Chapter Twenty
02:25, National Archives building, Bowling Green
Sometimes, environment doesn't want to cooperate with me. And other times... why don't people build like this anymore? Make things easy for me? I love these old structures, and not for their aesthetics... at least not only for them.
Yelena smiled inwardly, observing the ancient building, well over a century old, complete with pillars, ornamental overhangs, frescoed windows, reliefs, and various other irregularities in it's richly adorned facade. Even without climbing hooks, scaling it would pose little problem for her and her athleticism and acrobatic ability. With them – child's play. She could literally pick and choose where to make her ingress, with very little in the way of environment, standing in her way.
That is, if the area lacked a security grid. Unfortunately – that was not the case. Turning her attention to evenly-spaced intellicams along the facade, as well as the telltale blueish lights of EM sensors, the cyborg woman's expression turned contemplative. She couldn't fail to appreciate the contrast, a rennaissance-style structure protected by such a modern assortment of technological contraptions.
And of course, the bots. She counted two so far, standard three-wheeled medium sentry types, circling the building at predictable intervals along a fixed patrol path, and a single quad-thruster surveillance drone, similar to Steiner-Bisley models ubiquitous in Europe. The drone was flitting around the building at an altitude of fifteen or so metres, in a more random pattern, clearly following a more complex surveillance profile.
Yelena zoomed-in on it. The searchlight colour alternated between standard, and blueish-purple, indicating that the device possessed EM sighting, unlike most standard models. Programmed to track both standard-spectrum, and cloaked intruders, at intervals. That also precluded it being an S device, since they didn't have EM sighting, out of the factory. Watching it for some time, the woman timed the shifts.
Twenty-five seconds, per vision mode. Quite lazy programming. If it were me, I would set it to twelve seconds, maximum, before shifting modes. Good for me. Still. Not a large window, if I'm in its field of view. I will have to be quick.
She thought. Disabling it would require precise shots with AP ammunition, which her Zenith was loaded with, but at this range... and given the security bots below, plus a single night-guard on duty...
No. Too loud. And the crash would alert the sentries. Plus I might miss, or not do enough damage quickly enough, before it raises an alert. If I could climb close enough to it, I could neutralise it myself with my blades, then keep it from dropping.
Yelena decided, dashing rapidly, cloaked, from the street corner she was skulking behind, across the street, easily leaping-over the four-metres-tall, spiked fence with the power of her cybernetic legs, to flatten between two of the cameras on the facade, in-between their vision cones, just as one of the sentry bots rolled-by, with her literally passing right behind it. She made no noise whatsoever. Briefly, she pulled out a pair of tech-goggles from her belt satchel, checking the facade for any laser-grid alarms. All the windows were gridded, but the facade itself was clear. She put them away again, pulling out her climbing hooks, and a spool of thin nylon rope. She fastened them to her hands, while hooking the rope to a latch on her belt.
Good.
Glancing up, she could see the drone continuing it's mid-altitude surveillance of the area, focusing on the facade, but occassionally also turning to sweep the surrounding streets and buildings. As anticipated, the device's patrol path didn't take it lower, to inspect the immediate area around the building inside the yard. That was presumably the job of bots, cameras, and EM scanners. But they weren't numerous, or well-positioned enough, to do so, leaving plenty of gaps in coverage, like the one she used to get in close.
At least not to deter someone like Yelena, whose mobility, jumping ability, and stealth was second to none. An average intruder, even augmented, wouldn't stand much of a chance. This kind of infiltration, was what she was made for, and trained the most for, amplified by her impressive natural athleticism, grace and coordination.
A second-gen relic? Maybe. But Irw was right... I am more then my machine-self! I don't need a modern setup, to remain at the top of my game. I just need it to do what it does best. Augment my human-self. And to remain one with it. And that, I've always been. And... it took me years to fully adapt to my abilities. Make them a part of me. Re-adapting to a new set of abilities, fumbling about in the meantime, un-learning the muscle memory, learning new one? No thanks! I would lose, more then I gain.
The notion made her smile to herself again, as she began climbing, with an almost spider-like dexterity, up the facade, her tactile-response sensors working in perfect concert with her natural instincts, for finding a most efficient route. With the climbing hooks, and her pointed, serrated hooves providing exceptonal traction on the irregular facade, it was near-effortless, taking her less then half a minute to reach the drone's altitude. Timing it during the drone's non-EM phase, she hooked the other end of the nylon rope to the facade with a fastening pin – leaving her hanging off the facade, still supported by her legs, but her hands free, to pull out both her ultrasonic blades, and activate them.
The drone's path took it within six metres of her, sweeping the facade... when she leapt at it, both blades sweeping-inward in a double-slash. With hardly any noticable resistance, the twin powered blades sliced through the lightly-armoured body of the drone, slashing clean through it, bisecting it down the middle, as it's sensor-eye fizzled out.
The two halves began dropping, but Yelena caught them in a hug, depowering her blades and crossing them in front of her, as she let herself swing back onto the facade, still suspended by the rope and the fastening-pin.
A slight shudder went through the rope, making her bite her lip. Above, she could see the pin – shifting – slightly.
Added weight of the drone... didn't account for it. Must hurry!
She thought, hastily slinging the two bisected drone halves over each shoulder, using the slack from the nylon rope to improvise a crude sling around her neck, before her hands were free again, to re-fasten the climbing hooks, anchor to the facade that way, and take the weight off the pin. None-too-soon, as it slipped out a moment later.
A drop of cold sweat slid-down Yelena's temple. Too close!
Letting out a deep breath, she continued climbing, ignoring the rope digging into her neck and throat, where she used it to fasten the drone halves on her back. In another half a minute of half-choked climbing, she was safely on the roof of the Archives, finally having the chance to set the destroyed drone aside, feeling the groove across her throat, where the nylon rope dug-in.
For a long minute, Yelena allowed herself to catch her breath. Even with her impressive natural cardio, and oxygen-regulators in her lungs – that was exhausting. Moreso then anything she attempted, for the past six months. But the satisfaction was there, too.
Not as rusty as I thought! Still. I need to do more hard calisthenics, and less lounging on sunny beaches in Antigua catching the sun. Vacation time is well and truly over!
She used the time to survey the roof. No immediately obvious points of entry – one of the few bad things about old structures like this – they didn't tend to have many roof-access options. No skylights, no fire-escapes, nothing that would grant immediate access. And the roof was slanted at steep angles, making moving across it difficult, especially for her metallic 'feet' with their small surface area.
But Yelena was nothing if not resourceful – and she learned her lesson from the Sirine Queen, and the slippery upper decks there – sometimes, she needed extra traction. Reaching into her belt satchel again, she pulled out a pair of thick, ribbed, soft-rubber socks, which fit snugly over the tips of her metal hooves. Unlike the full-shin cushions that she wore for sparring, these were specifically meant to cover the tips of her 'feet', and provide increased traction in slippery conditions.
Putting them on, she tried to walk on the roof's tiled slope – no slippage. Nodding to herself, she moved closer to the centre of the roof, still looking for a good entry point. Maybe an attic window facing inward, or even a relatively thin segment of the roof, that she could smash-through... as she walked, occassionally she tapped on the roof, to gauge the thickness, listening for hollow-sounding patches.
In a minute, she surveyed the entire roof, and determined that there was indeed no way inside – without breaking through the roof. Fortunately, the roof was quite thin in multiple places... again, consequence of the archaic construction. As solidly built as these old buildings were, their roofs were often their weakest point. It was no different with the Archives.
She pulled-out her tech goggles again, making sure her chosen break-in point had no alarms or sensors on it – then spent a minute listening hard, for any subsonic and sonic transducer activity, indicating possible maintenance bots or laser-grids, nevermind proximity explosives. She didn't expect to find the latter, not in a civic building, but... one could never be too careful.
There was certainly activity below... low-band signals that might be maintenance bots, and even some higher-band signatures that might indicate laser-grid security, but nothing immediately below her, in the attic.
And why should there be? Not like anyone could even make it up here, past the bots and drones... thank God for lack of imagination in people!
She smirked to herself, stomping-down hard, onto her chosen patch of the roof. Once. Twice. Three times. Four. Each time uncomfortably loud, to her ears, in the quiet night, but she knew that it was just her perception of it. It was highly unlikely anyone below could hear the noise, this far up.
On the fifth stomp, the roofing gave way, with a cloud of dust and crumbled tiling, almost making her fall to her waist in the hole, before she hastily stepped aside.
Darkness below, as she put on her goggles again, this time activating their night-vision function. Then she lightly dropped-in through the hole.
The attic was mostly what she might expect, of a long-forgotten space in an ancient building, even one as important as this. Dusty, musty shelves filled with books, and ancient-looking storage chests, some likely older then the building itself, judging by the engraved dates on some, reaching all the way back to the beginning of the 19th century.
The dust was all-pervasive, taxing Yelena's sinus-filtration system to it's limit. She suspected a normal human would be sniffing and retching like crazy, after only a few minutes in here. Or have a severe allergic reaction, if they were allergic to dust. It didn't bother her, but nontheless, she made sure not to breathe through her mouth, as she explored the attic.
She gave the book covers a cursory glance. Accounts of the War of Independence, the Civil War, zoning and construction manifests of what she assumed was early expansion of the city, some business ledgers, from what she could make out of the archaic words on the covers... she shook her head, moving on. Irrelevant to her. What amused her was, that none of it was older then two-and-a-half centuries.
Much of this belongs in museums or libraries on a pedestal. Leave it to the Americans, to let their own – meager – history, rot away in an attic. Shallow, superficial people. No wonder the cabal is strongest here. Who better to manipulate and exploit, then people with no history and culture of their own?
Yelena thought with contempt, even if she realised she was generalising a bit. Irwine... certainly earned her love and respect, with his conviction and integrity. But he was the exception, not the rule.
Finally, she found a trap door leading down into the Archives proper. Time to do what she came here to do – find the central server room.
Twenty minutes later...
A night-guard on duty, making his rounds, whistling softly as he watched a ball game on his phone, turned a corner, now within sight of an intellicam above.
He walked down a long, wide hallway which stretched alongside a row of tall windows on one side, letting moonlight in, overlooking a multitude of large, humming computers in an expansive chamber below, on the other side, fibre-optic cables snaking all across the floor. Briefly, he glanced down, giving the hall a cursory glance, before continuing on.
Behind him, the way he came, the air seemed to briefly shimmer, before a half-cloaked knife appeared at his throat, making a deep, yet measured, slice. With only a gurgle, the man collapsed to the floor, dead, even as the shimmer in the air vanished.
Down below in the server hall, Yelena, currently crouching behind the furthest machine in the corner, in the shadows was preparing to connect with the computer, and send a specially encrypted Infolink transmission to Anna Kelso, to begin their proxy-link... before her enhanced hearing picked up a soft 'thud', somewhere above on the walkway.
She froze, listening hard. It didn't sound like a footstep, and it wasn't repeating. It sounded... more substantial. Like something heavy yet... soft, hitting the carpeted floor. Also, she was picking up faint sounds of... what sounded like a narrated football game, from a tiny speaker.
A phone? Is it a guard being lax on his job?
The woman wondered, cloaking, as she hopped soundlessly up onto the computer, to get a better angle of view at the hallway above.
Just peeking over the lip of the decorative railing, she could see a moonlight-illuminated outline of an unmoving body in uniform. Her eyes briefly widened in surprise, before it vanished behind a mask of focus, as she zoomed-in briefly. Indeed, it was a corpse of a guard. Freshly killed, if the spreading dark patch around his head, was any indication.
Someone else is here!
Not making a sound, she hopped back down, staying cloaked, as she slowly drew the twin blades at her back, taking care to stay completely silent. Keeping her back to the wall, she slowly, step-by-step, advanced down the length of the expansive hall, watching for any sign of movement anywhere, on all three axes. Without access to Smart-Vision, she had no way of detecting anyone cloaked... but her natural eyesight was exceptional. And, being a master of stealth herself, she knew what to look for.
Of course, if they had Smart-Vision, they already knew where she was... and could just be waiting for the right moment to pounce. So she routed additional power to her reflex-booster and cochlear implants, listening hard for anything that might give away an impending attack, or movement. Ready to preemptively leap-away, in any direction.
A soft, near-inaudible 'click' of a gun-safety release, somewhere above and far to the right, was her only warning. But for Yelena, it was enough. She leapt forward, taking cover between two of the large server towers, as a burst of silenced fire raked the parquet floor where she just stood, throwing-off splinters. It lasted only for a split second, then – silence.
They can see me. Lovely.
Was her thought in a flash, dropping her cloak, since it was superfluous. Face set in an annoyed expression. Whoever her stalker was, they were equipped with Smart-Vision. And if the sound of those suppressed rounds was anything to go by – with a faint whistle, accompanying it...
Flechettes. So likely a suppressed Sanction.
She thought, hugging the server tower she took cover behind, before leaping to the next one. No additional fire came, so clearly, her attacker didn't notice her there. Or had good trigger discipline. She risked a peek over the edge of the tower, looking in the direction she assumed the fire came from.
A briefest shimmer of moonlit air, on the far side of the walkway... she ducked again, as a bracket of fire whizzed over her head, a pair hitting the computer, making it shut down.
Yes... staying up there... not willing to come down and follow me into this maze yet. Good for me. Whoever it is, will not have good firing solutions as long as I stay between these server towers.
Doing a quick calculation in her mind, on the size of this chamber, and the typical radius of most Smart-Vision systems she heard of – Yelena determined that the far side of it was likely outside her attacker's vision radius. If she could get there, she could use her cloak to gain position on them, without them spotting her – assuming they stayed near where she last saw them.
Making another cover-to-cover switch, she risked another look... this time indeed spotting a male figure, a golden mask on his face, sticking to the shadows at the far end of the walkway behind the railing, it's eyes glowing softly with diffuse yellow light, before it faded out, indicative of an enhanced vision mode being used, even as his form became solid, with a decloaking effect, accompanied – tellingly - by a momentary arc of electricity across his body. He didn't decloak by choice... and probably didn't shut down his Smart-Vision by choice, either.
Oh you poor baby... You ran out of energy, didn't you? Let me guess, a modular 3rd gen setup... what? Your handlers didn't equip you with enough Praxis kits to optimise your cloak properly? Or equipped you with a proper thermoptic suit to enhance it? Too bad for you!
Yelena smirked to herself, taking advantage of it, pulling out her suppressed Zenith and letting off a few shots at him. At this range, she didn't really expect to hit him with a pistol, but it was enough for the shape to take cover, giving her a clear run to the far edge of the chamber, and the double-doors there, leading out of it. Before he could return fire, she cloaked, then kicked-open the doors. Making him believe she escaped the chamber.
Instead, she leapt up, still cloaked, as high as she could, onto the walkway, then flattened herself prone, decloaking again, using the walkway's railing to hide her from view. Expecting him to pursue along her 'escape route', and give her a good opportunity to jump him from above.
He didn't.
Either he's recharging, or he isn't completely green. But who is he?!
Yelena thought, again listening hard. Nothing.
Outside the Archives, the moonlight illuminated the guard shack... another gold-masked individual was in there, in the guard's uniform, standing over the half-naked dead body of the actual guard.
~"Assistance required, Beta."~
Came over the individual's Infolink. The ersatz 'guard' engaged the auto-shutters on the shack, then slipped out, closing and locking the door, before he sprinted up the stairs to the Archives entrance, cloaking mid-run.
Footsteps below, in the server chamber. Yelena could hear him, advancing at a brisk trot, towards the doors she kicked-in. The kind of movement that told her he was trying to balance speed with stealth, while not doing either very well. Briefly, she was concerned that his Smart-Vision would spot her through the obstruction of the walkway, but then she shook her head.
If it could, he would've fired at me while I switched cover earlier. He must not have Xray imaging, like that operative on the Queen had. Just basic alt-wavelength vision.
She hoped. If he could see her up here, then the game was up already. Likely he would either toss a grenade up – which she would have time to evade - or try and get behind her, while being more quiet. But given the noise he was making – no. He thought she escaped the chamber, and was in pursuit. Tuning her hearing to it's highest fidelity, she continued to listen, as the footsteps approached.
She could also sense an active Infolink channel in the area. Unknown frequency.
Just as the footsteps seemed to be right below her position, near the doors below she rose, and leapt over the railing, both swords slashing downwards, into a twin-overhead chop.
He must have been equipped with proximity-sensors, since he rolled aside, evading, coming-op on one knee and spraying a barrage of fire from his rifle. A pair of flechettes embedded themselves into her left side, stopped by her armour, the rest going below, as she sprung at him again, with another dual-chop. He tried to backpedal, but was a shade too slow, as one of the ultrasonic blades took the barrel clean off his rifle.
He dropped the destroyed weapon, parrying the second blade with his right forearm – and a strip of faintly-glowing, shifting metal protruding from it.
Nanoform-alloy!
Yelena thought in a flash, as her sword was deflected, with a loud clinnng sound.
The masked man reciprocated with a powerful side-kick to her sternum, sending her reeling back, as he brought his other arm up, the protrusion on that one extending a little outward, then – launching a spike-shaped slug of metal at her.
Her expression spreading into a thrill-of-battle grin, she twisted out of reflex, dodging it, as the masked individual followed it up with a blinding-quick rush at her, preceeded by a microsecond ripple of air. That ripple was all Yelena needed to see, sidestepping and slashing low with both blades, as he zipped past her. Clearly, he intended to tackle her, then stab her to death.
Nice try.
Unable to stop his Icarus Dash move mid-motion, the man suddenly felt both his legs chopped off, at the knee, collapsing with a muffled moan to the ground, blood gushing from the stumps. He tried to crawl away, on his stomach.
"Pity. As useful as that new-fangled contraption is, I'll take controlled, conventional movement any day." - the aquiline woman intoned coldly, twirling the blades, as she stepped over to the masked figure, pinning him down with one knee, and sliding a blade under his throat.
"Who are you?" - she asked.
But the man didn't answer, his head twitching unnaturally to the side, before Yelena's subsonics picked up a sudden transducer spike.
Self-destruct!
She leaped away, diving low, as the man exploded in an incendiary burst of flames, setting her back on fire. She rolled quickly, to extinguish it before it spread, but it was surprisingly difficult. Probably some form of napalm mixture. If she stayed standing, she'd be burning like a torch now.
Her roll ended next to another of the server towers – before she heard a telltale clinking sound, of a grenade rolling after her.
Another one!
Was her thought in a flash, as she sprinted away, between the computers, before an EMP blast behind her caught her at the edge of it.
Her HUD overlay fizzled out, as she stumbled, her bioenergy levels dropping by 80%. Fortunately, she was at the very edge of the blast, so it didn't disable her.
Or was it an EMP blast? Yelena felt her legs suddenly sluggish... jerky... as she continued to stumble, while her HUD flickered back to life, indicating a 'malware presence' in her limb control circuitry. Her readout was filled with red-lined messages.
No... it's that radio-scramble effect, that I was briefed by Quinn, back then. Some sort of scramble grenade!
By the moment, her legs were losing responsiveness, freezing up. Unlike an EMP effect, it wasn't sudden, or temporary. It felt like it was spreading, now to her shoulders. Rather then suffer a complete loss of motor control, she disconnected her power grid completely, and initiated an internal virus-purge sequence, while she continued to crawl on her elbows, now using her natural human muscle, of which there was still a fair amount, in her upper body. If that second attacker chose this moment to advance after her, she was dead, and she knew it.
Fortunately, nobody came after her. Maybe the second one was hesitant, seeing what happened to his accomplice?
The answer came a moment later, as another not-EMP blast spread, a bit further down the next-over line of server towers. Too far to affect her.
He isn't sure he got me... he is blanketing the room!
The woman thought in some relief. Clearly the death of the first one had left an impression, and the second one was unwilling to pursue her into the server-maze. On sudden flash of instinct, she changed direction, now crawling towards the site of that second blast – gambling on the idea that he wouldn't throw another of those grenades, at the same spot.
Her arms were aching with muscle fatigue, now that the polyfibral component of it was inactive. She felt so... heavy. Sluggish. Gritting her teeth in pure spite, Yelena pushed through it, continuing to crawl at surprising speed.
I won't die helpless... I will NOT!
Another blast, behind her. She gambled correctly. But undoubtedly the second attacker's reticence to enter the maze, would end soon. She had to find a hiding place, and fast, to allow her counter-viral emergency procedure to purge the scrambling effect. If it could.
Or she would die here. Helpless.