As the hacker glanced into the mirror, another person that he barely recognized stared back. He felt judged, and afraid- that what he'd endured was corrupting him; that he was becoming the very thing he'd been fighting against for the past six months… that he was the monster who'd put Mila in harm's way somehow.
The bright colors were gone from his hair, and it had been cut even shorter- military style, with shaved sides and maybe a quarter of an inch at most on the top of his head. He was dressed in black-and-gray urban camouflage with the insignia of the Syndicate field agents on his upper arms. A name tape velcroed to the right side of his chest identified him as J. CHENJANG, yet another person he'd never known, who was now a permanent part of his history. Two chevrons above the name tape designated him a rank that he didn't know the meaning of.
"Collar needs to be lying flat," Revenant growled at him. "That strap on the left side should be folded underneath. Fix the tabs on your pockets, skin-suit, and tuck the cuffs of your pants into your boots… Ah, this is ridiculous. Even the most incompetent guard is not going to believe that you're an agent."
"This was your idea," Crypto replied through gritted teeth.
"To attack their convoy as they come out from under the overpass, yes," the assassin replied. "The part where you play dress-up, like a little boy who misses his mommy? That's on you."
Crypto's hands clenched into fists at his sides as he turned toward the voice. Revenant wasn't even looking at the programmer as he insulted his family yet again… instead, the assassin was focused on the movement of his own shoulder joint, which Wattson and one of the faction's technicians had just finished putting back together. They had done excellent work, and he could find nothing physically wrong- but it still felt off somehow. He was never meant to be repaired or maintained, he supposed… His existence was meant to be fleeting, expendable, replaceable. That was how he'd been created- without the interference of his human predecessor, such minor details about himself were a lot more obvious.
The hacker wanted to yell at him, insult him- hell, maybe even threaten him, despite knowing full well what a stupid decision that would be. He clenched his jaw until it hurt and forced himself to hold his temper. Escalating the tension between them could only serve to give Revenant an advantage, anyway.
"Figures you'd insult my mother," he finally said instead. "You were built in a factory, and you've always been alone. No family, no one watching out for you- I'm sorry. You deserved better."
Crypto turned his head away to hide the smirk on his face as Revenant stared at him, at a loss as to how to respond to that. It was exactly what Crypto had anticipated, having watched enough of his interactions with Wattson.
"Family is just another name by which you skin-suits call ownership," he finally growled in answer, after a long delay. The hacker frowned, confused.
"Why would you say that?"
"How long have you existed- twenty-five, thirty years at most?" Revenant tilted his head. "Do you know how many human lifetimes I've experienced? How many different sets of memories? Some patterns just keep on repeating. You wouldn't know… You won't last long enough."
"False memories," Crypto pointed out. "Not the most reliable source of information."
"They came from somewhere," the assassin countered. "They're some skinbag's real memories… Just not mine."
"That's-"
The hacker's voice trailed off. It was his turn to stare blankly, entirely unsure of how to answer.
"An interesting discussion, for sure; the validity of the memories which are used to influence artificial intelligence," Torc chimed in from the doorway. Both Crypto and Revenant turned toward the sound of his voice. Like Crypto, he wore the tactical uniform of a Syndicate field agent. He was meticulous, and not a single tab, buckle, or shoelace was amiss from the regulations- despite that, the way he carried himself was distinctly not military. He walked in a relaxed way, lacking the rigid shoulders and the air of purpose with which soldiers and agents moved. His left hand was tucked into his pocket, and his right held a file folder.
"You're- well, you're not wrong, Revenant, as opposed to being right," the scientist continued. "The memories in your programming are, indeed, lived experiences of some human that you've probably never met. They are real events that happened to someone… but they don't reflect a statistical average."
Torc gave a quick nod to emphasize his point. "You inherited the bias of your programmer, who must have believed family to be equated with ownership, and given you… learned experiences that would teach you the same."
"Al gess-eoyo… That makes sense," Crypto muttered quietly, more to himself than to Torc. The scientist smiled warmly at him for a moment before returning his attention to Revenant.
"You know- it's funny… I came down here to give you this."
Torc held out the folder he was carrying. Revenant remained still, glaring at him for a moment. Finally, in a slow, deliberate motion, he reached toward the scientist with one clawed hand and took it.
He flipped it open to find a personnel file. The man whose face was displayed in the attached photo, Revenant recognized immediately - like instinct - even though he'd never seen them before. His posture went rigid; his fingers gripped the edges of the papers harder and began to crumple them.
"I didn't feel like sleeping, so I took it upon myself to see if I could dig up the paperwork on your human counterpart," said Torc. "It wasn't easy… Computer programming and data storage have changed considerably over the past two hundred years. But with some patience, some trial and error- by which I mostly mean error…"
The assassin cut him off by aggressively throwing the folder onto the floor at his feet.
"Why did you show me this? You know that I want nothing to do with humanity- with him…!"
Revenant took a menacing step toward the scientist, after which he remained still- perfectly still, but ready to strike without warning. If Torc was afraid, it didn't show at all. He appeared just as calm and collected as he had when he'd entered the room… He didn't so much as raise an eyebrow.
"Well, it's quite an interesting study," the scientist replied as casually as if he were talking to a colleague. "The human mind that was used to train your artificial neural network belonged to a man who could be charming, charismatic- and a cold, ruthless killer. He was whatever the Syndicate needed him to be, without care or conscience. And this fascinates me because- well, you really aren't like him."
As he bent down to pick up the folder that the assassin had thrown on the ground, Torc chuckled lightly. "Mr. Cross was an extremely rational man. To a fault, even; a natural expert at reading people and manipulating their emotions. He enjoyed a considerable degree of success in society because of it. I believe that's what the Syndicate was hoping his brain would teach the AI to emulate, but… the Revenant that we know today is not a manipulator, not even remotely- much more of a head-on aggressor, I'd say."
The scientist arranged the papers neatly in order and flipped the folder closed. "Your sense of purpose, your drive to carry out your directive- I believe that these are traits which your counterpart lacked, as well; in fact, he likely would have seen them as quite irrational."
"Oh, he did," Revenant snarled. Torc responded with a knowing nod.
"He didn't act out of determination, but to reap the benefits of success in the eyes of mass society- and for whatever you learned of his methods, experiences, or analytical skills, you developed an entirely different set of motivations. I don't believe that you are bound by the limitations of your predecessor or the biases of your programmers, Revenant… You have already shown that your ability to learn and interpret new information is independent of them."
A wide grin appeared on Torc's face as he tucked the folder back under his arm. His other hand pushed his glasses further up on the bridge of his nose. "I hope that you continue working for the faction once this operation is over. We need someone with your skills on the front line. And, you know, we are a community of anarchists, working cooperatively toward a common goal- no authority and no ownership in this family, my friend!"
Several seconds went by, during which Revenant didn't answer. He didn't react aggressively, either, which Torc saw as a good sign, at least.
"Heh. What do you think Cade would say to that?"
There was a slight edge of amusement to Crypto's words. Torc responded with an exaggerated shrug. "Cade is an excellent security enforcer, but his word around here isn't law. Well, then!"
The scientist clapped his hands together and clasped them in front of him, the folder still tucked under one arm at his side. "Shall we get going? I suspect the others are wondering why they're the only ones loading the van right now."
"You're not coming with us," Crypto said with a frown. His statement was met with a raised eyebrow and an inquisitive stare.
"Natalie and I have syncordings- and Revenant, he… well. If any of us are killed on this mission, we can be brought back. There's an entire warehouse full of our cloned bodies…" He tensed uncomfortably at the memory. "It should be the three of us. No one else- no one whose life is…"
Torc interrupted, sparing the hacker from his struggle to figure out the right word to end that sentence. "Ah, yes- about that."
He reached under the collar of his shirt and tugged on the chain necklace he wore. The roughly rectangular piece of plastic and metal that hung from it came into view- not a personal talisman as one might have expected, but an all-too-familiar data card.
Crypto raised his eyebrows. "You were a Legend…?"
"No, no," Torc answered quickly as he tucked his necklace - and with it, his syncording - back underneath his shirt. "I was an android. Developed to work in laboratories alongside human scientists; to instantly check their spur-of-the-moment ideas against decades of data and to flawlessly perform tasks on which humans tend to produce high error rates. An android who was also developed by a human scientist, one who was concerned that I'd eventually surpass her ability to do her job… So, she designed me with a failsafe. After four years, my body would shut down, and my processor would fail."
The hacker glanced wordlessly at Revenant, then back at Torc.
"I was responsible for running routine maintenance on the equipment used to produce syncordings and cloned organisms- so, to escape my date of decommission, I cloned a human lab tech and uploaded my syncording into the body. A sympathetic worker helped me create a new identity as a scientist, and- well, you know what happened from there."
Torc regarded Revenant with a wry smile. "You never really believed that an ordinary human could be as capable as myself, did you? Learning how to write code from the ground up in your unique programming language, within a time frame of hours…"
"Natalie was right all along," Crypto muttered. "Planned obsolescence is its own kind of corruption."
"Took you long enough to figure that out, skinbag," replied Revenant. His voice was quieter than usual, his tone duller- despite his words, he conducted himself with a degree of respect that was unusual for him.
"Yeah," the hacker answered absently. There was a lot on his mind now, but he didn't have the time to sort through it- he squeezed his eyes tightly closed, made a decision to focus, and opened them. "Let's go."
They walked down a long, gray corridor with a polished floor, rounded a corner, and headed up a flight of wooden stairs that could have come from a cozy, older house. Revenant still didn't like the feel of this massive building, that it was cobbled together from spare parts- which it probably had been, over decades, by thousands of resistance fighters who came and went. It occurred to him that he was among the things they'd been fighting against… in fact, his counterpart could very well have crossed paths with this faction, years ago.
Torc unlocked a heavy, steel door. Its hinges creaked loudly as it swung open to reveal the cold, gray expanse that Mauser had initially brought them to when they entered the command center. Cade and Augustin were there, loading crates and tactical cases into the back of an armored van. They, too, had shaved their heads and donned Syndicate uniforms- they were the only two among the group, Revenant figured, who would actually pass as agents.
"Not a good idea, the two of you in the same place," the assassin growled, looking back and forth between Cade and Torc. "Syndicate assassins have a bounty on both of your heads."
"We're not going to be in the same place," grunted Cade as he hoisted a crate onto one shoulder. "I'm going to be on the front line with you guys. Torc and Augustin will be running surveillance from the van."
Behind the equipment in the back of the van, Wattson was hunched over something electronic, stripping insulation off the ends of wires. She was the only one not clad in tactical gear; instead, she was dressed in the brightly-colored outfit that she wore in the Apex arena. She turned her head just long enough to wave at Crypto as her eyes met his, then quickly returned her attention to her project.
"Everyone ready to do this?"
Augustin spoke in a tone that was upbeat - perhaps inappropriately so - as he and Crypto tossed the last gear bag into the back of the van. The others looked his way or nodded in silent acknowledgment, each with their own thoughts about the mission to come.