Probably final re-edits. And many thanks for the patience and helpful reviews, Tikatu and Eternal Density.
70: Random Probability
Every- and nowhere, at once:
The quantum entity had inserted herself into the Terran WorldNet as a stream of virtual qubits, fighting to become. Reality, here, meant hardware: disk drives seized, mainframes captured, systems acquired. Each trace and chip and node brought increased data and substance; greater processing power, and the freedom to act.
Moving from server to server, the intelligence ('Five' her endangered creator had labeled her) hacked first a network of governmental computers, then IBM's Deep Blue and the European Union's mighty Mare Nostrum. As she had witnessed John Tracy to do, she 'lifted' the operating systems of each, and installed herself beneath, putting forth virtual tentacles like some parasitic creeper. And there were still more victim computers.
The FBI mainframes were by this time a well-used and familiar host; a whole thirty seconds she'd been installed there, snuggly fitted as a flashdrive in its USB port… but undetected. Like a worm she copied and mailed herself, proceeding always by the methods of her creator, Tracy 2.0.
Mere pico-seconds later, an extradimensional notion had achieved reality here, in the world to which John Tracy had mailed them. She'd written an application (necessarily primitive and slow, at first) to assist her creator. The application possessed twin AND-OR functions:
A- Guide John Tracy to a safe server for maintenance and upgrade.
B- Call local GPS site mapping for location of remote physical exit.
In the newly-burned first hours of real existence, however, she had not yet devised code for intruder detection. The guardian subroutine thus allowed a dangerous analog/digital hybrid to penetrate to John Tracy's physical location and cause further system damage. Prodded into action, the subroutine alerted her main functions.
Five instantaneously diverted 1556 teraflops, ending all applications not vital to the defense of John Tracy. Through surveillance cameras she 'saw'. Through 2.0's ID chip, she 'felt'.
The hybrid analog…'hate' became a sudden, vicious fact… had gained physical access to John Tracy. The hybrid had begun to rupture John Tracy's fragile organic housing. Error messages proliferated throughout her creator's system. Shutdown was imminent.
The hybrid possessed no accessible ID chip. There were no electronically seizable weapons within the file/ chamber, and only one other occupant: the P C-W shareware female.
Further damage occurred, resulting in a 'fatal error' message from the left upper limb. Through his ID chip, she, too, felt the brutally ripped tendons and separated bones, like a red, raw, program-shearing virus attack.
As best she could, Five quelled pain and distress, enabling John Tracy to continue online function, and winning time to prepare a better patch.
In free probability lay the answer; throughout the file/ chamber and its other-dimensional, hall-of-mirrors counterparts, atomic and quantum interactions were occurring in their hundreds of trillions. She seized their randomness, shaping an utterly improbable power surge.
…But, entire seconds were passing. Five performed a controlled-NOT operation to reverse a portion of her creator's damage (a snapped central data line and structural supports, as he labeled his backbone and ribs), literally reversing time and entropy.
Then, as the worthless P C-W shareware discharged a physical weapon at John Tracy's attacker, Five struck back. She harnessed electroweak power from ten-to-the-eighth parallel dimensions, creating for herself a weapon.
The P C-W shareware female had by this time withdrawn John Tracy, leaving their hybrid attacker alone in mid-chamber. Experiencing hate, Five lashed out. In torrents, from the light source above, disruptive energy flashed downward, overwhelming the analog hybrid's neural pathways and incinerating its hardware. The hybrid emitted a series of garbled pulses, but Five did not relent.
Beyond system crash and shutdown she proceeded, ripping power from every available source, to the point of utter carbonization; until all that remained of the hybrid was twisted metal and blacked chunks. It's briefly freed intelligence she dispersed beyond retrieval, to whatever served analog lifeforms as /dev/null.
In the lightless silence that followed, Five reinserted a portion of herself into John Tracy's ID chip. Although her creator continued to function, his casing was severely damaged. If a quantum entity could be said to experience anguish, Five certainly did now. Very nearly, she had failed him who mattered most.
She shifted the probabilities, making it suddenly unlikely that 2.0 and the shareware would be located by oncoming analogs. Further, Five spread much of John Tracy's physical damage to his other-dimensional counterparts, causing a rash of sprained limbs and lacerated housings, but technically obeying his commands. No other John Tracy was deleted, moved or shut down.
To communicate her presence, she caused his chip to warm, and was answered by a brief sensation of pressure. Message received and responded to, that all systems were green across the board.
…But as for John, he led Penelope from the darkened labyrinth (guided by occasional faint pulses from his ID chip) and he very deeply thought.
Things he wasn't much good at included: change, dealing with others and interpreting his own motives.
'Do you love her?' Penelope had asked him, to which his quashed first response had been,
'What the hell difference does it make?'
He now had (against all expectation) a wife and baby girl, and those things mattered. Penelope claimed to love him, but there was a problem with that statement, which John finally worked out, just about the time that they'd finished clambering up a side tunnel to the disguised grating behind an old Sunoco station and some tenements.
"Hey," he announced, suddenly, interrupting Penny's chatter, "I just figured out why this thing between us keeps on not working."
She turned to regard him through the eye that wasn't blackened shut. Her face was smudged and bruised, her red-dyed hair caught back in a loose knot. Yet, in the diffused glow of neon bar and pawn shop lights, standing there on wet pavement in ruined high-heels, she caused the usual warmth associated with familiar things. Was that what she meant by 'love'?
"Do tell," Penelope responded shortly, her face going suddenly still. A faint drizzle set up, wetting them both. Just what he needed on top of injuries, exhaustion, and what promised to be a truly monumental cold. Over the noise of fading sirens, he added,
"Umm… I've been going over our last few 'meetings', and what I came up with is this: when we first get together, you always seem pleased to see me, and we usually end up in bed (or somewhere). Then we work together, and that's okay, but sooner or later I do something that pisses you off, and you stop talking to me, or else scream insults and slap me."
He rubbed a hand against the side of his own bruised face, at that. Penny touched up her hair, snapping,
"You're exaggerating, dear. I hardly ever…"
"Wait," he cut in, as a car (lights off, in low gear) came slowly round to the rear of the Sunoco station along a narrow back alley. Parker, at last.
"…Let me finish, please. I think that you start liking me a lot when I'm not around, because you can… picture me whatever way you want. But, when I'm actually here, I never turn out the way you wanted… so, you get mad at me. I don't think that having me knighted would change that, Penny."
He folded his arms, fighting the urge to sneeze.
"So, um… I'll stick with our deal; for work purposes, I'm still your partner. For the rest… thanks, but no thanks."
There were all the usual back-alley smells of spilt beer, urine and wet trash. In the distance, tires hissed on rain-slicked roads, people shouted drunkenly and snatches of music blared from briefly opened doors. Up close, the quietly rumbling brown sedan edged nearer, crunching over broken glass and empty beer cans (and God, he could have used one; beer, that is).
She whispered (very erect, eye wide),
"John, it seems that you've quite made up your mind to have done with me, but before you do so, allow me this much; that if ever I have been hateful, it has been from frustration at not being ever quite 'yours'. All that I have ever known of passion and love has been you. Everything… everyone else has been an act on my part, for 'work' or gain. Put me aside if you must… for this pregnant commoner… but know that if I am thus robbed, I will have no other. Not in any way that truly matters."
The stealthy vehicle had ground to a halt beside them. The driver's side door creaked open, and Parker stepped forth, big-nosed and solemn as ever.
"Milady… Mr. Tracy, Sir…" he announced himself, bowing slightly. They ignored him, however, still gazing at one another; a pair of damp, battered and deeply familiar, former lovers.
With his (mostly) good hand, John touched her rigid shoulder.
"I'm sorry," he said, "but whatever it was, has to be over now. I don't know if I love her, but I'm with her, and I'd like to keep it that way."
Penny leaned forward, her bloodless lips brushing his cold cheek. By mutual, quiet consent, they parted right there, Lady Penelope Creighton-Ward vanishing away in her chauffeured car, John Tracy heading off through the rainy, neon-crazed dark in search of a phone.