex had always appeared in the conspiracy theories as some horrific underground prison, or something of that sort, a subterranean labyrinth that housed some awful secret. However, there had never been any proof of it, and most of the public, including her, disbelieved and even laughed at the notion.

And now Daniel Marcus claimed he had been there.

Daniel tore himself away from the sofa and stood again, and Anna could immediately tell she was not going to get much more from him. His eyes still fixed on her face, he breathed unevenly and worked his jaw. “You will perform the “Search All” function, or whatever function you can find to do the trick, and you will find out the status of these two females for me. It would be an understatement to say that they are dear to me; they are my life. You will do this for me, and you will report back with your findings.”

One of Anna's conversations with Dr. Jarrod flashed back into her mind and she remembered he had said Daniel had gotten tangled up with some woman at Central Admin. Perhaps this was her. She looked up at Daniel and all of a sudden she realized she despised this man, as fearsome as he was. Central Admin and the Secretary carried enough weight between them to squash one man like Daniel. She couldn't recall what had made him seem attractive to her before.

She stared at him with all the defiance she could muster and crossed her arms across her chest. “And what happens if I refuse to do all of this? I could report you, show the Party Secretary the numbers on your list, have you hunted down like the criminal you are. What is to stop me? Are you going to kill me?”

For the second time a smile split Daniel's face. “No, I am not going to kill you. But I'll gladly let you hang yourself if that's your fancy.”

Anna's blood ran cold. “What do you mean?”

“I have two ways of ensuring that you will get this done for me. The first is the highly incriminating data package that my compatriots have ready to drop on your comfortable little life if you choose to ignore me. It has just about every kind of damning evidence we could invent linking you with the Verité group, and believe you me, I am not afraid to use all of it against you if you betray me.”

Anna began to shake again. Along with the abject fear pulsing through her veins, her body had begun to crash after all that wine and she found it increasingly difficult to concentrate properly. “And the other way?” she croaked.

“The other way is this.” From the same pocket that the paper had emerged from now came another object, this one small and round and shiny. Daniel held it up so that she was sure to see. Anna realized with horror that it was her borrowed code slicer, the slicer that was supposed to be nestled comfortably inside her safe upstairs. Her stomach fell away completely.

“How did you get that?” she gasped.

Daniel looked askance at her. “You have a biometric lock on that safe, Anna, and your fingerprints are all over this house. Don't insult me.” He held it just out of her reach. “As I understand, this slicer needs to go back to HomoGen pretty soon. A couple weeks, perhaps? And then they will begin to demand it of you. I hope you are privy to the fact that this device is worth more than your entire property, and that you'd have to invent a fine excuse to explain its disappearance. So I will be taking this with me until I hear back from you.”

“Wait wait wait!” Anna stammered breathlessly. “Please don't, if I lose that I lose everything! And how am I supposed to get in touch with you anyways? I don't know how, you're liable to disappear and never come back!”

Daniel pulled a small commex handset from his belt and tossed it onto the sofa next to her. “You will use this,” he said. “I know you are a computer tech and that your first thought will be to hack this device and discover my location, but rest assured we've already taken that into consideration. If you take it apart it will signal me and then destroy itself. If you attempt to bring it into Central Admin the guards will scan your vehicle and yourself and they will find it. If you tamper with the code inside at all it will alert me. So don't try anything, it would only be a waste of both of our time.”

He looked at her one last time. “I don't want to do this, I wish there was another way, but there is no other way I know of. Play along and everything will be fine. Don't play along, and I and my allies will rain hellfire down on you.”

“Your allies?”

“Yes, if again you had not already guessed. They are Verité, and so am I.” He turned to leave, then paused briefly by the entrance to the kitchen. He held up his hand, and Anna saw the barrel of her gun shining between his fingers. “You know, it would take a professional only a couple seconds to reassemble this weapon under ideal circumstances. Your weapon is a bit more . . . scattered. I'll tell you what, since you fancy yourself handy with a gun, I will give you this-” he indicated the barrel “-and we will see how quickly you can reassemble and get off a shot at me. Farewell.”

With that, he tossed her the barrel and disappeared into the kitchen. Anna immediately dove for the floor and scrabbled for the remaining pieces of her firearm, snapping and clicking it all back together as quickly as her training allowed. When it was finally assembled again she raced through the kitchen to the back door, but she already knew it was a lost cause. Daniel Marcus was gone, and she was trapped.

She stumbled back into the living room overwhelmed with exhaustion and anger and fear. After stripping the magazine from her gun she threw them both onto the coffee table, then threw herself onto the sofa and began to cry. Her body trembled with wrenching violent sobs for a long time before she drifted fitfully off to sleep.

The SubVersion Complex, Chapter Eight

Here is the next chapter of The SubVersion Complex. Hope you all enjoy! If you missed Chapter Seven, click here.

This book is intended for a more mature audience, so be advised.

╗ EIGHT ╚

THE SECRETARY

The next day proceeded almost exactly as the one before it: arrive early, proceed through security, and run orientation with Terry for several hours. Terry introduced her to the workings of her security ID badge, a holo-electronic scan key which unlocked everything concerning her new job. Any restricted access point, including computer terminals and secure databases, would unlock with a simple swipe as long as it represented a relevant part of the reactive computer project. The key would also only work when the card detected her particular bio-signs, so that it could not be used if stolen.

Then lunch, then spend the afternoon immersed in computers and bio-tech technical jargon. There would be no more harassment by Central Admin's security personnel, however. They even stood at attention as she walked in and flashed her badge to the woman at the reception desk. A bit surreal, but Anna shrugged it off. At least they were not poking and prodding her inside the building anymore, albeit still scanning. She was still required to traverse all the same checkpoints to get through the perimeter fences, but the process had smoothed out considerably.

It was a good thing that she liked Dr. Jarrod too, because he decided that the second day was soon enough to dive into the deep end of his work. He also suddenly showed a strange reluctance to mention anything more about his suspicions and opinions, and remained in full-on business mode the entire time. They spent three solid hours after lunch going over the reactive computer and steeping her in its complex workings, and Anna found herself slowly coming to an appreciation of how involved Dr. Jarrod's work actually was. He boasted eighteen-year veteran status in his technology; Anna felt puny by comparison. However, by the end of the second day they had already begun to hammer out a workable solution to the transfer protocol problem.

Anna's third day began to feel routine. She breezed through the multiple walls, fences, and scanners and headed to Level 2 to meet Terry for more training. The tall blonde woman stood waiting for her in her usual pose with arms crossed and grudging approval on her face. However, Anna almost felt there was something more there now: grudging fondness as well, perhaps? Something about Terry's eyes had softened, maybe? Whatever it was, Anna felt more comfortable with her.

Terry nodded in greeting. “You're consistently punctual. I like that.”

Anna almost laughed. “Drilled into me in boarding school. They didn't tolerate tardiness.”

“I see,” Terry replied noncommittally.

Anna inwardly shrugged. Maybe she's not so fond of me yet. And with the way they've scrutinized my past, she probably already knew that. They both proceeded to the tables and, pulling their firearms from their holsters, arranged them on the tables before loading extra magazines with .40 caliber ammo. However, when they were ready to shoot Terry did not immediately pin up any targets, but instead stood with the last magazine in her hand while looking at the floor.

“Anna,” she said quietly.

The word was spoken so softly and with such concern that Anna looked up with a start. For someone who epitomized clipped and authoritative speech, this was jarringly unlike Terry. Anna raised her eyebrows in question and waited for her to speak again.

Terry swallowed and brushed a hair back from her face. “I want you to take everything we do here extremely seriously.”

“All right. I thought I had been?” Anna offered, unsure of the point of the statement.

“You have been diligent and thorough, yes,” Terry replied, finding her mental footing and proceeding more confidently. “But I have the feeling that this has not all sunk in like it should quite yet.”

Anna's mind remained a blank. “I'm-not sure what you mean. This is only my third day.”

Terry's jaw worked as some inscrutable thought flashed through her mind, and Anna could decipher nothing from her face. Finally the older woman spoke again. “You are not armed simply because we arm our officers and personnel. You are armed so that you can kill, when necessary.”

Anna swallowed and her heart beat faster. The thought had occurred to her while firing at the silhouette targets, but it had registered on some lower plane of her consciousness while her higher thoughts focused on making accurate holes in the paper. Now that Terry had mentioned it, however, Anna could feel her skin bristle with sudden cold. She licked her lips. “Kill?”

Terry nodded, looking hard into Anna's eyes. “Yes, kill. Using your firearm gave you a rush, did it not?”

Anna nodded. “I-I felt powerful,” she said slowly, almost with embarrassment.

“It's not an uncommon feeling,” Terry replied. “The feeling of power when handling a firearm, shooting it, becoming acquainted with it. It is power over the life of another, power to eliminate a threat. Potentially, the power to dominate others.”

Immediately Dr. Jarrod's comment rushed back into Anna's mind: She was the only member of the reactive science team with a gun. Her breathing increased as her mind became a rushing tumult of conflicting emotions and thoughts. Why did they give me a gun? Why did they choose me for any of this? Why not someone else? Why?

Terry must have sensed the maelstrom raging inside Anna's soul because she shook her head. “I cannot give you the why or the how of any of this, Anna. But I can help equip you for whatever is coming. I want you to trust me, with your questions and concerns. I want you to follow my advice, and follow it well.”

Anna looked hopefully at her and could feel a sudden warmth and concern in her mentor. Almost unnerving, but reassuring. Terry continued.

“You are part of a unique team here, doing unique work. Which means there is now a target of sorts painted on your back, a target that will only likely grow as time goes on.” She stared hard at Anna as she finished.

Anna bit her lip as a terrible thought suddenly crossed her mind. “Is someone trying to kill me? And if so, why was I not assigned a protective detail?”

Terry opened her mouth to speak, then thought better of it. She turned her face away from Anna and tossed the magazine onto the table with a thud. “You never know who is going to do what in this profession,” she remarked almost to herself. Anna's heart quickened again.

Terry had failed to answer her first real question.

The older woman quickly added, “I have killed before.”

Anna felt the attempted redirect strongly and anger began to bubble up inside her. But the admission intrigued, if not surprised, her. Officer Garnham looked the part in her efficiency and stolid temperament. However, it still came as a shock to hear her admit it. She decided to humor Terry's diversion for a moment. “You have?”

Terry continued to look away, her silence only prolonging the tension. Finally she sighed. “I have. I shot a man through the eye and blew his brains out of the back of his head. He was dead before he even hit the ground.”

Despite her anger Anna felt reluctant to pry, but her curiosity hounded her to find out more. “How long ago was this?”

“That doesn't matter,” Terry replied sharply, her sudden emotion not directed at Anna but at some other unknown entity. “I would have been dead had I not pulled the trigger, had I not had the will to pull the trigger. But I did, and I am alive and he is dead. And I want you to remember that, Anna. That in the larger picture, we need you alive. Which means that you need to have the will to pull the trigger if and when the time arises.”

Terry's tone had risen to an urgent pitch throughout her speech, and Anna was once again both confused and distressed. Everything felt even more cryptic and opaque than before, but Anna no longer felt like she had the permission to ask any more today, despite Terry's “open door policy.” Besides, Terry had in effect admitted that she either did not know what was going on or did not have the clearance or desire to tell her.

Disheartened and indignant, Anna picked up her weapon with less enthusiasm than before and walked up to the firing line. “I assume we are doing the same exercises today as before?” she asked flatly.

A strange look passed briefly over Terry's face before it reverting back to the usual business-like somberness. She shook herself and picked up a rolled up paper target. “You assumed correctly.” She clipped it to the sliding hangar and let the paper unfurl. Anna felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach as she saw, not a black human silhouette, but a full-color representation of a man holding a gun pointed threateningly in her direction. The whole exercise had become much more personal.

For the next two hours she practiced with minimal supervision, then broke down the weapon and cleaned it. When the gun was clean again a new officer joined Terry and introduced himself to Anna as a Sergeant Revier. A short, powerful and blocky man, he began to demonstrate some tactical maneuvers to Anna with a dummy firearm. No sooner had he begun, however, when Terry's commex began to chirp. The group paused the exercise as Terry answered the call.

Her conversation was short, but dramatic. Anna watched Terry's face go red with consternation, and then turn completely white. “Really? Now? He wants her now? What for?” After another moment she sighed with resignation and tapped the screen to cut the call. She licked her lips nervously and slid the commex back into her pocket. “You can go now, Sergeant,” she said, waving him off. He grunted something in annoyance and stalked away.

“What happened?” Anna asked, mystified.

“You are spending the rest of the day with someone else,” Terry replied uncomfortably. She picked up her firearm from the table and holstered it and Anna mimicked her reluctantly. The two of them exited the firing range and returned to the elevator, where Terry tapped the topmost button and watched the doors slide shut.

Anna's blood churned. “Where are we going?”

“To the top floor,” Terry remarked solemnly. “The Party General Secretary wants to see you personally in his office.”

It was as if a bomb had exploded inside her head and Anna felt as if she were falling even though the elevator moved steadily upward. The combination sickened her. She shot an arm out to the wall to counter her sudden vertigo and save herself from falling over, but her head would not stop spinning.

The leader of the entire Reunited States, the General Secretary himself, wants to see me. The most powerful man in the world wants me in his office. She had no time to prepare, no time to gather her thoughts or steel herself for such an encounter.

“Terry, help, I'm going to be sick...” she blurted out. Her own body surprised her in its total breakdown of higher control. It had rarely happened before like this, with no alcohol or medication of any kind in her system. Terry reached out a supporting arm and Anna grabbed at it.

“Pull yourself together Anna, he wants you now. And that means that you're going to see him, no matter how you're feeling about it.” Terry's voice was harsh but definitive and represented a rock to cling to. Anna gritted her teeth and willed herself to calm down. Few ever got to see the Secretary on a regular basis, and very few people were ever especially summoned to his private suite. At least that was as far as Anna knew. She barely knew what he looked like anyways.

Terry became business-like. “Just answer his questions and follow directions,” she said quickly. “And remember that he is just a human being like anybody else.”

Just a human being like anybody else?? The sentiment did not resonate with Anna at all. She found herself possessed by a sudden desperation to know what the hell was going on and to either escape from it or throw herself into it headlong and be done. All of this cryptic behavior surrounding her did not help. The desperation fueled her anger and she turned on Terry.

“Terry, how much are you telling me? Or not telling me?” she asked quietly. “I feel like the world around here has begun to revolve around me and no one will give me a clue as to why. Why am I special? What does the Secretary want with me? What do any of you want with me? Why was I brought in, besides the transfer protocol?”

Terry stared at her for a long moment. Her face showed no signs of returning Anna's anger; if anything, she looked sad. “Anna, I don't know.”

“Bullshit!” Anna muttered miserably.

“It's true. You mistake my rank. I only know my orders.”

Anna groaned and slumped against the elevator wall. “I don't want to do this,” she groaned.

”I think he wants you in his office so that he can tell you what is going on himself,” Terry proffered. “He doesn't mean to make you anxious and miserable. This is unlike you, Anna. ”

“If you say so . . . ” Anna shook her head to clear the nausea.

The doors slid open and Terry crossed into the new hallway. She turned on her heel to face Anna through the opening. “Are you coming?”

Anna nodded and followed her through the doors. This new floor differed strikingly from the rest of the building. Instead of the sterile grays of the lower levels, the top level of Central Admin boasted sumptuous salmon-hued marble walls and floors lit by imitation-incandescent lighting. Beautifully executed vaulted ceilings stretched the entire length of the hall and one whole wall was dedicated to tall windows in cherry wood. The effect it produced was warm and dignified, if not exactly inviting. Despite her anxiety Anna couldn't help but notice its beauty and she found herself stealing glances out of the windows as they traversed the length of the hall.

A beep emanated from her pocket. Anna distractedly pulled out her commex and swiped the screen. Then she froze; Jesse's number blinked on the screen. She hesitated, then realized that he was the last person she wanted to talk to right now. She mashed the exit button and pocketed the device, and tried to put him out of her mind.

They came to another scanner manned by two guards, one of whom requested that Anna hand over her weapon and walk through the frame. She complied and, after a physical pat down from the other guard, she was given the thumbs up. She turned to Terry.

Terry waved her ahead. “His door is right there. You are to go in alone.”

Anna's stomach dropped again. “Are you sure?”

“Go.”

The door in question was the last door at the end of the hall, a huge heavy oak affair stained an extremely dark brown. It looked old and imposing, and Anna hesitated before walking up to it and knocking timidly. She jumped as she heard an electronic lock click open and turned to see if Terry still stood behind her. Terry raised her eyebrows at Anna and gestured for her to go. Steeling herself, Anna pushed the door open, stepped inside and shut it behind her again. The rest of the world seemed to disappear and a profound silence enveloped her.

Her first impression was the dim light. Only one tall window allowed a shaft of sunlight in from the right side of the room, revealing a dark oak desk and an empty chair behind it. Every wall was a bookshelf, and every shelf was crammed with books and documents of all kinds. A fire crackled in a large fireplace behind the desk, and in front of the fireplace stood a man.

His back was to Anna, one hand on the mantelpiece and the other on a metal cane. All she could see of him was his long brown hair overlapping a beautifully tailored suit coat. She hesitated, completely out of her element, the desire to simply bolt back out through the door growing to almost overwhelming levels. Before she could act on that impulse, however, the man turned suddenly and smiled.

His face was long and thin, his teeth very white. Every stitch of clothing he wore screamed designer label, from his frock-type coat to the shoes on his feet. Anna also noticed that the clothing, although well-made, exhibited signs of age and dust. The man also stood at an impressive height; Anna guessed he would easily have measured at six-two.

He stood with the whole weight of his upper body leaning into his cane through both hands, regarding Anna with a strange sort of quiet excitement. His eyes took her in from across the office and he nodded with what felt like approval. He gestured for her to sit in one of the plush leather seats in front of his desk.

“Please,” he said. “I won't have you standing there like that, come and sit.”

Smooth and reassuring, Anna decided. Which was good, because her knees had come close to knocking together in her anxiety. She slowly shuffled over to the desk, eying him the entire time. He watched her with a quiet amusement as she warily approached.

He held out a hand to her and smiled. “Welcome, Miss Annalise McLean, to my humble office. It is so good to finally officially meet you. I am the Party General Secretary, as you might have guessed.”

Anna shook his hand. “It's an honor to meet you, sir,” she croaked through a dry throat.

The man smiled again reassuringly. “Please, there is no need to stand on ceremony. Your name is Anna, is it not? And I will call you that. My name,” he added as he sank into his own chair, “is Adam. And you will call me that.”

Click here to read Chapter 9!

The SubVersion Complex, Chapter Six

Here is the next chapter of The SubVersion Complex. Hope you all enjoy! If you missed Chapter Five, click here.

This book is intended for a more mature audience, so be advised.

 

╗ SIX ╚

LABORATORY A1A

Anna tore into her lunch with a vigor that surprised even her. The last three hours had approached grueling in their intensity and food had never looked so good before in her life. Despite the greasiness and lack of taste of Central Admin cafeteria chicken, she was determined to have her fill before someone else grabbed her and whisked her away for more orientation.

Her hands still shook from the sheer physical exertion they had endured since she arrived. Her right index finger in particular ached, and now that salt and oil covered her fingers she realized painfully that she had rubbed a raw patch on both her finger and the web of the same hand. Terry's mention of one hundred more shots had proven entirely misleading; she had made Anna fire five hundred rounds before she was satisfied. But satisfied she was in the end, and their training had turned to cleaning the firearm.

Anna had no idea a gun could become so filthy so quickly. When she had first handled it out of the box it smelled new, a crisp scent of oil and fresh plastic. After five hundred rounds it smelled of propellant and ash. In her usual matter-of-fact manner, Terry had taken the gun and demonstrated how to brush out and oil the barrel, slide and stock. She was not squeamish about dirt and grime, and by the time the gun clicked back together clean, both her and Anna's hands were covered in black. After washing their hands, Terry had shown her to the cafeteria and left her to eat by herself for the next forty-five minutes.

Anna now silently thanked her for the solitude; it gave her some time to reflect. Her mind still reeled from the events of the morning and it was good to let everything settle. Since her arrival she had been accosted, searched, scanned, probed, and suddenly granted unmolested access to the Central Admin building. On top of that, she had gone from never having touched a firearm in her life to firing, taking apart, cleaning, and reassembling one. Her own, no less. The thought somehow refused to sink into her consciousness easily. The bulge in her waistband begged to differ, however, and she reached back to touch the weapon that nestled under her shirt in the small of her back.

Terry had given her that as well, an in-the-waistband holster that fit both her gun and her body perfectly. Terry had shown her how to draw the gun properly from behind her back and Anna had again impressed with her quickness to learn and her accuracy. With only ten or fifteen tries she had satisfied Terry's critical eye, at least for today.

She glanced at her watch: forty-two minutes had ticked by. Looking up from the remains of her lunch, she saw Terry enter the cafeteria with a business-like stride, accompanied by a very short stout man who was forced to run to keep up with his much taller companion. He looked to be in his late forties, dark skinned with a fringe of gray hair framing his ears. He wore a long white lab coat and a pair of glasses pushed high up onto his forehead.

The odd pair did not immediately approach Anna but instead visited the food counter first. Anna studied the small man with increasing curiosity and a growing sense of wonder; she realized she knew who he was: Dr. Konrath Jarrod, reactive computing specialist extraordinaire. His picture featured prominently in the news she had seen regarding the breakthroughs in reactive computing, and he looked every bit the scientist in real life as he had on the broadcast.

In a few moments they were headed in Anna's direction and Anna quickly wiped her mouth and hands in embarrassment, still oily from her chicken. Terry approached first and gestured to Anna: “Anna, I'd like you to meet the man who invented reactive computing, Dr. Konrath Jarrod. Dr. Jarrod, this is Annalise McLean, the one who will be writing your transfer protocols.”

Dr. Jarrod, all smiles, eagerly proffered his hand to the star-struck Anna. “It is good to meet you, Miss McLean,” he rumbled agreeably. His accent leaned Caribbean, but Anna found it impossible to narrow down any farther. “Officer Garnham has told me how smart you are already, but she did not mention how beautiful as well.”

Anna unexpectedly blushed hard. It had been ages since someone had called her beautiful, at least as sincerely as he just did, and her heart melted a little. Her instinct told her she was needy for being so touched, but for once she didn't care. She held her hand out to him. “I am so pleased to meet you, Dr. Jarrod. I've heard plenty about you as well.”

She was taken completely by surprise when Dr. Jarrod, instead of shaking her hand, took it in his own and kissed it gently. He looked into her shocked face and smiled, showing a full set of very white teeth. “All good, I sincerely hope. I wouldn't want my newest programmer to harbor any animosity.”

Anna stammered something unintelligible and the scientist laughed and sat next to Terry, across the table from Anna. “One would think a man had never paid you any of the proper courtesies due to your sex,” he chuckled almost to himself. “I cannot imagine why or how.”

The offhand comment bit right through to Anna's core and she winced inside. He was more correct than he knew. She pushed the garbage from her lunch to the side and leaned on the table in front of her, searching for a way to change the subject. “So, how far along are you with the whole reactive computing process?”

Terry tapped the doctor on the shoulder. “That is my signal to leave. She is in your care for the rest of the day.” She turned to Anna. “Please review the agenda for tomorrow's orientation before you arrive in the morning.”

“Yes ma'am,” Ann replied, then turned eagerly back to Dr. Jarrod, who had begun to dig into his own lunch. She repeated her earlier question as Terry exited, and he held up a finger as he chewed his first bite. Finally he was ready to speak.

“To be honest,” he said with a sudden seriousness, “now that Officer Garnham is gone, we are far enough along in the reactive computing process that I am surprised they even brought you into it.”

Anna frowned. “Wait, what?”

He looked deep into her face and for the first time she saw a troubled flame in his eyes. “We are almost done. Them bringing you into the project almost seemed like an externally-motivated stunt. I am sorry to say that most of the interesting work is already complete.”

“That's odd,” Anna mused, her spirits falling. She hadn't realized how eager she had been for this challenge until it had apparently evaporated. “So then why did they get me at all?”

Dr. Jarrod leaned back in his chair and chewed silently for a moment before he replied. “The day that I submitted my latest progress report to Central Admin, I included a small action item that I needed fulfilled at their earliest convenience. I told them that I needed a software person to provide a badly needed fresh pair of eyes. We had hit a small snag with the transfer protocol and needed an outside opinion.”

This sounded better than nothing. Anna perked up as he continued: “The reactive tech, as you know, works the same way the human brain works. And the human brain is notoriously...eh...nonlinear in how it processes information.” He rolled his eyes, searching for the correct explanation. “Making that last jump between computer and brain is a bit like trying to pin a fly to a table while it's flying around. The brain attempts to reject the information at every turn.”

“That is fascinating,” Anna remarked. “So the reactive computer simulates the brain that well?”

“Simulates may be a strong word for it. We actually use real brain tissue in the computer, so we are working with essentially the real thing.”

Anna started. “Real brain tissue? But I thought-”

“Most people think the same thing,” Dr. Jarrod said, smiling. “And we did originally build a computer simply based on the structure of the brain. Now we've enhanced it with some of the real thing and run into the problem. We didn't have this transfer issue with the man-made version. A major oversight on our part.”

“Ah.” Anna wasn't sure what sort of reply was appropriate.

“Let's just say that we are finding it much easier to extract muscle skills and thought patterns from the human brain than to put those skills and thoughts back in.”

Anna nodded, again unsure of a proper reply.

“The protocol is finished up to that point. And once we-or you- figure out that particular algorithm, then the project is complete. Central Admin and HomoGen will have instant education at their disposal for the Versions.”

“Then it doesn't sound as bad as you were making it out to be,” Anna said with a dry chuckle. “It leaves me something to do, anyways.”

Dr. Jarrod smiled briefly. “I suppose.” He fiddled with his fork. “The question is, what will you be doing after the project is complete? They seem to want you for the long haul. Officer Garnham really hammered the firearms training this morning, did she not?”

Anna blushed again, this time for other reasons. “Word really gets around in here, doesn't it?”

“She told me herself,” Dr. Jarrod laughed. He became serious again and leaned forward closer to her. “Miss McLean- may I call you Annalise?”

“I prefer Anna.”

“Very well, Anna.” He wiped his mouth with his napkin. “I would recommend that you keep your eyes wide open. Something is going on here that is bigger than you, I think. As much as I will enjoy working with you, I feel your time with my laboratory will be brief. They didn't bring you in here just to program a protocol for me.”

A cold sensation washed over Anna as she listened. She could think of no explanations but in her gut she felt he was correct. She moved closer to him and asked in a lowered voice: “Why am I here then?”

The man across the table from her gave her a perturbed shake of the head. “I have no idea. All I know is that neither I nor any one of the scientists I work with keeps a gun on their person. You'd be the first in my laboratory to do so.”

The cold feeling settled into her stomach and began to wind it up in knots. “Should I be worried? Or should you be worried? I was never told to...to keep an eye on you or anything of that sort.”

“I wouldn't worry for the moment,” the doctor replied. “I don't think. But...keep your eyes open. I like you already, Anna, and I wouldn't want to see you get hurt.” His face was gloomy for a few moments, then it suddenly cleared and he smiled his wide toothy smile again. “Speaking of laboratories and projects, shall we go get you acquainted with mine?”

“That would be wonderful,” Anna said.

They both were eager to change the subject and both left the cafeteria with Dr. Jarrod leading the way. They walked for what seemed like an eternity, down several long hallways and up another elevator, then down a long windowed gallery similar to HomoGen's huge windowed upper stories. Anna slowed down and Dr. Jarrod, realizing he was no longer being followed, slowed as well. She insisted on pausing here, and with her back to the windows she stared with wonder at an enormous mural on the wall opposite.

The painting must have stretched for fifty feet in either direction and easily stood twenty feet tall. Darker hues dominated the leftmost portion, gradually growing lighter as the eye moved from left to right. The individual images crowded together into a fantastic mass of chaotic motion, and yet each was distinct enough to easily make out. Men fought each other; tanks battled, bodies bled, and in the background of the dark section of the painting rose a glowing mushroom cloud. Anna wasn't sure if it literally represented the nuclear terrorist attack of 2024 or if it stood merely as a symbol of past violence, but either way it made an effective image.

Towards the middle of the painting the individual images began to change, forming into a charging slew of men and machines facing off against another army charging in the opposite direction. A different flag flew over each army, the one on the right she recognized as the blue and white flag of the Party of the Reunited States. The flag on the left she did not immediately recognize; it was striped red and white, with a blue field studded with white stars. She guessed it belonged to the rebellion forces, judging from the ugly snarl of the man carrying it. In fact, the entire rebellion army showed the bias of the painter with their bloodthirsty open mouths and animalistic poses.

Moving farther to the right along the painting, the images changed again to dark rivers and fields that gradually yielded to sunshine and brilliant light. From that point onward no darkness or violence lurked, no men fought, no blood ran. At the far right end stood a shining representation of the Central Administration building, with a portrait of a man emerging from behind it. Anna recognized him as Secretary Bono Clark, the first Executive Secretary of the Reunited States. The entire mural, she realized, was a history of the last one hundred years.

“Quite a stunning piece, is it not?” Dr. Jarrod remarked quietly, his hands behind his back and his gaze on the wall. Anna nodded.

“Maybe a little over-the-top, but yes,” she replied, taking in the vast picture. It reminded her of an image she had seen long ago as a little girl, in a book that her parents owned; she only remembered that the picture was titled The Divine Comedy and that it depicted a similar progression of images. Hard to forget, those images of twisted and agonized bodies in hell, of fire licking at damned souls, of the two men walking through the midst of it all witnessing the brutality of their surroundings. She had gone running to her mother in tears after seeing the picture, after which the book disappeared without a trace. To this day Anna could not find it.

She sighed and turned to Dr. Jarrod. “I'm sorry, I've never seen it before, that's why I stopped. We can keep going.”

Dr. Jarrod smiled graciously. “I do not object.” He turned and continued walking down the gallery with Anna in tow. She could not help but give the painting one last glance before they passed through another door and another hall. Finally they stood in front of a door marked Laboratory A1A, and Dr. Jarrod swiped his badge against the sensor pad. The door clicked sharply and he pushed it open, waving Anna inside.

“Welcome to my humble but very well-equipped abode,” he said grandly, spreading his arms wide. Anna grinned at him and, entering, looked around.

Everything was white: the walls, the floor, the equipment. It all gleamed and exuded the feeling of new and expensive. Most of the equipment stood in the middle of the room, forming an island around which the workbenches were arranged. Every work station featured its own omni-monitor and data inputs. Anna felt her spirits rise as she took it all in; this put her setup at HomoGen to shame. She finally felt at home. She poked and probed around, and Dr. Jarrod watched her with an increasingly amused smile. “You are allowed to touch, you know,” he laughed. “Although whatever happens in this lab stays in this lab for security purposes.”

Suddenly she gasped and pointed to the corner. “Is-that it?” she asked, looking to Dr. Jarrod. He nodded.

“That is the crown jewel, yes,” he said, walking to the corner where a large bank of monitors sat atop a shelf that hung suspended over a long black box. As Anna approached she saw that the entire corner was bursting with support equipment for the reactive computer, with wires and cables of all sizes and shapes snaking in and out of the black box and feeding information to the monitor array. She ran her hand along the tops of the glass screens, reveling in the feel of high technology under her fingertips. Looking down past the complex wiring harness, she suddenly found herself disturbed staring at the black box. It looked like nothing so much as a child-sized coffin made of black metal. She shook herself and willed the thought out of her head.

Dr. Jarrod cleared his throat and sat down in front of the monitors. “Sit down if you would, Anna, and we'll get started.”

They spent the next two hours sitting in front of the computer screens, Anna asking many questions to which Dr. Jarrod almost always had an answer. The scope of his knowledge and expertise was truly vast, and Anna thought she could never tire of picking the man's brain. She watched with rapt attention as he demonstrated the wave patterns the reactive computer core generated, and the thought patterns that he and his team were attempting to input. She soon found herself puzzled, though. “Dr. Jarrod? I have an odd question.”

“Yes?”

“You said earlier that it was a lot easier to extract thought than to put it into the brain, correct?”

“That is correct, yes.” Dr. Jarrod pulled his spectacles off his head and began to clean them.

“And you are trying to input a specific thought pattern into the reactive computer core?” Anna continued.

“Yes.”

“Then, if you don't mind my asking, where did the thought patterns come from? The ones we are trying to input? Who did you record them from?”

Dr. Jarrod seemed surprised by the question, but he shrugged and replaced his glasses atop his head. Anna wondered offhandedly why he bothered to clean them when he was just going to stick them back up there. “Now that is an interesting story,” he said. “I didn't get my choice of subject for the thoughts and muscle motor skills I was extracting. Central Admin, in their infinite wisdom, picked my subject for me. I would have chosen...oh, I don't know, a violinist, perhaps? Someone with finely honed artistic skill of some sort. But no, they decided I would get someone else.”

“Who?”

“His name was Daniel Marcus, ex-military Elite Combat Unit. The best of the best, or so they told me. Story goes that he fought his way single-handedly out of Mogadishu during the Allied campaign there and rejoined his squad with barely a scratch. Anyways, he supposedly represented the pinnacle of physical prowess so we recruited him to donate his motor skill thought patterns to us.”

Anna frowned. “You said his name was Daniel Marcus. Where is he now?”

Dr. Jarrod became silent for a long moment. He rubbed his fingers together and with a discouraged look on his face turned to Anna. “Something went wrong. Very wrong. He got mixed up with some woman around here and got into a huge fight. Even started demanding that I erase the brain data he had donated to me. Finally he disappeared into some Central Admin prison and word came out that he was actually an agent working for Verité.”

Anna drew in breath. “Were they attempting to break into something?”

Dr. Jarrod shook his head. “I have no idea. But Central Admin naturally wanted him as dead as they could make him so a brief went out just last week that he was to be executed. It was going to be televised, as a warning against any further Verité intrusion attempts. Then the whole affair just disappeared.”

Anna's eyebrows shot up. “What do you mean? Did they execute him?”

“If they had executed him they would have made it public, like they promised. But they haven't said a word about it since. So I think he either killed himself in his cell, or- and I know this is insane- he escaped.”

Something in Anna's mind instantly clicked. “He escaped,” she breathed.

Dr. Jarrod sat back and raised a doubtful eyebrow at her. “How the hell do you know?”

“The Central Police were stopping all traffic out of D.C. at checkpoints just a matter of days ago,” she explained. “And they refused to tell me why. I'd say it's a good bet that he escaped and they are looking for him.”

Dr. Jarrod chuckled grimly. “Heh, well, I wouldn't have known about roadblocks or checkpoints. I am almost chained to these desks; I sleep here many nights. Just over the weekend I got to go home for the first time in weeks, and I plan on leaving here at decent hours from now on.” He grinned. “Now that I have a savvy programmer in my lab to do my work for me.”

“You can expect work from me, not miracles,” Ann replied, catching his infectious humor. “But I already have some ideas as to how to fix your problem.”

“I'm glad to hear it.” Dr. Jarrod said, then stood as another man entered the lab. The new man stood much taller than Dr. Jarrod and sported a much younger face, a face which he was in the act of stuffing full of doughnut as he walked through the door and sat down.

“Anna, this is Dex Lynch, my assistant,” Dr. Jarrod said, motioning to the other man. Anna nodded to him and he nodded wordlessly back, the doughnut still obstructing his speech. Without another word he plugged his ears with digital music and pulled himself up to one of the computers to work.

“Not much of a conversationalist,” Anna remarked dryly. Dr. Jarrod chuckled and sat back down.

“No, and I prefer him that way. Nepotism at its best; Dex the Second, son of the founder of Dexworks. He's a whiz at brain pattern analysis but he spews some of the most obnoxious crap when he gets started.” The doctor tapped the data pad in front of him. “Shall we get back to the task at hand then? All of this talk of escaped convicts has derailed my train of thought.”

Click here to read Chapter 7!