StarFall Comics
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Metal Fire
#8 False Maria 02
He sat in an windowless, off-white office, enduring the dilbert-esque monotony of fluorescent lights and endless paper work. His in-box was long ago buried with time reports and project status updates and requisition requests from computer bound employees who no doubt blamed the molasses response time on inefficient management and unclear direction. None of them, of course, had to deal with a dozen or so of unhappy lazy programmers. He'd loved for them to try this job for a while, to deal with the nit picky little whiners and actually try make any drastic headway in an eight hour workday.
His desktop computer was crunching through a spreadsheet, manipulating numbers in formulas and cells to make a schedule that didn't go too far over budget or deadline. He left it on a programmed script that ran it through hundreds of combinations, an hour here, a temp worker there, to eventually spit out the top four possibilities based on his pre-defined criteria.
None of them would be completely satisfactory, of course. It wasn't management's job to be satisfactory, though, it was their job to make the best of what almost always turned out to be a bad situation.
While that was going on, he had his laptop opened up, and was looking over some pre-compiled code one of his special projects programmers had emailed him. He had an email window open, and was already making a short list of needed changes. He really wished these guys would be a little more careful in their work. Or even, heaven forbid, take a look or two over it before sending it in as 'complete'. Somewhere in the world he could imagine a handful of dotcoms going under for just this reason.
The phone buzzed cheerfully, hidden by a stack of overdue placement forms. He brushed them away, and was puzzled to see it was his direct line, not the one guarded by his secretary. Very few people knew the number to that line.
None of them ever called with good news.
He coughed a few times, clearing his throat before picking up the receiver and leaning back in his chair. "Gregory Reeves, Direct Market Programming. How can I help you?"
"It's Poe."
His heart caught in his throat, and he sat up straight again.
"Mr. Hamilton is interested in the project," Poe continued, unflinchingly calm. "More specifically, he was wondering how far along we are."
"Very far, sir, we're really close," he replied, cradling the phone between his chin and shoulder and bring the laptop up beside him. "I was just going over one of the updates for the next upload. We're going in again tonight to see how a couple of our benchmarks are doing, and then it's just a matter of configuring the variables for compilng."
"Not the patch. The final product."
"Final?" he paused, confused. "Not for a month, at the outside. We're still stabilizing the operating system."
"We'd like to be done by the end of the week."
He didn't say a word. Truth be told, he nearly dropped the phone. He was completely blanked on how to reply to such an unreasonable request. He just stared at the laptop screen, the flat haze staring back at him expectantly.
"Is there a problem?" Poe prodded, snapping him back into real time.
"We're can't be ready in a week."
"You'll be ready for week."
"We don't have enough time to stabilize the system. The test periods don't allow for that aggressive a time schedule."
"Stick the subtle approach. Sleep the system for longer periods and code the OS directly."
"She'll know... What if she finds out?"
"Then you better make sure to get it done right the first time." He could almost hear Poe grin maliciously on the other side. "This won't be something your marketing department can put good spin on." Click and dial tone.
He hung up the phone, and turned to the code on his laptop. The bare bones text and numerical code of computer operating system and user interface stared back at him, looking for a few nips and tucks before being transformed into a fully fledged usable program. And somehow he had to convince a dozen white collar department computer programmers it would be in everyone's best interests to work overtime to get this project done weeks ahead of schedule.
He looked at the phone, a now silent partner in his predicament. He saw his name stenciled on the handle, Gregory Reeves. He hoped the next time he saw his name stenciled on anything would be on a pink slip and a very generous paycheck signed by Mr Hamilton. He was afraid he'd see in chiselled in stone above his grave, instead.
Eddy blinked his eyes a couple times as he painfully regained consciousness. It wasn't the same thing as waking up after sleeping, this was a lot more drawn out, a lot more painful, and quite usually a lot more jarring. And, as he kind of suspected, was accompanied by a splitting headache and an unfamiliar room.
It was badly lit, the only light being cast was a few candles burning away on a card table beside him and the tell tale flickering colors of television monitors somewhere behind him. Quiet bass music popped his eardrums, and a subtle vanilla smell mixed with the scent of matches and ozone.
Getting a better look was out of the question. He had been expertly tied to a plastic and metal kitchen chair, facing a wall. His hands and arms were bound behind him, and his legs were knotted to the sides of the chair. Short of twisting his head around slightly, his range of movement consisted shuffling against his ropes uncomfortably.
He heard typing behind him, just out of his field of vision. Quick, hurried typing, but very methodical, very ordered and precise. Someone else was in the room with him, most likely his kidnapper. The last thing he remembered was being at his apartment getting ready to hit the sack after a long night's work when the side wall exploded. Literally exploded.
"Hey," he said weakly, his voice dry and cracked. He had no idea how long he had been out, but his stomach was stabbing at him just as bad as his headache, if not worse. "Hello. Hey, I'm awake over here."
The typing stopped suddenly, and a chair screeched backwards, the person interrupted from their work. But he didn't hear any footsteps in his direction, he heard no reply.
"Hey, anyone there, can I get some water or something?" he croaked out. He wanted to get a look at this person, maybe it would jog some memory. He couldn't think of anyone he could have pissed off enough to have caused such massive property damage and risk federal offense. That wasn't to say he didn't have enemies. Hackers like him have telephone books full of people who would mind seeing him get his, but last he checked, most of them were the call-the-police or shake-an-angry-fist type.
He wondered if his voice had been to quiet to hear, if the kidnapper had not made out what he said. He was about to try again when he heard the chair against the floor again, and heavy footsteps walking away from the room into another. A cupboard, the clink of a glass, the pouring of water from a kitchen faucet. If he hadn't been so bone dry, he'd be salivating about now. Maybe afterwards he could negotiate for some corn nuts or pork rinds or something.
As he heard the footsteps return, the little light there was all but disappeared with the sound of a subtle click. Ambient light from a window somewhere was the only thing keeping pitch black away, and the blue moonlight gave his eyes a challenge to adjust to. The footsteps can beside him, a shadow of a figure vaguely feminine in shape holding a tall glass to him. She seemed much smaller then he imagined, considering the heavy footfalls, but he wasn't going to complain before gulping down the water. It took a bit getting used to, seeing as she had to tip the glass at his mouth, and more probably dribbled down the front of his shirt that down his throat, but never before had the tinny taste of tap water been more appreciated.
She took the glass away from his mouth, and walked over to put it on the nearby table. He licked the last few drops from his lips as he looked the shadow over. It was a woman. Or more correctly, a kid, she couldn't be older then fourteen or so, by his guess. Interestingly enough, he couldn't help but notice, even in the darkness, her curves were too well defined to be obscured by clothes.
Despite the absurdity of it, he had to face the facts. He'd been apparently been assaulted and kidnapped by a naked junior high drop out. Wonder what Val would think of that.
"Ed Babbage," she spoke up to him, a near familiar garble barely noticeable behind the words. She had what he guessed to be his wallet in her hands, waving it generally at him. "That's you right? Babbage?"
He nodded, watching her start to pulled cards out from his wallet, some of them glancing at the contents, most of the time just letting them drop to the floor. She did the same to the paper money he had, apparently not interested. He just watched her silently for what had to be a handful of minutes.
"I went through your stuff, you know," she said again, holding up a credit card to the light to read. "When you were knocked out. I went through your apartment. Your tapes and CDs and books and stuff. I went through your mail too." She let the sentence hang there, waiting for his reaction.
She needn't have bothered. Eddy just stared at her quietly.
She dropped the empty wallet on the table, and walked nearer to him, leaning a bit to get closer to his face. Despite himself, he couldn't help his eyes from drifting to her chest.
"I found your computer too. Your disks and stuff. I threw them out your window before bringing you here." His head jerked up to look at the outline of her face in the shadows. He could almost see her grin. "Your monitor and everything."
"You tossed my... I live on the fourth floor."
She stood upright again, satisfied he was responding. "Yeah. It made a hell of a mess when it hit bottom. Too bad, it looked like nice stuff."
"It was nice stuff," he said rejected. "It was my stuff."
She snorted, that way teenagers do when they know they're right, even in the face of opposing proof. She trodded away behind him, beyond the turn of his neck, and it sounded like she was ruffling through papers. She wasn't long, and she came back with a few sheets she was flipping through, skimming as she approached him again.
"There's phone numbers and IP addresses here. Some of these are dated weeks ago. I tried a couple of them, but I either couldn't connect or I wasn't allowed inside the system." A pause, rehearsed just for this. "You a hacker or something? Someone pay you to get into these places?"
"Something like that."
"Alright then," she nodded, pulling a crumpled sheet from the others, and holding it in the light, in front of his face. It was his latest list of jobs, requests for info from systems, and paying prices. There was a single line circled and circled again in highlighter, standing out. A user list from an underground bulletin board system. "Who told you to do this one?"
He stared at the sheet dumfounded. That was the job he had been working on all night just before his apartment became a scene from Apocalypse Now. He never did get the user list, it had taken him forever to get past the ridiculously tight security. He suddenly was worried he had been lead into something bigger then what was originally let on.
"Is that what this is all about?" he managed eventually. She pulled the paper away from him, looking him directly in the eyes. He looked at her confused a second, then tried again. "The user list? Look, I don't know anything about nothing, okay. I didn't think that system belonged to a terrorist cell or anything, I was just doing a job."
She didn't seemed impressed, even in the dark.
"I didn't get the list," he added, hoping it helped.
"You were inside. I know you were."
"I didn't get in."
"I know you were," she snarled at him. He didn't like the way this was heading. She was definitely getting impatient with him, she had let the sheets fall to the floor, stepping closer to him. If she decked him now, he couldn't even defend himself, his arms tied behind him. Instinctively, he jerked his hands against his bonds, trying to loosen the knots.
Her hands came out, and grabbed his shoulders, leaning the chair forward. He was caught by surprise at how easily she did that. He wasn't a heavy guy or anything, but there was no way a kid like her could move that much dead weight.
"What did you see?" she spat at him. She was losing it; he had seen Val flip out like this once.
"Nothing, I didn't see nothing. I didn't get in," He called desperately. He grit his teeth, pain shooting from his arms up to his neck. Her grip was a vice, he could feel his muscles burning and bone weakening.
He looked at one of her hands in the low light, and stared at the glint it gave off. Shit, she was wearing a metal glove or something. What kind of nut was she?
"You got past the walls! You got in! I saw you!"
"I didn't see anything, I just had junk on my screen ow!"
"What junk?"
He clenched his eyes, his shoulders were on fire. "I don't know! I don't know!" He breathed shallow, opening his eyes in fear. "It was just some OS or system or something! Iit was garbled and shit! Iit was junk, it wasn't anything!"
The pain let up suddenly, as she eased her grip. He breathed easier, hoping that was the answer she was looking for. She stood stock still, frozen at his answer.
Then she was on top of him. She had pounced on him, tackled him, chair and all. He heard the chair legs snap, and he had the mind knocked out of him. She was right on top of him, his head between her iron fingers, her face just inches from his, and feral expression of hate. She was going to kill him, my god, she was going to kill him.
"That was my head, you fuck! That was my head!" she screamed at him.
She banged his head against the floor repeatedly, he saw stars, and felt the tell tale stickiness of blood on his scalp. "you were in my brain! You hacked my brain! I should kill you! Kill you right here!" More banging of his head, he could feel his consciousness drifting off again. "You hear me, you shit? Do you?"
The pain was blissfully fading into the background. He was losing it. This might be it, the big five oh, the end. Buying the farm, kicking the bucket. Bashed to death somewhere in the big city, another university dropout. But he didn't care. He wasn't thinking about that. He couldn't.
All he could do is stare at the face of the murderous teenaged girl, finally close enough to see, finally in the light. The slickness and shine from the moonlight, the seamless movement around her eyes, the nearly silent whirs of hidden gyros and motors and unimaginable more.
Her face wasn't her face. It wasn't anyone's face. It was like her hands ands arms. It was like the rest of her crushing weight, slight but more then it seemed.
It was metal.
She was a robot. He was getting killed by a robot. The television like flicker in the pupil of her eye was the last thing he saw before everything faded to dark.
She didn't stop when his eyes closed.
But she did when his breathing rasped. She stopped when she saw the blood behind his head, slick in his hair and dull against her fingers.
She let go of his head, sitting up. She breathed hard, vents in her back and in her throat working together to oxygenate her systems. She felt her arms loosed up, as hydraulics eased up, joints slowly worked themselves back to normal. The red tint over her vision slid through the spectrum, out from a furious view of the world to a contrast green, showing the room in grainy light amplification. Nearly real, if not appeasing.
She didn't do this. She refused to believe it for a second. She'd nearly killed him. She had wanted to kill him. She had wanted to beat him to death against the floor, to feel his skull crack between her palms.
Now he was bleeding.
Bleeding.
It took a minuted to make the connection. He was bleeding, he was breathing funny. He might be dying, she might have killed him. She started to breath quicker, panicking. He couldn't die, not now. She didn't mean it; she'd never killed anyone.
She quickly got up, and ran to the kitchen, grabbing the remains of the first aid kit sitting on the counter by the sink. It was the same kit she had used to clean him up when she first brought him here. When she had blown the side of his home in. When she had nearly killed him the first time.
She shook her head, and ran back to him, crouching. She started working on him, acting instinctively. Cleaning the wound, stopping the bleeding. She got a needle and thread, and gave him a couple stitches, then bandaged him up. It was a bit of a blur, her hands were doing all the work without instruction from her. Accessing knowledge from her mind, saved in a file somewhere in her head she couldn't consciously get to. She just watched.
She righted him in his chair when she was done, kicking out the few remaining legs to even it out. He looked kind of dumb, sitting on the floor tied to the remains of a kitchen chair. She'd had layed him down on the card table or the bed down the hall, but she didn't think she could she could effectively tie him down with the amount of rope she had.
Tie him down. She couldn't believe what she had gotten into. She felt like she was out of control, seeing red more and more often. She was flipping out, and lashing out violently. Screaming and yelling. Acting before thinking.
She had thought about taking him to a hospital. He might need it. But there was no way looking the way she did. She looked at her hands, the exact shape and feel as she remembered them. They moved like she remembered. They sometimes hurt like she remembered they used to. But now they were more then her hands.
Skin and flesh replaced by steel and platinum. Bones replaced with armored endoskeleton and gold internal structural bars. Muscles and blood replaced with motors and pistons and drives and wires. Her head filled with micro chips and sensors and god knows what else.
Less then a year ago, she was Kimberly Roberts, fifteen year old girl, with friends and school and a father. She was looking forward to getting her license. She was looking forward to graduating high school. She was looking forward to losing her virginity. She was looking forward to the look on her father's face when he found out.
Now she was a thing. Some science experiment out of control. A comic book character. A prop from a black and white german art film. She was the result of the manipulation of others. She was the result of the manipulation of herself, of her emotions. She was a freak, a metal freak.
She looked at the unconscious man, slumped over, arms tied behind him. He had been attacked and his home destroyed and threatened and beaten to an inch of his life. He probably didn't even know why.
And she hadn't cared. She was a metal freak, and she was freaking out all over him. And she had nearly killed him.
She sat down on the floor beside him, and wrapped her arms around her legs. She would have cried if she could. She knew she had the ability, she knew she wanted to. God, she wanted to. But she couldn't. Maybe some switch she tripped, maybe another setting in a file in the computer in her skull that was her mind.
She was losing control.