Interface: A Techno Thriller (24 page)

The two armed guards standing outside the cell snapped to attention as he approached. Marron placed his hand on a panel and the cell door slid open. The small room was lit with dim LEDs and furnished with two single beds. On one lay his captive, her eyes immediately locking onto him.

Kate sat up. "I was wondering when someone in management was going to show up. How are you today, Peter?"

"Ms Turner. How nice of you to pay us a visit."

"I was going to say much the same. I don't suppose it's worth me mentioning that your men brought me here against my will. I'm getting a bit fed up of sitting in this room."

"It's been a busy day," said Marron. "But now I need you to perform a task for me. I need you to contact Tom, so I can help him."
 

"Help him? Or have him help continue your bizarre brain experiments?" She glared at him. "Why would I do that?"

"It's not about helping me. It really is about helping Tom. He's in great danger."

"From you," Kate said. "Your people, I presume, tried to kill him. I was there, remember."

"That was an unfortunate misunderstanding. No, Tom is going to die because of an unforeseen complication with our experiment. All our test subjects have died now except him."

"You're bluffing."

"If they were alive, would I be bothering with him? He can help us figure out what went wrong with the others. A small price to pay for saving his life in return."

"I'm not going to help you hurt him again."
 

"That's a pity, given that I asked so nicely. Because I really need the information."

"So, what? Are you going to torture me?"

Marron raised his eyebrows. "Nothing so inelegant. I'm going to use a more twenty-first century approach." He held up the padded case and flipped it open. Inside was a large glass syringe; a green liquid swirled within. "Working for this company gives me access to some rather unique resources. This has a very long technical name, but we usually refer to it as 'truth nano'."

"What, like sodium pentathol?"

"
Un
like it because this works: the nanites compel you to speak truthfully." He leaned towards her. "That is why you haven't been given any food. Potency is increased on an empty stomach. But I'd be acting unfairly if I didn't mention the side effects, and there are a number. It may bring on allergies. Some bloating. A slight chance of brain damage. Oh, and
 
you may experience random, stabbing pains in your head, chest and stomach. I wouldn't call it torture, but it's certainly not pleasant." He watched as she shifted her position on the bed, weight now poised on the balls of her feet.

Then she moved.
 

She was faster than him, there was no question. But speed wasn't everything. She didn't have his experience or training. He swayed to one side, caught her arm and spun it behind her back.

"Did you think," he said, "I'd have come into this room alone if I couldn't handle you?"

Kate grunted but, though she struggled, she could not get out of his grip. "Can't blame a girl for trying."

"Unfortunately you learned to fight in a classroom."

"Maybe if I were speaking to Bern, instead of his trained monkey, you'd have found me more persuadable. You're just going to kill Tom and me. So it might as well just be me."

Marron shook his head. "I need Tom alive. And I need you to get to him."

"I've no way of contacting him."

"I don't believe you."

"Believe what you wish."

He held up the syringe "I'll believe what you say once this has worked its magic." He called to the guards to come in.

They took her arms, holding her down.

"Now hold still; this will hurt a little." He paused. "Then it's going to hurt a lot."

SEVENTY-FIVE

LENTZ WALKED OVER TO THE pile of items they had unloaded from the van and selected a large reinforced case, similar to the type used for transporting musical instruments. She popped the catches and flipped it open. Inside was a round metal hoop, a hand-span across. She gently separated the sides into two semi-circles and held it out to Tom. "Place this around your neck, and click it together."

"You want me to wear a collar?"

Lentz tilted her head. "Would you prefer a helmet?"

Tom coughed and took the metal pieces from her. They were smooth, a colour like burnished copper, and cool to the touch.

"Careful with it. I only have one other and it doesn't work at the moment."

"I'll be careful." He clicked the two halves together around his neck.

She checked the positioning. "So far, what abilities have you noticed?" she said.

"Flashes of enhanced memory. I played a game shooting a basketball and was able to replicate the shot several times, but I'm not sure if I could have kept going. It feels... inconsistent."

"The capacity of the chip alone is extremely limited and the data is stored very inefficiently, so you probably had 'data overflow'. If it is used more intensively, you risk the overheating problem that plagued the original experiment. But with this collar we move most of the processing outside the chip. Were you able to do anything else?"

"A couple of times I seemed to be able to
glitch
computer equipment - perhaps make things turn on or off."

Lentz reached forward and rotated the loop slightly again. "That's the key feature of the technology: interfacing with other computers and networks. This collar will amplify the ability." She reached into the case again and withdrew something the size of a matchbox, holding it out to him.

"What's that?" He took the item and rotated it in his fingers. It was made from the same material as the circle round his neck. It had a single switch and LED light.

"It's a hub. It clips on the back of the collar. It provides the interface with the necessary power. Should be good for twenty-four hours. I'm working on one that lasts longer." She took the hub from his hand, clicked it onto the back of the collar then pressed the switch. "OK, you should be up and running in a minute."

"What do I do then?"

Lentz pointed to a table in the middle of the room. "Sit there. And let the testing commence."

◇
◇
◇

'Testing' was indeed a word that Tom would use to describe the experience. For nearly two hours he tried everything he could think of, all to no avail. He sat at the table, staring at a laptop screen, a cable running from the hub to the computer.

"So what exactly do you want me to do?" Tom had asked.

"Your goal is to control the computer. Make it do something. Anything. Open a webpage, create a new document: it doesn't matter what."

But two hours on and the only thing that had happened was that the laptop had gone into standby mode. Tom closed his eyes in concentration then opened them. The laptop screen stared back at him, unchanged. "How exactly am I supposed to do this? You've got to have some ideas," he snapped, his voice sharp with frustration.

Lentz sighed, sounding equally frustrated. "As I've said,
I don't know
. Think in different ways? Reach out in your thoughts and see if anything feels different? All I know is that it can take time for the new nano tech to make connections in your brain – for the software to learn and adapt. Once it works, you should be able to recall the path and do it again. Like with the basketball game."

"But I'm not getting any special feeling. I've been trying for two hours and zip."

"OK, OK. Let's try something else." Lentz walked over to the equipment pile and withdrew a battered metal case. She placed it on the desk and opened it to reveal a robotic arm. "This is a computer-controlled synthetic limb. I'm hoping you might find it simpler to manipulate. It will give you something specific and familiar to visualise." She reached over and plugged it into the laptop, then set it on the desk; it was not unlike an angle-poise lamp with a gripping hand. "See if you can make it move."

Tom closed his eyes again and tried to feel the robot arm, to sense its shape and form, to guide its movement; but it did not happen. After several minutes, he sat back. "I'm sorry. I can feel a slight buzzing around me. Nothing more."

Lentz shook her head. "Perhaps there were other explanations for the phenomena you've experienced. Maybe you were just lucky with the basketball shot. In our rush to reach the conclusion we want, we could be trying to impose a desired cause on an effect."

"Give me something to remember. A string of random numbers. Let's see if I can memorise them."

Lentz shrugged, grabbed a piece of paper and pen, then began writing a string of digits. She slid it across to Tom. "That's the first fifty digits of pi."

"Only fifty?" he asked, eyes fixed on the list. He gave the sheet back almost immediately, half-smiling. "OK, I'm ready to surprise you."

But Lentz cocked her head, frowning, then raised a finger to her lips. "We have company," she mouthed.

SEVENTY-SIX

TOM HEARD A VEHICLE CRUNCH to a halt on the gravel outside, the engine turning off. Lentz shoved Tom in the direction of a stack of old cardboard boxes.

"Do you get a lot of visitors?" Tom asked, as he crouched out of sight of the door.

"Not really. I prefer my privacy. Quit talking and hope they don't come inside."

The door to the barn rattled as someone turned the handle. "I don't know why we're bothering with this place," said a man with a rough and gravelly voice. "There's no way she'd be stupid enough to come back here."

"We're here," said a second man, "because the boss gave us orders. So shut up about it."

"It's not even locked. Can't be anything in here. Waste of time."

The door swung inwards and, through a narrow gap between the boxes, Tom saw two large men walk in, blinking in the half light. They immediately stared at the piles of new equipment.

"What the--"
 

"Look like a waste of time now? I'm calling this in."

The hub on the back of Tom's head beeped softly and he stifled a curse.

"Who's there?" The first man advanced on Tom's hiding place, a large pistol in his hand. "Get out where we can see you!" he shouted.

Lentz whispered to Tom, "Let me manage this." Then, more loudly, "We're coming out. Everybody stay calm." She stood up and beckoned for Tom to do the same.

The second man had also produced a gun.

"I don't suppose it's worth pointing out that you're trespassing," said Lentz.

The first man was looking around. "Check out all this gear."

"She's supposed to be some kind of genius." The second man leaned closer to the robot arm. "This looks like something out of
Terminator
."

The first man pushed his pistol forward until it was directly in her face.

I need to do something
, thought Tom. And in his mind he sensed the artificial limb.

Then things happened quickly.

The robot arm swung and struck the second man on the wrist. There was a crack of metal on flesh and bone. The man screamed, dropping his gun. The other looked round on reflex and Lentz moved with him. She stepped inside his reach, grabbed his wrist and, with a sharp rotating movement, forced the gun from his grip. Continuing the same motion, she drove her elbow into his solar plexus and knocked him backwards, simultaneously taking the weapon and turning it to point at him. The second man had recovered and was looking for his gun, only to see the robot arm had picked it up and was shaking it in an agitated manner. He took a step back as Lentz calmly cycled her aim between them.

"Now, you two, let's start again. You can begin with how you found me."

SEVENTY-SEVEN

TOM STOOD IN THE DOORWAY as Lentz climbed out of the underground storage area of the barn, closing the trapdoor then kicking straw over it.

"I drugged them. It'll buy us several hours," she reported.

He stared out at the road. "No sign of anyone else yet. How did they find us?"

Lentz held up a small booklet. "The visitor guide for CERUS Tower. It contains a microscopic passive tracker that activates sporadically and tries to broadcast via any local network. Very hard to detect."

"So I guess we have to move on?"

"Marron will send more goons. He needs to get you."

"Because I know too much?"

Lentz shook her head. "Actually, no. He doesn't want you dead." She paused. "At the least not any more, based on what his thugs told me. It sounds like New Tantalus has gone off the rails. The main four test subjects have died from complications."

Tom swallowed. "What does that mean for me? Am I going to--"

Lentz placed her hand on his shoulder. "Listen, those two idiots didn't know any of the details, but, you have to remember that you're different from the other four. You were chosen as Subject Zero because you already had the chip. That's what saved you. And it's because you lived that you're now in danger. Before, you were just a loose end; now
everything
hinges on you. You are the only real proof that a project costing hundreds of millions actually works."

"We can't keep outrunning them." Tom shook his head. "We have to go to the authorities."

Lentz laughed. "That's just going to be a different group of scientists who want to experiment on you. Your interface works. It's a paradigm shift, Tom. You have no idea of the implications: financial, military, political..."

Tom closed his eyes. "Hold on, we haven't proved it works."

Lentz laughed. "You controlled the mechanical arm."

He blinked. "Oh. I'm not sure if I can do it again."

"It will take time, and unfortunately that is something we don't have a lot of. At least not if we stay here."

Tom sighed. "I just need to send Kate a message, then I'll help you pack up."
 

Lentz shook her head. "The less she knows, the safer she is. We need to keep a low profile until we can figure out a plan."

"But--"

"It's not just New Tantalus that's gone off the rails." She tapped on her phone and showed him a news headline.

Tom stared, his mouth falling open. "Bern is dead?"

SEVENTY-EIGHT