James Knapp - Element Zero

“ …the end is nigh …”

It was the last thing I remember thinking. The chaos around me seemed far away. It was happening somewhere else. In my mind, all I saw was Van Offo’s face as he said the words, and the look in his eye that told me it was true.

“When?”

Wachalowski, do you read—

“Soon …”

The darkness was reluctant to let me go. With no need for sleep, it had been a long time since I’d been under. The last time had been almost two years ago, and I remembered I’d found it peaceful. This time, though, something felt wrong.

Reanimation occurred without a hitch; energy began to course through my body, and the blood thinned in my veins. My mind, however, awoke to a dark void. Usually I could sense all of my memories, assembled like a field of stars beneath me. And far below that, in the cold depths of space, that dark hole pulled gently at me and waited. This time my memories were gone, and I was face-to-face with oblivion.

My memories were still there, just far above me. My mind had sunk below them, to the bottom, where I’d one day disappear. Even so close, I could see no end to it, but its gentle tug was more insistent now. It held me with millions of tiny black threads, drawing me slowly inside. I had always feared that void, but I found myself unable to resist. It was almost hypnotic.

“What’s the problem?” a voice asked. It was a man’s voice, from somewhere close to me. Impulses began to fire through my brain as it processed the signals, breaking me out of my trance. I felt my mind float back up, until those black threads stretched taut, then finally broke. The void released me, but it seemed reluctant. As I floated back through the field of memories, it seemed to deliver a wordless promise.

Soon.

“What’s the problem?” the voice asked again. This time, another answered.

“The name on the tag doesn’t match the signature.”

Energy trickled down the length of my spine and bled through my arms and legs. It began to gather where my heart had been, pooling and growing stronger. Muscle tissue began to reactivate, and I curled my fingers closed.

“Let me see,” the first voice said.

“Jesus, this one took a beating,” a third voice said. “Looks like an old stab wound to the chest, and five, maybe six bullet holes. Look at the size of those entry wounds.”

“According to the tag—”

“The tag’s wrong. Run the signature.”

I became aware that I was lying prone, with several figures positioned around me, and I heard the white noise of electronics. Something sharp and cold probed the back of my neck.

“What’s the matter?” the woman asked.

“There’s something strange about these wounds.”

“Is it a gen seven?”

“Yes. According to the signature, her name was …Faye Dasalia.”

“She was a police detective,” one of them said. “Maybe she got shot in the line of duty.”

“I don’t think so. Look right there…. Were those grafts revivor flesh?”

No one spoke for a moment, but I could sense them crowding in around me.

“I think these wounds happened after reanimation.”

“Maybe it’s back from the field?”

“These haven’t gone out yet.”

“Get it hooked up and let’s pull the memory.”

“Cognizance variant is very narrow,” the woman said. “Look at the date. It must have been one of the last before the injunction.”

“MacReady’s team will want a look at this one. Dump its core and let’s get it to T-Five.”

One of the figures leaned over my body, and I felt the probe slip through into my spine. My body went rigid as the probe turned live and found the socket to my main control node. All of my systems lit up, and the probe began to take inventory.

“It’s definitely been in the field,” someone said. “We’ve got quite a few custom modules here.”

“Flush all that. Just take the memory buffers.”

The probe cycled through my different packages, schematics flashing by behind my eyelids. The custom software modules raised some eyebrows, but the extra hardware put them all on edge.

“The Leichenesser capsule’s been removed,” one of them said.

“It’s got some kind of custom hardware fitted in with the bayonet too.”

“I’ve got a second bayonet here, in the other arm.”

“Stop the scan.”

The probe tapped into my memory buffer and opened a connection. When it did, the virus there executed. It took control of the link and then flooded the circuit. The code quickly propagated through the lab, then pushed through onto the rest of the network. Address registers scrolled by as it isolated their security and began to shut it down. A Klaxon sounded but was quickly cut off as the first module went dark in my display.

“What the hell was that?”

“Stop the scan!”

Voices rose outside the room. The intrusion on the network was spotted as they lost their connections to the outside.

“The system’s not responding,” one of the men said. His fingers worked a console to my right.

“Then pull the probe!” the woman snapped.

Slowly, I opened my eyes. Three people stood around me: an older, gray-haired man with a thick beard; a broad-shouldered black man with a large belly; and a gaunt-looking woman who kept her long, thin hair in a ponytail. Probes stuck out of my chest like pins in a pincushion, and readouts streamed on a bank of monitors.

The old man had reached for the probe in my neck, but stopped when my hand and forearm split apart. The blade deployed with a loud bang, and he froze, the tip an inch from his throat. He raised his hands so I could see them.

“Deanimate it!” the woman snapped.

The tray creaked as I sat up. Wires connected to the probes in my chest pulled taut, then the needles clattered to the floor. The virus branched out, infecting all of their security protocols. It disabled the cameras, motion detectors, heat sensors, everything. The lethal current running through the perimeter fence faded, then died. The gates unlocked and opened. I placed my bare feet on the cold tile floor as behind me the door to the lab opened, and the three technicians looked past me, toward it.

“Ang, Dulari,” the woman said. “Shut that thing down!”

As she spoke, her pupils dilated, and I fired the injector from my arm. The thin tube whipped through the air, and the needle lodged in the side of her neck. She slapped the spot with one hand, but the needle was already gone. As I watched, the orange glow in her rib cage that pulsed so frantically began to slow down. Her legs gave out, and as she started to fall, the bearded man caught her, his eyes wide with shock.

“She’s alive,” I told him.

“Ang, what are you doing?” the second man demanded.

Two of my three contacts had arrived. Ang Chen, a Chinese man with a dour face, and Dulari Shaddrah, a Pakistani woman whom I suspected might have been beautiful, stepped fully into the room. Dulari put one warm hand on my shoulder. Ang approached the men, a pistol in his hand.

“Back against the wall,” he told them.

“Hold still,” Dulari said in my ear. She carefully removed the probe from my neck, and I felt the circuit cut. I pulled the remaining needles from my chest as she handed me a bag. It contained clothes that had been folded neatly.

“Why did the perimeter go down?” I asked. “You have control of the transmitter array now.”

Dulari smiled weakly. “Don’t worry about that.”

I looked around, but the third man I was supposed to meet was not with them.