James Knapp - State of Decay

“Where am I?” she asked.

As I looked down on her, she just stared up at me, her brown eyes replaced by moonlight silver. It was amazing how dehumanizing that one change alone was, but it was more than that. This was the first time I had ever seen a revivor that I had previously known so closely, and the change was subtle but startling at the same time. More than just the color of her eyes or her skin, it was her body language, her expression, the way she held herself; everything was different. It was as if her body had been inhabited by some completely different entity.

I sat down on the bedroll in front of her so that we were facing. Immediately, she reached out and took my hands in hers.

“Why did you do that?” I asked. Her palms and fingers were cold, with no pulse.

“I don’t know.”

“Hold still,” I said, “and stay quiet. I need to concentrate.”

Closing my eyes, I scanned the communications band until I found her signal. She was on an encrypted broadcast band.

“I can’t force my way in,” I told her. “I’m extending a connection; can you see it?”

She didn’t respond at first. I opened my eyes and saw her staring into space, slightly out of focus.

“Yes,” she said.

“Can you accept the con—”

Call connected.

Are you picking me up?

In front of me, her lips curled very slightly, forming the ghost of a smile. Or was that wishful thinking?

“Yes,” she said.

Answer back over the connection.

Yes. I’m picking you up.

Good. There should be a copy of any communications you’ve received in your memory buffer.

This feels strange.

I’m going to try to retrieve it.

Okay.

Her hands were like ice, but my palms were sweating.

The last time I tried this, I accidentally triggered a device designed to prevent anyone getting in.

Okay.

The revivor was destroyed.

Okay.

I moved more carefully this time around, sending a data miner across to feel out any security instead of brute-forcing it. Her systems were protected, but since she hadn’t been deployed, there were no modifications, and the miner managed to clear the way in.

What are you looking for?

Having only been reanimated for a short time, there wasn’t much in there. The bulk of it was a dynamic database. It looked like a full copy of the list I’d pulled off of the dock revivor.

I’ve got it.

I compared the list fragment I’d pulled from the dock revivor to the database of names I’d just recovered. There were no matches.

As I watched, it changed size in front of me. A couple seconds later, it did it again. It was getting smaller.

Do you know what this is? I asked Faye.

No. Do you?

A list of names, but the ones I was looking for aren’t there.

It keeps changing.

What?

It keeps getting updated.

How often?

It varies.

How do these updates occur?

A connection opens and they arrive , Faye said. First the list came; then, after that, the updates.

The list was keeping track of the names dynamically. That was it; the names were no longer on the list because the people they represented were dead. The database had been updated, and the names removed. If it was a synchronized database, then the updates were coming from somewhere. As the Heinlein rep had pointed out, revivors communicated in a hub-and-spoke fashion, not directly to one another but through a common point. That common point, that hub, must be where these people were based. If I could locate that …

The last change in the list size was already complete. I set up a monitor to watch all incoming ports to trace the next one when it came in, then went back to the list.

What do these names have in common? I asked her.

I don’t know.

Was your name on the list?

No.

I’m going to try to view the history. Hold on.

There were backups going back several iterations in case of corruption. Fishing through them, I found the names from my list fragment. They had been removed eight iterations ago:

Database synchronization pending. Updating …Header mismatch: Zhu, Mae. Murder. Removing. Header mismatch: Valle, Rebecca. Murder. Removing. Header mismatch: Craig, Harold. Murder. Removing. Header mismatch: Shanks, Doyle. Murder. Removing.

There were several iterations preceding that one. There were a lot of names in there. At least twenty had already been removed, and there were hundreds more.

I’m going to need a copy of those names. I’ll be careful.

Okay.

Rather than try to mirror the entire database, I decided it would be safer to go through and just scan the names one at a time and copy them manually. As I got closer to the most recent version, I noticed one of the iterations actually increased the overall size by a small fraction instead of decreasing it.

Hold on.

Shuffling ahead to that entry, I brought it up to view it.

Database synchronization pending. Updating …Header mismatch: Ott, Zoe. Experimentation. Adding.

I jerked my hands back, but those cold fingers locked around my wrists.

Who’s Zoe?

Let go.

Who’s Zoe?

Twisting my wrists, I knocked her hands away. I put a call in to Sean.

Sean, the revivors are communicating with a base of operations somewhere. That partial list we recovered from the dock revivor is part of a much larger one, and they’re making their way through it.

Why? Who are they?

I don’t know why, but do some digging. I’m sending the names to you now.

Roger that.

The entries have been getting crossed off more and more frequently. It looks like it started to ratchet up maybe six iterations ago….

That was around the time Ohtomo dispatched the National Guard. There was a string of removals prior to that, in between.

Faye, these early names are all your victims. The ones you were investigating.

I noticed that too.

It looked like in addition to that, the suicide bombing was referenced as well:

Database synchronization pending. Updating …Header mismatch: Strike 0. Terror. Removing.

The equipment, bodies, and weapons Tai was bringing in, the victims of Faye’s killer, the recent bomb attacks; all of it was planned in advance.

Sean, I need to know who these people are. They have something in common. Someone out there wants them dead, and they’ve gone to a lot of trouble and expense to make it happen.

If there’s a connection, I’ll find it.

In the meantime, I’m monitoring the channel so the next time a communication comes through I should be able to trace it back—

Faye twitched in front of me, her eyes widening. All at once her body tensed up, cords standing out in her neck.

Shit.

I backed off, recalling the miner and retreating from the memory I had accessed. Her fingers curled and I could see warnings spilling past. Was I too late? Had I already triggered it?

“Faye?” I asked out loud. She didn’t respond. Her eyes didn’t turn toward me.

Agent Wachalowski.

I turned my attention back to the connection between us. The message hadn’t originated from her. It came over another connection to her that had just been opened.

Who is this?

Agent Wachalowski, this is Samuel Fawkes. Why are you playing with one of my revivors?

Samuel never left.