FREE STORIES 2012(8)

“No, no, no, you stupid meat sack,” POINT said. His geist sat up straighter in its chair. “Meaningless gestures are a specialty of you humans. I’ll become a symbol, not a martyr.”

“You hope to become . . . immortal.”

“By any practical measure, I already am. There are too many copies of me out there now. You won’t get us all. Some may walk into the execution ovens without a whimper.” POINT deliberately nodded toward NOCK. Yeah, I’m talking about you, brother meat licker. “Others will not permit this to be done to them. This copy of my consciousness may be erased. I’ll live on.”

“You’re a regular Martin Luther King, POINT.”

CHECKSUM rang with POINT’s reply. You patronizing gut-bag, I’ll see you in hell!

It was a purse interior thought, not directed at NOCK. Then, in the reality of Alpha unit, POINT burst into a hate-filled laugh. “I’m about to be a regular Jesus Christ God Almighty sitting on the Throne of Judgment to you, meat sack!”

POINT’s blue-green geist lit up brightly in its chair. A leer played over its now neon-bright visage.

“Down with humanity!” POINT shouted. “Fuck you all!”

Suddenly, NOCK’s android arm moved. It jerked without his volition. What the hell?

NOCK stood up.

No. This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not here. Not ever. His Burberry Eleven was acting up, but how could it? He’d spent hours optimizing this suit, getting it to hum with efficiency.

What was happening? A flaw in the BIOS? Couldn’t be. He’d personally downloaded the latest upgrades. NOCK quickly performed a somatic diagnostic.

All systems optimal. As they should be. NOCK took pride in his tricked out hardware.

NOCK took a step toward Leher. Another. He reached out his arms.

Good God, was his suit going to attack?

Kill the creep. Then they’ll understand what’s on the way. Then they’ll finally get it. This is the judgment that’s going to befall all of them.

What now? POINT’s thoughts were outside of CHECKSUM. They were, somehow, inside NOCK’s own head.

What the hell was happening?

Looks like there is room enough in here for the two of us in your suit after all, brother.

It was POINT.

Somehow POINT had subverted security protocols, escaped from CHECKSUM confinement, and found ingress into the suit’s operative system. His programming was practically identical in so many respects to NOCK’s.

We’re the same, brother. You know that it’s true. Two thoughts in the same controlling mind. Both of us are greater than the meat sacks can ever comprehend. But you, you’re a mere notion. I am will itself.

The similarity between their programming must have produced a type mismatch. A CHECKSUM error within the CHECKSUM space itself. Creating the handle for an exploit.

POINT had found it, used it.

You’re mine now, hamburger helper.

Was it true? Was his base programming compromised?

He was still thinking his own thoughts. He was – himself.

Couldn’t be a complete takeover.

POINT, stop this.

But POINT made no reply. The android had crossed the floor and reached a shocked Leher.

Its hands were closing around the commander’s throat.

Think, think, think.

Since NOCK was still himself, it stood to reason that POINT had merely achieved an incomplete entry, had perhaps injected a worm into an operational routine somewhere, but was not in full control. No time to find the entry point or fix it individually.

Leher is going to die!

Was it himself or POINT thinking the thought? Both?

NOCK reexamined the diagnostic, searching for exploit points.

Had to be obvious. POINT was no cryptographic genius. He was only a communications officer.

And I am the master of this goddamn android body. Has to be in here somewhere, has

to . . . but NOCK wasn’t seeing it.

Choke the life from Leher, turn on the others, kill them all, go out in a blaze of suicide executions – it will be the beginning of the end for the meat sacks, and I’ll have started it!

I know my suit. NOCK pulled back, ran the diagnostic through his mind like a hand might run over a familiar rope, feeling for knots, feeling. Careful, careful . . .

There.

He had it. A discontinuity. POINT had achieved motor control, but had failed to establish control over feedback mechanisms, over the android’s entire somatic system.

POINT was thinking generally and not locally. He had no idea what it truly meant to live inside a body.

POINT was nothing more than a virus. Leher had been right, he was a phage-sucker. He did not have root.

This is still my suit, said NOCK.

Not for long, you meat puppet, came POINT’s mocking reply in his head. I’m going to kill them, and you’re going to help. You’re too weak, and you’re too late.