Rethrin shifts her stance and takes a breath as if she’d been holding it during that conversation. “Did you make that up? About the United Governments demanding him to release the HolinMechs?”
“If communications are down, there’s no way to prove or disprove what I said. It’s worth a shot either way.”
Rethrin can’t help but smirk, a fleeting expression that vanishes as quickly as it arrived. “There’s something else you should know.”
Roths has her hand across her eyes and sighs slightly. When she takes her hand away her eyes are wet but her expression is clear. “Why is there always more?”
“You worked on a few aspects of the HolinMech android system design, yes?”
“It’s why I was given the job as William’s second in Raddocks Horizon.”
“Have you ever actually seen any of them?” Rethrin asks becoming more uncomfortable.
“No I can’t say I have.”
“Neither have I but several pockets of the military have worked with them on deployments and I can’t think how it went unnoticed.”
“How what did?”
Rethrin takes a breath. “I gained possession of a picture taken from security footage of one of the HolinMechs on mission. I don’t know if it actually is, but it looks an awful lot like Forgal Lauros as a HolinMech.”
“What?” says Roths, trying to focus her exhausted eyes. “Which one of them? What is this HolinMech called?”
“I don’t know which it is. Since Arca Drej went missing his picture is all over the place, so it’s one of the remaining twelve androids in the team.”
“Where did you get the picture from?”
“Peter Stanner’s office.”
“Who?”
Rethrin resists the urge to roll her eyes. “The policeman who shot all those people at the Gorai Aurelia Rally.”
“He gave it to you?”
Rethrin makes a dismissive gesture. “Of course not. I ransacked his office at the abandoned police station the night I fled. There is a lot there worth going through but I was in a hurry and that picture stood out the most.”
“What in the hell is going on here?”
Sindaris opens his eyes to find himself staring at the ceiling of the reservoir.
For just a moment he’s confused. He wonders if running outside and being found by the military was all a dream until he hears voices a little way off. Turning his head, he sees a small crowd of people nearby having a look at the destroyed controlling entity.
A hand grips his face and turns it upwards. Sindaris manages to gain a glimpse of two glowing green eyes before a torch is shone into his face making him squint. “Sindaris Tessol, I am Doctor William Caufmann,” he says moving the light back and forth from one eye to the other. “How are you feeling?”
Sindaris pushes himself to a seating position feeling several shots of pain from his arms. He checks them to find they’re both bandaged tightly. “I’ve been worse.”
“I doubt that. We’ve been examining your handiwork,” says Caufmann inclining his head towards the dead controller. “I really wish you didn’t shoot it in the head.”
As far as Sindaris’ eyes are concerned he is looking at the remains of his wife. He blinks but her visage doesn’t alter. “It still looks like her. Why does it still look like her?”
“Who?” asks Caufmann.
Sindaris nods to the downed construct. “It looks like the woman I married, the very day I married her.”
Caufmann glances at the entity. “What I see is obviously substantially different to what you’re perceiving. Unless you married a woman with looks akin to a poorly crafted mannequin. The fact you still see someone you recognise means it’s not quite deactivated.”
Sindaris seems to ignore him. “It was reading our minds, telling us what to do, uniting our entire consciousness into one driving force. Made my ears tickle and the hair on my head crawl.”
Caufmann’s glowing eyes glance up to Sindaris’ hairline. “Is that so?” he asks running his hand through Sindaris’ thick hair feeling the strands.
Sindaris feels a little uncomfortable, “It wasn’t as strange as what you’re doing now.”
“We’ll have to shave your head, Mister Tessol. You may do your privates yourself.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“This being you shot is a conduit, an organic conduit, that sends out signals like an insect hive-mind. Your hair seems to have mutated into a kind of antennae, receiving these signals. If you shave it off you might be able to block the effects of other contaminants.”
“But won’t that also blind me to being able to sense them?”
“In theory it should work both ways, yes.”
“That… conduit, controller, whatever it is, is dead now, so is it necessary to shave my hair off?”
“It is not the controller. It is only an instrument used to control. Whoever is piloting the conduit is the real controller.”
“Piloting it? From where?”
Caufmann shrugs, his unnerving gaze fixed on Sindaris. “Anywhere. And we would be foolish to think that this is the only one. It’s probably DNA encoded and piloted by the same method it used to gain influence over you and the other contaminants.”
Sindaris touches his own hair, “They’d have to be infected too.”
Caufmann nods, “More than likely. Some kind of alternate mutation, possibly like you.”
“How would we go about finding it?”
“Impossible as far as I can tell. How do you track organic telepathic signals?”
“They almost found me a few times through a kind of…” he tilts his head from side to side raising his hands searching for the right words, “… emotion web. A metaphysical target painted through the reactions of those around me to my presence when I exhibited any emotion strongly enough.”
Caufmann’s face is expressionless but his eyes shimmer slightly as the thoughts fire though his mind at a ridiculous speed. “That’s brilliant. Truly brilliant,” he says, looking back to the downed conduit. “We’ll find it through the contaminants, but how do we get a strong enough emotional reaction that you can track? I suppose the closest to the source of the emotion feel it the strongest?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Sindaris, these others with me are leaving the city, you have the option to go with them.”
Sindaris laughs. “To do what? Surrender and become a science experiment? Examined in a lab, poked, prodded and put through trials just to be killed and dissected… I can’t leave. Not really, can I?”
Caufmann nods. “If I brand your forehead it’ll imprint a serial number indicating to scans that you’re Godyssey approved.”
“You mean ‘property’, don’t you?”
“Yes. Despite your infection you’ll be given enough leeway to move about freely as long as you’re not in contact with uninfected people. The branding also means you’ve been extensively examined by a high-ranking scientist in the department of genetic research. My department.”
“Won’t they expect scars of some kind?”
“The ones on your arms are adequate and while you were unconscious I did a little poking around. You heal very quickly when stitched up properly.”
Sindaris instantly looks down at his chest and pulls up his shirt revealing a massive scar from his abdomen up to between his collarbones. He lets out a shrill whimper when he touches it. Not from pain; from shock. “What did you do to me?”
“I merely had a brief look at your internal organs. The operating scar is already sealed. A little fragile but stable. I didn’t have time to examine your spinal column but I’ll get to it.”
“You certainly will not!” calls Sindaris pushing Caufmann away and sitting up gaining the attention of the others.