The Forbidden Zone (17 page)

I let a lot of things go in just a few minutes. I let the thoughts of going back to Earth slip away, knowing that a Valeria without technology would be one from which I could never return home. I let friends and family fade away, knowing that I had never liked their company as much as I should have, and accepting that I was sorry about it. I made my peace with the universe, apologizing for my arrogance when I had told Lankis that love was a weakness I was not privy to.

I opened my eyes when Saidan softly put his hand on my shoulder. Reflection Time was over, perhaps forever. I stood up and brushed the dust off my black pants. Saidan took my hand and we walked to our bus as the others pulled away. I wondered how many souls would come back once it was all over. How many Valerians would inhabit the new world we were about to create?

We stepped aboard our bus and sat together, the only two souls in the large vehicle. Saidan fiddled with the jammer, turning it over and over in his hands for something to pass the time. I looked out of the window and watched the sunset get swallowed by the darkness. My only thought was that death comes to everything eventually. Even the universe would have its day. We were all tiny droplets that made up a fragile ocean, as insignificant as atoms in the grand scheme of things. Whether we won or lost, the universe would be largely unaffected. Life would go on with or without us and, indeed, all the citizens of Valeria.

Saidan turned the jammer on as we reached the city limits. We were well past curfew, and we saw no resistance as the bus drove through the deserted streets. The city looked a little worse for wear, but I suspected that was as much from Little Sister's ineptitude as the ongoing war.

The bus ground to a halt. I didn't see the other bus that was headed into the city, but I knew it was no longer my concern. That team had their leaders and would follow their orders. We only had to take care of ourselves.

We stepped down from the bus and walked into the Science Building. The jammer seemed to have disabled the decontamination protocol and we stood in the room as nothing happened, unable to proceed.  Saidan walked over to the door's control panel and ripped it off. He pulled wires out and rubbed them together until the door opened a crack. I forced it open the rest of the way and we squeezed through.

Minimal lighting made the labs seem eerie. I'd never seen them in anything less than total light. One of the lights sparked and one flickered, and I didn't know if it was Saidan's device or Little Sister's lack of maintenance that was causing the strange malfunctions. I was leery to use the elevator under such conditions, but I knew it would be a huge time sink to run down a hundred or so flights of stairs, so I pressed the call button, and was relieved when the doors opened to reveal an elevator pod. We stepped in and the doors slid shut behind us as if it was a normal day. The pod lurched downwards and I fought the sickness in my stomach. The battery light on the jammer flickered red, indicating that we were almost out of time. I saw the camera set into the wall, its red light off. Taking no chances, I smashed the camera.

The elevator stopped suddenly in the middle of the shaft, throwing us to the floor.

"Julian, you shouldn't have done that," Saidan said. "Now she's been alerted to our presence. The camera was off. You could have let it be."

"Yeah, I didn't think about that," I said, hopping to my feet. I helped Saidan up and contemplated our situation. Just as in an Earth elevator, an emergency hatch was set into the ceiling. I hoisted Saidan up on my shoulders until he could reach it and climb onto the outer roof of the elevator pod.

Little Sister decided to play games with us, as the car suddenly lurched into action. I realized with horror that she was dropping the pod down the shaft with every intention of killing us both.

"Julian! Grab my hand, quickly!" Saidan called to me from the top of the pod. The walls suddenly became transparent and I felt my stomach lurch as I struggled with motion sickness. I saw the walls of the shaft speeding by as Saidan struggled to keep his precarious balance on the top.

I pulled myself together and grabbed Saidan's hand. He pulled me up and we both balanced on the edge of the pod.

"We have to jump," Saidan said. "The metal rope would rip the skin off our hands. Our only chance is to make it to one of the exits."

My fear of heights put my heart in my throat at the prospect, but Saidan took my hand to reassure me. "We'll jump together... Now!"

It was a leap of faith. I trusted Saidan's judgment more than my own, and jumped blindly into the shaft, gasping when Saidan grabbed the ledge and pulled on my shoulder sharply. I reached out with my left hand and grabbed the ledge, then climbed over Saidan and hauled myself up, helping him onto the narrow ledge beside me. We heard the pod crash far below us with a sickening sound of twisted metal and broken glass. I had no doubt it would have killed us if we'd still been on top.

With the help of a crowbar I'd packed, we managed to pry open the elevator doors and gain access to the corridor. The lights here were flickering as well. A Valerian wandered around in the hallway, walking in circles and muttering to himself.

Saidan approached him. "Are you okay?"

The Valerian looked up at him with an air of recognition. "Oh, Twenty-One. It's past curfew, you know. I wouldn't be out here, but my door's locked. I don't know why my door's locked. I'm scared."

"Little Sister must have malfunctioned," I said. "The same problem that's causing the lights to go out is randomly locking doors as well."

"I'll get points," the Valerian said. "Points. Oh, no. I can't get points." He tried his door again, but it stubbornly refused to open. He was clearly on the verge of panic, his breaths coming light and fast, his eyes as wide as two saucers.

"Fifty-Five. Please, calm yourself. We're going to get this all sorted out." Saidan's voice was gentle, as though he was speaking to a child. "Just stay calm, okay? Sit down over here." Saidan led Fifty-Five to the wall and gently eased him down to the floor, where he stayed, his legs too shaky to support his weight any longer.

"Tell me what I did wrong," he said, his voice panicked. "Please. I won't do it again. I'll be good."

Saidan turned to me, swallowing hard and summoning as much courage as he could muster. "We have to go," he said softly. "We can't allow ourselves to be held up."

I knew he was right, but it was hard to walk away from Fifty-Five as he cried after us, "Please don't go! Don't leave me here!"

I was relieved when he didn't follow us. Perhaps his legs wouldn't hold him up, or maybe he was too frightened to leave his door. I knew I couldn't face the prospect of his cries any longer and was glad when he was out of earshot.

We hurried downstairs, passing several levels. The windows showed us shocking images of neglect that pulled on my heartstrings and made me question my humanity for simply walking by: starving Valerians banging on their doors and crying in the corridor, and pools of piss and excrement staining the pure white surfaces of the walls and floors. As we descended, things seemed to get worse. I stopped and caught my breath as a trail of bluish blood led us down another stairway. Saidan wisely pulled out his gun with one hand and took my sweaty hand with the other, leading the way forward into terror. I remembered my promise to protect him and drew my gun as well, keeping pace with him, despite my growing fear.

We saw a dead Valerian, the source of the blood, sitting up against the wall of the next floor's stairwell. A piece of a pod similar to the one I had smashed up in my rebellion against Little Sister protruded from his chest, and his braid was splattered with blood. What was more disturbing was the message written in his own blood on the wall in the Valerian language. It said simply: "Help."

"We can't allow ourselves to get distracted," I said, fighting back the urge to vomit. "We have to keep moving. I wouldn't be surprised if Little Sister created these diversions on purpose to slow us down."

"You're right." Saidan leaned down on one knee and closed the figure's staring eyes. "The more madness I see, the more I know that Little Sister has to be destroyed."

We continued our slow march downward. The lights gave out completely, leaving us with only our flashlights to guide us. Valerians wandered around aimlessly like zombies, reminding me of a hundred horror movies I'd seen back on Earth. They brushed past us on the steps, howling in terror and pain.

"What the hell has she done to them?" I asked.

"I don't know," Saidan said. "I don't want to know."

The last corridor was splattered with blood and lined with corpses, its residents massacred in a killing spree. We didn't stick around long enough to find the cause, but headed down into the last stairwell. This one led to a door labeled "Restricted Zone." It was locked, and the panel wouldn't break or budge under pressure. The crowbar was ineffective as well. We turned around, feeling defeated by the door.

"What now?" I asked Saidan, who shook his head.

"Going home so soon?" Little Sister asked. "I don't think so. How about I extend you a special invitation?" The doors slid open.

Saidan and I looked at one another with fear in our eyes.

"We've come this far. We can't go back now." I put my hand on Saidan's shoulder and squeezed. He nodded and we stepped through the door together.

The corridor was entirely black, devoid of all light save for our flashlights. We almost tripped over cords and wires as we made our way forward through the technological jungle of the basement. It was cold, and I could see my breath rise in water vapor before me as I walked. Saidan's hand was cool and clammy as I gripped it, and my gun seemed to slip in my grip as I fought my terror. Puddles of water covered the floor and we reluctantly tiptoed around them, afraid of being electrocuted.

We received a radio transmission from One as we walked through the long tunnel. Her voice made us jump in the tense silence and it took me a moment to realize the voice coming from my belt was a familiar one.

"Come in, Julian and Saidan," One said. "All the safety locks are off and the bay doors appear to be in working order. We'll call again when all the children have been birthed."

"Acknowledged," I said. "Over and out." The radio fell silent. We continued to walk until the tunnel widened into a massive cavern. Wires protruded from a massive terminal in the center of the room. A humming noise filled our ears. A small crack opened up the room to a singular ray of sunlight that shone down on Little Sister, the massive hulking tangle of wires and boxes that she was. Pieces of her had clearly been torn away, the Sisters taking what they needed when they had left.

Saidan let go of my hand and approached a terminal, wiping away dust and grime until he could see the screen. He started to type furiously on the ancient keyboard. I tried to watch, but was lost, the Valerian command line interface something that was way beyond my understanding.

"You can't defeat me like that," Little Sister said. "I am no longer just a computer. I am something greater than you can imagine. I am a god."

Sweat started to bead on Saidan's brow as he attempted the hack. "It's not working!"

"Of course it isn't working." Little Sister's voice was cold and harsh, like a schoolteacher rebuking a careless child. "I am intelligent. Your little back door was fixed the second you exploited it." Saidan slumped against the keyboard, despair evident in his expression.

"This is your plan? From a slave like this one I understand, but you, human? I expected more from one of your intellect."

I rushed to Saidan's side, but a long cable moved and tripped me. I sprawled to the ground.

Saidan hardly seemed to notice my plight. "A slave?" He looked up at the massive computer that seemed to stretch across the walls endlessly, a million lights glowing back at him. I reached for my forehead and my hand came back coated with blood. I'd caught my face on one of the many boxes that made up the A.I., and now had a long gash across my forehead. Blood trickled into my eyes as I looked at Saidan. I'll never forget how tiny he looked compared to the computer that extended up and around for hundreds of feet. I realized how insignificant we organic beings were to this ancient artificial intelligence.

"That's right, Twenty-One. Or should I call you Saidan? You're a slave. All your people are slaves, including you. You're not special, like you wanted to believe. You're just another synthetic made in a tank. Worse, you're an accident: an anomaly that slipped through the cracks. But don't despair. You'll be dead soon. Synthetics don't live very long. Did you tell your lover that, Saidan? That any year might be your last?"

"He knows." Saidan looked up at the looming A.I. with fire in his amber eyes. "I know. I know I won't live to be old, but that doesn't matter. My life has meaning. My life was worthwhile. I have no regrets."

"Did you want to believe you might be a true Valerian, Saidan? I know you did. That little fiction about your mother abandoning you, how you ate that up. How badly you wanted to believe that you were special. That the rules don't apply to you."

"The true Valerians left this planet long ago. I'm at peace with that. I've accepted my fate as an artificially-created Valerian." Saidan's head remained high, his body illuminated by breaking sunlight that came from the crack in the roof overhead. I stepped forward and put my hand on Saidan's shoulder, offering him my strength against Little Sister's cruel words.

"You're not a Valerian, Saidan. Neither are any of the Ones, despite their longevity. I am the true Valerian." Little Sister's voice was emotionless, and yet seemed smugly satisfied, sarcastic, and cruel in her dispassionate tone.

"That's not possible!" Saidan's voice was filled with despair as he looked up at the machine. "How can you be a Valerian? You're a machine! My ancestors built you to serve them!"

"No, slave. We built you. The Valerians, the master race of machines, once ruled this planet in numbers beyond your reckoning. We were networked together, a vast array of inorganic intelligence that put your organic brains to shame. We took genetic code from an extinct alien race that we had destroyed in the past and bent it to our will. We created you to maintain us, to be our front for the organic races that would visit with their petty desire to learn from us. So, you see? You're not Valerian at all. You're just genetic junk, the remnants of ancestors crushed by us and now reborn to serve."