The meta rise, p.17
The Meta-Rise, page 17
Tellie almost looks relieved when I point this out.
“Trout,” Mr. Rix starts. “I’m not letting a kid do what a man should be doing—”
“I’m almost thirteen.” I open the arthropod and slide my arm in. “Besides, this worked once before. It’ll work again.”
• • •
We make sure the president is comfortable and well hidden from sight. As Tellie goes in search of a blanket or sweater to put around him, I crouch next to him. “Is there anything else you need?”
He manages a half smile. “A cheeseburger?”
I laugh. “I’m all out of those.”
He closes his eyes and winces when he readjusts. “You are a brave young man, Trout.”
Across the store, I watch as Tellie opens a box and pulls out a pink sweater.
“I don’t know about that,” I respond to Callo.
“No, you are. You and your father and brother. You are great people. The UD needs more people like you.”
I think he might be delirious, so I just nod and say thank you.
Tellie comes back with the sweater and tucks it around the president’s legs.
“We’ll send help as soon as we can,” I assure him.
“I’ll be fine,” he says, and settles into a restless sleep.
At the front door, I peer outside. To Mr. Rix and Tellie, I say, “When I go out, I’ll go right, you guys go left. I’ll draw them away from you.”
Before I open the door, I pull on the pair of Fairenhort goggles I bought before I left Line Zero. They make me feel even more like a soldier.
Not wanting to waste another minute, I whip the door open and step outside. As soon as I’m out on the sidewalk, in the daylight, I regret making the decision to be the distraction. All of the bots in the street, at least thirty of them, turn to me.
“Holy space junk,” I breathe.
Too late to turn around.
I start running.
The thunder of robot feet behind me is like the stampede of an army of bulls. I can barely hear the beating of my own heart, even though I can feel it hammering against my ribs.
At the next intersection, I whip my arm out, press the button on the arthropod, and watch as the claw-like hoverpoint shoots out of my hand. It latches itself onto the side of the building across the street, and I’m sucked in like a magnet. I hang there, at least thirty feet off the ground, for a second as I get myself together.
A bot trains his gun on me. I hit the button on the inside of my thumb and plummet to the ground. This is a fall I won’t survive.
The ground zooms up beneath me. I hit the button again, and the claw shoots across the street, yanking me back into the air before I hit the ground with a splat.
Before I’m sucked into the hoverpoint, I hit the button again, retract it, hit it again. Soon I’m flying between buildings like Spider-Man, and I can’t help but let out a whoop just like he would.
I’m two blocks away from the library when I see something flying in the air toward me. I panic, and miss hitting the button right away. I fall several feet, arms and legs flailing before I get hold of myself again.
I aim higher with my next shot, and kick my legs, getting some extra momentum so that when I reach the hoverpoint, and hit the button, I fly over the top ledge of an old bakery, and hit the roof and tuck and roll.
I lie there for a second, gravel and old debris digging into my back, when something lands on the roof next to me.
A pair of boots thump toward me and I know in an instant, I’m jammed.
I ROLL OVER ONTO all fours and heave myself up, ready to fight. Except it isn’t Ratch on the rooftop with me, or any other bot. It’s Vee.
“Holy jet smoke,” I say, and collapse against her in relief, our matching arthropods clanging together. “I thought I was dead.”
She laughs. “Happy to see you too, FishKid.”
I pull away and take off my goggles. “How did you find me? How did you even get here?”
“I traced the disposable Link I gave you. I uploaded it with a tracker app before giving it to you. And I drove, gearbox.”
“For once, I’m happy someone did something without telling me!” I raise my arms to the blue sky and thank every hidden star.
“Where is everyone else?” Vee asks as she tucks a stray hair into her ponytail. She’s not wearing her feather earring, or any necklaces or bracelets. This is fighter Vee.
“Tellie and her dad are in the library trying to stop the ThinkChip control server.”
Vee looks past me, out over the city. In the distance, a plume of smoke hits the air and I wonder if that’s a point for us or for the bots. I wonder where Po is, if Dad is okay. Are they free on the streets? Are they fighting too?
“We should get to the library to help them,” Vee says.
“I don’t know how we’re going to get inside, though. The streets over there are crowded with bots.”
Vee shields her eyes from the sun. “Who said anything about using the streets?”
• • •
We make our way back toward Fifth Avenue, but the same bots that were there when I left Tellie are still there, as if waiting for me to return. A short but wide bot charges up his laser gun and takes a shot at us as we sail through the air.
It misses us, but just by a foot.
We aim our arthropods at the library, hit the buttons, and loose the claws through the broken windows. In a second, we’re flying through the windows, sucked into the hoverpoints that are lodged into the walls inside the library.
When I detach my point, I hit the ground hard and grit my teeth, taking an extra second to recuperate. When I finally stand up and look around, I freeze in place, totally in awe. Sunlight blazes through what’s left of the arched windows behind us and pools on the patterned floor. An iron lantern still hangs from its chain from the ceiling over the staircase on my right. There are stone columns in front of us. Huge, huge columns. The second floor is open through more arches that look down on the first floor.
I wish I were here just to explore.
But I can’t.
At least not now.
After a lot of wandering around, we finally locate the stairs down to the basement. Once we’re below ground, everything becomes still again. There are rows upon rows of shelves on the first below-ground floor. Most of the shelves are empty, but books remain here and there, some stacked up on top of each other in piles that look as though they could crash at any second.
Vee gestures to a plastic sign glued to the wall. It reads To Bryant Park Storage, with an arrow pointing us in the right direction. So we follow the signs to an open door where cobwebs still hang.
“I hate spiders.” Vee runs her hands up and down her arms.
“I hate moths.”
She snorts. “Moths? Are you cracked?”
I frown. “Moths are scary! They eat sweaters!”
She bursts out laughing. “That is the best thing I’ve heard all day.”
“Whatever.”
We peer into total darkness.
“I’ll go first,” I say.
Once inside, I’m totally disoriented. Somehow it feels darker in the tunnel, like the blackness inside is liquid that swallowed me up. The hair on my neck stands straight.
“Here, take my hand,” I whisper to Vee.
Fingers slide into my hand, but they aren’t warm, human fingers.
They’re cold. And metal. And they bite into my palm. Blood wells in fresh crescent-moon cuts and I swallow the yelp trying to escape me.
“I know where we’re going,” Ratch says. “How about I lead the way?”
I’M THROWN BACK, out of the tunnel, and smash into a shelving unit. Pain shoots up my back. The shelf teeters back and forth. If it goes down, it’s taking the whole row with it, like dominos.
I slump to the floor. Vee screams as one of Ratch’s robots holds her in place.
“Did you really think it would be that easy?” Ratch says.
Something coppery fills the spaces between my teeth. It’s blood, I realize and spit it out.
“The problem with humans,” he starts, “is that they believe they can conquer anything. They believe they are smarter than the enemy. Stronger too. Maybe that’s true in a human war, but I’m a robot, Trout. I will always be smarter and stronger. And I don’t have any human emotions holding me back.”
My vision sways. Pain throbs behind my eyes. I worry I have a concussion. What are the symptoms of a concussion?
Ratch paces in front of me. I have to get it together. Otherwise we’re all done for.
“I have to give you credit, though,” he says. “You made it this far. Farther than any grown man did. Like your father. Weak. Useless. Neither man, nor robot. When all of this is over, I plan to make your father my slave.”
Something inside of me snaps. Rage boils through my veins. I grit my teeth. I make it to my feet.
I feel like I’m about to go nuclear.
I clench my hands into fists and charge.
Ratch isn’t prepared for it, and I take him down with my momentum. We slide forward, toward the tunnel entrance. Ratch’s back leaves a long gouge in the stone floor.
I roll away. A bot lunges for me, but I’m small and quick and he’s got no shot.
I charge at the bot holding Vee hostage. He doesn’t move. Probably because he’s under Ratch’s control and Ratch is currently distracted.
“Run, Trout!” Vee says, but I’m not leaving her, and she’s a bolt-head if she thinks I’d do something like that.
I scoop up a huge book. “Duck!” Vee ducks, giving me a perfect shot at the bot’s head. I whack him where it counts and his neck snaps back. His head cranks to the side. I hit again and his claw-like hands let go of Vee’s arms.
“Go. Go!” I drag her into the stacks.
“Find them!” Ratch yells.
I go right, then left, then right again, hoping to lose them in the maze of stacks. But then the shelves end, and we have to dodge across a corridor into another room.
The floor here is covered in crumbling newspapers. More line the rows and rows of metal bookcases. I motion Vee down a short aisle and have her sit in the corner. I position myself so I can see the door through the shelving units. So far so good.
I don’t know how long we’ll stay here. I don’t know what my plan is at all. I just need to think. I squeeze my eyes shut for a fraction of a second until I feel Vee tugging at the hem of my shirt.
“What?” I whisper, and she points at the bookcase in front of me, at a shelf above my head.
I look up into the eyes of a spider bot.
“Jam,” I breathe one second before it leaps.
The spider bot latches onto my face, its legs wrapped around my head. I can’t see at all, so I use my hands, clawing at the spider with all I got. I tear off one leg and toss it to the side, then work on another, breaking them off one by one like crab legs.
I get the spider off just in time to see the room swarmed with another three dozen of them. They scuttle across the floor together, like one mass being.
Vee gives the bookcase behind her a push. The units here aren’t as huge as the ones in the main stacks, so it doesn’t take much to tip it over. It creaks, groans, then crashes into the next unit and spider bots are thrown every which way.
The rest of the cases go down too, until the last smashes through the room’s back wall and into the main part of the basement.
“Go! Go!” I say, and Vee scrambles over the bookcases. I race after her, the spider bots following.
We burst into the main part of the library, and are greeted by three bots, their laser guns trained right on us. The barrels glow orange in the dim light. I tense, knowing there’s only a second, maybe two, before they pull the triggers and blast us out of this world.
“We are so cracked,” Vee says.
And then all three bots pitch to the side, matching holes in their heads belching smoke.
I look to the right. Scissor stands in an aisle of shelves, shoulders squared, a laser gun at her side. Her audience track claps as her LED panel glows bright yellow.
“How did you—” I start, but Vee cuts me off.
“No time!”
Ratch rounds the corner. Scissor throws Vee a laser gun and Vee starts shooting.
Spider bots swarm us. I lunge for a laser gun abandoned by one of the dead bots and press the trigger at the last second. One spider bot disintegrates in front of me. I shoot again, blasting a spider clear down the corridor.
I shoot again and again, taking out spider bots like they’re the enemies in a vid game.
Ratch goes for Scissor first. “I see you are still in charge of your own ThinkChip?”
Scissor backs away. “I upgraded my chip this morning, because I’m smarter than you.” Her audience track goes oooooooh.
Ratch grabs Scissor’s arm and bends it back at an odd angle. Scissor’s free hand retracts into her arm, leaving nothing but a metal spike in its place. She stabs upward, burying the spike into Ratch’s side. He convulses, falls to his knees.
“I suggest you get moving!” Scissor says to us.
Vee pushes the barrel of her gun into the gut of the spider and says, “Look away, FishKid,” right before she blasts the spider with one shot. It bursts into a million plastic and metal pieces. I shield my face with an arm, but several pieces get through, slicing open the skin on my cheeks. Blood instantly runs from the cuts.
“Thanks,” I say.
“Don’t mention it.” She nods toward the tunnel entrance. “You first?”
“I’m on it,” I say, and run into the tunnel.
• • •
We run down the darkened tunnel, following its many curves. When we reach the secret facility beneath Milton Hall, I find Tellie and her dad in the room, but they aren’t alone.
They’re both being held by robots, but not just any robots. Robots made of black composite with a band of orange eyes.
I have a gun in my hand, but I know I’m not fast enough to outdo a robot. More importantly, I don’t know if I’m a good enough shot to hit Ratch’s clones without harming Tellie or Mr. Rix.
I look around the room for another weapon, or a distraction.
The facility is exactly like I thought it would be.
It’s about the size of my old house in Brack. A control panel runs the span of the room straight across from the door we entered. Lights blink on the boards. Mostly red. Some blue.
There are a few desks in the center covered in dust. Fluorescent lights hang from the ceiling by thin chains.
The server, pushed into the back corner, is taller and skinnier than me. A row of lights blaze in the top panel. A screen below that reads OUTPUT 100%.
I can’t tell if there’s an off switch, which I guess would make it too easy.
Something zips into the room behind Vee and me. I think it’s Scissor, and turn around, but a hand grabs me by the throat and slams me on the ground. I lose the ability to breathe. Vee shouts something that I can’t make out over the ringing in my head.
Orange eyes come into view. It’s Ratch’s hand wrapped around my throat, closing off my airway. My lungs burn. My throat turns raw.
“Now, Tellie!” Mr. Rix says.
Tellie goes limp, dropping to the floor, taking her robot down with her. Mr. Rix swings back, breaking the knee of his robot. Vee swoops in and blasts Tellie’s bot with the laser gun. My nose fills with the smell of charred rubber.
Ratch lifts me up. My feet leave the ground. I’m close enough to him that I can see the finer details in his head and neck, close enough that I can see the patched charcoal metal exactly where LT said it would be.
It’s the real Ratch.
He smashes me against the server. My eyes water. I grit my teeth against the pain taking over every corner and nook of my body.
I’m dead. Notched. Ratch is going to kill me. He’s going to win.
His metal teeth mash together. “It’s really nothing personal, Trout. You’re just collateral damage in the laying of the framework. The country has been divided for too long, and it’s time to unify it under one robot ruler.”
“Under you?” I choke out. “You’ll never be a leader.”
Some odd emotion crosses Ratch’s face. He shakes his head and starts to say something as a sharp object bursts from his sternum. Wires snap and spark inside Ratch’s torso. He looks down at the chair leg jammed straight through him, through his hard drive. I can just make out the top of Tellie’s head over Ratch’s shoulder.
Ratch jolts. His fingers lose function and he lets me go. “This is not how this was supposed to end,” he says.
I slump to the ground as he pitches forward, slamming into the server tower. Tellie cocks her arm back. She holds a folded chair over her head and swings it, hitting the other end of the chair leg still sticking out of Ratch’s back. It jams forward, slicing through the innards of the server tower.
Wires catch fire. Smoke curls from the wreckage. Ratch’s body seizes and shakes uncontrollably. The ceiling lights flicker, then cut out as sparks from Ratch’s body illuminate the darkness.
I pull myself up and gulp down air. Everything hurts. I can barely keep my eyes open. What about the other clones? Are they dead? Are we safe? All I can smell is the scent of burning plastic and rubber. It hurts my nose. Makes me nauseous.
“Trout?”
I think that’s Tellie.
Something buzzes in my ears.
“Aidan.”
A spindly hand grabs the front of my shirt and yanks me closer. “Aidan,” Ratch says, his voice raspy, urgent. Only a flicker of orange light shines in his eyes.
I fight against his hold. The room spins. Someone else calls my name.
