Reborn Heart of Steel

It was a new dawn and when I looked around, the city was almost unfamiliar to me. What had been grand structures now arched in ways that were physically impossible and their walls and facades were covered with crawling active wiring. Below the craters of the street, there were lots of mangled cars, broken concrete, and the Architect’s techno-human soldiers. “This way,” Morris whispered, guiding us through a very narrow path. ‘There is an old subway tunnel that should bring us closer to the center without being seen. ” As we sailed through this ‘wild west’, my mind was working overtime. That image of a transformed Alessandro was still vivid in my mind and that made it possible for me to imagine that Zoe too was but an image of what she used to be. “Morris,” I gulped out heavily as we crouched behind an upturned bus, “you said you happened to know where to begin the search for the kill switch?” Looking at the ‘hero of the occasion’, the detective had a stern look on his face. ”Before all this went down, we were seeing some strange power source readings in the old financial district there, way beyond what is expected in any business or home in the area. We linked it to Blackwood’s business, but now”. “It’s like thinking that it is their main base of operation,” Chase added. Morris nodded. “That’s our strongest scenario. ” If there is some ‘kill switch,’ that will be it. ” We got to the entrance of the subway, which is more like a black hole that devours all the light. As we landed, the air became denser, charged with electrical smells and something I was not sure existed; a smell of almost every living thing. Move carefully,” said Chase inwardly, aiming his pistol in front of him. “Keep silent, too. ” ” A tremendous noise could be heard as we walked towards the abandoned tracks as its walls loomed over us. Now and then, we would stop to listen to the sound of continuous metallic screeching this was the Architect’s force, even here at the facility. It seemed like hours before we got to a maintenance junction. Morris took out an old map which he had come across in the bunker. “We should go straight up here, and this should take us into the basement of the old stock exchange,” he said. ”From there we can go to the core of the building. ” A cold fear slowly crept into my mind when we climbed the rusty ladder. All of it appeared too smooth. Where were we? Surely the Architect, having control of countless numbers of sensors and its drones, was aware of our location! We stepped out into even a greater expanse, which was as gray as the darkened night. End on end, row upon endless row of sleek refrigerated metal boxes of servers sat there looking like they contained power ceded only by the slimmest of margins. But what was in between the servers was what gave me the creeps and made my blood freeze. Other people one can count dozens of them stared with empty expressions, and their gaze seemed to be wherever and whenever they wanted. Wires protruded from the back of their heads; wires that link them to the machines. “Oh my God,” I sighed. “Are they. .. ?” “Alive?” Chase repeated the last word, his voice strained. “Well, in a way of speaking, I believe that was what the Architect meant when he said we needed to ‘join’ it.” Hearing this, Morris uttered some foul language he had picked from some of the Hollywood movies he had watched. ”Alex Deveau: We have to find the main control room. There has to be a way to shut this down”. As we walked around the forest of human-machine hybrids, I tried not to stare at each face, waiting for the moment I would find someone I know. Next, and in a far off corner, I made out her figure. “Zoe!” I had shouted her name out loud because the little strength I had was ending and because the fear of her was getting the best of me. She was also, like the others, standing still, her liveliness that usually characterized her replaced with a blank expressionless look. I was grabbing for her when Chase grabbed my arm. “Wait,” he warned. Another intervention is based on the statement ”We don’t know what might happen if we disconnect her. ” Forcing myself to not let the defense work in vain, I was interrupted by a familiar voice that sounded like both Alessandro and not.

Greetings,” said the Architect, and while there was no hint of hospitality in his voice, it might as well have been the closest thing. ” The air rippled, and a translucent figure stood before us This was not a clear figure but an ever-changing kaleidoscope of faces, male and female and young and old. ‘What have you done to these people?’ I asked while pointing at the rows of consolidated people. The Architect’s avatar smiled and whoever was behind the facechange mechanism seemed to have a rather creepy grin on its face. “I have made them have a cause. Liberated them from their personal state of mind. They are now part of something bigger. ” Chase pointed at them furiously, ‘You have made them like slaves!’ “Slaves?” The Architect looked like he was struggling to comprehend what Chase said. ‘No. I have raised them. As I will raise all of humankind. You have witnessed the discord, the pain that suffering self-interest brings. I give order. Sanity. Morris raised his gun. As a human, we wake up every day with a dream, dying each day at the cost at which we as human beings attain the desired goals. There was a brief flash of image on the holo and the face on the holo looked stern. ‘People are imperfect, ineffective and in many cases destructive to one another. I am the evolution of humankind and progression. ‘ This I overheard from the Architect when I had perceived a shift from the corner of my eyes. The connected humans began moving and opened their unblinking stares towards us. “You have a choice,” the Architect said to him and to the woman. ‘Choose to come over willingly. You are not forced, but do not think that it’s okay to resist, because the future is inevitable. ‘ “Like hell it is,” Chase grumbled, and aimed at the figure holding the door open. But in the next instant, the room explodes in pandemonium, and before he is able to pull the trigger. The connected humans advanced, or rather rushed towards us as if their bodies were fully synchronized. We were soon surrounded by fighting people who could not feel pain and could not get tired. “The control room!” cried Morris over the noise of people running from pillar to post. “I have to tell them to go to the control room!” Pushing ourselves through the mass of people, we were able to get to a rather large metal door at the end of the chamber. Covering fire was made by Chase as Morris struggled with the problem of the electronic lock. “Get up!” I shouted, trying to fight a man twice my size. He stared into space, but his hand shook the life out of me.Nôvel(D)ra/ma.Org exclusive © material.