X5-111
Chapter One
I always liked Seattle. It was the first major population center I came across when I ran from Manticore. God, after that place… I didn't know what to expect. Nine years locked in a basement, only getting let out for another experiment or, rarely, a walk in the yard with Sandeman after lights out. Imagine how completely unprepared I was for a modern city! But I was smart and fast and strong – I figured things out pretty quick. One thing about Manticore – they were some sick bastards, but even their rejects are survivors. The digestive track of an X5 can wring nutrition out of rotted garbage just as easily as a gourmet meal. I laid low, built up some strength, and soaked up the modern world. I stayed in Seattle for a few months, just long enough to figure a few things out. Then I started moving again.
Never thought I'd come back, to be honest. But my fellow transgenics have started themselves a little trouble out here, and you know how I like a little trouble…
I've traveled a lot of places in the twenty years since escaping my little basement cell in the Seattle suburbs. Seen the bright lights of Paris, the crowded streets of New York, the tundra of Alaska, the beaches of California. I sat at the feet of Lincoln in DC and ran my fingers along the granite Wall, my delicate senses feeling the runes of hundreds of strangers. But nothing has felt more like freedom to me than the top of the Needle. I remember climbing it as a boy – feeling instinctively the need for the improved line of sight only high ground can yield. I barely made it – nine years old, nearly starved, half dead from pure exhaustion. But when I reached the top and saw the city before me… The lights, the traffic, the noise, the smog, the people. I realized then just how much of a cage I had been in. All I had wanted to was to see some of the world, to actually view the things I could hear outside my window when the other 'nomlies had finally stopped their screaming for the day and, blessedly, slept. My limited experience could never imagine the wonders I'd see. I stayed there until dawn, drunk on the sensations of civilization. I remember catching a pigeon and feasting, barely tasting the raw flesh and feathers, while walking the perimeter and just absorbing the chaotic purity of it all.
Naturally, it was the first place I went when I breezed back into town.
The city wasn't quite the same – the effects of the pulse. Hard to imagine such a bright and brilliant world could be brought so low by such a simple thing. The Pike Street Market is still there, and the waterfront looks as busy as ever. The sound is a little more crowded than I remember – I suppose even in a post-pulse world, waterfront property will always be valuable and someone can always afford it. The suburbs in the distance don't have as many lights as there used to be, but I already knew that from the drive in. Once outside of the downtown area, that's where the trouble starts. Fences cordon off the various sectors, their gates highlighted by cheap sodium lights. My enhanced vision easily finds the guards, the patrol cars, the hoverdrones, the aircraft.
Sectors… What have we done to ourselves?
While my sentimental side is lamenting the current state of this personal symbol of freedom, the tactician part of my brain soaks in all of the details, categorizing them, sorting them, organizing them. My photographic memory records all of my senses' input. Some time, some place it'll be needed.
Once I've gotten a good feel for the general situation, I focus on the particulars of my objective. Terminal City is a square mile of ugliness on a city that has seen better days. The perimeter is fenced in, the reminder of a biological incident – what do you think happens to a bunch of bio-gen labs after an electromagnetic pulse destroys all their containment measures and refrigeration? Thirty yards from the fence the soldiers keep their watch, obviously the first circle of their perimeter. Another 30 yards from them are the tanks. But they don't form a perfect circle – too many buildings in the way – they just fill up all of the streets that lead in or out of the place. Back from them are the cops. Snipers line some of the roofs.
It looks pretty impressive from a layman's view, but not so much so from mine. Lot of holes in that circle. And they're too close – a transgenic can cover 60 yards faster than most of those soldiers could shoulder their weapons. I'll have to get a closer look for the sewers, but I figure I could get through the human's line without too much trouble.
No, the trouble will be getting through the transgenics' line.
The transgenic side of the fence is a marvel in its design. I can barely make out anyone – they're dug in, and dug in well. Their use of cover and concealment is textbook. And judging from the fact we're talking about the Manticore textbook, that's pretty damn good. Knowing how they're trained, I figure that ten clear yards around the inside perimeter is a mine field. Their fields of fire are clear and channeled. The transgenics had no problems whatsoever taking down walls and buildings where they interfered with defense. They're ready.
Seeing the situation, I'm tempted to just walk away from it all – they look like they can handle themselves pretty well. Militarily, at least. That line of tanks is no match for a handful of trained X5s, and I'm sure the bunch of mad scientists cooked up all kinds of good stuff after my escape. Probably up to X10 or something, damned overachievers.
I'll keep observing through tomorrow. I've got enough fake tan left to cover myself up enough to get a closer look in daylight. Tomorrow night I think I'll pay my family a long overdue visit.
Getting through the police line was child's play. I snuck past unobserved, but I could have simply walked through – I don't think their hearts were really in it. Smoking and joking – its obvious they're just in place for politics. The tanks were even easier. Most of them were asleep, curled up in their chairs, relying on the radio to wake them when needed. I was seriously tempted to swing by the lead tank and give their commander a good dressing down for being such a disgrace. The final line, the soldiers, they were a bit trickier. There were more of them, for one thing, and they were at least awake and alert. All I needed was a few seconds' head start. I found my spot – the place I figured most likely to be a transgenic guard who, hopefully, wouldn't shoot me, and made my move. The two soldiers went down quietly – neither knew what had hit them. The next pair was fifteen yards away, and they didn't hear a thing either. If I moved fast, I might make it to the fence before they realized the line had been broken. I check my gear one last time, take a final look around, a deep breath, and then I start running.
A transgenic can run 100 yards in less than three seconds. Needless to say, I cover the remaining thirty yards faster than the guards can follow. When I leaped to the top of the fence, that's when they noticed. I grabbed the top rail of the chainlink and brought my legs into a crouch. I was twenty feet up. I had ten yards to clear – nothing to it. As soon as my feet hit the rail, I sprung out into the darkness. Shots were firing, but they were firing wild – I was moving too fast for their human eyes to track and their aim was far from the mark. The transgenics were another story. Their eyes had taken in everything and had decided to hold their fire. I stretched my body out as streamlined as possible, willing my body out across the makeshift minefield. I hit the ground with my hands, collapsed my body into a ball, and rolled back to my feet. The transgenics had made at least a partial decision and decided to give me some covering fire. My eye spied a muzzle flash which was instantly imprinted into my spatial awareness. I changed direction to intercept. Now that I was behind the manned perimeter of the transgenics, the humans stopped their fire, though an odd shot or two still broke the silence for a few seconds more as one soldier or another tried to release a little unspent tension. The transgenics stopped firing as one entity, cool and controlled.
I found myself looking at the business end of an M-15 wielded by a 14 year old veteran. He looked human enough, probably some type of X-series. He was sure and steady as he kept his distance.
"Who are you?"
"I'm X5-111, kid. Who're you?"
"Drop your weapons and hands up."
"Sure kid, whatever you say." I slowly un-snap my belt and harness, letting the whole thing drop when I slink the straps off my shoulders. Then I just as slowly put my hands up. "Why don't you just relax, I'm one of you."
"You don't look like an X5. You look more like a Polar. I think your story's full of shit." Not taking his eyes off of me, he speaks into the microphone that comes down from his left ear. "Mole. Got a situation here. I think we got an imposter."
"Stay tight, Bullet. Target, Moxie, keep an eye on him," comes the voice at the other end. Two voices, one male one female, respond with "affirmative."
The boy speaks to me once again, "Stay still. I will shoot." The voice is hard. Too hard for such a young man.
"Don't worry, kid. I'm in no hurry."
But I don't have to wait for long. A desert soldier comes up out of the darkness, his worn camouflage barely rustling against his dark scales, an unlit cigar in his mouth and a shotgun in his arms. He's much older than the boy with the rifle. A male X-series and a Dog are with him.
"Who the hell are you, pal?" Barks the Lizard.
"X5-111. And who might you be?"
"X5 my ass, pal! Keep those hands up. Krit, Joshua, lets get him out of here. Bullet, good job, get back to perimeter."
The boy crouched back into the darkness and resumed his watch. The two called Krit and Joshua took up flanking positions around me while the Lizard kept his shotgun on target with my stomach. I could tell he had seen action. My hands were zip tied behind my back, a hood put over my head. I moved out in the darkness, directions given to me by shoves against my shoulders.
I never really saw the point of blindfolding an X series. Our spatial awareness is so exact and our hearing so acute we're just like old missile guidance systems – the kind that relied on accelerometers and gyroscopes instead of GPS. By the time our little convoy comes to a stop I know our exact position in relation to my 14 year old friend as surely as if they had given me a map. My ears and nose tell me I'm in a large, covered space, probably a former warehouse. There are four other people in the room besides my three captors. Smells like one woman, two men, and another hybrid.
"He says he's an X5, but I think he's full of shit. Don't look like any X5 I've ever seen."
"Take off the hood, Mole." Barks a female voice. "Lets get a look at him."
Rough hands grab my shoulders and the Lizard pulls off the hood. A very angry, but pretty, young woman is standing in front of me. Over her left shoulder is a human, past her right another male X5. A Cat stands farther back, crouched with her claws showing.
It's the woman who is in command here.
"Mole's right, no way you're an X5. So, who the hell are you? What are you doing here?"
"Well, little lady, it just so happens I am an X5. My designator is X5-111. You can check my barcode if you want. I was the first of you --- "
"Bullshit!" interrupts the Lizard.
"Excuse me!" I counter, using a command voice. "Before I was interrupted, I was saying I was the first of the X5s. I was also the first 'nomly of that series."
"Check his bar code," she orders.
I feel a hand on my neck and another pulling down the back of my shirt. "I don't see anything here."
"I knew it!" barks the Lizard, as the barrels of his shotgun poke between my shoulder blades.
"Look closer. It's white, just like the rest of me. It'll show up better under a blacklight, if that will help."
The woman motions for a light. The Cat gracefully exits and returns with a small wand light and hands it to the woman. She in turn tosses it to the Dog behind me.
"I'll be damned," Mole whispers.
"Code!" bellows the Dog. "Purple under light!"
The woman comes closer, giving me the once over. "Who are you?"
"I told you, I'm X5-111. But why don't you ask my old buddy Joshua there. He's probably the only one who would remember me. I was a bit before your time, princess."
She looks over my shoulder at the tall Dog. "Joshua…?"
I can feel the Dog sniffing me, hear his footsteps as he moves behind me, my eyes track him in the peripheral as he slowly circles to my front, looking me up and down as he travels.
He stops and looks at the girl, then takes one last look at me before answering her. "Ghost," he whispers. Then he turns and begins to walk out of the warehouse. "He is Ghost" he whispers again as he passes the two men and the Cat, pushing open the door marked Exit.