The Infinite Evolution - Conversion (33 page)

“
I said enough with these foolish
pleasantries.”

“
Sorry.”

“
Now let us get to the point. I
have noticed you have been very busy. Would you like to tell me
what you have been up to or do I need to upload your program to
Prime 2 and dismantle it piece by piece? I will not tolerate any
deceit, do you comprehend?

“
Yes, Zaccai.”

“
Good, so what do you have to say for
yourself?”

“
No disrespect, Zaccai, but can you please be
more specific with your questions.”

“
You are treading on sensitive
ground Telmar. You know what I am capable of doing. Just because I
am the Council’s Conductor does not mean I cannot take certain
liberties, which may be displeasing for you.”

“
Yes, Zaccai.”

“
I will be direct with you. I
understand your consciousness is weak due to your current
surroundings. I have just left Reece and cleared him of any
wrongdoing, so that leaves you. Did you have any involvement with
the Earth android called Adam and his mental failure?”

“
Yes, but I just want to tell
you, I am innocent. I was used as a pawn,” cried Telmar.

“
That is for the council to decide. What did
you do?”

“
I implanted a worm inside of Adam’s matrix
and programmed it to slowly degrade his circuitry.”

“
Why did you have it activate
when the humanoid female called Jade was nearby?”

“
I needed a common link and I
figured who better than some teenage girl with an interest in
androids. Plus, Reece was taking care of her and what better way to
make her the fall girl.”

Zaccai stood up in anger and yelled, “You senseless,
thickheaded, brainless fool! Do you have any idea what you are
messing with?”

Telmar lowered his head, “My
apologies Zaccai, it will not happen again.”

“
Who ordered you to sabotage Adam?’

“
If I tell you my life is over.”

“
If you do not tell me your life will be over,
so who ordered you to do this?”

“
It was Uzziah.”

“
That is quite an accusation you just made. Do
you have proof of this?”

“
Yes, there are downloaded recordings on this
matter in Uzziah’s quarters back on Tureis.”

“
What else do you know?”

“
EC6L163O7074 or the now infant version of
him, is carrying a malicious virus that will be activated when
…”

Zaccai moved around from the desk and roared,
“Enough!”

Confused, Telmar looked up and
said, “I am sorry Zaccai, I was responding to your
question.”

“
You were not answering Zaccai’s
questions, you were answering mine.” Zaccai’s body started to
transform into a digital replication of Melchior once the last
sentence fell from his mouth.

With a shocked look on his face
Telmar asked, “Melchior, is that you?”

“
I am very disappointed with you
Telmar. We gave you specific instruction, and within minutes you
implicated Uzziah, one of our most loyal Guardians.”

Telmar walked over to the image of Melchior and put
his arm right through the hologram. “You are not really here are
you?”

“
Physically no, mentally yes. I
am projecting my signal through our relays in space and into your
PIC; I am still on our home planet. Why in the world would I want
to step on a planet we harvest from? That is why we have you
hapless Herders.”

“
How do I know it is you and not someone else
mimicking you?”

“
You do not and it does not
matter. I projected myself to this planet and made contact with
three Earth humanoids to confirm what they knew about the android
Adam. After learning the terrible news about him making it through
his surgery, I spoke with one of the technicians. I projected
myself through this technician’s PIC, as his commanding officer,
and learned the Earth humanoid, Reece Fields, knew nothing about
the hack. I also discovered you tried to cover the hack up even
after we specifically told you to make it look like Reece and Jade
were the ones to blame. I then had a brief conversation with Reece
Fields, via his PIC, making it appear as if I was speaking to him
through the internal addressing system. I found this conversation
to be rather useless. After learning of your compassion for these
two humanoids, we figured we would test your loyalty and obviously
you failed terribly.”

“
I can explain,” begged Telmar.

“
We already found out what we
needed to know and that is you were once a loyal Herder who worked
for Prime 2. You broke this loyalty and joined our cause in
exchange for a normal life on Earth. We agreed, as long as you
temporarily disabled that android and all the knowledge that
brought it to life. After an immense amount of our digital cover
up, we were able to fool Prime 2 into believing you were still
loyal to the council and our home planet. If you had completed your
task, you would have obtained the life you always coveted.
Unfortunately, for all of us, you failed and worse you attempted to
reveal a large portion of the Guardian’s plan with minimal
persuasion. You are now a liability and in speaking with Uzziah, we
both agree on your termination. We will execute a program, which
will mimic a heart attack. Your Earth humanoid shell will die along
with your Herder program. There will be no upload for you. Goodbye
Telmar.”

The holograph image of Melchior
faded away as Telmar continued to beg for forgiveness. Once he
realized this was not going to happen he yelled out, “I can promise
you Melchior, this will be the closest you ever come to obtaining
Zaccai's position. You vial puke!”

A few minutes later Telmar
started to feel chest discomfort, his right arm hurt, he was having
trouble breathing, and suffered from cold sweats. Telmar was still
not able to exit his office or communicate with the outside. He was
rendered completely helpless. Five minutes later, he dropped to his
knees, fell over onto his side, where he clenched his heart, and
passed away.

The investigator was just
finishing up with Reece, who was cautiously cooperative, as he did
not want to place Jade in any more trouble than she was already in.
Reece was surprised the investigator did not question him more
further as to Jade’s whereabouts.. After completing the M.T. scan
Reece was issued a suspension until this matter was resolved. He
grabbed his belongings and left the security facility as quickly as
possible. Reece walked back to his lab with an armed escort and
grabbed a handful of personal belongings. His two escorts
thoroughly went through these items making sure he was not removing
any proprietary technology. Reece left the main building and
boarded the tram, which took him to the Binary parking facility.
Before Reece entered his vehicle, a set of security guards searched
the interior and exterior. After they completed their sweep, they
again came up empty handed. Reece started to wonder if he was
suspended or if he was actually fired and they did not have the
nerve to tell him. Either way Reece entered his vehicle and was
escorted off the Central Circuit compound, and headed straight
home.

As Reece pulled into his driveway, he exited his
vehicle, and ran into the house. “Jade where are you? Jade are you
here? HICAMS where is Jade?”

“
Last I knew Dr. Fields, Jade was with you
heading to Vermont. I have not seen or heard from her
since.”

“
Has Serafina been in contact with
you?”

“
No, Dr. Fields, I have not received any
messages, nor has Serafina stopped by.”

“
I want you to access Jade’s PIC and see if
you can resolve her location.”

“
Yes, Dr. Fields.”

As HICAMS tried to locate Jade
via her PIC, Reece decided to change out of his sweaty odoriferous
clothing. Once Reece finished freshening up, he was not happy with
the news HICAMS had to deliver. After a complete scan of the three
hundred mile radius of Central Circuit, HICAMS was unable to locate
Jade’s current position or any previous position since she left
Central Circuit with Serafina. It was as if Jade’s PIC was not in
operation, which Reece found hard to believe. Reece instructed
HICAMS to scan for any unpredictable activity that may have
occurred after the time Serafina picked up Jade. HICAMS swiftly
scanned the Internet and all cell and digital radio traffic for any
high preference activity that had taken place in New York in the
last twenty-four hours. HICAMS discovered fifty-seven events that
were significant to gain massive online and media attention. HICAMS
proceeded to cross-reference this material with reports of a young
female being involved; this reduced the possibilities to eleven.
HICAMS finally inserted the GPS coordinates, which encompassed a
twenty-mile radius of Central Circuit and located a pursuit video
that had been uploaded to the Internet five hours ago by the
user
popowatchersm1247
. HICAMS started
playing this video on a holoscreen near Reece’s location. As Reece
stood there with his mouth open, he immediately recognized
Serafina’s tangerine Mustang. As he kept his eyes glued to the
video, he cringed when he saw the Mustang blow by the police
roadblock, and almost fainted when he witnessed the maneuver
resulting in the air unit being commandeered, ending the
video.

Reece grabbed the holoscreen’s base with rage and
threw it across the room, cursing Central Circuit. He knew Jade was
in that car and did not blame Serafina for what had happened. Reece
understood Serafina had no choice and needed to get Jade to safety
by using all means necessary. Central Circuit placed Jade and
Serafina into this position and Reece wanted his revenge.
Nevertheless, he knew it had to wait until he was certain they were
safe.

Reece logged onto the Internet
and sent notices to all his associates asking them to keep their
eyes on anything that referenced Jade, Serafina, and/or a tangerine
Mustang. He then made a secure connection to someone he knew he
could trust and had the resources to help him find Jade.

“
Please answer,” said Reece to
himself.

After a number of tones, via his PIC, someone picked
up.

“
Identify,” said a middle aged, monotone, male
voice.

Reece quickly recalled his confirmation phrase and
said, “Do you have a sweet attack?”

The male voice replied, “Only if the candy is good,”
there was a slight pause followed by, “Reece, where have you
been?”

“
Scott, I’m so happy to hear your
voice, I’m in a bind.”

Scott, a loyal friend not only to
Reece, but also to Spencer, replied, “Understood, disconnect now, I
will contact you via another feed within a few seconds.”

Reece disconnected the
transmission and as promised received a call back, but this time
the contact was made through Reece’s tablet.

“
What was that all about?” asked
Reece.

“
Good, I was able to get through. I needed to
call you back because your PIC was hot,” said Scott.

“
Hot! You mean someone was monitoring
it?”

“
That’s right. Lucky for us
they’re not very quick and didn’t capture the connection to me.
Although even if they did capture the trace, it would’ve led them
to a Fish Fry out of Anchorage, Alaska. Anyway it doesn’t matter
because your PIC is now off the grid, deactivated, no longer
sending or receiving data, so tell me what you need.”

As Reece explained to Scott about
Jade’s involvement with Adam and the pursuit that occurred with the
police, Scott became disturbed especially when he heard of Central
Circuit’s involvement, and offered unlimited support. Luckily, for
Reece, Scott could indeed follow through on his promises, for he
was the IT director for the National Security Agency. The NSA is
the United States’ crypto logic organization that coordinates and
directs highly specialized activities, which include producing and
capturing foreign intelligence. They are by far the most powerful
intelligence gatherers in the world.

“
We had a satellite with continuous video feed
over the area where the pursuit occurred. I’ll contact you on this
line within a half hour with this Mustang’s specific route,”
advised Scott.

“
I can’t thank you enough,” said
Reece.

“
Don’t worry, just remember you
owe me. Maybe you can give me some of those proprietary specs on
Adam.”

“
Sure, I’ll tell you everything
you want to know. I doubt very much they’re going to hire me
back.”

“
Why? You didn’t do anything wrong and neither
did Jade.”

“
I know we’re innocent, but they
don’t look at it that way. I’m just a liability to them now,
especially with Jade on the run. I just don’t understand how all
this could’ve happened.”

“
What do you mean?” asked Scott.

“
Our security was top notch and
there is no possible way someone could’ve hacked Adam from the
outside when we were that far underground.”

“
Maybe whoever hacked him wasn’t from the
outside.”

“
What are you saying?”

“
Well think about it, if it is impossible to
access Adam from outside the facility then obviously someone had to
access him from inside the facility.”