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Keira indicated a pair of pants and a sweatshirt draped over a nearby chair. She’d anticipated the need for a change of wardrobe. Cole slipped on the shirt. It was a perfect fit. He could feel Keira staring at him for a protracted moment before she turned away. It seemed to Cole that his presence was affecting her on some deeper level. But why?

  Keira shifted her attention back to her main workstation. “Now, if I were you, I'd try to make a run for the border. Go through Mexico, maybe even head out to Guatemala. Just get the hell out of this place.”

  “That's one option,“ Cole said in a soft voice.

  Keira’s face screwed up with exasperation. “It's your only option. You hang around this city, they'll find you. Tracker or no tracker.”

  Keira punched up a 3D-city grid on her holo-terminal. “I may still be able to locate a safe route to the nearest port...”

  “I'm not leaving the city.” Cole’s voice was calm but determined.

  “Listen, you want to end up on a scrap barge headed for India, be my guest,” she said.

  “I'll take my chances.”

  “I'm serious here.”

  “So am I.”

  “Where are you going to go?”

  “Don't worry about me. You should take your own advice, Keira. Pack up and leave.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Right now, AI-TAC is pulling every feed around the salvage yard. It'll take a little while, but they'll figure out who you are. You don't want to be around when they come knocking.”

  Keira took a step back. Cole’s words had achieved the desired effect. He had meant to scare her into action before it was too late. She was a criminal assisting the rebels, but she had also saved him. He didn’t want to see her rotting away on some lunar penal colony. His warning wasn’t just empty words, either. AI-TAC would find her. It was just a manner of time.

  Cole turned toward the door. There was a newfound determination in his eyes. He needed answers and he knew exactly who to talk to.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  COLE HAD MANAGED to slip past security and now found himself on the fifteenth floor of the luxury apartment tower that his target called home. If anyone tried to stop him, he was here to make a food delivery. He had purchased some Chinese takeout for that specific purpose and the pungent garlic smell of fried orange chicken and lo mein filled the air. He couldn’t quite recall how the scent differed when he was still human, and the realization filled him with a renewed wave of fear. How could he forget so much in such a short period of time?

  Cole pulled his hoodie tighter around his face, doing his best to hide his mech electronics, and made his way down a corridor lined with apartment units. Outside the sun was setting. The shadows were lengthening and the lights of the neighboring towers glittered in the golden dusk.

  He paused in front of one of the units at the end of the hallway. An address popped up in his field of vision. In the upper right hand corner, a familiar face appeared — Dr. Ajit, the Indian scientist who had overseen Cole’s upload. This was his apartment.

  Cole interfaced with the dwelling's security systems. He swiftly bypassed a series of sophisticated alarm systems and hacked the security code. A moment later, the door zoomed open and he was granted access to Ajit’s shadow-draped abode.

  The place featured a soothing Pan-Asian decor. A perfect balance of wood and stone was accentuated by an assortment of tropical plants that faced a fireplace. Ajit’s interior decorator knew his feng shui. Cole paid little attention to his elegant surroundings, his interest drawn to the doctor’s computer station. A laser dot lit up Cole’s pupil and he began to visually interface and communicate with the computer, hacking at the speed of thought.

  Holo-images flickered at rapid fire. A database labeled COLE MARSALIS popped up, followed by a series of photographs and data. But to Cole’s surprise, the images dated all the way back to his days as a police officer at Central. There were pictures of his wife and kid, followed by shots of the car accident. A terrible suspicion tugged at the edge of his mind, and its implication was chilling. One thing was clear… He’d been on Synthetika’s radar for some time now.

  Cole’s dread was growing. He clicked on another file and a video began to play. He recoiled at the sight, the images hitting him with the force of fierce kidney punches. He couldn’t believe what he was watching. He’d come for answers, but he was getting more than he’d bargained for. The video showed both Ajit and Janson inside a lab, looming over a lifeless mech body. Solus! Or a mech made to look like the android leader. It was the exact same model.

  The world seemed to tilt and spin, the depth of his employers’ betrayal coming into sharp focus.Janson had engineered his personal tragedy so he would do their bidding. Signing up for the upload process had not been an act of free will but just another example of how Synthetika had manipulated him from the start.

  Cole wanted to give in to his boiling rage and let it erupt in a fury of destruction. He was tempted to demolish Ajit’s apartment, but to what purpose? Security would be alerted and he’d be denied the chance to face Ajit himself. No, he had to pull himself together, maintain his cool and remain in control.

  It took Cole all his willpower to copy the files and sneak out of the apartment without giving in to his roaring emotions. He took the elevator to the underground parking structure, located the doctor’s spot and waited.

  Two hours later, Dr. Ajit’s luxury car pulled into the garage. The cyberneticist parked and killed the engine. He was about to get out of the vehicle when Cole stepped out from behind a nearby column. He was inside the car before Ajit could even react, a gun leveled at the scientist’s head.

  Ajit stared at Cole in horror. His expression bore little in common with the warmth he’d projected in the days following Cole’s upload.

  “Don't worry,” Cole said. “This is going to be just like my upload... Quick and painless.”

  “Please. I was following orders. I’m just a scientist...”

  “Then break down the science for me.”

  Cole could feel Ajit’s fear. His face was coated in fat beads of perspiration. “I already figured out there were a few items you skipped during orientation.”

  Ajit’s files had been quite educational. They had scanned his mind instead of uploading it. He was nothing more than a digital copy of the real Cole Marsalis. A perfect copy. Except for one glaring difference. He wasn’t human any more, and he never would be again. He was trapped, doomed to be a mech for all time. This mission didn’t come with a return ticket, as promised. But dwelling on his condition was a waste of energy. Instead, he forced himself to turn his mind toward the future.

  Toward his revenge.

  “Why do you have files on me that date back to my days at Central?” Cole asked.

  Sweat trailed down Ajit's forehead as he stammered, “I'm so sorry…”

  “You lied to me!”

  “I had no choice...”

  Cole didn’t think it was possible but Ajit’s fear seemed to metastasize, eyes popping from his head. “Synthetika needed someone so desperate for revenge they'd be willing to upload themselves into a machine. And if that person didn't exist, they'd have to create him.” Cole's intense gaze bore into Ajit.

  “It wasn't my idea... I swear...”

  “Janson ordered the death of my family.”

  “I tried to change his mind—“

  “They programmed a mech to be behind the wheel of that car.”

  “Please—“

  “A mech that looked like my future target!”

  Cole stopped, his face filling with sudden alarm. His enhanced hearing had picked up incoming sounds from the parking structure — boots tromping concrete. The sounds of an advancing assault team, which meant they’d anticipated Cole’s move. Not surprising, considering who he was up against here. AI Cole scanned the dark parking garage through the windshield of Ajit’s vehicle. His eyes found his human counterpart. The man he used to be. The man he thought he once was.
/>   Human Cole was facing the vehicle, pulse rifle armed and ready. His electronically amplified voice reverberated through the parking structure. “Drop the gun and get out of the car! The building's surrounded. We have sharpshooters positioned on every rooftop...”

  AI Cole scanned the garage, noticing more shadowy movement. AI-TAC was setting up their perimeter. Human Cole’s voice echoed. “There's no escape.”

  We’ll see about that, AI Cole thought. He forced Ajit to floor the gas pedal and the car blasted forward.

  Human Cole darted aside at the last moment. Two other troopers weren't so lucky and got sideswiped by the out-of-control vehicle. The HUD of their helmets fizzled and went black as they were tossed to the ground.

  AI Cole jumped out of the moving vehicle seconds before it collided with a row of parked cars. Ajit was hurled against the windshield, head slamming into the glass, while AI Cole rolled across the floor of the parking garage and sprang to his feet. As he ducked and dodged between vehicles, bullets lashed the air around him, AI-TAC already regrouping from the attack.

  Cole vanished into the maze of parked cars. Taking cover behind an SUV, he observed his biological double from this temporary hiding place. Human Cole’s voice boomed through the parking structure as he closed in. “There's nothing you can do that I can't predict!” He pivoted, responding to every possible sound, his senses finely tuned.

  AI Cole observed from his hiding spot between the parked cars, fascinated on some level. Watching human Cole was like looking into a mirror. And he wasn’t sure he liked what he was seeing.

  “I just put myself in your shoes,” human Cole said. “You've been lied to by the people you trusted. You could try to escape, go into hiding, and act like every other runaway out there but not you. Not me.”

  Human Cole grew still, eyes scanning the parked cars.

  “I'd want to get even with the people who did this to me. I'd want to look into the eyes of the man responsible...”

  Human Cole spotted movement and unloaded a full clip in that direction. Bullets chopped a stone column.

  At the same time, AI Cole remained crouched in his hiding place. Waiting for the right moment to make his move. A new sound caught his attention. A vehicle was entering the garage. It was a large, armored AI-TAC personnel carrier. A roof-mounted gun turret swiveled in predatory anticipation as its massive tires rumbled forward.

  The advancing tank couldn’t completely drown out human Cole’s incessant chatter. “Where are you running to? No matter how far you go, no matter what you do, you can't escape what you are.”

  AI Cole was pressed tight against one of the parked vehicles, his eyes glued to the structure's main exit. The AI-TAC assault vehicle was cutting off his escape.

  “You think your memories are real, but they don't belong to you. You're just a machine that carries a man's life inside your head.”

  A haunted expression edged into AI Cole's face. The words were getting to him. Rattling him to his core. Because deep down he knew it was true. He was a digital copy, just a duplicate of another man’s soul...

  PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER!

  The voice in AI Cole’s head sounded like his instructor’s voice when he imparted the hard-earned lessons of AI combat on a new crop of cadets. This wasn’t about him any more. It was about making Synthetika pay for what they’d done.

  If he could only somehow share with his human counterpart the files he found on Ajit’s computer. Once the other Cole knew who he was really working for, he could become a powerful ally.

  Good plan, better in theory than in practice, especially when the man he was trying to connect with seemed intent on turning him into a pile of scrap.

  AI Cole brought up a small gun — the EMP weapon. He activated a thirty-second timer. As the seconds began to count down, human Cole kept talking. His mirror image was waging a form of psychological warfare, hoping he would make a mistake.

  Clever.

  Human Cole might be able to anticipate every move he made, but the reverse held true too.

  “Give yourself up,” human Cole urged. “Your mission is over. We got Solus. If you're anything like me, you know it's time to pull the plug...”

  The words died on human Cole’s lips as AI Cole leapt from the shadows. His fist blasted out at his double and sent him flying. Human Cole crumpled into a parked sports car, body armor spider-webbing the windshield.

  More bullets seared the air. Other troopers had spotted AI Cole and were now unloading their weapons. He launched into a mad dash toward the exit while the APC barreled toward him. The tank’s gun turret locked on AI Cole but before the weapon could unleash its deadly payload…

  He lobbed the EMP weapon as if it were a grenade. It smacked against the vehicle's steel hull just as the countdown hit zero.

  The vehicle was hit with an EMP blast. Its systems shut down, gun turret growing still. It bought AI Cole precious seconds to slip past the frozen APC unharmed.

  He ran for the exit.

  While AI Cole made his getaway, human Cole was scrambling to his feet. He shouldered his power rifle in one smooth motion, crosshairs closing in on AI Cole. He pulled the trigger and launched searing beams of heat at his doppelganger.

  It was too late. AI Cole had vanished from view. Human Cole rushed toward the deactivated tank. His eyes fell on the discarded EMP weapon lying on the ground.

  “Ground assault team one, what's your status?”

  Instead of answering the incoming call, the AI-TAC commander let out a curse under his breath. Once again, his double had bested him and gotten away.

  ***

  Lightning split the dark sky and thunder rumbled as rain lashed the city streets. AI Cole dashed ahead, a man trying to outrun his past even if he knew it was impossible. His memory had become a digital playback device, capable of recalling even the most distant life event in glorious high definition.

  AI Cole was oblivious to the rain. He was lost, plagued by questions for which he head no answers. Who was he? What was he? His memories threatened to overwhelm him, so he decided to add new input sources to distract him. He began to scan the various news feeds, paying special attention to any mech-related story he stumbled upon. A visiting Japanese celebrity was being interviewed on a local talk show. “The Japanese people have an ongoing love affair with robots,” he explained.

  The story was replaced with handheld video footage of a couple diving headfirst off a building. The voice of a news anchor accompanied the grisly footage, which mercifully cut to black before the couple impacted with the street. “A young medical student and a military mech jumped to their deaths today. The suicide came in the wake of a ruling declaring bio-mech marriages illegal...”

  Another news story showed before-and-after images of a female mech. Beautiful in one, beaten and battered in the other. “A server mech was sexually assaulted by three men—“

  A second broadcaster interjected, “You’re talking about her as if she was a real person! What's next? Cars that file for divorce?”

  It was merely the tip of the iceberg. More and more news segments followed. There was a piece about an art exhibit with a mech nailed to a cross, a techno-twist on religious iconography. Another story reported that a man went on a shooting spree at a Synthetika store.

  The stream of images in AI Cole’s mind kept building. Faster and faster, a visual overload. But instead of being devastated by what he was seeing — a sobering reminder of how mechs were treated by their creators — it filled AI Cole with new resolve. He became more focused with each step he took, shedding his air of defeat like an old skin, allowing it to be replaced with something very different... a sense of purpose.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  ZOLA SHOWED UP at Keira’s workshop two hours after Cole had left for Ajit’s apartment. Keira was furiously stuffing her most-precious belongings into a duffel bag when a sudden pounding rattled the entrance to her workshop. Her beagle watched her with big, concerned eyes as she tentatively turned her attent
ion to the door.

  “If it was AI-TAC, they'd be breaking down the door, right?” Her voice sounded calmer than she felt. The beagle looked at her in apparent agreement.

  Reassured by her own logic, Keira crossed the loft. She tapped a button on her computer and security footage recorded from outside her door filled the screen. Fronting the apartment was none other than Zola. Solus’ second-in-command was flanked by two other mechs.

  Keira let out a sigh of relief. Despite her earlier words, she had expected helmeted AI-TAC stormtroopers to be waiting outside.

  She buzzed the androids in but remained wary. A sudden panicked thought slashed through her mind – what if it was all an elaborate trap? But it was too late to entertain paranoid fantasies. Zola and the others were now inside her workshop. Her beagle watched the unfolding scene in silence.

  “How many made it out?” Keira asked.

  “We’re it.”

  Keira tried to process the enormity of what had happened. She had always feared this day would come and couldn’t help but be affected by its arrival. Solus had grown too daring, pushed too hard in his quest to let the world know about the movement. It was one of the reasons she had decided to get out when she still could, but here she was, right in the middle of the shitstorm.

  “What's your plan?” Keira queried.

  “I've got a truck waiting for us downstairs. We'll make a go for the Mexican border and hope for the best.“

  There was an unvoiced invitation in Zola’s words and Keira was ready to accept it. Cole’s words haunted her – he had urged her to leave, and she sensed that her time was running out.

  “Best idea I've heard all day,” Keira said. She cleared her workstation and finished her last bit of packing. She snatched a device that resembled a futuristic hearing aid.

  The item caught Zola's attention. “What's that?”

  “A little project I've been working on. Remote hack system. Allows an android to interface-hack another unit-”

  She paused, renewed knocking echoing through the loft. Zola exchanged a probing look with Keira. “Expecting visitors?”