Part 3

"I'll worry about getting information on Lans and True Force," Nada, in Surf-mode, said. "You find DaVinci." Aztral nodded, and Quinn watched from the passenger's seat.

They were all sitting in Naught's car, Zilch and Niente flanking them. The car was about a kilometer from TruPharm Inc. HQ, and they could see it through the haze from the hovertraffic. Quinn rested his shotgun against his legs as he watched.

Surf spoke up, "I'm getting a signal! I think a security program has locked onto us!"

"I'm on it," Aztral said. He tapped a button. "Technical Support. How may I disconnect you?"

"Surrender now! There is no escape, hacker!" the voice on the other end replied.

Aztral smirked. "Snow crash your system? Certainly, sir! See you on the flip side!" He tapped another button. The open comm-line hissed with white noise.

Surf nodded. "Trace aborted. They lost us." She continued to tap away.

Aztral blinked. "Whoa! Surf, I found DaVinci's icon. He's in the lower levels, heading for an exit!" He slapped his icon, shutting his computer, then tapped it to change to normal Naught-mode. "To the exit!" he cried, pointing down and to the southeast. He whipped the car around and dived.

Quinn grabbed hold of the door and closed his eyes. No matter how many times he went driving with Naught, the hacker-sprite always scared the bejeepers out of him. Naught screeched the car to a halt and opened his computer again. "He's coming this way. But I think there might be some guards after him."

Quinn cocked the shotgun and propped it against the door, aiming at the exit from TruPharm's lower levels. He smirked. "Let 'em come."

"Don't look at me!" Cato said. "You're the Renaissance Hacker! Devise a way out!"

"All my plans require the use of a firearm," DaVinci said, edging out to peer around the corner. Cato reached into his pocket and produced a small pistol. DaVinci looked at him before snatching it. "Next time tell me you have these things." He smirked as he peered around the corner again. "I saw this in a movie once. Seven on the left, five on the right."

With that said, DaVinci stepped around the corner and fired the pistol several times in rapid succession before whipping back around the corner. Gunfire followed him. DaVinci grinned. "Three on the left, two on the right!"

Cato grimaced. "That still leaves five!"

DaVinci raised the pistol again, waved it once, then popped back around the corner, firing. The pistol finally sputtered, its charge spent, and the hacker ducked behind cover. "One left. Dammit, I don't have any more ammo!" Here he looked at Cato again. "Unless you have some hidden in there."

Cato shook his head. "Only the one."

DaVinci swore. "Well, that leaves the old-fashioned way." He tossed the empty pistol away and popped his knuckles and shook out his legs. "Gotta limber up." Then he paused and waited for the gunfire from the remaining guard to pause.

DaVinci used that moment to whip around the corner and slide sideways along the floor at the guard. He spread his legs and jackknife-kicked the guard's legs out from under him. As the guard fell, DaVinci clobbered him on the head. Grabbing the unconscious guard's gun, he summoned Cato back out from the corner. "All clear!"

The anemic aide crept back out from the corner, then crumpled as a concentrated laser blast struck him in the shoulder. DaVinci looked behind Cato to see Lazarus stalking down the corridor, a swarm of guards following him.

"Go, get out of here!" Cato screamed. "Don't worry about me!"

DaVinci considered, then blanched as another laser blast came from Lazarus' direction, but the True Force leader was too far away to see his weapon. The hacker swung up his gun, fired twice at Lazarus, then shot open the exit door and dove through.

Cato looked up in fear as Lazarus loomed over him, his cybernetic eye glowing harshly. Lazarus turned to the guards. "Take him!" Then, he indicated DaVinci, "And get him!"

A lank man in a cross-bearing uniform stepped out and glared up at them, a cybernetic eye glowing beneath his long hair. The man fired a concentrated laser blast up at them, but missed widely. Nil and Void turned in their seats to fire down at him. The man dodged aside as half a dozen guards poured out of the access and began firing up at them.

Quinn turned in his seat, aimed his shotgun and fired. Two of the guards went down as they left firing range. He lowered his gun as he looked at David, then twisted his face. "Phew! David, you smell like you took a bath in a sewer!"

"Lazarus was kind enough to give me prime accommodations," DaVinci said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. He wiped his sunglasses off. "Sorry I'm not more presentable."

"Hey, as long as you're breathing, D," Zilch said, "we're glad to see you."

"Thanks, Zilch," DaVinci said. "Let's vamoose, shall we? I don't want Lazarus finding us."

"Lazarus. That'd be Lans?" Nada asked.

"Yeah, that guy," DaVinci said with a scowl. "When I worked for him, I knew he was a racist slimebag, but I tolerated it."

"Well, I'm trying to find some information that we can use to clear Faraday and--"

"--Fra il'Rena and Rania, right?" DaVinci said. "Yeah. Lazarus was tormenting me with news-feeds. I know all about them."

"Right," Nada said. "But I can't find anything!"

DaVinci grinned. "Take me back to my apartment. I can get into the network easy and find Lazarus' files. He's never been much for upgrading."

Naught smiled in the front seat. "His first mistake!"

"Nekhet'r," Deki explained. Lean blinked. He didn't understand Deki's idiosyncrasies.

"Hoo-mans," Celesi defined, mangling the pronunciation.

"Really?" Lean said. "Wonder why they came here."

"Hey, boss!" Tomasi called after he set down his crate. "I found something!" The sprite held out a boxy device. "Looks like some kinda scanner."

Lean took it and examined it, then noticed the cross on the side, and a memory flashed out of his cortex. He wolf-growled and crushed it in his hand. "It's a viral scanner. It transmits a signal to a certain destination."

"Ah, basic!" Rollo said. "You mean someone knows we're here?"

"That's what the Golems tell me," Lean said. "And I know who it is. The blasted User that first called me the Wolf."

Both of the Exleys looked surprised. "What?" Tomasi asked. "I thought you killed that bastard."

"No such luck," Lean said. "At any rate, he lost an eye because of me."

DaVinci guided the strike. "There we go. Lazarus' files. The funny thing is that Dr. Archer doesn't seem to have any files on TruPharm-Net."

"That's actually kind of smart for them," Aztral commented. "True, though, that does make it hard for us to pin Faraday's massacre to Lans."

All at once, DaVinci jerked in his seat and put a hand to his head. His sunglasses glinted. He turned and looked up at the ceiling. "What? He's here?"

"What?" Quinn asked, skimming around. "Who he who?"

"Lean's in Great Codex," DaVinci said. "And he's nearby."

Nil grimaced. "Zish. As if we haven't got enough troubles already."

"Focus!" Surf admonished. "Let's just focus on getting information from TruPharm, then we'll worry about Lean."

"Right, right," DaVinci said. "Still, guys, be ready."

"What's the word, boss?" Rollo asked.

"It appears my creator is here in Great Codex," Lean said. "And in this very building."

"You want us to go rough him up a bit, boss?" Tomasi asked.

"Just pay a courtesy call," Lean said with a smirk as he directed the Golems in setting up the computer systems.

That said, the writer fired a large blast that knocked them down. Both got up, their tanks scorched and torn. Tomasi scowled. "All right, you blasted User, you asked for it!"

And both had to stop as Zilch and Niente aimed their own guns, the twins aiming. Quinn cocked his shotgun and aimed again. "Make one wrong move," Quinn said, sneering. "Please!"

DaVinci swiveled in his seat. "Rollo! Tomasi! Hi! Do drop dead, then go tell Lean to do the same. I'm busy trying to prove that my former employer is plotting genocide."

They blinked. "What?" Rollo asked.

"Klaus Lans," Surf said. "He's the one behind Elim Faraday's rampage in the Resonate, Fra il'Rena in Mainframe, and Rania in Dekka-Nor."

Tomasi was outraged. "Some User did that?!"

"Some User got those three to lose their minds and go on a shooting spree," Aztral corrected. "And we have to find the proof so things don't go from bad to worse."

"So if you two would be so kind as to turn around and go back to Lean," Surf continued, "we'd greatly appreciate it."

Tomasi scowled. "I hate working with you guys, but fine. We'll go back. Don't expect us to be this nice in the future."

"Don't worry," Quinn snapped. "I won't forget."

"They said that Klaus Lans is behind Faraday, il'Rena, and Rania," Tomasi explained, "and that they're trying to find the proof."

Lean scowled. "Lans? What's his angle in those massacres?"

"The guy's a racist," Tomasi said. "He's probably trying to get the Users to distrust us."

Lean frowned. "Really?" He pointed his cane in front of him, and a vidwindow map appeared. Several flashing points were en route to the building. "So, looks like Lans is coming here either for DaVinci or me. Or both."

He smiled cruelly and electricity crackled around his cane. "Let's give them a warning, shall we?"

As they got nearer, however, the proximity alarm went off. A bleak gray-skinned sprite hovered into view, a cane sparking in his hands. The sprite was supported by nothing by air, and his eyes glowed blue-gray. A grin marked by wolf-like teeth pierced his face as a roiling orb of energy charged and fired.

The first shot struck the middle APC. The sides exploded, and the True Force agents within plummeted out. The sprite--no, virus--charged up again and let fly at another APC. This one met a similar fate. When the virus charged a third blast, the side of one APC opened and the agents within fired. Their shots struck an energy shield and were merely absorbed.

The remaining four APC's hurried by, but the virus pursued and shot down another. Soon only two were left, and they set down atop the building, ignoring the empty car there. Two large sprites, however, did lunge into view and clobbered four agents before they could react.

By then, however, the True Force training kicked in. They screamed with rage and opened fire. The sprites shrugged off the blaster fire and smashed more of the agents down, until only half the surviving force remained. Then they abruptly stopped. The sprites grinned evilly, made a few nasty faces and then charged down the roof access and back into the building.

Provoked by the taunts, the True Force agents charged after the sprites, heedless of their training.

Rollo and Tomasi returned. "Those True Force agents lost us in the corridors. They'll go right for DaVinci and his friends," Tomasi said.

"Good," Lean replied. "Get back to the Base. I'll finish up here before I join you back in Omega-Cragis."

"Right!" Rollo said as he followed his brother through the portal.

Lean turned back to the computer server and looked it over as he prepared to run a system check, but before he could do that, a voice spoke up.

"My, my, my, a Class Eight! I haven't seen one of you in years!"

Lean whirled around, his cane crackling with energy to the source of the voice. A shadow in the dark area of the room chuckled. "And a feisty one, too! This just keeps getting better and better!" It was a female voice, with a slight resonance to the voice. Lean's eyes narrowed.

"Who are you?" he demanded. "How did you get in here?"

The female chuckled. "How else? I came in through the door."

"Bullshit," Lean said. "The Golems would have seen you."

The voice laughed again. "They didn't see me because I didn't wish it that way." She stepped into view. Despite his control, Lean was immediately struck dumb by the figure's beauty. She was tall, perhaps an inch or two than he, and her body was perfectly formed. She wore an outfit that just barely seemed to cover her, but it drew attention to her feminine aspects.

She looked very much like a sprite. She had very pale cream-colored skin and wild gray hair. Her eyes were...well, he couldn't quite tell what color they were. One moment they were green, the next they were brown. Then yellow, black, gray, hazel, red. It made him dizzy. Her fingers were longer than normal, and came to a sharp claw-like tip. She smiled, and sharpened teeth were exposed. Lean finally realized what had struck him about the voice. He knew what that bit of resonance was.

"You're a virus!" he cried.

"Correcimundo!" the female virus said gleefully. "I'm the epitome of the species!"

Lean felt a chill go through him. "A Class Seventeen," he whispered. "That's impossible. The government should have detected you the moment you initialized! They should have shut you down!"

The Class-17 laughed. "They didn't shut you down when you took over Omega-Cragis, Lean Il Lupe. I doubt they even realize I exist. I've been very careful to hide myself from prying eyes."

Lean backed away. He feared two things. One of those things was Game Cubes (stemming from his nullification). The other was any virus more powerful than he. A Class-17 definitely fell into that category. He raised his cane, though he doubted that it would do any good against the Class-17.

She laughed again. "Ooh, fear! I like how that tastes. Come here, I am very hungry." She stalked toward him, her claws uncurling.

Lean fired a bolt of lightning. The Class-17 staggered backwards, her color-changing eyes closing momentarily. Then she opened them and smiled her sharp-toothed smile again. "That tickled!"

Lean turned toward the portal to Omega-Cragis. If he could get through, it would immediately close behind him. The Class-17 would be delayed long enough for Lean to summon some Golems to get in the Class-17's path.

But the portal dwindled to a point and vanished. The Class-17 smiled. "No fair escaping! Now stand still!" And she pounced.

Quinn cocked his shotgun and fired, knocking several of the True Force agents down. He focused on them. These were the people who had turned Faraday into a maniac, and he didn't like it one bit.

All at once, DaVinci stopped screaming, his sunglasses falling off his face. His eyes glassed over with shock as he stood up, staring up at the ceiling. His jaw was hanging open. A True Force agent fired at him, but DaVinci ducked reflexively. He still stared up at the ceiling, toward Lean's room.

Quinn took out the last of the True Force agents before skimming over to DaVinci. "David! What's happened? Why did you scream?"

"Something happened to Lean," DaVinci said. "I felt it over our link. He was in pain. Incredible pain."

"And this is bad because?" Quinn asked.

DaVinci looked at him. "Consider: if something is powerful enough to hurt Lean like that, what could it do to us?"

Aztral blanched. "What say we vacate the premises?"

"I think that would be a very good idea," DaVinci said. "Surf? How's the hacking going?"

"I think I've got enough to clear Faraday, il'Rena, and Rania of their rampages. It'll prove they were controlled," the female sprite said.

"Right," Zilch said. "Let's get outta here, hey?"

"Not yet," DaVinci said. "I have to go see what happened to Lean."

"Dude! You're crazy!" Nil said. "Something just did that to Lean, and you want to go see what happened?"

"I have to know, Nil," the hacker said. "I have to know."

The room that Lean had been occupying was empty. There were a few old computer servers nearby, but a brief inspection told DaVinci that they had been abandoned here years ago. There were a few scuff marks on the floor, and a burn mark against a wall, but no sign of Lean.

Save one thing: his cane. It was discarded in a corner, and several claw marks were left in it.

DaVinci got the creeping horrors.

"Let's get the hell out of here," he said.

Several minutes later, a woman walked into the room and stared out in the direction Elogin was looking. The Class-17 looked at the woman--a hacker. The hacker was dressed like Elogin, but a bit more conservatively. Her dark hair was in wild curls, and a headset with a VR monocle sat on her head.

Sagittaria smirked. So, did you take care of that little problem? she asked mentally.

Elogin smiled. Naturally. He was a bit feisty.

That was to be expected, Sagittaria replied. At any rate, Archer should have things wrapped up soon at TruPharm.

Does Lazarus suspect anything? Elogin asked.

Of course not, Sagittaria smiled.

If anyone had been looking, they would have said that Sagittaria and Elogin looked exactly alike.

The anti-sprite and -anthro people were still clamoring for a few days, insisting it was a cover-up, until the investigation's report was published, and they slowly began to retreat to the woodwork from whence they had come.

Quinn wrote a column pondering about where Faraday, il'Rena, and Rania could have been affected to do the killing sprees they had committed. It got people wondering. And enough people were smart enough to look at TruPharm Incorporated, the world's foremost producer of behavior-altering drugs. They didn't see any coincidence that it was run by the world's most prominent racist recluse.

Quinn hoped that this defeat would provoke True Force into becoming more public. Lazarus couldn't just hide in the shadows forever. And when he did step out, people like Quinn, David, and the Aughts would be there to oppose him. At least, if people like Alpha Group didn't step in the way first.

"Finished," she replied. "He's been utterly brainwashed and augmented so he won't turn against us ever again. No more worries about him harboring any pro-synthetic tendencies."

"Excellent," Lazarus said. "Bring him online."

Dr. Archer pulled a cable out from Cato's new neural-plug and pressed a button on the console. The former aide sat up. His anemic skin had taken on an ashen color and his eyes gleamed with circuitry. His hair had been shaved off to make room for the bionic implants on his skull. His right hand had been replaced by a robotic prosthesis. He swung his legs out and stood upright. Cato looked around briefly before focusing on Dr. Archer.

/Commander?/ Cato's voice had been synthetically altered. It now sounded like his computer-generated counterpart.

"Lazarus," the True Force leader spoke. "Sub-Commander is Dr. Sarah Elizabeth Archer."

Cato's eyes closed, then opened again. /Mission?/

Lazarus tilted his head, considering. "Bodyguard."

Cato's eyes closed and opened a second time. /Status?/

Lazarus' cybernetic eye glowed again. "We are at war."

Cato's eyes gleamed. /Hostiles?/

Lazarus nodded to Dr. Archer, who brought the computer screen online. Images of Quinn Rentack, David Gabbiani, and the Aught Siblings came up. "These are the hostiles."

/Recognized,/ Cato said.

Lazarus smiled cruelly. "Doctor, is this sort of thing feasible for all of our soldiers?"

"On that broad a scale?" Dr. Archer asked. "No. But pick a few elite, and I think I can do something."

"Excellent," Lazarus said. "Cato is less than pure now, but if that is what God wills, then who am I to question His will?" He nodded to her. "Proceed with his indoctrination, Doctor. I have business to attend to." He went back into the private elevator and went back up to his office.

Dr. Archer smiled to herself. "Yes, Lazarus. Who are you to question His will?" She laughed, then turned to Cato, who stood immobile, awaiting a command. "Let's see what we can do with you."