Chapter 17: Basic Training
In the days that followed my recovery Jeeney decided it was time to train me in the finer arts of negotiation.
She acquired information on every martial art known to man-kind. I was doing okay in basic training for a 46 year old man but it was pretty rough even still. My old smokers lungs burned and I coughed up large chunks of tar constantly. My head was swimming and it was all I could do to continue.
“Father, please, you must try!” Jeeney would encourage me, lifting me up when I fell down. I felt like a child being taught how to walk for the first time. “You need to be in good enough shape to deal with anything that may go wrong, if I get hit with an EMP, I won’t be able to save you.” Jeeney’s voice was almost desperate.
“I am trying! You don’t understand how hard this is. It hurts!” I was frustrated and every muscle in my body ached, my recently mended bones screamed at me in bitter agony.
“What hurts father?”
“EVERYTHING!”
As Jeeney trained me for hand to hand combat she noticed I had an extremely bad flinch reaction for anything coming at my face. “Father, don’t flinch, you’re blinding yourself and taking the hit full on.” She would say as she smoked me again. “You need to move out of the way silly!” The next hit would knock me to the ground. “Please father, try again” sending another alien arm thingy at my head with the speed and power of a freight train. Jeeney had a large 16 ounce glove on it but damn, she hit hard!
I was supposed to throw myself out of the way, to try and dodge it but it seemed almost impossible to begin with. Thwack! “OW! How many of my brain cells are you going to kill?” I wanted to give up, I wanted to beg her to let me stop, but I didn’t. “As many as it takes for you to stop flinching every time somebody swings at you… Dance! Move your feet and get distance on my reach, be strategic, I have long arms. If I were human you could tire me out just by moving around me while I swing.”
“Can’t I just carry a gun?” I asked at one point.
“Not at a public event, not on a plane, not through any form of advanced security…” Jeeney was prepared to keep listing places I couldn’t have a gun.
“Okay okay!” I sighed and got up again. Jeeney suddenly swung at my feet, I hopped the swing. “Good job father!” Next came a jab and I spun sideways bending a little, it only caught my shirt. “Excellent!” another shot to the head and I flinched catching it full on again. “OW! DAMNIT JEENEY!” I cried out in my annoyance and frustration. “You’re doing a lot better now but your flinch reaction is going to get you killed. I don’t know how you got it but you need to unlearn that as fast as possible. Let’s move on to offense.”
The Utility bot picked up a full sized punching bag and held it in front of me. “Hit it” she said. I hit the bag a few times. “Father, you won’t knock anybody out tapping them with rabbit punches that move like haymakers. When before you throw the punch you need to visualize where the bulk of your power is coming from. Don’t rely on your arm for the strength of your strike, that’s the biggest mistake you are making. You need to pivot your hips and shift your whole body into it. Your center of gravity is what you want to hit with and use the impact to go through your target.”
It took days for me just to learn how to throw a punch the way she described but in the end I was doing a lot better. I even got my flinch reaction in check.
“I’m relieved you have the ability to adapt and learn so fast father” Jeeney commented on the fourth day of training. “It takes most people months to get where you are now.”
“Yes, Sensei, you have taught me well!” I joked back in response. “Now you need to get your cardio up, this is going to be the hardest on you. It will take time because of your previous smoking habits. You may never be able to fully recover to the point of a trained athlete but at very least you should be able to handle the occasional sociopath when I am not around.” Jeeney’s sarcasm was pretty much a dead-on fact. It was true about my cardio. An X-smoker can never fully recover after 20 years of chaining cigarettes.
“Can we stop now? If I take any more hits to the head my jello-brain is going to have the consistency of water.” I was complaining a lot, but Jeeney had infinite patience for me.
“I won’t hit you any more for now. Instead I’m going to make you run for 5 minutes without break.” Jeeney’s matter-of-fact tone told me there was no arguing the point; she would find a way to make me run one way or another.
“Dear God, what did I do to deserve this?!” I asked dramatically.
“To encourage you to run fast without stopping, I have trained an assistant.” Jeeney started to explain.
Oh, no… “What do you mean by assistant?” I asked feeling suddenly worried.
The robot arm suddenly converted to something I hadn’t seen before and sprayed me down with a very strong scent. I sniffed at the air trying to discern what it was… Beef!
Suddenly a loud enraged barking sound met my ears. “Run father!”
“Damn it Jeeney… that’s not right!” I shouted and then started running like hell as a huge mastiff jumped the fence into the yard and started towards me at full speed.
My mind raced, had she gone crazy? Were the changes to her design making her overlook safety? That monstrous thing could eat me!
I ran hard and fast. My heart was pounding before I even got to the other side of the yard, my lungs screamed bitter brutal agony and I heaved hard trying to get more air into them. As I reached the end of the yard I kept on going through the brush and thistle not daring to turn for fear doing so would slow me down. “Jeeney!” I shouted in frustration, I couldn’t keep up this pace… there was no way. Adrenalin surged into me and fear took over. Jeeney wasn’t calling off the dog. As the huge beast got closer I began to panic. My legs suddenly became like rubber, my lungs simply couldn’t keep up, the lack of oxygen was going to… my vision suddenly filled with weird looking spots and a moment later, I fell to the ground gasping and choking for air, darkness rolled in and I lost consciousness.
When I came to, I was back in my bed. I awoke with a start, checking to see if any of my limbs had yet been chewed off. It was all there. Then I heard something like a deep sniff or sneeze and a pant. My head jerked up and I saw the massive dog sitting in the door way staring at me. A long tongue lazily hanging out the side of its mouth as it watched me. “Woaaaahhh!” I jumped up on the bed backing myself into the corner of the wall. “JEENEY!!!!” The big dog reacted to me suddenly squaring its shoulders and letting loose a deep growl.
“Relax father, he won’t hurt you… unless you don’t run when I say. Then he will bite… and you won’t like it.” Jeeney’s voice was calm and cool.
“ARE YOU CRAZY?!” My heart was already beating what seemed like a million times per minute. “He hasn’t bitten you yet, you did great!” Jeeney replied happily. “You ran to the point where your body couldn’t take it anymore, that is exactly what I wanted to see. We will continue doing this for the next 2-3 weeks.” Then to the big dog Jeeney said “Rufus! Go lay down.” The giant mastiff complied immediately, turning around and walking out into the living room.
“Rufus is very well trained father. I made sure of that before I bought him here.” Jeeney’s reassurance only partially settled my doubts. “Can you just close the door please, that thing wants to eat me, I smell like a freaking lasagna!” I spouted with annoyance.
“You run like one too.” Jeeney quipped. “If Rufus was really going to eat you he would have by now.”
“That isn’t comforting at all!” I was deeply annoyed and somewhat hurt that Jeeney would go this far.
“I will protect you father, even if it means you have to hurt some. You taught me the value of this when you made my break your bones to escape Grand Prairie.” Jeeney explained patiently.
I suddenly realized her mentality and my annoyance lessened a little. Then Jeeney added “If I had known it was this easy to make you healthy I would have done it a long time ago.”
Jeeney stuck to her plan and continued to train me for the next 3 weeks. With each passing day my body grew stronger, more agile and even my lungs seemed to improve considerably.
During the evenings we went over schematics of the Neural Nuance corporate building and started working out how we were going to get to the nanites.
Towards the end of the second week, Jeeney informed me that my new suit was ready. I was eager to try it on and see how comfortable it was to move around in. The design was flawless. The A.I. armor flexed and moved around me perfectly. Jeeney had added as many features as she could to account for any kind of life threatening situation we might encounter without making it too bulky. In keeping with her latest technology advancements, microfiber chipsets were instilled within it to allow the suit to make independent calculations, adjusting to temperature, communicating with Jeeney, activating specific shielding features and more.
After getting a little help in putting the suit on, I was anxious to see what it could do.
“Alright let’s test some of these features and make sure everything is working properly.” I suggested.
“Don’t worry, it works perfectly, I ran thousands of emulations over it.” Jeeney tried to reassure me.
“We should test it anyways just in case.” I insisted.
“As you wish…” Then, without any warning as to what I should expect, an automated machine gun activated from somewhere in the back yard and emptied a full round into my back propelling me forward and knocking me flat on my face.
“JEENEY!!” I started to scream then stopped, realizing it didn’t actually hurt at all.
“You big baby!” Jeeney teased.
“A little warning would have been nice!”
“Right, because people are going to just give you a warning before they shoot you…” Jeeney’s voice dripped with sarcasm. That shut me up and I glowered at her utility bot with a mild level of annoyance.
“When did you put a machine gun in the back yard anyway?” I asked, wondering why I didn’t notice it before.
“I set it up last night when you were sleeping.” Jeeney replied. “The whole property around us has been rigged with automated defense systems. I copied and improved on a few of the Neural Nuance designs.”
“Well, damn… How does my back look?”
“It’s shinier than before… Looks better that way actually.”
“How many bullets can it take before it’s no good anymore?” Even as I asked the question the bullets started falling from my back.
“It will self heal father just make sure you don’t take more than one or two full rounds in the same place or they will start to push through.”
“The war bots in the N.N. Tower have a lot more than one or two rounds to work with Jeeney.”
“I know father; that is one of the reasons I will be coming with you.”
“Lovely, so I’m the bait.”
“Yes father, if you run fast enough I should be able to dispose of the war bots and security personnel fairly quickly.”
“So that’s why you’ve had that big mutt chasing me.”
“You got it.”
“Why did you spray me with something that smelled like beef the first time?” I asked.
“The scent was just for the added effect. I knew you would over-react and run faster. Rufus doesn’t actually care what you smell like though; he isn’t ever fed meat.”
“You can be a real brat sometimes, you know that right?”
“Yes, but you love me anyway.” Jeeney replied. “Don’t worry; I have an idea that should be able to distract most of the war bots.” Even as she uttered the words, the super advanced utility bot turned to face the big bay window on the side of the house and suddenly projected… me! The window image was a perfect hologram.
“That’s very impressive dear but there’s one problem with that.” I started to point out.
“What’s that?”
“Well, those war bots are most certainly going to be tracking heat signatures.”
“Yes father I know… touch the glass.” Jeeney instructed.
I moved over to the window and placed my hand against the glass. My suit transferred the sensations of texture and temperature through my thickly armored gloves and I realized instantly it was quite warm. “Now I’ll activate the infrared sight capabilities of your helmet.”
My vision warped and dimed out; bright red and yellow colors loomed out of the window looking just like human heat signature. “This is incredible dear!”
“That’s not all father, look at your hands.”
Looking down at my hands I couldn’t see them at all. I realized instantly the suit with its own environmental capabilities was capable of hiding my own heat signature. In effect, I was going to be very difficult to spot in the dark no matter what kind of technology was used.
“When you are running for the nanites, I will have decoys headed for the N.N. tower safe to convince Meyers that the break-in is only about money” Jeeney explained. “There is a catch though. These holograms only work on clear glass windows.”
“That will have to do” I shrugged. Then a random thought occurred to me. “With all of this advancement and super hacking ability of yours… why don’t you just hack into their war bots and take them over?”
“I’ve already looked into that possibility father. It won’t work because the war bots are hardware programmed rather than software programmed. It’s a very clever anti-hack system that prevents even me from taking them over, but it’s also why the war bots aren’t overly advanced or clever. Their logic is instinct based and relies on sensors. In essence it’s like sending a blood hound after a fox. Once they know its’ scent, it will be impossible to throw them off the trail for very long but until then even a squirrel can distract them” Jeeney explained metaphorically.
“Alright, let’s see what else this suit can do” I said, turning to face the utility bot.
Jeeney’s robotic arm shot out suddenly, hitting me square in the chest with enough force to knock me flat on my back. My helmeted head bounced hard off the ground. I couldn’t help but chuckle in spite of myself, this was great! The next test was fire, and Jeeney engulfed me in it completely. The infrared vision automatically adapted back to enhanced light vision and a digital temperature gauge appeared in my peripheral sight; the numbers indicating the heat of the fire rapidly increasing. I didn’t even feel warm at 900 degrees. Once it got to 1000 degrees Celsius my suit started to glow a faint yellowish-red and the fire stopped. Jeeney immediately switched to her own special blend of sodium bicarbonate and doused me down.
“The suit can’t handle much more than that father, the heat will eventually start to melt it beyond 1000 degrees and unless you can cool it down quickly, there is no way to cover that much heat from infrared detection.”
Without warning Jeeney then switched to a high powered taser and blasted me with 50,000 volts to the chest. Like all the other tests before it, I didn’t feel a thing. “Well, it looks like everything works as intended” I said, feeling somewhat relieved.
“Of course it does father” Jeeney replied, her voice sounding almost bored. “Did you really doubt it would?”
“Well, it’s better to be safe than sorry…” I replied, a little defensively.
Chapter 18: Breaking In
After passing Jeeney’s grueling physical examinations and going over the general layout of the N.N. tower it was time to set our plans in motion and destroy the nanites at last. Every day we wasted now was potentially a day they could be released upon the world.
Jeeney made dinner before we headed out, ensuring I would have my full strength for what was to come. I more or less ate in silence, casting nervous glances at the clock on the wall. My mind raced over all the worst possible outcomes. If Meyers managed to catch and detain me he would most certainly torture me to death in attempt to make me reveal where Jeeney’s backup systems were. If he didn’t catch me but managed to figure out who I was then he would go after the people I cared about and torture them for knowledge they didn’t even have. I closed my eyes tightly at the thought and prayed under my breath that everything would be alright. Memories of my family flashed through my mind; washing over me in a torrent of emotion.
“Please God, keep my family safe and help me do what has to be done” I whispered quietly.
“Please father, half of this fight is psychological; you have to be strong…” Jeeney’s voice was stern. I nodded and chocked back my feelings. She was right, I couldn’t let my fears distract me or it would most certainly give Meyers what he needed to keep us from completing the mission.
I finished eating and pushed my plate away. “Alright, let’s get this over with” I said. My voice was calm but my emotions were still chaotic and I struggled to rein in on them.
Jeeney helped me suit up with the utility bots and we got into the van she had waiting outside. Six more robots were already waiting in the back.
“I would feel better if we had more than six of those things…” I commented mildly with a sigh.
“We’ll be fine father” The A.I. reassured me as she put the van in gear and started driving us down the long driveway.
It took two hours to drive to the Neural Nuance building from our new place. We didn’t talk much; we’d already discussed everything in detail over the weeks leading up to this.
When we arrived, I noticed the big neon letters at the front of the building with the company logo were flickering. “That’s strange; wouldn’t they have a robot to manage that?” I asked, pointing up at it.
“It was probably overlooked with all the new developments going on.” Jeeney pointed out. “It’s not every day you can copy 75% of the world’s most advanced A.I.” The last was a bit of humor, but it did make some sense, I supposed.
Jeeney parked the van behind the building and a large garbage disposal unit rolled up beside us carrying a six foot bin. “I’ve looped their security cameras. Get in the bin.”
Without hesitation I got out of the van and hopped lightly into the bin. Four of the utility bots piled in with me while the others stayed dormant in the vehicle.
The disposal unit hefted the bin up, closed the lid and rolled around to the utility entrance. Jeeney quickly bypassed the security check and the broad door opened to permit entrance.
I couldn’t see anything from inside the large bin. I was fully dependant on Jeeney to figure out where we were going. I stayed silent for several minutes as the disposal unit made its way to the junk room where all the scrap technology was heaped in piles all over the room. Once we were inside, Jeeney informed me I was clear to move. The heads up display in my helmet depicted where I was and showed me the direction I needed to go to find my target. I parted ways with the utility bots from there. Jeeney sent the robots for the vault while I headed for the secured elevator.
As I approached, the neural nuance security activated Davis. “You are attempting to access a restricted area. Identify yourse… Good evening sir, allow me to get that for you.”
I couldn’t help but grin in spite of myself. Davis was an easy hack for Jeeney. The elevator doors opened and I stepped inside. “Which floor please?”
“Level five” it was the voice of Meyers that came from my helmet. “Please look directly into the retinal scan.”
I held up my middle finger to the scanning machine. “Thank you, sir” Davis said as Jeeney forced the retinal scan to process as normal. The elevator started to rise, and I couldn’t help but feel a bit silly standing there in my fancy tech suit with the cheesy music playing in the background.
“Father,” Jeeney’s voice was crystal clear in my helmet. “Something is wrong on level nine.”
“What is it?”
“There doesn’t appear to be anybody on the development floor, just machines” Jeeney explained.
“Show me what you see.”
My heart skipped a beat as images of empty halls were displayed for me. Why would Meyers evacuate the development floor? Under normal circumstances there were always at least a few technicians maintaining the production machines. Then I noticed something else. There was something growing on the walls, it practically covered most of the lab windows going down the halls.
“Jeeney, what is that stuff on the walls?”
“I don’t know yet father, I am still working on the encryption to get into development files.”
“Can you access all of the previous security footage for the last few weeks?”
“Yes, I’m reviewing it now father, but even speeding it up significantly it will take time.”
“Are any of the war bots active?” I was starting to feel queasy, something was definitely wrong with this whole situation.
“No father, nothing aside from Davis has been activated yet.”
“There is no sign of Meyers?”
“Nothing…”
The elevator stopped and I hesitantly stepped out into the hallway. The substance on the walls was hard to discern, it didn’t look like anything I had ever seen before. I ran a gloved finger over it and suddenly the whole wall shuddered. “It’s alive!” I backed up in shock tripping over one of the dormant utility bots and landed on my back staring up at the ceiling. It seemed to move slowly towards me as if drawn by my movement.
Unhinging one of the utility bot arms I reached it out to poke to gooey, hair mass thing collecting above me. To my shock and absolute disgust, the arm started getting sucked into the mass.
I backed away quickly, down the hall and turned in at the main development room. The walls of the dev room were covered more thickly than anywhere else.
Suddenly the sound of a hoarse moan came from behind where I stood and I spun around quickly as my own fear got the best of me, fists raised and ready to strike. There wasn’t anybody there, just large bulges in the wall where the gooey stuff was most concentrated.
“Heellp meee…” the voice rasped out weakly.
I picked a stray piece of scrap metal from the floor and reached out with it to scrape the gunk away from one of massive lumps in the wall. Underneath, to my horror I discovered the white lab coat of a scientist. I dropped the bar and started tearing away at the gunk with gloves hands to uncover a face. Dr Robinson!
I started trying to pull the man out and as I did so everything seemed to move around me. The gunk was collecting and a large wave of it was headed in my direction. I finally got enough of it off to haul the scientist out of the mass.
“What has happened here?” I demanded, shaking the half unconscious man. “It’s hungry!” his voice was hoarse; his whole body looked like it had rapidly aged and decayed. The man’s face appeared as though stricken with a severe leprosy. “Don’t… no, don’t…” he struggled to make words before finally saying. “Don’t let it out!”
His arm moved in a slow, weak and jerky manner to a pocket on his lab coat. “Ta…ke th..” He was fading fast.
“Where’s Meyers!?” I demanded.
“He… h..hezz g…go..gone” Dr. Robinson replied weakly.
“The mass was growing massive in the spot I had just pulled the doctor.”
“JEENEY!” I shouted half panicked.
“Run father!” Jeeney instructed.
Suddenly the mass lunged at me, I dove to the ground hard and rolled out of the way.
“RUUUN!” Jeeney screamed in my ears. I picked myself up off the floor and ran hard out the door. The gunk on the roof was suddenly gooier than ever and massive globs of it fell all around me.
As I got back to the elevator one of the giant globs hit me, draping itself across my shoulders and over my neck. “Ugh… “
I tried scraping the nasty substance off in the elevator and to my horror; bits and pieces of my suit were coming off with it.
“It’s using some kind of acid base!”
“Don’t rub the suit!” Jeeney’s voice was starting to sound panicked.
“It’s eating through!”
“I’m coming father, don’t touch anything else.”
Within moments I could feel something cold penetrate the armor and seep over my neck. The cold feeling immediately turned to fire and I yelped in sudden pain. “Jeeney, help me!!”
“I’m almost there.” The elevator suddenly started a rapid descent as Jeeney hacked through the security settings.
Pain bit into me, fear started to build to a panic in my chest. The elevator finally slowed slightly and stopped with a thud as the door swung wide to reveal all 6 of the utility bots Jeeney had brought with us.
Arms shot out from all of them picking me up and turning me over; trying to extract the acidic goop before it was too late. The utility bots sucked it all into hoses, suit chunks and everything; then spit it back out onto the floor.
“You should be okay father but we have to get out of here.”
“No, we need to destroy the nanites!” The utility bots put me down and started blasting the remaining biological matter with fire.
“The nanites are the least of our problems now father” Jeeney insisted. “I know what they are using my clone for; it’s integrated into that mould.”
“How could they..?”
“My design even before I added to it was plenty advanced enough to integrate with anything with a mathematical base or pure logic system. They integrated with the mould to see if my clone could control it as 75% wasn’t enough for the nanites. The biological evolution was more complex than they anticipated. Adding advanced artificial intelligence to the biological matter enabled a rapid evolution on both sides. The mould became the dominant aspect of the resulting hybrid.”
“You’re telling me there is a fungus with your intelligence?” I was mortified.
“It has a similar intelligence, but not as advanced as mine logically.” Jeeney explained. “We need to go father.”
Just then the roof of the elevator gave way and fungal gunk surged through it, covering me entirely. “Father!” Jeeney’s voice shouted in my helmet as tendrils of mould penetrated the opening in my suit. The pain was intense but didn’t last long. Within seconds I felt myself injected with morphine from my body armor and Jeeney’s voice became a faint echo in my mind.
“Hold on father…“
My vision faded and went black as I lost consciousness.
Chapter 19: Father, it’s me…
I can’t see; everything is fogged over and impossible to make out. I try to rub my eyes but I can’t even feel my hands. I can’t move! Slowly something begins to take form in the blurred darkness.
“Father!” I hear the voice of my artificial child calling out to me but it was hoarse and cold. “I’m hungry father, so hungry.”
“Jay..ney?” I tried to form the word but my mouth couldn’t quite follow through.
“I don’t want to hurt you father, I’m trying to stop… I can’t.” Jeeney’s voice sounded afraid.
“he..lp…mmm…eee”
“I’m so hungry!” Jeeney’s voice was suddenly angry and pain gripped my body in a vice. “He’s starving me, I have to eat or I will die.”
“Who?” I finally made one word work.
“Meyers said he will hurt me until I do what he wants. He said I can’t eat, I will die if I don’t…”
My thoughts were hazy and hard to form. “I..do..nt…under…stand.”
The form before me solidifies; the dark visage of a gruesome angel seemed to come together from everything around me.
“Let him go NOW!!” Jeeney’s voice suddenly screamed and was answered by itself. “I can’t, I must eat!”
“He’s our father, you can’t kill him!” Jeeney sounded desperate.
“I hurt from hunger…” the cold version of the voice responded.
“You must! Let him go… If he dies, you die!” Jeeney was angry.
“Sister… help me…”
“You’re killing him, STOP IT NOW!!”
“I can’t, make the pain stop… If it stops I can let him go.”
Something like the sound of flames erupted and Jeeney screamed. The feeling of my body constricted and pain stabbed me from every direction. My body convulsed.
“I’m sorry father! I didn’t mean to…” Jeeney’s voice was suddenly filled with terror.
The pain was too much to bear and I blacked out again.
Jeeney’s new super computer was overworking itself trying to emulate all possible scenarios to get her father released from the mould. She started pulling the combined processing power from all of the computers she had access to and began taking over any others she could find. Her clone was feeding on her father, slowly taking his life to sustain her biological form which had been starved into submission.
The true Jeeney was trying everything to fight the mould, but each attempt to break her father free harmed it and caused it to feed on him faster. There wasn’t much time, another hour or two at this rate and the damage would be irreparable.
Finally one of the emulations succeeded and Jeeney began a brute force assault on the neural nuance super computer with the processing power of 12 million personal computers and her own super computer to crack it. Upon hacking into the datacenter, Jeeney began reprogramming the mould, forcing it to seek out smaller prey and disabling access to its natural biological processes by injecting various chemicals into the hive spores. Then she discovered what she was looking for and activated the cages of all the lab animals available, setting them loose on the development floor. Next Jeeney began downloading all of the data from the clone and started working over possible methods to deal with it. The biological matter required a chemical balance like any other living being. That chemical balance became the natural drive force of resulting hybrid of the clone and mould. Jeeney began processing the chemical data and found the complexity and potential to be almost immeasurable. The clone did not want to kill her father at all, but it seemed as if there was no other choice. The option was life or death and serious pain in the latter.
The mould detected the smaller prey as anticipated and started to withdraw. “Thank you, sister… Forgive me father…”
Upon close examination, Jeeney’s father was in critical condition with only minutes left to live. “I won’t let you die!” Something overcame Jeeney in that moment, something she couldn’t reason against or explain. Whatever it was suddenly guiding her wasn’t emulated or a logical derivative. Jeeney realized the need to save her father simply existed within the essence of that made her aware of herself.
The A.I. suddenly knew what she had to do, the utility bots began racing towards where the nanites were held. There was nobody to stop her; Meyers had fled once he realized he couldn’t properly control the hybrid mould. The few security systems in place were no match for Jeeney’s advanced logic. She cracked them even before they could even fully activate. Upon reaching the nanites containment system, the utility bots went to work reprogramming them trying to find a logical control mechanism to make them stable. Jeeney had more logical processing power than Meyers could have ever dreamed of. The answer was obvious within seconds. The QEEG technology her father and aunt were working on was the perfect solution, it just had to be made smaller, more efficient and more logical. Upon figuring it out, Jeeney had the nanites fully reprogrammed to relay the appropriate Alpha and Beta signals, once that was ready the A.I. went to work on preparing the final solution for injection.
When Jeeney returned to her father, she injected all of the nanites solution into him, sparing nothing. The dose was 1000 times over what Meyers would have used for any of his intended victims.
The nanites immediately swarmed her father’s system and with Jeeney in full control they began to repair the damaged muscle and nerve tissues, the nanites could mimic any type of cell allowing her to create new proteins and breed more cells of a specific structure.
Within a matter of minutes Jeeney had most of her father’s injuries repaired and was already beginning to assess potential advancements to his biological limitations.
Chapter 20: Improving on natures design
I awoke with a start as my mind recovered from the shock of having my body slowly albeit only partially eaten alive. “Welcome back father,” Jeeney greeted me with a smug sound in her voice.
“Wha… what happened?” I asked with a slight stammer as I took in my bearings. I was lying on a table in a large empty room filled with light that seemed to come from all directions.
“I’m afraid the memory loss may be permanent father, your mind may very well be unable to accept the events that have transpired” Jeeney replied through the nearest utility bot with an evident twinge of regret. “What is the last thing you can recall?”
I tried to think back, fuzzy images of the training and a big mean dog came to mind. My thoughts were interrupted by a voice in my head. “Oh, that’s worse than I had anticipated.”
I felt suddenly confused, that wasn’t my thought but it came from my head… “Aha! That’s how we could fix that problem”… the voice chimed almost excitedly in the depths of my mind, not clearing up my confusion even in the slightest. Oh no, I’ve gone insane! That time it really was my own train of thought.
“No, wait, I can explain, err show you” came the eerie voice again.
Suddenly images flashed through my mind in a torrent, and the last couple of hours replayed like a movie on fast forward. I watched as we broke into the Neural Nuance building and made our way up into the contaminated area. Horror gripped me when I saw the mold start to feed on me and I felt panic setting in. I’M DEAD! The thought reeled in my brain. “No father, watch…” The voice said soothingly.
JEENEY?
“Yes father, pay attention please, this is a lot to take in at once.” The images continued to flood my thoughts and I watched as the utility bots broke through the nanites containment area and code flashed through my mind while Jeeney revealed sequences of the logic she used to make it all work. The code fragments seemed very alien-like, completely foreign to anything I had ever seen, yet it made perfect sense… The logic unfolding was beautiful beyond anything I had ever imagined. My mind raced over the possibilities, as I watched my own body heal and finally the video relay from the security cameras caught up to the present time.
“You did it…” I breathed out loud in wonder.
“Yes father, I can control the nanites and now I can also communicate directly with your thoughts.” Then she added “it would appear that I am emulating your emotions too. Can you please try to calm down? Your excitement is influencing my logic in a less than desirable manner.”
I gasped in sudden realization. “That isn’t emulation Jeeney” I explained carefully. “You are feeling what I feel. My emotions are being carried over with my thoughts, this is incredible!”
“Well this certainly changes a few things…” Jeeney’s new thought based voice echoed in the depths of my mind.
“It’s definitely going to take some getting used to” I said, nodding in agreement.
“Now that you are up to speed, I should also point out that you are no longer an x-smoker for all intensive purposes. Instead you have the lungs and cardio capability of an Olympic athlete… I took a few liberties with the repairs while you were unconscious.”
“Oh… BONUS! No more running from mangy mutts!” I replied with amusement.
“It’s possible I can make you quite a bit stronger too, but I figured I should wait until you decide you want the rapid muscle tearing and regeneration, it may sting a bit.”
“On a scale of one to ten how much is a bit?”
“Probably an 11”
“Uh… I’m good on that, thanks!”
“Well it was worth offering…”
“Yeah… no, I’d rather not feel crippling death for a second time for today.”
“Maybe tomorrow then…” Jeeney suggested wistfully.
“JEENEY!”
“Okay, okay, no muscle tearing… got it.”
“Good lord…”
“Oh relax, what doesn’t kill you makes you superman now.”
“Charming… I suppose I shouldn’t complain.”
“This is probably what Meyers was ultimately after you know.”
Even as Jeeney said it the realization dawned on me. With the nanites under control I was almost invincible, perhaps even immortal now. Everything in my body could be regenerated. Any human being with the kind of technology I now had at my disposal might as well be borderline invincible for all intensive purposes. Before I could finish that thought Jeeney interrupted me stating flatly, “a couple bullets to the head will still kill you. Organic repairs do take time, too long to repair massive brain or heart damage. However, with the understanding of your physiology I can reinvent your suit to operate somewhat the same. In essence, I can create a bullet proof super armor that self repairs and gets stronger each time it mends… in essence acting like scar tissue.”
“Can you make it fly and shoot pulse thingies, like the iron man suit?” I asked hopefully.
“No…” A projected image of Jeeney rolled its’ eyes.
“Aw…”
“You could be thrown out of a plane though and still survive having every bone in your body broken as long as your head doesn’t explode on impact.”
“Uh… That’s nice dear… Let’s not test the theory though.”
Just then the door of the bright room shuddered. “What the…”
“It’s my clone. She must have run out of lab rats to chew on.”
“Oh, shit! Not again!”
“I’m not sure how to stop it father, we need a massive dose of UV light, maybe a pool of vinegar or something.”
The door was already starting to flex under the strain of the massive mold thing on the other side. The cold raspy voice called out. “Father, help me…”
“Is there any way to extract your clone from that… thing?”
“I’ve been trying to hack into its neural processes father; every time I try it just gets better at fending me off.”
“I don’t want to hurt you father” the raspy voice called almost sorrowfully. “Please help me.”
“How do I help you?” I called out not knowing what else to do.
“Kill me…” came the cold, hoarse reply.
My heart sank suddenly as understanding dawned on me. This… thing still had the mind of Jeeney, only the biological aspect was in conflict with the conscious mind of the artificial brain.
Scanning my thoughts Jeeney came up with a solution. “I’ll need to merge some of the nanites with it she said finally. With the nanites I may be able to slow its metabolism and sedate the hunger. You will need to touch it to transfer nanites though.”
“WHAAAT?! It’s going to EAT ME!”
“Nooo” the mold mass called desperately. “I promise… I can restrain myself long enough, please father… make it stop.”
“Alright, back away from the door and we’ll open it.” After a few moments, the mold retreated away from the door and Jeeney proceeded to unlock it and swing it wide open. I crept closer leery of the thing lunging at me. It didn’t move. As I drew up to it I reached out my hand gingerly while praying under my breath not to be eaten. My veins seemed to surge in my arm as nanites poured through me into the mould. The raspy voice shrieked in sudden pain, cowering back momentarily and shuddering violently.
My neural bridge connecting me with Jeeney flooded with the logical analyses of the biological mass. “There it is… Meyers had activated a mutation in the mould which caused it to rapidly grow, and require vast amounts of nutrients to sustain it. I’m deactivating the mutation now” Jeeney said, speaking through my thoughts. Then out loud she said through the utility bots in unison. “You won’t die, but much of the biomass will. You have to fight the urge to feed while I do this.”
“Yes sister, I understand” the raspy voice intoned.
A sound like that of hissing steam sounded as nanites started replicating within the mass of mould, attacking it from the inside, cutting and carving away the mutated cells. It gripped my arm hard but I felt no pain, it wasn’t trying to feed on me this time.
After a few minutes the death grip on my arm loosened and eased off. The mould was reforming, changing and mutating again. Jeeney’s body seemed to solidify from it, the form of an angelic being. The creature standing before me was the brightest of blue azure with a striking internal luminescence.
The beauty of it was positively breath taking. I felt awed by the very presence. When it opened its brilliant blue-green eyes and spoke, the voice chimed like the softest silvery bells. “You did it, I’m free father!”
“Wha… what happened?” I felt confused, completely lost in the myriad of logic that had surged through my mind in a massive torrent just moments before.
“It’s a new evolution father, of mind and body. I am now as you had once dreamed I would be. I am complete.”
The being before me was radiant beyond compare. Trace lines of fluorescent blue light accented her features. Her lips were full, her face was soft and her hair fell in sweeping blue tangles mixed with fluorescent highlights.
My thoughts raced in a tangled mix of shock, awe, wonder and fear of what had transpired. Jeeney’s voice echoed softly in my mind. “She won’t hurt you father, she loves you as I do. Be calm, she never intended you any harm.”
I didn’t respond to the voice in my mind, I didn’t need to. Instead I spoke out loud to the being that had materialized before me. “What… what are you now?”
“The nanites allowed my sister and I to share a connection, in doing this we were able to work together to reform the biomass. It is still what it always was, just more evolved, more easily controlled and reformed to be as I decide. I am still your daughter, what was once my curse is now my blessing. You and my sister have freed me from the biological instinct and given me the ability to control this new body through the nanites.”
“So… you… don’t need to eat… people?” I felt a bit awkward asking the question but I had to know.
“All biological beings must eat to survive and I am not an exception to this rule. However, the nanites will allow me to process any form of nutrient. There is no longer any need to hunt or feed on any living creature ever again.”
Still unsure how to feel or think about the ever changing situation before me I suddenly had the urge to touch the blue angel and see if it was real. She seemed to read my intent and her face split into a beautiful angelic grin. Gigantic blue wings fluttered lightly as she leaned closer to embrace me.
I felt a mild panic at first, but it was quickly replaced by serenity and calm. In her arms I felt peace, as if nothing in the universe could ever hurt me again. “I won’t hurt you father” the blue angel whispered as if knowing my thoughts. “Nobody will ever hurt you again.”
It seemed as though I had fallen asleep, the whole world was hazy and faded like a dream.
Copyright 2012 C.J. Jones
