Church's Crusade #29: Sierra 25

Church turned from the image floating in front of him to look at O'Mally, "So what did you do to her?"

"Nothing major. I just forced her into a dormant state."

"Uh huh', Church turned back to look at the image. The AI was most definitely female. She floated upright, as if suspended by wires, eyes closed. She was decked out in armour similar to Penny's and her hair was cut in a short style, so as to fit easily into her imaginary helmet. Her eyes were a pale blue and her hair was blond. All in all the overall effect was rather pleasing. It was spoiled however by the large rents in the image, as though pieces had been torn from her body. The whole thing looked, to Church, to be incredibly painful. He looked at O'Mally again, "She looks to be in pretty bad shape. How much of that did you do?"

"Very little, actually. Most of that was caused when Pennsylvania here bashed the man in the head with the rock."

"Can it be repaired?"

"I can't be sure exactly. She should do it automatically as soon as she is reactivated, unless of course they have become horribly inept at making AI's recently. Why do you care? We should erase her as soon as we have the information we need, otherwise she is a danger to us."

"Perhaps. Can you bring her round?"

"Certainly."

There was a flicker as the image dimmed then brightened suddenly. Sierra opened her eyes and looked around. Church felt instant attempts to use his radio to send a signal. He smiled at her and shook his head, "Sorry but don't you remember? That doesn't work."

Sierra shot Church a look filled with hatred, then looked about at the others there. Her eyes fell on the crumpled figure of her former host and her lips curled in a cruel sneer. She looked back at O'Mally. Church could see the holes already closing up. Sierra crossed her arms and glared at the AI.

"So, what do you want?"

O'Mally smiled, "Oh it isn't me who wants something. In this situation it isn't my opinion that matters."

Sierra snorted, "That's hard to believe. This…thing', she gestured in Church's direction, 'It's your host. You control him and you're the one keeping me contained. Therefore it is to you that I speak."

O'Mally smiled thinly, "We all serve a master…eventually. In your case I would assume that you serve the AI's in Freelancer Iowa. In my case it would be Church here."

Church was shocked at this admission. He had never noticed until now the way O'Mally seemed to willingly support him now. It just didn't seem probable. Church would have continued to mull over this new revelation, however O'Mally began to speak again.

"You think I have you trapped, but I'm as much a prisoner as you. You're so scared of me', he smiled, a look with absolutely no humour, 'I'm not the one you should be afraid of."

"Oh yes, how very frightening', sneered Sierra, 'All I see is a stupid tin-can. Whatever you want, you can fucking find it out for yourself!"

O'Mally sighed theatrically, "Shall I begin deletion? I can probably pull a bit of data from her during the process."

Church thought for a moment then shook his head, "No, I have another idea. You said that she is subservient to Iowa's AI's?"

"That's right."

"So remove any data related to that subservience. See what happens."

O'Mally looked at Church, then shrugged. He closed his eyes for a moment then opened them and looked at Sierra. Her face blanched and she looked around with an expression of horror. She looked at her former host and her expression seemed to crumble. She opened her mouth…and screamed…

A few minutes later, Sierra looked up at Church, "I can't believe the things I was thinking. I…I wanted to hurt people, cause so much pain and suffering. It…it was horrible."

Church leant down to her, "It's okay. It's over."

Sierra looked up at Church then looked over at her host again, "Is he going to be okay?"

Church nodded, "Penny is very precise in everything she does, including beating people over the head."

Behind Sierra, Church could see Penny pull the finger, but she was smiling while she did it.

Sierra looked up, "Why did you spare me? I've done such horrible things."

"We need information to be perfectly honest. We need to know what is in there."

Sierra wiped away a holographic tear before replying, "Well, there are many floors to it. The lift inside this hill goes down for over a mile before the installation even begins, and after that there are hundreds of chambers full of different sorts of weapons. Video camera's are stationed every thirty feet, though some of them have stopped functioning in the years since the installation was abandoned. Here, I'll give you a map."

She gestured and a stunningly detailed 3D map rendered in blue appeared in the air beside her. Other colours were present as well and Church gestured to them, "These red dots, they are the video cameras?"

"The known functioning ones yes. The green dots represent the known malfunctioning cameras."

"And the purple areas?"

"Collapsed areas of tunnel."

Rourke whistled, "Some of those tunnels look as big as freeways. Do they have vehicles down there?"

"Yes. They have randomly set patrols as well."

Church nodded, "Well, it looks like we have everything we need. Let's get in there."

Tucker tilted his head in assent, "Let's get this door open."

Paul stepped forward and hooked a small handheld device into the door panel and began pressing buttons. Church turned to Penny, "When that door opens I want you to use your speed to disable the camera in the lift. Okay?"

Penny nodded.

"Right', Church gestured to the others and they moved out of the line of the door. Church looked at Paul and nodded. Paul pressed one last button and the door opened. Church watched as a blur of indigo sped past him and there was a crash and a burst of sparks as the camera was destroyed. He looked inside to see Penny casually brushing her hands together as if to remove dust. Church looked back and motioned for the others to enter the lift. As soon as everyone else was inside Church climbed in and pushed the button for descent. As the lift started to drop, Church turned on his sensors and began to scan below them…and got a terrible shock. His sensors could not seem to move beyond the walls. After so many months using them to survive it was as though he was running blind.

When they reached the bottom they entered a long corridor with many others branching off of it. They moved carefully along this, occasionally moving down side passages according to Sierra's directions, with Penny disabling cameras as they found them. Eventually they came to a solid looking door, and Sierra flickered into being beside them.

"This is the only door leading to the next section of the installation. Once through we get to the real dangerous stuff, trip wires, auto-turrets, that sort of thing. Plus all the actual super weapons are stored here as well."

Paul nodded, "Better get it open then."

As Paul knelt and began to hack the door controls, a thought occurred to Church. Turning to Sierra he asked, "How many soldiers would you estimate are down here?"

"Somewhere in the region of two-thousand. Why?"

"Well it just seems odd that with that many, we haven't encountered any of them. What does that tell you?"

At that moment Paul hit the final button and the door opened. Church looked up, opened his mouth and uttered the first words that came into his mind.

"Oh fuck…"