Shattered Minds Read online

  Even the slightest little taste of Zeal is better than nothing.

  The Trust attach the electrodes to their temples, syncing the implants. Dax adjusts her left temple connection; she’s placed it a little too high.

  ‘You remember the disconnect password, right?’ he asks.

  ‘Yep.’

  He injects her with the tiniest dose. She can barely feel the Zeal, but even that tiny drop is heaven and hell all rolled into one. Dax shakes his head and quickly doses the rest of the group.

  ‘We should be in and out in ten minutes,’ Raf says.

  ‘Don’t jinx it,’ Dax warns.

  ‘Focus.’ Charlie touches the electrodes at her temple. ‘I don’t want any stingers coming to make this nasty. Everyone ready?’

  They nod.

  Raf holds up his hands. ‘Abracadabra,’ he says, and runs the code.

  Raf’s virtual reality is nothing like Zeal. It’s a visualization for him to check his code, work with it more interactively than on a wallscreen and share it with the rest of the Trust. People using VR to hack in this way is relatively rare, which is the main reason Raf likes it so much. It spreads around him like an aura without the distraction of the real world. Raf looks just as he always does, but the edges of his body are sharper, lined with electric blue. Carina holds out her own hands, seeing her nails and the outlines of her fingers glowing red as blood. Like softly glowing beacons, the Trust shine in the darkness. Charlie is purple and Dax is green. She wonders what colour Kivon would be. A deep red-orange, the colour of a sunset, maybe. Did Raf choose the colours, and if so, did they have any significance to him?

  Raf’s code glimmers, scrolling through the black. Carina understands basically none of it. He creates a window, drawing up the information gleaned from Mitford’s implants, and begins to manipulate the code. It comes to life, looking like a snake as it sneaks deeper into Mitford’s implants. The snake becomes a hydra, heads forming and moving laterally, tongues tasting for the data they are designed to find and sink their fangs into. So much security is designed to protect from the outside, and they don’t anticipate attacks from within the same way.

  Their paltry protections are no match against Raf. He has so much information squirrelled away in his own brain from years of working with material not meant for his eyes. He knows plenty about Sudice, but not quite enough to take them down. Not without Carina’s help.

  If Raf could give this hydra enough heads while remaining undetected, he could download so much information from Sudice’s systems that the company would never stand a chance, whether Carina accesses the rest of her symbols or not. Mark found all his intel from these same systems.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Carina catches a flash of light in the darkness. Sickly yellow.

  Charlie says.

 

 

  Dax says.

  Raf’s fingers fly.

  Charlie says.

  Carina can sense the giant Wasps made of swarming code. Yellow and angry, their stingers sharp. Trust Raf to make the bots look like Wasps in his VR, larger than life and absolutely terrifying. And Carina can’t do anything but watch them come towards her.

  Raf dismantles the program, but one of the Wasps hits him. He staggers, the code fracturing. It weakens the thread to Carina’s own body. She feels it growing more distant. Isn’t this what happened to Dax’s sister? She needs to speak the passcode and get out, but she’s paralysed with fear. Raf recovers, yet he’s still trying to extract information and cover his tracks. If they pull out in the middle of the transfer, there’s a chance they could leave a clue for Sudice to find. They won’t be able to try the hydra again.

  The Wasp turns and makes for Carina. They know that unauthorized people are in Sudice’s servers. Anomalies must be destroyed.

  One of the Wasps snags Carina. It’s not pain, exactly. The VR simulation is too rudimentary for that. But it feels as though they tear away a small piece of her. She doesn’t know how to protect herself. Raf creates a code and flings it at the Wasp, a cascade of binary that forms a wall. Carina stumbles back and the Wasp buzzes angrily.

  The Wasps pummel the wall, fracturing it, desperate to break through. If Carina were in her body or a proper Zealscape, she’d feel adrenalin and her thundering heart. Here in Raf’s VR, she feels as though she floats through cyberspace like a ghost.

  , Raf says. Charlie’s light-limned form extinguishes. Then Dax. Raf looks at Carina, and she feels herself return to the world, but not before she feels the Wasp break through the barrier and swarm Raf.

  Carina falls back into her body. She tears the electrodes from her head. Her head is pounding, and she can feel the minuscule amount of Zeal in her system. ‘Get back in!’ she yells at Charlie. ‘They have Raf!’

  Kivon darts over from the main entrance, his face slack with shock and fear.

  Charlie starts the process to go back in. ‘Stop,’ Dax presses her arm. ‘It’s too late.’ His voice breaks.

  ‘I have to try.’ Charlie adjusts her electrodes and slips back into Raf’s virtual reality, her body going limp.

  ‘Dammit!’ Dax holds her, frantic.

  ‘Charlie’s a decent hacker in her own right. We have to hope . . . she can do something.’ Kivon’s voice is strained with grief, his eyes wet with tears. ‘We have another problem.’ He points at the security footage projected onto the silo’s curving walls. Hovercars come into view, dark and unmarked. ‘They’ve tracked us. Disabled the proximity alarms, so it’s too late to run.’

  Kivon passes them weapons. Carina holds the gun in her hand. It’s been years since she fired one, at least outside the Zealscape. She still remembers how. The gun is cold and hard in her hand. Kivon’s security shows five heat signatures, but there could be more if they are masked.

  ‘What’s the ammo?’ she asks him.

  ‘Smoke bullets,’ he says.

  ‘Excellent.’

  ‘Be careful. Try to avoid fatalities. We don’t need murder added to our list of crimes.’

  She laughs, harsh and grating. Kivon’s eyes turn hard and he looks away.

  Raf’s body is so still, so silent. The sight of him lying supine, along with the weapon in her hands, reminds her of the Zealscape, and brings all her urges to the surface. She wants to murder each and every one of them. She also wants to get out, stay safe, protect her own skin. Could she use them to do that? Her finger rests on the trigger. Their pursuers start working on the lock. It won’t last long.

  ‘We’ll have to go through them,’ Kivon says, shifting his gun and pulling the Kalar hood over his face.

  They all follow his lead, pulling the bulletproof hoods down. They should still see through them, but they’re now entirely covered to their fingertips. They aren’t infallible, but Carina is glad Charlie insisted everyone wear a suit under their clothes, even if it means an extra layer between Carina and her victims.

  The Trust take cover behind the metal cases that housed their kit. Not ideal, but better than nothing. Dax guards Charlie and Raf, and his hands, normally steady from his doctor’s training, shake. None of them have ever killed in a fight, as far as she knows. Kivon looks grim, determined.

  The lock gives, the door swinging open to clang against the silo wall. ‘Freeze!’ a woman in a Kalar suit shouts. They do not identify themselves as police, so Carina wastes no time and shoots a normal bullet, following immediately with a smoke bullet.

  The woman falls.

  Kalar suits can protect against the bullet, but not absorb all of the force. A well-placed bullet in the throat, the face or the stomach makes them choke, slows them down. Smoke bullets release a small, concentrated burst of smoke for a foot in either direction, and should knock them out.

  The smoke bullets are illegal; if someone inhales too much, it can kill them. Carina has spent a lot of time in Zealsc
ape target-practice simulations. Live targets, of course. The deaths were so quick, they weren’t much fun. No artistry at all.

  This isn’t Zeal, though. This is real. This is too much of a test, too soon. Her control, weak as it is, unravels around her. She can’t draw back the tendrils and isn’t sure she wants to.

  Carina shoots a second figure, and Kivon a third. They fall, but Carina’s not sure they’re all knocked out. Or dead. She should be horrified and perhaps she’ll feel it later, when the adrenalin drains. If she makes it that far. At the moment, all is the thrill of danger and the hunt.

  There are at least two attackers left, but more are surely cloaked or on the way. Charlie fires, but hits the fourth in the arm, only slowing him. They return fire, and the Trust duck back as bullets rain against the boxes. Charlie darts up again, firing a neat shot into someone’s face, at the very least breaking their nose or giving them a nasty concussion. Screams merge with the loud reverberations of shots. One left.

  Carina hears a gasp behind her.

  ‘What’s going on?’ she calls back over the din of the guns. She shoots at the last man, and three more enter. Fuck.

  ‘Raf and Charlie have woken up!’ Dax yells.

  ‘Good!’

  Charlie says something, but Carina can’t hear it over the shots.

  ‘Time to push forward,’ Kivon yells. He grips the gun, eyes snagging on hers. He nods, once. Carina is a fellow soldier. In this battle, he’ll have her back and trust her to have his.

  Kivon leans out, fires. He hits one more, then a second, but misses. Carina pops up behind the box, but a bullet grazes her arm. It hurts and she’ll have a hell of a bruise, but the pain fuels her. She shoots. She hits the person square in the stomach. Follows it with smoke. The last person falls.

  Charlie joins them, looking like hell, but her voice is steady. ‘Everyone keep your heads up. There’ll be camera drones circling the place. We’re going to have to dart out to the hovercar and hightail it out of there. Then dump it and find the Metro and ride the trains for hours. If we get separated, we meet back at base no sooner than four hours from now. Do. Not. Let. Anyone. Follow. You.’

  They all nod.

  Raf and Charlie both look decidedly green around the gills, but they can stand. Carina refills her gun with smoke bullets.

  ‘What about the bodies? Has anyone checked if there’s any fatalities?’ Dax asks.

  ‘Leave them,’ Kivon says. ‘No time.’

  Carina wants to move towards them. She wants to peel back their Kalar hoods and look into their blank faces. She wants to see who they are, and if any of them are dead. She starts moving towards the nearest prone, black-clad body. The head is tilted at an unnatural angle. The person fell and the neck is broken. Carina’s breath comes faster, blood rising in her cheeks. Did she do that? She doesn’t know whether she’s sickened or thrilled by the thought.

  Dax puts a hand on her arm. Fighting the urge to shrug it off, she concentrates on its weight. Real.

  The Zeal still buzzes in her mind. She grinds her teeth. Wants to turn and run. Run as fast as her body will allow, through the dark labyrinth of the port. To find the dimmer streets of Los Angeles and walk into the nearest seedy Zeal lounge. If she doesn’t, no one is safe.

  Again, Dax holds her back, and she twirls and snarls at him. Dax doesn’t flinch. He holds her arms against her sides. Not hard enough to hurt, but firm. Warm. Again, she tries to anchor herself to it. It doesn’t work. She bites the insides of her cheeks. Dax reaches into his medical bag.

  ‘To help detox,’ he says, and she gives a stiff nod before he presses the needle into her vein. Right next to the mark left by the tiniest dose of Zeal that has undone her completely.

  While Dax helps Carina, Charlie reaches into her bag and brings out a DNA bomb.

  ‘Ready?’ she asks.

  They nod, and Charlie throws the DNA bomb over her shoulder.

  They run from the silo, avoiding the supine bodies. Kivon first, Raf behind him and holding onto the strap of his backpack. He still looks woozy. Charlie does too, but she’s steady on her feet. All have guns at the ready.

  Carina hears a small cry, and then Dax pushes her forward, hard. She staggers out of the silo, turns just in time to see Dax framed in the doorway. Behind him, a Kalar-suited shadow rises, grabbing Dax by the neck and dragging him back into the darkness, kicking the door closed behind him. Carina tries the door. Locked, or something heavy is wedged against it. She bashes her fist against the metal, screaming. They hear the hammer of gunshots from inside.

  ‘Dax!’ Carina screams through the door. ‘I’ll fucking kill whoever hurts him!’

  The Trust run back towards the silo. Charlie is keeping one eye on the horizon in case backup arrives. Kivon yells at Carina to move out of the way. She stumbles to the side and he rams his massive bulk against the door.

  Bam. Bam.

  The sound is as loud as the heartbeat in her ears. She screams again, a wordless cry of fury, and Raf puts his arm around her shoulders, dragging her back. She strikes out at him, pushes away. It both feels horribly real and impossibly far away. Dax’s medicine has not helped.

  The door opens and Dax staggers out, his Kalar hood gone, his suit torn and soaked in blood. The bullet hit the suit at such an angle it went right through, now embedded in his shoulder. He falls to his knees and Carina goes to him, hauling him up with effort. She looks at him, burning eyes wide and blank. Blood. Red, beautiful blood.

  ‘We have to get to the hovercar,’ Kivon says. He pushes Carina away and takes Dax up in his arms, careless of the blood now soaking his own suit.

  Charlie glances into the silo. She goes still. Carina edges closer, wanting to see. Charlie pulls the door closed. ‘Let’s go.’

  ‘What about our kit?’ Raf asks.

  ‘Leave it. None of it will link back to us. No time.’ Charlie points to the sky. Off in the distance, three hovercars are flying towards the silo.

  They dart to the shadows. The sound of gunshots hasn’t drawn anyone else to this deserted section of the Port of Long Beach. No sirens call. The hovercar is still where they left it. Raf is well enough to check it hasn’t been tampered with. A bruise is blooming on his cheekbone where Carina hit him. It should shame her. It doesn’t.

  Charlie’s head tilts as she accesses her implants. ‘Hovercars are landing near the silo now. Let’s get in and lie low, see how Dax is doing. They’re going to expect we’ve already left.’

  They climb in and Raf strengthens security. ‘Been wanting to try this out,’ he says, giving the rest of the group a wavering smile. He plays with the controls and then staggers to his seat. ‘Outside is camouflaged and they won’t be able to sense heat signatures or the fact there’s a car here. Should be good.’

  ‘That’s new,’ Charlie says.

  ‘Accessed military records and retrofitted.’

  Charlie sees to Dax. He’s ashen from blood loss and breathing shallowly.

  ‘Can you stitch yourself up?’ she asks.

  Dax looks down at his shoulder. He shakes his head. ‘No. Bullet’s inside. I can’t get it out.’ He has his implants run a diagnostic. ‘Thought so. Hit an artery. Internal bleeding.’

  ‘Can you get it out?’ Charlie asks Carina.

  Carina takes several ragged breaths. She’s hung back from the others in the hovercar, back pressed against the wall. She’s been concentrating on their conversation to try and distract herself from the blood. It hasn’t worked. She sees it, smells it, imagines its texture against her skin. Words fail her. The sight of Dax lying there is too visceral. She wants to dart through and push the bullet in deeper, despite the fact he’s one of the few people who has been kind to her. Despite her fevered fear for him when he’d been locked in that silo.

  She shakes her head, still gasping, her fingers spasming into fists. At the moment, she does not see any of them as the people she worked with. They are only so many bodies she could tear apart.

  ‘Carina,’
Kivon says, carefully. ‘You won’t like this, but I’m going to restrain you.’

  Carina’s head hangs low. She wonders if she’ll fight him, though she has no chance against his strength. Maybe if she surprises him . . .

  The rest of the group is still and silent, poised in case they need to attack. Kivon takes some cable ties from his pocket. He leads her to a chair, her legs stiff as the robot assistants’ at Sudice. He ties her wrists and ankles to the chair legs. She wants to kick him, scratch him, but from some deep reserve, she finds the strength not to. It’s a little easier when Kivon gives her another mild sedative from Dax’s medical kit. The pill is bitter as it slides down her throat.

  Kivon’s done a good job; the restraints are loose enough not to hurt, but tight enough there’s no way she can wriggle free, if the bloodlust grows again. The rest of the group look slightly happier now she’s restrained. Carina closes her eyes, imagining breaking bones and drawing them out from beneath the skin.

  ‘What about Dr Zwiker?’ Charlie asks. ‘He’s patched us up before.’

  ‘I can try contacting him,’ Raf says. ‘It’ll take a bit to get through the subfrequency though.’

  They wait, both for the hovercars near the silo to finish investigating the carnage within, and to hopefully connect to the doctor who can stop Dax’s slow, steady dripping of blood. Charlie murmurs to Dax, doing what little rudimentary first aid she can.

  She sprays the wound with disinfectant, puts pressure on it despite his low moans of pain. She injects him with a painkiller. Carina forces herself to open her eyes and see what’s happening. The pill has made everything fuzzy, taken the worst of the edge off. Raf watches the backup that’s arrived at the silo on the wallscreen. They’re removing the bodies from within, swarming like ants. So far, they haven’t spread out to search for them.

  ‘No response from Dr Zwiker,’ Raf says. ‘Don’t think we can wait much longer for him.’

  ‘Anyone know anyone else?’ Charlie asks.