Generator Rex: The Modern Prometheus Chapter Two: "Life on the other side"
Like before she knew just how long she'd been out, 2443 minutes.
Why so long this time?
Unlike her time in the void their was nothing to even attempt to answer her question.
Doctor Holiday found herself inside the last generation scanner she had mothballed the very hour Doctor Fell got fired. The thing was a slow power hog of a machine with a scan resolution .02 higher then the one she used . . . unless you read the phone book sized manual and knew how to work the newer model.
No NO ONE without a death wish touches my scanner. If Fell had the thing moved to hook this clunker back up it will be such a pain to get it running right again! Wait calm down, they think this is your first time waking up since the morgue, play it up.
"What is going on? Six get me the hell out of this thing!"
The pain hit her when she tried to move. She didn't remember turning that back on, but a half a dozen commands shes tried or asked what would happen if she tried them might have done something. The room was spinning too fast for her to think any harder then that. When it stopped Six was looking down on her. His suit and shades flawless as ever, and he was smiling that tiny easy to miss smile of his.
"Can you hear me Doctor Holiday?"
"Ibuprofen 200 milligrams, and get me a damn coffee."
She flexed the muscles on her formerly numb arm and every movement was agony but it was there. Six started asking stupid questions.
"How do you take your coffee again?"
"The same as I have for years black as my soul, and what the hell happened. . . wait . . "
The Doctor brought her good hand to her chest, and didn't feel and staples.
"I woke up in a body bag, and you where pounding Rex like he asked for an Abysis vacation."
He kept asking questions, and seemed so happy to be doing it. Moments like this made her believe the tin man really did have a heart.
"What is the last thing you remember before that?"
She played along just a bit more, but just a bit.
"Grunt lab work at 4am on Rex's new control nanite, and the oh so comfortable feeling of sleeping at my desk. This is my lab Six, I do the tests here, unless its Rex testing my patients he's allowed to do that anywhere."
The man in green stopped smiling.
"We got blind sided, they had a mole one of our privates was some kind of EVO worshiper, thinks Van Klies is some Messianic figure that can give power to the fateful. We lost you Sara, Doctor Zimmerman quit this morning, he . . .did your autopsy, and couldn't deal. Please take it slow, I talked to Knight and . . . "
She cut in, so happy to finally be able to vent what she'd been feeling.
"I died? I DIED? Six get me a wheel chair and my glasses I need to look at those readings! Oh hell where is Rex, and what did that . . . . White Knight do with my sister?"
"Your sister is fine, Rex is in his room, with BoBo and Noah taking 48 hour shifts with him. He's under orders to behave and that's all. You are an EVO now Sara, and there are rules for what happens if one of us goes EVO."
The Doctor felt her blood pressure go up, and was almost glad to feel the anger building even if she was holding it in now.
"Since god damn when?"
"Since Knight took over, and it was over our clearance level until now. The comity has sent someone to review your . . case, and you will NEED reviews every so often from here on out. If you are not deemed a risk, you will keep your job, your clearance, your 401k, everything."
She didn't pretend to snap, she just did, and it felt so good.
"I get a spot tested like a junkie?"
The man took his glasses off, and for the first time she saw the scar over one if his eyes. Blind as Callan would have been if he hadn't blinked at the just the right moment.
"It is a lot to take in, but the brass is saying they burned Christians as street lights in Rome until the emperor became one. You are a world away from that, and I have your back the same as ever, but please play nice with Doctor Fell."
After a long minute she spoke.
"I have stayed up nights wondering what I'd be like if I went EVO like my sister. . . so if it gets me a look at myself in that scanner, I will behave for now. She needs to be fixed, and if I need to fix ME too then big deal."
Agent Six woke up at dawn, the same as he had since he could remember. He looked over at the alarm clock that came with the room, that he had never needed to set just to check the time. He was up at the right time, same as ever.
Hoping out of bed he made a quick shower, then pulled out straight razor turned on some hot water and started to shave without needed shaving cream. As he went he started to plan his day.
Check money in wallet, and money belt. Find out if Carol in accounting will keep letting me submit recites and not leave a digital trail with that company card nonsense. Talk with the night watch Captain after breakfast to see if Rex tried anything after I went to bed, then talk to BoBo after he goes off shift to see IF he REALLY tried anything too bad. Then it's Friday, and the mid month mark so . . . I've got four vaccinations and a tetanus shot due. . . that can wait my Doctors out sic. . .check on my Doctor after I get out of accounting Holiday should be up by then.
Six wondered if they could weaponize Carol from accounting for use against the pack.
"MISTER Six again I have to remind you it is not NINTEEN ninety nine and we need an immediate digital trail on our LIMITED financial resources. "
"Carol to do my job I need to be invisible some times. That means dealing with people that don't take visa some times."
"Then MISTER Six we have requisition forms that if you fill out in advance are rather speedy."
Sargent Wells was the only Mormon Six had ever met in any military that kept up with the taboo those people had about coffee. At the end of a ten hour shift he was just eating a plate of eggs with a glass of OJ and some how still functional.
"The kid hasn't even used his power to rip of any vending machines Six. The boys in IT tell me he not doing anything but listing to itunes and playing his xbox. Not that they haven't been wrong every time he's gotten into something, but still by the books all is well."
A while later BoBo was sneaking a cigar in a none smoking room and look happy to be off for a few days.
"Green man the kid is just like you think he is, and he needs to vent or he'll crack. SHOT AND A BEER for the last time, or don't cry to me when he runs off again."
An hour later the green man walked into what he still though off as Holidays lab to the sound of raised voices. Holiday was in the wheel chair she'd been in for a past four days, and it was getting to her.
" . . .and the data is only bad if nanties get into this thing HERE, that doesn't work because its control terminal over HERE separated by nine layers of shielding is not calibrated right. We could get that fixed in five minutes if REX was here and then I could get you that scan data in an HOUR NOT A DAY."
Fell was nicer then last time.
"Doctor Holiday for the final time you are not to have contact with Special Agent Rex. Do I need to remind you what happens if you violate that?"
He moved in to break them up, but she fired off a come back before he could get there.
"Then I write him a note, and leave the room Doctor Fell!"
Six got between them before Fell could react.
"Doctor I can vouch for Rex fixing this thing, he did do it at least twice that I know of."
Fell looked tired of this argument.
"If that shielding doesn't hold. . . . "
Holiday barked.
"It works I should know I OWN THE PATENT ON IT!"
". . . the scanner will both be ruined, and it might explode."
Six tired to play peace maker.
"Rex spilled coke on it twice, and fixed it both time. If it didn't work then, it hasn't worked in eighteen months."
"You let him bring food in here Agent Six?"
"He lives out of the room some days Doctor Fell."
"Very well write him a note, but have a technician watching him."
Six tried to sound as professional as possible.
"I would like a report if I could get one, if not I will come back later no rush."
Fell started talking first.
"Her brain is a nanite controller slower and less efficient then we thought possible, but practical for running a closed system. "
Holiday chimed in.
"It looks like Rex's control nanite copied part of itself but it didn't or LIKE I KEEP SAYING COULDN'T copy everything. "
Fell picked back up, these two did work well together even if they didn't like each other. What six could figure out is why Fell wasn't going in for the kill more often, the man had ice water in his veins.
"The THEORY is that all nanotechnology has some safe guard against what is called "gray goo" a term to describe nanites that just build more of themselves over and over until nothing but them remains. The very existence of EVO's however is due to bad or incomplete programming however."
Holiday calmed down a bit.
"My godfather got me a copy of Asimov's "Robots" novels for my 8th birthday. I asked him why someone didn't just delete the laws governed their behavior at some point. Even if its stupid I said some one would try as some point. He told me that they where based on the first generation of computers and they where hardwired in a way that couldn't be changed. If these where production grade nanites someone needed to saved ten cents on the dollar to turn a profit on I'd give you that Doctor Fell, but they are second generation prototypes made by people as much dreamers as scientists. If it is possible to keep every single nanite from building something as advanced as itself it would explain so much about EVO's in general wouldn't it?"
Fell calmed down a bit.
"Your god father may he rest in peace would know better then either of us Doctor."
Six raised an eyebrow.
"Did he know your godfather?"
Holiday smiled, and he couldn't help but notice just how pale she looked.
"A lot of people knew Steven Hawking, but he didn't name a lot of people. So Six the rest of that report is my brain I can't change or view settings on itself, the rest of me is set to minimum more or less so I've got the most nanite resources fixing the damage from the fight, and not being alive. On top of that we are more or less trying to work out what needs to be where for me to be alive. Hows thing with you?"
Six was still Six even after all of this.
"Rookies everywhere, if you know you have a few bad apples you start taking them from the tree. We haven't found and more moles and there is never only one."
Holiday tried to sound interested.
"Connery and Costner in "The Untouchables" Agent Six you belong to another decade."
"Yea I kind of do. Are you in pain? Do you need anything?"
"I'm really annoyed I have to eat though a tube in my arm until I fix a few things, and the highlight of my week has been the fact that I'm here to deal with all of this. I've got to start taking longer shutdowns to run more maintenance, and maybe play around with some stuff Doctor Fell found in a paper Rylander wrote once that might be relevant, mind . . . posting a guard or something I'm paranoid about being out that long. Six I can't wake up if someone . .disturbs me."
Fell chimed in like he'd heard this before.
"Doctor Holiday we ARE NOT tampering with you in your sleep cycle."
Six nodded.
"I'll put a rookie by your door at night. That girl Rex met in Basic Training you read her file after it was over right?"
She looked relieved.
"I remember, and thanks Six."
Private Jones popped her head in at ten minutes to nine the same as she always did.
"Do you need help with anything Doctor Holiday?"
"No thank you Kenwyn, just keep an eye out till five thirty. I might need help with the bandages on the arm in the morning, and the normal help with my hair and all."
"I'll make sure you have clean ones Doc."
"Thank you sweet heart."
One hundred and twenty six minutes later Holiday opened her good eye, and scanned the room. Nothing was out of place, and at the very limit of her hearing she could tell Kenwyn had her Ipod plugged into her helmet. She hopped out of bed like a kid about to sneak out without her parents noticing.
"I need to wear something that's not hospital scrubs, denim yes!"
She slipped into a pair of jeans older then Providence, a sports bra, and a dark blue T-shirt from the ex-boyfriend slash give to the good will drawer in her dresser. A pair of white tube socks completed her dressing as scuff marks on shoes where harder to cover up then scraps she could heal in a few minutes, or a hole in a sock blend in with all the other none work crud in her dresser. The Doctor then grabbed the cheap nerf basket ball net off her far wall and pulled the suction cups that healed it to said wall off.
"Time to be the Black Cat for a few."
Rolling up the carpet in the left corner of the room, Holiday used the suction cups to pop up the floor plait that had been prepared in advance. She then slipped between her room, and the shock absorbers separating each level. It wasn't as easy as the ground floor, but how Rex got around was so easy to see now. Fifteen minutes later covered in a layer of dust, she was popped off a similar plate in Rex's ceiling without making a sound. Hanging by her legs she lowered herself down behind Noah. The boy was watching a movie shirtless and in her opinion skinny as a rail, on Rex's TV while his EVO friend slept. He had a look on his face like he could use a few hours of it himself, and didn't expect to get it.
"Boo!"
The boy twitched just a little, but didn't speak above a whisper.
"It is sooo MY ass if you to get caught with this. You get that right?"
The doctor sounded nice when she responded at least.
"Thank you Noah. We'll be back on time I promise."
She hoped down into a hand stand and into her feet without making a sound. Noah didn't even turn around as she walked over to the sleeping Rex, and pinched his nose closed with a smile on her face.
He opened his mouth, and started to snore.
"Oh no you don't."
She grabbed a discarded empty bag of chips, and sprinkled a few crumbs into his open mouth. The boy then sat up and spoke totally bewildered.
"Sour cream and onion?"
The Doc smiled and answered him.
"Oil and vinegar."
He smiled a roguish smile.
"I hate that flavor."
"Me to! Maybe go out to dinner?"
"Oh yea! Noah be back before shift change."
The boy didn't answer as they climbed into the ceiling.
Fifteen minutes later they popped out of a vent in mess hall cook station next to a robot fry cook, that turned to them.
"Unidentified personnel present ID or verbal code. "
The Doctor spoke.
"Debug 23 health inspection spot check. As you where we wish to see you in normal operation."
She turned to see Rex had piled a few boxes of ketchup into a table, and two empty tomato crates to sit on. He pulled out her crate nice and romantic like.
"Your chair my lady."
"My Rex how gentlemanly."
She sat down and started working on the menu as it where.
"Food preparation unit, what menu items will expire in the next four hours?"
It ticked a bit and while it was cooking a burger, and answered.
"Starch product alternate 2 "spiced curly fries" .1 pounds, vegetable starch combo unit spaghetti and meat sauce .6 pounds, salad lettuce .03 pounds."
Rex raised an eyebrow.
"How did you work out this end of the building was full of vegans?"
"They are worried about moles hence the AI in place of food staff. I asked to help program the stuff because I was bored. Places like this always try to cut corners by fudging the health inspections. You do it right no one has a bad meal or gets sick, but if you have robots you have a digital paper trail the health inspector can look at. Since its an emergency security issue, they don't care about the bill RIGHT NOW. They will in the long term, when some paper pusher notices something, but until then if there are no incidents . . . .like you eating all the good stuff and some coming to find out where all the burgers went. . . we will be fine!"
Rex frowned.
"OK Ok I'll eat the fires!"
"We will both have the spaghetti I need carbs, and the sauce is the closest thing to a vegetable we've got, and you need that."
Rex grumbled.
"Never any Mexican, its raciest!"
"This is where the over night shift people eat, would you eat tacos a with extra sauce and then lift stuff all night? Yes yes you would, you'd eat taco sauce on corn flakes if I let you. Food service unit will sample the spaghetti and meat sauce please, .5 pounds of it. "
"True on both counts Doc. Sooo not that I mind the late meal and all how long we doing the cloak and dagger thing?"
"Once I get that . . thing I can't talk about done, then I can tell them. They need to know I'm not going to change loyalties because I'm an EVO, and I need to know I'm going to be out in a molecular dissection machine if they think I'm more valuable in tiny bits. "
"And over all of this is your sister, and oh yea that war we are fighting in general. That just sucks!"
"Welcome to the adult world Rex. It is not always kind, so prepare yourself the best you can."
The robot gave them an over half pound bowel of spaghetti and a pair of forks Rex shook his head as she dug into the spaghetti like a cartoon character will a bottomless stomach.
"If this is the school thing again what time do I have for that? Between the job I need to run away from to get time off, the powers I need to figure out or the wars not going to end, I am tapped out."
She came up for air, and to give Rex a turn, then answered him.
"Another part of the grown up world Rex is learning to make time if its really important. My kid sister is both in MENSA, and a high school drop out. All the ability in the world doesn't help if you don't do a few things the world expects you to Rex."
He looked up at her, and she could tell she struck a nerve.
"That's the first time you've ever told me anything about your sister."
"Here's another one Rex, when I do get her fixed you are not allowed to be alone with her. She will wrap you around her little finger, and the next thing you know your bottomed out in Reno wondering why no one you know is answering you calls. Nichole's done that twice to guys, and shes only eighteen. Shes been a giant spider for as long as I've known you Rex do that math."
The boy put his fork down.
"I sold three people to a crime lord once, we might hit it off."
She smiled with a tiny bit to sauce on her chin.
"No one here knew you before Rex, but now you don't have that in you. Some people learn not to not care, and if you lost that when you lost your memory you'll just have to make up your mind again when you get it back. Have a little faith I do."
Rex's eyes focused on the Doctors stomach, and as it started to shrink like deflating balloon.
"That's gorse by the way."
"Don't change the subject because I turned my metabolize up so I could enjoy myself."
Rex just got snotty after that.
"Someones enjoying her powers."
"My "powers" forced me to have a long talk about my ovaries Fell today, that is not enjoyment! AND you have a past no matter how much baggage you have locked up in there it's YOURS. You'll be glad for it one day good and bad. Don't start worrying about IF its like a fight go in there knowing your going to win and you'll do better then if your heads full of maybes. The rest is timing and details."
The boy perked back up a bit.
"Did you get that from Six?"
"Yes I did, and no I never told him about my sister. . . though she would try to get his attention. Little slut hit on my favorite teacher once and thank god he was gay!"
Rex blinked after finally doing the math.
If shes that much younger it would be like me hitting on Noah's Mom nasty.
"OH Nikki had no end of confidence, and wonder bras . . . If I bring her back fully grown I will make her more powerful I think."
"I'll have to remember there is an Anti-Holiday out there."
Holiday slid back into her room silent as a ghost, and pulled the filthy shirt off. By the time she grabbed a bottle of water from her dresser and a towel the lights came on.
"Doctor I think we need to talk."
She turned around really slow.
"Hello Six, is that girl Number Seven or something?"
"Nope, Seven's a Pakistani midget. I just looked in on you because I was . . . looking in on you. Doctor please tell me what that was all about?"
Holiday sat on her bed towel in hand.
"Bull you'd never stick your head in here without a reason."
"I am worried about you, get that though your head! We all have to play the game around here, and I know I'm the one that signed up for this from day one so I have the least cause to complain about it but YES it sucks. The system is against you now, but in the end it protects more people then it hurts. Deal with that, and start trusting people again please. If you don't it's going to end, badly."
She smiled and shook her head.
"My sister is an incurable that needs to drink blood to live, and costs 400k a year to keep. If Fell makes a phone call and says my brain is more valuable in a jar we are both dead. White won't argue, and if its us or the war Six you won't either. Your a good soldier, you'll honor my name, and remind them how far behind we'd be if I hadn't been promoted all those years ago. You wouldn't risk Rex, and the war not for me. So I'm stuck between two endgames with not ability to influence the outcome, so yea I stuff cards up my sleeve whenever I can, and DEAL however I can."
The man in green sat next to her, and took her hand.
"You're not thinking . . .the way you used to, you are missing several shades of gray."
Next: "Reflections."