“The Reivers reproduce quickly and efficiently,” Jaidev said. “They pass information and apparently genetic material from one aggregate to another…anything poisonous or damaging that hits one in its information-processing center, also known as its brain, will hit them all.”
“I still don’t get how we get it to them,” Weldon said. “The Reivers have totally corrupted and infested the Keanu system. What is the actual vector? You don’t just jam that injector into the nearest pile of Reiver goo.”
“It goes into a human host,” Harley said.
There was another interruption caused by a group of people descending from the third floor as another individual tried to reach the second. It was Xavier Toutant, with this sad message: “Mr. Bynum is dead.”
There was an additional bit of data for Harley’s consideration: the apparent sell-by date for the Keanu Revenants. It was as if they were brought back to perform a single function, then tossed aside.
Not every Revenant, of course, and certainly not at the same rate. Look at Camilla. Also, animals from cows to cats and birds to bats had been emerging from the Beehive for the past several days. None of the HBs had been able to figure out a pattern—assuming there was one—but one thing was clear: None of the animals displayed the types of wear and tear that affected Revenants Camilla and then Chitran and now, finally, Brent Bynum. They had probably been deemed too lacking.
“Is that the bug zapper?” Xavier said, pointing to the injector.
“Not to go all operational security at this late date,” Weldon said, “but aren’t we afraid they might hear what we’re planning?”
“The Reivers?” Nayar said, standing up for his team. “If they are literally bugging us, then they know all our moves and we are wasting our time. Let’s remember that while they’ve corrupted Keanu’s systems, they are still quasi-organic beings with their own vulnerabilities and limitations. Which we will exploit.”
“By injecting someone with the…the bug zapper?” Weldon said.
“No, Shane,” Harley said. “By infecting someone with a fast-moving fatal disease that will kill him, and by killing him and putting his personality matrix, or whatever it is Keanu is able to isolate and reuse, into the Revenant system.” He had been reluctant to say it aloud, he realized, because that someone was going to have to be Mayor Harley Drake.
So he would get stuck with the bug zapper. He would be the one to quickly plunge into a feverish coma and death. It would be his poisoned and corrupted morpho-genetic data that would be absorbed into the Keanu system, and quickly into the Reivers…where it would burn them all.
“Oh.” Weldon looked at the injector. “So I guess the question is—”
“Who,” Nayar said. “Not when. This has to happen immediately.”
“There’s no point waiting,” Harley said. “It’s my job.” He had hoped that saying it aloud would make it seem easier, somehow. So far…no.
Then Sasha Blaine came hurrying up the steps, all red hair and inescapably impressive figure in a tank top. Great, Harley thought, let your last conscious thoughts be lustful.
That surge of inappropriate interest passed quickly, because even in the faint light, Sasha was clearly distraught. “What’s wrong?” Harley said, as if there was anything else that could possibly go wrong.
“Camilla left.”
“She was curled up in a ball in the corner,” Weldon said. “Just like Bynum.”
Sasha turned to him. “Oh, she was. I thought she had gone completely catatonic, and was just talking to her in German. Nothing, nothing, nothing. Then I started repeating her little ditty about ‘ratos’ and she sat right up. And just ran away.”
“Then forget her,” Nayar said. “I know she’s a child, I know she’s not responsible, but we have larger problems.” He pointed to the injector. “We need to make our move now to have any chance.”
He slid it toward Harley.
Sasha intercepted it. “Oh, no,” she said.
“Yes,” Harley said.
“Why you?”
“It has to be one of us,” Weldon said.
Sasha turned to him again. “Except ‘us’ has turned into ‘Harley.’”
“I’m the leader,” Harley said.
“I’m the leader, too,” a voice said behind them.
It was Gabriel Jones, his eyes still red and face still shining from a very emotional conversation. “These people were my responsibility from the beginning. The weapon uses my…tissue. If anyone should make the sacrifice, it should be me.”
“You need to see Yvonne face-to-face again,” Harley said.
“Oh, Harley, she’s wearing out. Dying like Bynum.” He forced a smile. “She seems okay with it…says she fulfilled her mission, redeemed herself. But she won’t last.”
“Actually,” Shane Weldon said, “none of us will last if the core isn’t rebooted and the Reivers eliminated.”
Jones pointed at Weldon. “Exactly. And I’m the biggest medical burden. I’m past my sell-by date. Give me the zapper.”
For one selfish moment, Harley felt a flood of relief. Gabriel Jones was the most logical victim.
And yet…Harley was in charge. If there was one lesson he had learned in life, one thing he believed in without question, it was this: The guy in charge makes the big decisions. The captain goes down with the ship. “Sorry, Gabe,” he said, and reached for the injector.
Then Xavier Toutant stepped forward, snatched up the injector—and handed it to Jones! Before any of them could stop him, the JSC director touched it to his arm and triggered it.
He seemed about to say something…but failed, as his eyes rolled up in his head and he fainted.
Nayar and Jaidev caught him and gently lowered him to the floor. “For God’s sake,” Harley said, “make him comfortable.” As he dies.
“God, that was brave,” Sasha said.
“Let’s hope it wasn’t for nothing,” Shane Weldon said.
ZACK
The encounter with the Skyphoi had been strange even by Zack Stewart’s improved and expanded scale of strangeness.
The survivors of the Dash treachery had returned to the “station” in the railcar, bumping along on low power, like a golf cart with a dying battery. A pair of the giant balloon creatures had been waiting, both flashing chromatophores in patterns the humans could not and would likely never understand.
The failing state of the railcar matched that of the Architect. It seemed to be declining into immobility and likely death at the same rate as the entire NEO. When Zack said as much, Rachel announced, “That’s because he is Keanu.” Zack would have loved to pursue that, but the Architect went into terminal failure at that instant, slumping to one side and almost crushing Zhao. “Daddy!” Rachel shouted.
Zack and Dale reached for the Architect, their hands failing to find purchase on the creature’s garments. But sheer muscle power allowed them to extricate Zhao.
As the Chinese spy slid out from under the Architect, he said, “Should I try some kind of resuscitation?”
“Where the hell would you start?” Dale said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Yvonne said. “He’s gone.”
Zack didn’t like the way Yvonne looked: gray and listless. “How are you doing?” Had she been linked, somehow, to the Architect as the alien died? And how did the death of this creature relate to the possible death of Keanu itself? Was the Near-Earth Object itself dead already? How would you be able to tell?
“As okay as I’m going to be,” she said. “For the first time since…coming back, I feel like myself. No more voices in my head.” She managed a smile, one that was so familiar to Zack from their time as astronauts that it brought tears to his eyes.