The Siren Project (27 page)

WAIT.

Gunter pulled the door open for the others,
then directed Mitch to read the message on the terminal screens. As soon as
Mitch was looking at the screen, another message appeared.

RECONNECT.

“Yeah right!” Mouse exploded, “So he can
get the rest of my code.  Screw that!”

Mitch hesitated. “Do it.”

“Are you crazy?”

“We’ll give him two minutes, then we’re out
of here.”

Mouse sighed. “Okay, but I'm telling you,
this is a bad idea.” He plugged his laptop back into the network, then the hard
disk began spinning immediately. “Wow! EB's pumping a lot of data down the
pipe.”

Mitch turned to Gunter. “Put C4 on those
four particle accelerators, and on anything else that looks expensive or
irreplaceable.” Without a word, Gunter vanished into the hall, while Mitch started
anxiously checking his watch. On every screen, a status bar appeared. It was
more than half complete, but was filling at a painfully slow rate. Soon, the
initial two minutes had passed, while the status bar crept passed ninety
percent. Mitch hovered over Mouse’s shoulder impatiently, then one of the terminal
screens filled with the security camera view of the main entrance.

“EB's giving us the feed,” Mouse said
absently.

There was still no sign of approaching
vehicles, but the guard from the front gate was walking towards the main
entrance with his gun drawn. He spoke into his two way radio, growing visibly
concerned that he received no acknowledgement. The guard peered through the
glass doors, looking for any sign of the other security men, then the doors parted
and he stepped into the foyer. The image changed to the perspective of the
foyer’s camera, just in time to see the confusion on the guard’s face as he
inhaled the gas, and slumped unconscious onto the floor.

The status bar hit one hundred percent and
vanished. Mouse pulled the connecting cable free, locked his laptop shut and
then all three of them started running for the rear exit.

Mitch yelled into his radio, “G, we’re
moving. Where are you?”

Gunter’s voice crackled back. “Energy lab. Just
finishing number four.”

“Time’s up.”

They ran through several corridors, past
sleeping guards and laboratories, towards the exit, finding Gunter was already
there, waiting for them. Once outside, all four ran for the hole in the fence,
peeling off their gas masks as they approached the van. Mitch tossed his gas
mask into the van's rear as he climbed into the passenger seat, while Gunter
took the wheel. In a few seconds, they were speeding away from the Institute. Gunter
handed a small radio transmitter to Mitch, who pulled the aerial out, and
pressed the detonate button. A dozen thunderclaps rolled out into the night,
signaling the destruction of fragile equipment and laboratories throughout the
Institute. There'd been no sirens warning of the approach of the security
force, but if EB’s timetable was correct, they would have been caught in the
blast. 

Mouse buzzed Mitch on the intercom from the
rear of the van. “I’m looking at the download EB sent us. We've got hundreds of
files, blueprints, statistics, scientific reports. It's massive, everything you
wanted to know about turning men into robots, but were afraid to ask.”

Mitch knew he should have been satisfied,
but EB’s strange words echoed in his mind, words that left him in no doubt, EB
was the key.

I AM CRUEL.

* * * *

“Okay Princess, give,” Mitch said, as
he slipped into a chair beside her under the awning, outside the mobile home. “You’ve
been in a trance since we got back.”

Christa shook her head slowly, staring
absently at the row of permanently sited vans lining the narrow road through
the trailer park. “There’s nothing to talk about. She’s gone.”

“The woman in the video?”

“Number seven,” Christa spat the words
bitterly.

“You were close?”

She nodded. “She was very gifted.”

“Ah, from Psychomet?”

“Metapsych,” Christa corrected.

“She might still be alive.”

Christa turned her head away from Mitch so
he couldn’t see the tears forming in her eyes. “If she is, she’s one of their
robots by now.”

Mouse pushed the mobile home door open and
jumped down excitedly, then stopped as if he had run headlong into a barrier.

Mitch looked up. “What is it?”

“We’re ready,” Mouse replied, glancing
uncertainly at Christa.

“I'm all right.”

Mitch stepped up into the mobile home after
Mouse. Christa breathed deeply, calming herself, then followed. Gunter sat at the
table, beside a laptop and a stack of printouts. Mouse slipped into the seat in
front of the computer.

“We have started indexing the EB download,”
Gunter began. “We still have a long way to go, but it appears to explain the
scientific rationale of the brain conditioning technology itself.”

“There’s a lot of technical crap in there,”
Mouse added. “Molecular mumbo jumbo. We don’t understand a word of it.”

“This data requires a level of scientific
analysis we are not qualified or equipped to conduct. Curiously, the only
nonscientific files refer to an extreme right wing militia group-”

“Neo-nazi aryan master race loser types,”
Mouse cut in. “You know the kind; my sister is also my mother.”

“That is the image they portray,” Gunter
said cautiously. “But that is not who they are.”

“It’s a cover?” Mitch asked.

“Ya. They are called the American Patriot’s
Regiment, APR. They claim to have antigovernment anarchist sentiments, a
distinctly paramilitarist nature and a secret training base in Louisiana.”

“I ran a search through the FBI archives,”
Mouse said. “They have a long and glorious history, documented down to the
tiniest detail. The names, photographs and bio’s of all the leaders are there,
including a string of weapons offences. Several have served time in both the
military and prison. A very thorough dossier, and it’s total BS. When I got
into the system logs, I found the entire file was loaded into the FBI system
less than seven months ago, even though the APR’s supposedly been shooting up
Louisiana state forests for more than fifteen years.”

“That kind of elaborate cover story
requires a lot of preparation,” Christa said. “Did you cross check the prison
records? Or circuit court records for the weapons offences?”

Mouse nodded. “Louisiana state penitentiary
records match perfectly with the FBI archives. So do the court documents and files
held by various district attorneys. US Army personnel records also show the
service files of APR members. Not one of them above the rank of corporal. Two
supposedly dishonorably discharged. When I dig behind the data to the system
logs, I find all these records, in all these different systems, were loaded
within a three day period. It’s a very comprehensive cover.”

Christa thought for a moment. “So if you weren’t
doubting what you saw on the screen when you called up the names, you'd never know
they were fakes?”

“Correct.”

“How hard is it to get to the system logs?”
Mitch asked.

“Not hard, but it’s not about hard. It’s
about credibility. FBI agents, or local police wouldn't check this stuff. They'd
believe what they see. It'd require a proper computer audit to find the fakes.”

“Did EB tell us this stuff was faked?”

“No, but he had to know I'd find it.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Because, in case you haven't worked it out
yet, EB is a computer genius,” Mouse said simply, “And he's seen my code. He
knows how I work. He knew how deep I'd dig.”

“That’s giving him a lot of credit,” Mitch
said thoughtfully. “But you might be right.”

“EB’s download contains copies of orders
coming from the APR, requesting weapons, vehicles, designating individuals for
conditioning,” Gunter said. “There are no names signing these orders, just
authorization codes. I assume the APR leaders have no real authority, and
whoever does, prefers not to use a name that can be traced.”

“Fake identities and fake organizations,”
Christa said. “It's a tangled web.”

“We are not sure if the conditioning list
is of people already conditioned, or people who will be, once the technique is
perfected,” Gunter explained. “There are also references in the EB download to
a paramilitary operation using a mobile conditioning unit based on the east
coast. It appears the devices we saw in the Newton Institute were older designs.
There is a newer, smaller model we haven’t seen yet.”

“Any details on what this operation is?”
Mitch asked.

“They are going to attack a major political
convention in New York City.”

“Do we know why?”

“No,” Gunter replied. “There are thousands
of files, and we have not had time to go through them all. If EB has given us a
file with all the details, we have not found it yet. Or perhaps EB does not
know.”

“How long have we got?” Christa asked.

“A few days.”

“We have to warn Gus.”

“We will,” Mitch said.

“They are planning on many casualties,”
Gunter added.

“They want it to look like a terrorist
attack?” Christa asked.

“Ya. Their website reeks of mindless,
ignorant hatred, but the EB communiques have no trace of that. They are clear,
lucid and precise.”

“They're not gun toting rednecks, and this
isn't a mindless anarchist plot,” Mouse said, “Although they want it to look
that way.”

“The rednecks may be the fall guys,” Gunter
said. “The people putting this together are professionals. Rogue intel or
military types.”

Mitch nodded. “We've met them already.”

“Was there anything about the invisible Dr
Steinus?” Christa asked.

“EB gave us a more detailed version of the
dossier Knightly had on Steinus,” Gunter replied.

“Does it tell us his middle name?” Mitch
asked.

Gunter looked puzzled. “No, why is that
important?”

“Because his first name is Erich. If his
middle name started with B, he would be E. B. Steinus. EB.”

Gunter flicked back through the dossier and
shook his head. “No middle name. There is an employment contract with the
Newton Institute, and an order transferring him to ‘the Arizona Facility’, whatever
that is, but no indication where the facility is. Steinus’ dossier tells us he
is a clinical neurologist. From his file, a very brilliant man.”

“What exactly does a clinical neurologist
do?” Mitch asked.

“They study the nervous system,” Christa
said. “The part of the body which responds to external stimuli.”

“You knew this already?”

“Yes. Everything to do with this technology
is classified, but now that you know what he is, there’s nothing to be gained
by further secrecy.”

Mitch exhaled slowly, weary of the secrecy
games. “I guess it makes sense. If you want to condition the brain, you have to
know how it responds.”

“This whole thing is about how responsive
the brain is to certain influences,” Christa explained, “And how to pattern the
brain to get the response you want.”

“So we have a brilliant egghead figuring
out what makes the brain tick for Uncle Sam, we’ve got someone siphoning off
left over technology from the Strategic Defense Initiative, and we’ve got this
expensive research institute turning monkeys into Nintendos.” Mitch said,
drawing the pieces together. “Is there anything else about this facility in
Arizona?”

“The Newton Institute sent several modified
AM-X accelerators there,” Gunter replied. “The monkey in the chimp room came
from Arizona. It was brought up here to test the latest prototype particle
accelerator. In fact, that whole set up in the chimp room was shipped up from
Arizona.”

“I think EB liked that monkey,” Mouse said.
“He sent us its history, medical records, photographs, even what kind of food
it liked.”

“Maybe it was his pet?” Christa suggested.

“He was upset when I put the monkey out of
its misery,” Mitch said, then his eyes widened. “EB's at the Arizona Facility! That's
where the monkey was!”

“That chimp’s head was wired by Steinus,”
Mouse said. “Once he had that level of control over a chimp brain, the powers that
be must have realized he was for real.”

“Even so,” Gunter said, “There is a great
difference between the brain of a chimpanzee and the brain of a human being.”

“That's for sure,” Mouse said. “They might
be able to make a chimpanzee quack like a duck, but that doesn’t mean they can
make a man walk like one.”

Mitch’s mind went back to the Chimp Room. “If
you can see through a chimp’s eyes, if you can make its hands and feet move
like a marionette, all because some egghead runs a wire into its brain, I’m
inclined to believe they can make a man walk, talk and quack like a duck, or
any damn thing they want. If not now, then soon.” He thrust the memory of the
dead chimpanzee aside. “So we have the technical readout. Do we know how this
thing works?”