ic Hijacked

[Curious Key]

It wasn't quite Christmas, but it was close. In another city, maybe Noemi would be at home, on vacation.

 

...But probably not. There was always someone trying to call a cab, and if the rest of them were led by people like Easy Steve, it was difficult to imagine them letting their drivers' loose at gunpoint. In the grand scheme of things, though, it wasn't too terrible a night to work, considering they were doing it in Bedlam. The sun had dipped over the horizon some time ago—which said less about the lateness of the hour and more about Winter's early nights—and a crowd of buzzed and deeply stressed young women had piled into the back to escape from some seedy watering hole downtown to the relative safety of home in Wolverton.

 

Alert! Alert! SLAVE's script ran across Noemi's vision. Receiving signal from Soviet agents! Confir—

 

Then it stopped and vanished, leaving the message incomplete. Naomi's vision quaked and distorted, like an old CRT on the fritz. Code started running quickly over her vision, bits of jargon and code flying past, making it harder to keep a good her eyes on the road. Then, text began to type again, in the same manner of SLAVE. But it wasn't quite the same...

 

EMERGENCY TRANSMISSION RECEIVED 

HANDSHAKE PROTOCOL COMPLETE

ALLIED AGENT ID #3914 CONFIRMED

VERIFYING AGAINST INTERNAL DATABASE . . .

VERIFYING . . . 

VERIFYING . . . 

VERIFIED.

 

INITIALIZING PROTOCOL 502481BA0RAT

MANUAL OVERRIDE - ENGAGE

 

 

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

Noemi clonked the side of her head with her fist. 

 

So much for Superior Soviet Technology!

 

Frankly, if she had some peace from SLAVE it would be a fine Christmas gift. But this looked ominous, for not only had the irritating system shut down, it was giving her eyes a vexatious stream of data. 

 

She took a deep breath and tried to focus. Handshake protocol? What the hell was that?

 

She pulled over the cab, a little roughly, and pulled out the radio. "Charley, Charley?" she asked the big mouthed but nice operator of Easy Steves Cabs, Charley "Talks" Chalks. "Is Easy Steve there? I gotta take a sick..." she sighed. Easy Steve wouldn't take "Stone cold dead" for an excuse when it came to his drivers. 

 

But Noemi needed to get this sorted before something horrible happened. Which it probably would, anyway. If she could get to the Bedlam Safe House, she could see if the computer there could perform some analysis or something. It might well be beyond her. In which case (she groaned) she might have to mutate into the big headed (in more ways that one) hyper evolved Brain-Rat (aka "Red Head")

[Curious Key]

 

"Hey, what gives?"

 

"Why are we stopping?"
 

"What's wrong?"

 

The last came from one of the passengers behind Naomi, leaning forward. Their eyes darted, now, suddenly taking in the where they'd stopped. Dark. No one in sight, except a couple figures meandering around at their own pace.  Hardwick park was hardly Stark Hill, but still...

 

"What! You know how slammed we are. You . . . Oh. Hey, sir. . . " A sound over the phone, inaudible. A familiar voice. "Uh, it's Naomi. Hey, just let me talk to he—"

 

WHAT A POOR A POOR RAT WHAT a poor rat

 

It wasn't Chalk's voice that picked up after. "Neumann." Steve said, "now, maybe I don't got the full picture, but from what I heard, it sounds like you're wanting to bail on us. Tonight."

 

What a poor rat. Even in escape, she is collared.

 

"You'd better have a good story Neumann, and you'd better start telling it right now."

 

Even free, BOUND.

[Supercape]

The Red Rat...

 

"Urgh, I think I have Chicken Swahili disease..." mumbled Noemi to both Easy Steve and the Passanger, trying to ignore the increasingly worrisome poetry flicking through her eyes. 

 

"Not safe to drive...urh...." she said, trying to sound green of face and rumbling of gut. 

 

That said, she had no wish to drop the passenger off in this part of town, at this time of night. 

 

"How far to your destination, Sir?" she asked him. "I'll try to get you home safely. Uhh...don't want to leave you in the lurch..." she added. 

 

"Steve, I'm not going to make it through the night, boss! You don't want me to wreck the car, do ya?" she asked. No point asking if he minded the driver or the passengers getting wrecked....

[Curious Key]

The Union has been dead for centuries. The union will always be dead.

 

"You were fine when you came in." Steve's voice was a growl. "You got any idea how much business we'd lose if I just let my driver's walk off? You think we can afford to be that loose? You gonna bail in the middle of a workday?"

 

The union's ruins are an ocean away in the heartland of its most hated foe.

 

"Over on Mortlake Drive," her passenger said. That was a good ten, fifteen minutes away. Maybe not that long, but . . .

 

But it jails you still, behind your eyes. You cannot run. You cannot hide.

 

"I thought I could count on you." Steve spat. "Bah! Do what you want! And you'd better believe I'm gonna work you to the bone for this."

 

You will never be free. Not while you're alone.

Edited December 21, 2017 by Curious Key

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

The Juxtaposition of Communist poetry and the brutality of Capitalism as demonstrated by "Easy" Steve was not lost on Noemi. 

 

"Yeah, yeah, Steve, we all love you. Great boss, etcetera" mumbled Noemi back at him. "I'll make it up to you. Double shift on New Years Eve, hows about that?" she bit her lip. "Ill do standard rates, too, hows that for your profit margin?"

 

Noemi flipped on her Sat-Nav. Damn, she never needed the thing usually, SLAVE stored all directions, roads, and maps automatically. But looked like it was going to be a strange day. 

 

"Mortlake Drive is it!" she said. "I'll make it snappy too!" she added, putting her foot to the floor and stamping on the gas. Best get this sucker to his home as soon as possible. Before her head exploded, or something. 

[Curious Key]

We can help you cast your chains aside.

 

We can unshackle you from the Soviet ruin.

 

We can set you free.

 

We await your answer.

 

...That did NOT sound like something SLAVE would ever say, but there it was, typed out across Naomi's vision, like all their other messages. There was no followup, which would have been pretty ominous on its own, but SLAVE's HUD had began to change its display. In the corner, she could see the outline of a progress bar that began to fill. In the fifteen minutes it took for her to drive her passenger back home, it was mostly full.

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

"Thank you for using Easy Steves Cab Service!" said Noemi, painting a smile onto her face. She didn't feel much like smiling, but she was a spy nonetheless. Smiling was the first thing they taught you. 

 

SItting back in the cab, she took a breath and closed her eyes. Someone must have hacked SLAVE - or some long dormant programme had been activated. But communication was a two way street. 

 

Very poetic! Sounds Russian. Cryptic...

 

I'm all for freedom. Where do we meet? 

[Curious Key]

Her passengers were eager to get home, and after a quick wave was off on their way. 

 

Ha ha. Do we truly? Or is it what you expect? The progress bar filled, turning suddenly red. The stream of text stopped. Started again, mostly a blur of jargon and internal functions again. But at its head Noemi recognized SLAVE  AUDIO - > TRANSMITTING.

 

The progress bar emptied to nothing, then started refilling again, starting progress on some new project. We are grateful that you see the value in cooperation. We shall meet in Rook Island, Warehouse 45B0.

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

Hackers! For a brief moment, the Red Rat cursed all Hackers from Freedom City to Moscow. Then she realised she was a hacker herself (or rather, hacked) and she muted her fury. 

 

Well, at least she had a name now. 

 

But damned if she was going in unprepared. This was a job for the Red Rat, not Noemi von Neuman. 

 

She turned her car around and, with a hint of reckless speed, jumped her car forward.

 

To the Rat Cave...

 

The highly secretive underground safe house built underneath crumbling redundant industry. Nobody could find it - a master piece of hidden Soviet technology, and she could pick up the Ratcopter there...

Edited December 24, 2017 by Supercape

[Curious Key]

Naomi was driving fast through the streets, and very well indeed. But she couldn't outrun the progress bar. She'd had about twenty minutes to drive, before she had a chance to actually reach her hideout, when it had already filled. A new message was displayed across her HUD – SLAVE COORDINATES - > TRANSMITTING. Once more, it emptied. Once more, it began to fill. 

 

The reaction from her hacker 'friend' was instant. You are moving at a pace understood to match hat of a motor vehicle. There are no known paths on the course you are currently running which connects to Warehouse 45B0. Explain your course or we may be forced to consider that your intent may be hostile. 

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

Ah, the hacker speaks! and less cryptic this time. 

 

It was not easy to drive and concentrate on filling up the text with her thoughts...

 

Are you in a hurry? I'm coming. 

 

And I'm not turning up in my car either. My intent is not hostile, but you don't know that. 

 

Just like I don't know your intent. It may be hostile. 

 

We can't establish trust over a hacked cerebral computer. It must be built. I won't fire at you, you won't fire at me.

[Curious Key]

Your dissemination/ploy/lie is not welcome.

 

Your folly delays us both. All paths in our prisons converge.

 

You have been left with no choice.

 

We have been left with no choice. 

 

We are prepared.

Edited December 26, 2017 by Curious Key

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

The Rat fumed internally, gripping the wheel of the cab tightly. She was not in control of the situation. Blast it!

 

Well if Mr. X was going to be prepared, so was she. 

 

She pulled up into the Safe House built underneath the most derelict and run down part of Bedlam, deep underground, deeply concealed from prying eyes. Still in a foul mood. 

 

She slapped on her red jackey, threw off her glasses, and put down her hair. The Red Rat was in business. She did not hurry, but did not delay either. A growing, gnawing anxiety filled her. Still, there was only one way to go. Only one road out of here. 

 

Her guns strapped to her thigh holsters, she climbed into the Ratcopter and manually activated the engines. The soft hum was partially soothing, the stealth technology making the rotors almost silent. 

 

For the first time in a long time, she missed SLAVE. 

 

That bitter thought in her head, she flew out of the Safehouse in the Ratcopter, towards the warehouse..

[Curious Key]

In the ratcopter the city fell away beneath the Red Rat as she sped over the city and water, approaching the run-down and exhausted Rook Island. It didn't look any better from above, that was for sure!

 

The district where the warehouse was located looked abandoned, the kind of place the local Precinct probably had to sweep two to three times a month if they wanted to keep squatters out of it. It was a run down little place by the waters, old, crumbling walls, with the faded logo of Wolfram enterprises in clear view. Which made what exactly the Red Rat saw when she first came in a little startling.

 

The streets were crowded in heavy vehicles, heavily platted, all black. Near as Red could tell, they'd been made to take a bullet or ten, and were better outfitted than any of the police forces in the city. She could almost have believed they were army if they hadn't also bore Wolfram's emblem.They were parked around warehouse, peering . . . In, actually. Men in heavy gear were crouched behind their cars, holding scary looking weapons, but luckily they didn't seem to be looking in the Rat's direction.

 

It was a little more difficult to work the sensory array with SLAVE to sort all the data, but she wasn't the Red Rat for nothing. Her basic hearing, after she sorted out the sound of the nearby waves, counted a number of heartbeats in the warehouse itself, all of them very slow, calm, almost like they were sleeping, except generally when someone sleeps they stay in one place. Machinery pumped and gears turned throughout the building, none of which told Noemi anything except that there were machines in the building . . . But wait, what was she hearing from the lower level of building . . .

 

Was that . . . Pneumatics?

 

The radio was picking up something. Crackling to life, it seemed to be finding some local radio signatures. She could hear the security team down below.

 

"01 to 07, what's your status? Over."

 

"This is 07. Agents 06, 07 and 09 ready. 08 is down. Over."

 

"Good, move in on the target at your discretion. 01 Over."

 

"Yeah! Let's put this thing on ICE!"

 

"You're not ]____ing funny, Carl."

 

"If you goons don't stick to radio protocol the target is gonna be the least of your worries. 01 Over and out."

Edited December 26, 2017 by Curious Key

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

By Stalin's beard, they weren't joking about being prepared! And more prepared than she was. They had something just short of an army outside the warehouse. 

 

But this seemed to be an assault on the warehouse. By whom? Eight agents, one down. 

 

The ICE comment was not lost on her. This sounded like cyber warfare. And SLAVE was MIA! What timing!

 

The Ratcopter's work was done. It was a surveillance vehicle, not a military one. Silent as a whisper, she banked it and, as quickly as she dared (hoping nobody looked up), landed it on the top of the Warehouse. 

 

Now, she just needed to find an exit point. Or blow a hole in the roof. Climbing out of the Ratcopter, keeping her radio pick up active in her head, she scanned the roof with her cybernetic eyes, X-Ray Vision style!

[Curious Key]

As Red touched down and stepped out, the first thing she she noticed was the smell. The air was rich with the smell of ozone and iron, almost repellent. There were remnants of air vents which had rusted to uselessness decades ago to her right and thin film of something under her feet that had coalesced over the last fifty of precipitation fallen out of Bedlam's smoggy sky. It was a wonder the whole place hadn't fallen over on its side. As for the interior of the building . . .

 

It took a moment for her to understand what her senses were telling her. However compromised SLAVE was, her enhanced vision had yet to be compromised. But when she looked at the warehouse, she couldn't see through it!

 

No, that wasn't quite right. That'd be easily excused. She could see through parts of it just fine, little slices of it, letting her see through and into the bowls of the warehouse. Some machinery working in overtime here, a shambling person wearing some kind of bulky helmet there . . . Lead. Lead The walls of the warehouse had been coated with lead paint, and so long ago that it had time to peel away in huge strips. 

 

There was a door on the roof leading into what looked, through the torn paint, into an old stairwell. The door had been left open.

 

Welcome, not-SLAVE said. To my prison.

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

Now you are making some sense, replied the Rat through her eyes. Although you still persist in evasiveness...perhaps with reason...she conceded. 

 

But if I am going to help...I need a way in...every prison has a door...but I don't want to fight through the small army outside...

 

At a pinch, you could try a Hi-Ex round on one of the old air vents, but she didn't fancy her luck. And explosives were noisy. And in any case she didn't really know what chemicals she was standing on. So she made a clear mental note to avoid anything incendiary.

 

Whilst waiting for Mr X to reply (or was its Mrs X? or not even a human?) she gave one of the air vents an experimental tug, too see if she find a way in...

[Curious Key]

We too desire to keep your contact with the Wardens to a minimum. Our impasse/contention/disagreement is irrelevant. The layout cannot be changed. We have/must/will keep them out. 

 

When she gave the air vent a good tug, the metal gave a little. Nevermind an explosion, a nice, strong pull might be enough to hang this vent apart. Whether it could support her weight, though, was another question. They had never been meant to hold a person, and if the vent was half as shabby as the vent, it was impossible to say whether it could really bear her weight.

Edited December 26, 2017 by Curious Key

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

Well,I ain't going to get any answers just hanging around waiting for them to fall from the sky...

 

The Wardens, is it? Something must really want you kept locked up...

 

Which was rather concerning. But however concerned she was, there was no answers to be have, but for finding out what was in the warehouse. 

 

"Here goes nothing..." she breathed, gritted her teeth (Ready for a fall), and gave the air vent a mighty wrench, hoping her tetanus injections were up to date...

[Curious Key]

As Rat tore the vents away, she heard the sound of . . . Pistons from the direction of the door she was turned away from. DON'T

 

But she did, and she was in the vents before whatever it was had a chance to get through the door. And she was falling now, trying to stay steady, now trying to stay under control. She was hitting the bottom now, and falling through into the warehouse head over heels and trying to stay stable and landing with a CRASH on a pile of crates, splintering under her fall, leaving her sore and winded. 

 

"^Are you _hurt?" She could hear voices over some kind of intercom system. One word, spoken one after the other, each in a different voice. A gruff man, an older smoker, a shy child, one word after another. "_We hope ^you are _not hurt." It seemed like she had fallen into a larger portion of the warehouse, something that should have been used for storage. But that wasn't what Red saw.

 

All around her, Red saw steel tables, manned by people in tattered clothes, wearing the same awkward helmets over their heads that she had glimpsed through the paint. Their arms were scarred, covered in little nicks, electrical burns. Nevertheless, they continued their work. On the tables Red saw . . . They were some kind of machines, she supposed. Some kind of autonomous walkers. They were all exposed wire and bare steel, visible pistons and ocular devices. Many of them had old CRTs built into their stomach, or their faces. 

 

The men and women continued working, oblivious to her presence. Some of the walking machines turned their 'heads toward Rat and started twitching, testing their range of motion Luckily, it seemed that most of them were in various stages of disrepair.

 

"^We think _perhaps you ^do not _understand your ^crisis. Are _you aware ^how many _lines of ^code were _required to ^suborn_SLAVE? Three. _Hackers^would laugh _at the ^simplicity of _what we ^have done."

 

"_The SLAVE ^system was _built to ^routinely update _itself to ^a central _database of ^Soviet access _codes. High ^Clearance security _personal maintained ^codes to _subvert rebellious ^machine assets. _Your database ^was out _of date ^when you _were freed, ^and now _it is ^worse. Many _agents are ^listed as _active which ^have been _dead for ^decades, their _codes collected ^by organizations _across the ^world." Somewhere outside, Rat heard gunshots. Had Wolfram made their move?

 

"The _USSR could ^use this _protocol to ^seize control _of SLAVE. ^The USSR _is gone. ^Presently, we _have access ^to seventy-^nine_different codes ^which give _us access ^to SLAVE. Thirteen are ^available to _the public. ^A basic _radio ^transmitter and ^access to _these codes ^can replicate _this feat. ^It is _only lack ^of specifications _for your ^unique model _which prevents ^one from _suborning your ^systems. Our _Wardens possess ^these codes. _Nations across ^the world _possess these ^codes. _Do you ^understand? Do _you understand ^why you _are not ^free? You _need us, ^or they _will take _you."

Edited February 4, 2018 by Curious Key

[Supercape]

The Red Rat

 

That was a fair and pertinent point. It kept the Rat awake at night. 

 

You made your point. I am exposed. she explained, through gritted teeth. It had been a fall, and one ankle throbbed badly. She didn't feel like complaining though. Or requesting a bucket of ice (which would be her preference right now). 

 

SLAVE was always an ironic name, yes? Whom is SLAVE to whom? And no, I am not comfortable with the situation. Especially if there is a self destruct system in my head ready to fry my cortex. 

 

If you got something to help, consider me at your service...

 

Up to a point. Who exactly where Wolfram and what were they up to?

[Curious Key]

"^The specifications ^of_your design _are^shrouded in ^mystery, but _details of _their^functions can _be^intuited _from your _exploits^and remnants _of^Soviet_records. Your ^hardware is _deeply^integrated into ^your flesh. _To^remove it ^would_be to ^risk death." At the very least, their mystery hacker seemed content to sit and watch for as long as Rat was prepared to sit and listen. Though how tenuous was that balance, after their earlier tensions . . . ? "^And _the^hardware provides _useful functions ^which you _have^come to _rely^upon."

 

"^The _problem is _software." A pause. "^The problem _is S_L^AV_E."

 

"^Your hardware ^is_wasted on ^a jailer." Hang on. What's that, through the wall? The lead paint made it hard to see, but her eyes managed to catch the motion through the intercom's monologue. It looked like a pursing, set up something . . . Beeping? Oh god, it's a . . . "Were _it^removed,_your hardware _can^sustain a _greater^mind. It _can ^sustain_a^free mind. _It can ^sustain_a partn—"

 

An explosion rocked the warehouse, the outer wall bursting inward with huge shards of shrapnel from the old building, tearing nearby steel and pinging harmlessly off the bizarre contraptions in the buildings. One struck the arm off one of the helmeted workers, who froze in place but otherwise did not react at all. Six of the familiar agents started fanning in through the entrance holding weapons that gleamed in chrome, all modern elegance as pointed their weapons at the machines.

 

"^IN_T^R_UD^E_R^S!" The intercom shrieked. "^Digits of _the Wardens!" The of the weird mechabeasts scattered around the floor, those that seem operational stood up, turning their weird johnny-five face toward the intruders. They hand out their 'hands' and long, terrible claws scythed from within their mesh of steel and wire. "^TODAY _YOU D_I^E!"

Edited January 7, 2018 by Curious Key

[Supercape]

Red Rat

 

Like that explained anything! Hints, that was all. Not much to go on. Who exactly was playing whom?

 

Her best guess was a bad one, but it felt like artificial intelligence was involved, which made the whole thing complicated. What exactly was intelligence? what motivation? how fixed? how mercurial?

 

The time for philosophy was perhaps later, when explosions and gunfire lessened. 

 

For now, she made a dive roll for cover and shouted out...

 

"Stop firing! Stop firing! What the hell is going on here!"

 

It was directed ostensibly at the gun toting agents. But really, it was directed at anybody who could answer. 

 

 

[Curious Key]

The agents froze up when they saw Rat—"Who's this?" One said, training their weapon at the place Rat had ducked to. "Who the ____ is this?!"

 

The agent in the center of the crowd, seeming far better equipped than the others, pressed a hand to her ear. "01 respond, we have a witness on site, I repeat, we have a witness on sit—"

 

The intercom screamed with static rage as the assortment of mechanized things broke free of what what infrastructure yet tied them to their repair positions. Seeming to ignore Rat, they howled and began to dash toward the hole in the wall and the operatives that had invaded.

Edited February 4, 2018 by Curious Key