Serpent and the Sun, Chapter 1 – Xperience Fiction

Serpent and the Sun, Chapter 1 – Xperience Fiction – by Liam Sweeny.

Chapter One

A glint of light from the upper window of the New Rochester Public Library caught on Blake’s shades, splashing a starburst across the windshield. Had he not known better, Blake might have mistaken it for sunlight. He cleared his throat, tossing a hand-rolled cigarette from the open window as he stepped out. The sound of his closing the door was deafening; it was the only vehicle on the once-gridlocked street. Two men stood motionless in front of the main entrance, fully-automatic assault rifles held muzzle crossed. The familiar red band across the back stock identified them as Directed-Energy weapons.

As Blake started toward the library, the men tightened up their stance. He got a better look at the rifles. Heckler-Koch i77s. The HK-i77s were all-purpose, with settings from tickle to fry. Most likely these guys were set to fry his ass should he pose a threat. Blake laughed to himself. Must be new guys. He could remember going to libraries when he was a kid. Back then they didn’t need a security detail.

As he got to the front entrance, the man on the left reached into his pocket, pulling out a small black plastic box. A biometric reader; an old one at that. Blake held up his wrist. The scar was invisible these days. The guard waved the reader over his wrist, with no result. He motioned to the other guard, who pulled out a wand. Blake stood in front of the second guard as he swiped the wand down. Silently, he looked over at the first guard, who nodded. They moved a few inches to the side; Blake was cleared to enter.

“Those things are out-dated,” He said. He pulled a chip out of his pocket and tossed it to the first guard. “Put that in your head-gear; swap it for your standard interface. The reader’s built-in.” He walked in without explaining how he got it. It was too cold out for long stories.

The New Rochester Public Library was a Greco-Roman marble edifice to knowledge. It was left untouched by both nature and human nature. During the devolution, books were deemed little more than glorified heating-wood, neither a guide to intellectual survival, nor a symbol of power. Now, two decades after the end of the devolution and the birth of the UEC, the Terrestrials were forced to see libraries as both.

Between the stained-glass window on the left side and the wide marble staircase on the right stood a large wooden table. Five men hovered around it, commenting on a map splayed out before them. One of the men Blake knew. He nodded as he looked up.

Hey Blake,” the man said, “Ya here to see Jameson?”

“Yeah, Timmy.” Blake looked down at the map. It was covered in marker lines. There were circular perimeters emanating out from the library. Zones of some sort. The remaining lines must’ve been power lines, sewer lines; none of which would be operable. New Rochester was one of the most heavily sanctioned regions in Terrestria; much of the above-ground infrastructure was destroyed by the UEC. The roads had been blasted to craters, making them impassible to conventional cars or trucks.

“So you’re the legendary Blake Chaplin, huh?” One of the men said as he looked up. He was much older than Blake, the hard lines of his face giving him the visage of living stone.

“Is that what they’re callin’ me now?” Blake chuckled. “Legendary?”

“You escaped a Sanctuary and lived.” The man said. “That’s word on the street, anyways…”

“Bobby, leave him alone,” said one of the other men there.

“Nah, I don’t mind,” replied Blake. “It wasn’t me, though…”

“Yeah, you and Mike Wynsee…” Suddenly the table got quiet. Wynsee was a name seldom mentioned. Anywhere.

“OK, back to work.”

A voice from the top of the staircase called the attention of the men back to the map. Blake didn’t have to even look up to know it was Jameson. They had a long history. When Blake did look up, Jameson motioned for him to follow.

They walked into the third floor, the most spacious area of the library. The tables that lined the center of it were filled with readers. Blake had been in enough libraries to know that they weren’t reading casually; it was their job. Some had books; others periodicals. The five microfiche machines were armed and spinning, manned by people who had to strain at times to read the old newspapers they were preserving.

Jameson took Blake into the third floor collection area, where he yanked the chain loose that covered the central staircase. They went up to the fourth floor, home to storage and Jameson’s office.

“Mike called you by now, I assume,” Blake said as he sat down on a pile of dusty books.

“Yeah,” Jameson replied, “I almost didn’t believe it was him. You know, their technology and all.” Blake nodded. Jameson wiped off his chair before sitting down.

“You’re lucky they didn’t kill you,” he said. “Are you sure you weren’t tracked here?” Jameson motioned up.

“They think I’m dead.” Blake pulled out what looked like a scientific calculator. It was one of his many hacks. He set it on Jameson’s desk.

Jameson picked it up, tracing his finger along the slim side. “What’s this?” He said. “Aside from a calculator…”

“It’s a null transmitter.” Blake answered.

“A null transmitter?”

“Yeah.” Blake turned it over, showing him the mode of invisible. “The Sanctuary scans biometrics.” He flipped the case as he spoke. “When it gets zero response, it returns what the programming interprets as a null sweep. One of the things this does is; it tricks the Sanctuary’s main system into reading a null sweep wherever it should be picking up activity.”

Jameson fiddled a pencil through his fingers as he stared at the hack.

“What’s the range?”

“Four hundred yards.”

Jameson cleared his throat. “It’s not gonna’ screw with our cloak, is it?”

“I’m just gonna’ assume you’re fucking with me on that…”

Jameson grunted. “Sorry.”

Blake could tell he’d been frazzled as of late. Five years ago, J’ would have never even thought to question Blake’s security sense.

“So why are you really here?” Jameson didn’t like to waste time or mince words, and he knew Blake wasn’t there to show off toys. And indeed, there were other matters at hand.

“Mike may have figured something out,” Blake said, “something big.”

“Big like what?”

Blake took a breath. This wasn’t going to be an easy explanation.

“We may have a way to counter PEALE.” He said. Jameson stared at him in shock. The PEALE system was what they’d been fighting for the past twenty years. Rather; it’s what had been killing them for the past twenty years.

“How!?!” Jameson had lost his eldest son to one of PEALE‘s strikes last June; a lightning burst. It was a direct kill; a message.

“It’s no guarantee,” Blake said, “And it may well backfire.”

“Just spit it out, Blake.” Jameson wanted payback, regardless of consequence.

“PEALE is artificial intelligence,” Blake started, “and I’m not telling you what you don’t already know, but that PEALE isn’t truly AI.”

“It’s not self-aware.” Jameson said. “Just a smart brick.”

“Right.” Blake reached into his coat pocket, this time drawing out an old smartphone.

“I haven’t seen one of those in years…”

“You’ve never seen one of these,” Blake flipped it open. A dull yellow power indicator turned to green, and the LCD display activated. An image appeared of a purely white background, except for a young boy; his face unusually fair, dressed in white cloth of some sort, very plain.

Jameson looked on. “Who’s that?” He asked.

“I’m Adam.” The voice came through a pair of speakers Jameson had plugged into an old FM receiver. He nearly jumped out of his seat when he heard it.

“What the fuck was that?” Jameson shouted. Blake chuckled, reminded of his own reaction when Mike introduced him to Adam.

“What are you, Adam?” Blake spoke into the phone.

“No one has figured that out yet.” Again the voice went through the speakers.

“Wait,” Jameson said, “Do you understand what we’re saying?”

“You’re not saying much, but yes.” Adam said.

“You’re shittin’ me, Blake,” He said, “Tell me this isn’t some fuckin’ joke.”

“I’m not a joke.” Adam said. “I know what a joke is, and that’s not me.”

Jameson looked at the phone, looked at Adam. Adam smiled. After a pause, Jameson himself smiled.

“Real AI.” He said. “Un-fucking-believable…”

“I prefer the term cyber-sentience.” Adam said through the speakers. “I stopped being artificial when I woke up.”

“Sorry.” Jameson just stared at the smartphone screen. He grunted, chuckled, made a few other unintelligible noises as he scanned the room back and forth, his gaze revolving between Blake and “Adam”. He got up, finally, running his hand along a bookshelf, tracing paths in the dust that had accumulated.

“So what’s our role in, umm … Adam?” He said, referring to the library.

Blake himself got up, and said something under his breath to Adam, who subsequently disappeared from the screen. The green indicator went back to yellow. When Adam’s housing was dimmed, he walked over to the window overlooking East Main Street, stood side-by-side with Jameson.

“We need you to hold on to it,” He said, “to him.”

“Why me?” He replied. “I’m not cut out for that stuff. I barely know how to hack a soda out of one of the old vending machines in the barrens…”

“We’re not looking for a hacker.” Blake replied. “If we were, Adam would be with Mike right now.”

“So what are you looking for?”

Blake paused. East Main Street below was dead. Not a shock; the current population of New Rochester could fit in the third floor of the library. Such a shitty small place for the tide to turn, Blake thought. But Mike picked it out, and Blake knew that if anyone was up to the current phase of the resistance, it was Jameson.

“Adam already knows more about hacking than you, me and perhaps even Mike combined.” Blake said.

“What he needs now isn’t a hacker, but a teacher.” Blake said, “Hell…maybe a dad.”

More from Liam Sweeny…