The Legend of Ivan (9 page)

Mutation moved into details regarding the varied effects of radiation. Radiation gave way to fission as a primitive means of producing electricity. Ancient energy production in other means, specifically geothermal, spun out of control towards planetary core and composition, then terraforming procedures. Mining operations. Industry accidents and miraculous survivals through the years. Phineas Gage and Piper Welkin. Brain tissue grafts, augmentation, Archivist creation-

My mind pulled into control of itself as I reasserted a rational, personal control and recalled a sense of self in the infinite immersion of data. I mentally logged the time. Ten minutes of my hour had gone by. Not a bad loss by any means.

The inevitable byproduct of net-diving for an Archivist is being dragged along by curiosity. Something sparks interest in something else, and before we know it, our inquiry is twelve degrees removed from the original intent. The process draws us so far away that the initial data no longer has much applicability, so usually few useful conclusions can be drawn.

Carefully shutting out all but the most direct inquiry, squelching every stray or curious thought, I set about my search regarding Traverian Grey:

Conjecture, very little confirmed details. Wanted for questioning on a dozen worlds but nature of offense classified. No military record to speak of. Suspected corporate ties to Soma, Keritas, ISCG, Berlioz, Seryia Hakar, and more. Criminal ties to Phoenix Organization, Dathan Reynolds...

More names, places.

Voux Hanatar. Familiar: logged as important. Marqyni mentioned it.

With so many current-day criminals sliding by, I hardly noticed when my inquiries dropped into deep history of infamous outlaws. Archaic metal repeaters hid in musician cases. Famous orchestral performances. Conductors, batons, redwood forests, environmentalism, the toxification and flight of civilization from Old Earth and expansion into the galaxy, starship innovation, alloy production, mining operations, industry accidents and miraculous survivals. Phineas Gage and Piper Welkin. Brain tissue grafts, augmentation, Archivist creation-

Warmth blazed inside my skull, and I could feel an electrical tingle behind my eyes as the processors lodged in my brain tissue overtaxed. Isolating myself, I ceased all inquiry, imagining deep, calming breaths as my whirling brain relaxed. Slowly, I peeled back sensory blocks, letting bytes of data pass through. Twenty minutes on valid inquiry, another sixteen lost.

Some Archivists more keen on self-preservation utilized contacts and proxies to complete net-searching. I spend much of my time speaking with sources displaying a wide variety of unreliability, so I prefer to gather direct information when I can. I have a system, and it has functioned quite well for me.

A gentle notion, the eternal and simple interest in my own creation and existence has allowed me to survive and focus my inquiries through nearing two hundred net-diving attempts. Every tangled web of queries will eventually end at the creation of Archivists, which will remind me where I am, giving me the tiniest moment to reassert self-control.

Marqyni himself suggested the idea to me, swearing it was no different than a normal person discovering how to dream in lucidity, reining control over the actions of their subconscious. He told me of a mental image he crafted of the starry night sky. Every time he looks out a window and sees the inky void, a tiny thought passes where he wonders if he is asleep. What began as a conscious effort to think about a dreaming state turned into a conditioned response which he says has followed him into his slumber.

Indeed, it was his suggestion to try it myself when attempting net searches that created our friendship and my great respect for him. Prior to this, my net experiences yielded about ten minutes of useful searching for each hour spent.

Fourteen minutes before Marqyni was set to cut me off. More on Voux Hanatar or Traverian Grey?

Useful Traverian Grey information exhausted. Voux Hanatar. Famous with massive criminal organization. Compartmentalized; many years without concrete evidence to convict. Reputation for paranoia and ruthlessness. Sudden change. Headlines for weeks about crumbling organization. Hanatar arrested with difficult trial. Convicted, sentenced to life imprisonment in maximum security. Failed escape attempts.

Still alive.

My mind became lost again with inquiries on health conditions and life expectancies of individuals, followed by a half-dozen tangential searches. I was entrenched within a mire of data regarding New Earth avian species when the connection was severed.

The highest risk involves an Archivist without a dedicated internal kill-switch to net inquiry. The individual will almost certainly become lost in the unending stream of data, burning out processors or starving to death without knowing or caring. To be safe, I also set Marqyni to disconnect me in case my undying hunger to eternally bask in the reservoirs of information caused my subconscious to override the redundant fail safes.

Even so, after being cut off, my mind continued to dredge through the recent data, stored for analysis and cross-examination: the secondary danger of net-diving. In rare instances, enough information is stored to provide a long, cyclical search pattern. Even disconnected from the nets, the Archivist continues the unending stream of searches within the confines of his or her own mind.

This didn't happen to me. After a few moments of disorientation, I discarded the data related to accretion disk artwork and realized that Marqyni had cut me off three minutes early.

He stared down at me, sweating and nervous. I scowled. "Why in the various hells would you-"

"Another Archivist came through customs four minutes ago," the librarian interrupted. "Your friend, Officer Tani, contacted me. You have to leave."

I stood up, pressing my fingertips to my temple as I internally and externally disengaged all wireless implant activity. My heart-rate, already elevated from the searching, sky-rocketed. Staring at Marqyni, I asked, "Who is it?"

He wrung his hands together, shaking his head back and forth. "I... I am not certain, but... she described him as almost entirely mechanical."

Closing my eyes, I grit my teeth. "Cain."

"It sounds that way," the librarian murmured. "Which means that you need to get to your ship and depart as soon as possible."

I experienced a tiny, infinite moment of thought.
Find him
, part of me screamed,
Find him and kill him. Take what he has for your own
. Another piece of my mind spoke up.
It's not worth the risk. Defeating him is doubtful.

Without further hesitation, I snatched my coat and hat from the desk. Sweeping them on, I grasped Marqyni's hand and spoke, "Thank you, my friend."

The librarian grinned, almost overcoming the fear still upon his face. "Good luck, Sid. Come back soon, and for God's sake have something concrete when you do."

I bowed and departed.

As I passed through station corridors, trying to consider the route least likely to create a confrontation, I wondered if I should have dropped a listening device in Marqyni's office. It seemed possible that Cain would stop to question him, but I rather assumed he would bend his effort to finding me.

Archivists cannot abide other Archivists. A terrible principle, as few others in the universe understand the horrid agony of a gruesome near or actual death followed by excruciating months of surgical implantation and a brief, obsession-driven life. It is a very isolated existence. The happy few who understand what is sacrificed in the process would tear each other apart given the slightest opportunity.

The kind of information in my data stores is the kind that corporations pay millions for; it is rare and delicate. Since our greater existence is bent towards finding these delicious secrets, simply knowing another Archivist is nearby can drive any one of us into a frenzy. No matter the surroundings: a funeral, fragile negotiations between warring parties, a hull breach on a crowded freighter... Put two Archivists in the same room, and they will do their best to bash in each others' skulls until one emerges victorious with a handful of bloody cortical processors.

Still, self-preservation dictates pragmatism. The time, effort, and threat ratio to information discovered has always proven more favorable for those who avoid conflict with other Archivists. There have always been others, like Cain, who cloud the calculation with emotional entanglement: the thrill of the hunt, sadistic desires, an inferiority complex. Cain had taken credit for a dozen Archivist deaths, and reputation suggested it was how he received most of his information. Though I didn't know if I was his specific target on this occasion or if he just happened to be stopping by, I had little desire to find out.

I moved through the station bazaar, tiny store-front shops lining the long, wide open space. Dozens of people milled about, buying trinkets and food. Exiting the market area, I neared the docking bay where Minerva lay waiting to spirit me away.

Moving through the station checkout with no hassle, I passed by row upon row of silent vessels. I saw Minerva and breathed a sigh of relief which caught in my throat as I noted something else.

A large figure leaned up against her. "Sid," a mechanical tone issued from his throat. "Running so soon?" The man grinned. His mouth and cheek structure was the only visible flesh left on his body. It lay beneath the metallic skull plate which made up the top half of his head, including two synthetic eyes, red and radiating malice.

Cain. Every inch of him the brute I expected, though I cursed myself for not considering that he'd simply turn around at customs and wait for me at my only means of departure. It seemed he
was
looking for me.

I made no response, and silence held between us for a few moments as we sized each other up. My own synthetic eye flitted through several visual analyses and noted heat signatures, power sources, and frightening hardware hidden within my foe.

My teeth clenched. Cain was almost all machine, but I could sense the barest vibration of an organic heart. Infrared sensors detected some manner of warm tissue in his torso region behind the cold lifelessness of the metallic pieces, however...

His every limb was mechanical and loaded with weaponry I wouldn't be quite able to identify until it was peeling apart or vaporizing my body.

"Tranquilizers is the worst you have?" Cain broke the silence, laughing and evidently completing his own analysis. "Sid, I'm disappointed. I'd heard you were the consummate survivor."

The slightest tremble, a flicker of fear, settled over me. "The opportunity to install upgrades has been limited," I replied, cycling through his hardware and trying to find some manner of weakness to exploit.

He laughed again, taking a step towards me. "Yet ever so vital, lest you find yourself in a situation such as this."

Taunting. Cain knew of his physical superiority, but he insisted upon eliciting a fear response, toying with his prey. Even though probability figures screamed that I hadn't the slightest prayer in a fight, part of me still hungered for what must of been amazing data stores in his brain.

Cain continued moving towards me. "Nothing to say? Not even going to put up a fight?" I felt the slightest tug as his wireless implant pinged my own, seeking a means of incapacitation. He likely intended to lockout my programming or freeze me in place to make it easy to reduce my body to ash or twist my head off with his bare hands.

His intrusion mechanism continued to scrape at my mental firewall, but his efforts felt clumsy and sloppy. It gave me an idea.

"What do you want from me?" I asked, stalling as a portion of my brain scrabbled to write a program.

He shrugged, and I could see heat pouring into his right arm: some kind of firing device. "You seek what I seek, so I must know what you know."

Clenching a fist, I replied, "You're looking for Ivan?"

"Oh sure. He seems to be an individual of relative importance, so why wouldn't Daedra-Tech be looking for him?" His grin didn't falter as he casually named my employer, a piece of information that was most definitely not well-known. "Now you question: am I working for someone else, or am I just trying to figure it all out and sell it to the highest bidder?"

I shook my head. "I have no interest in your motives, Cain." This wasn't true at all, but I was busy stalling and trying to find a way not to die. Power continued to ripple in what I assumed was an energy cannon inside his arm. If it was a singular pulse or beam, I believed I could dodge it without too much difficulty. If the weapon had sustain, Cain would likely be able track my movements and reduce all but my important bits to dust.

Still working on the program, I said, "I'd suggest against trying anything. I have many friends aboard this station." A semi-empty threat. No doubt he could murder me, dig out my brain tissue, implant my data stores in his mind, and stop at the bazaar for lunch in the time it would take for them to discern that the ashen remains were mine and attempt to arrest him.

Cain threw back his head and laughed. "Oh, Sid, be real."

"I don't have anything useful on Ivan yet anyway. Killing me now would be a waste." Still stalling, the program I was writing was almost complete, and his intrusion attempts became more urgent.

"For you, perhaps." My assailant shrugged, casually raising his arm. "I'm sure Ivan's not the only thing rattling around in that skull of yours."

Finished, I smiled. "Indeed."

Cutting loose my firewall, portions of his consciousness slammed into my own, driven right into the program I created. Noting the trap, he panicked and withdrew, intrusion of my own trailing behind and cutting into his own defenses.

A bright shaft of amber light exploded from the end of his hand, lancing over my head as I ducked. A deep scorch sliced into the nose of a nearby ship, and the stench of cooking metal filled the air.

I knew my tranquilizers would do little good here. I also wasn't certain of how effective my sonic emitter would be. Even so, I'd have to get very close, which was too risky by itself. The reality was that I had to hope my program was enough to give me half a moment to escape.