Entering the Weave

“Why don’t we fly?” Josh asked suddenly. “This walking malarkey’s no good. It’s too slow.”

Once they had reached the road, it had become apparent that the chain-linked fence that surrounded the factory was further away than it seemed.

“I forgot about that. This is just so real. Do you think we should? I mean we might be seen. We are trying to be stealthy.”

“Well, we can fly low. No one will see us.”

“I suppose so.” Toby stopped and backed up a little before running a few steps and throwing himself forward with his arms flung out in front of him.

It was fortunate that there was a lot of snow where he decided to try to defy gravity, because his defiance only lasted for as far as he could jump. He skidded headlong off the road in a jumble of flailing arms and legs. Josh couldn’t stifle a laugh as his friend came to a dead halt with his head and torso buried beneath the snow and his legs waving feebly in the air.

“What happened? Have you forgotten how to do it?” Josh helped his friend to stand back up.

“Yes.” Toby said crossly. “Yes that’s right. I’ve forgotten. Why don’t you try? I’m sure you’ll remember how to do it.”

Josh paused and realised his friend was being sarcastic. “We can’t fly here?”

“Nope. I think the programming is too strong. My hacking has no control here, or as my online buddies would say, my Kung Foo is no good.”

“Are we safe? Can we still get out?”

“I don’t know. It’s different from a programming perspective. The clapping controls the VR glasses, it just shuts them off, but the flying code tries to control the environment we’re in. I think we’ll still be able to exit.”

“We should test it.” Josh was thinking about the wicked claws of the virus checker.

“We can’t. If we leave, we’ll never get back here. Geigerzalion brought us, remember?”

Josh nodded uncertainly, but Toby continued insistently. “Well, if we can’t get out by clapping now, it doesn’t make any difference, because nothing is happening. If we can get out then our adventure ends. I think we should go on, but keep a look out and at the first sign of real danger, we’ll leave.”

“If we can.” Josh said gloomily.

“I think it’ll work.”

“You thought you could fly!”

“Yeah, well that’s different. As I said.” Toby shrugged. ”Come on. I’m getting cold.”

“Hang on a second. What’s this?” Josh was looking at the snow where Toby had skidded to his rather undignified end. There was something dark sticking up out of the crumpled whiteness.

He brushed some snow away and found to his horror that it was a glove filled with a rigid, icy hand. The hand was attached in the usual fashion to an arm and this was attached to an entire body, frozen beneath the snow.

“Oh God!” Josh sat back and felt the cold snow soak through the seat of his trousers.

“Don’t worry Josh. Remember this isn’t real. This isn’t a real person.”

“Then why’s he here?”

“I don’t know.” Toby was examining the body. “Look he’s wearing a uniform.”

Josh’s curiosity was vying with his fear. “What does it say on his back?”

The body was lying face down and Toby had only uncovered one shoulder and the head, but as he brushed more snow away three yellow letters were revealed on the dead man’s back.

“What have the F.B.I. got to do with this?”

“Maybe they were investigating this place as well. They’ve got the biggest Computer Investigation Unit in the world.” Toby started to dig more frantically. “Maybe he’s got some information about this place.”

Josh started to help, but no matter how much he told himself that this wasn’t a real dead body, every time his hand brushed against it he would involuntarily flinch away from the contact. Toby didn’t seem bothered by it at all and before long he had uncovered the whole body and was struggling to push it over onto its back.

Josh reeled back when he saw the man’s blue, ice encrusted face and staring eyes. Toby quickly opened the jacket and pulled out a battered black notebook which he riffled through. Josh, who was glad for an excuse not to look at the body, peered over his shoulder but couldn’t make head or tail of what was on the pages.

“It’s all hexadecimal numbers.” Toby said. “It looks like a memory dump.”

“In English, please.”

“A memory dump is a list of the numbers that are in a computer’s memory.”

“And hexadecimal numbers.”

“Numbers represented in base sixteen rather than ten.” Josh’s face was a study in non-comprehension. “And that’s as clear as I’m going to make it.” Toby added defiantly, daring Josh to ask further questions.

“Why’s that number got an ‘E’ in it?” Josh reached over prodded the notebook.

“Get off. Look this bit’s been highlighted.”

“What does it mean?”

“Well, maybe it’s a two dimensional byte map of the terrain.” Toby muttered to himself. “These numbers represent the road, so these would be the perimeter fence I suppose.” As he traced his finger on the notebook’s page Josh could see more digits appearing and disappearing next to the original ones. There didn’t seem to be any pattern in the grid of numbers, but Toby was closely inspecting one corner of the page.

“What is it?” Josh asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe it’s nothing, but… Yes. This could be very useful. Come on.”

They walked on and the fence rose higher and higher before them as they got closer, until eventually they stood at its base and it loomed above them like a endless cliff.

“I wish we could fly.” Josh mused.

“This will be an interesting test.” Toby was rummaging around in a small backpack that Josh hadn’t noticed before. He pulled out a huge set of wire cutters with a magician’s flourish, as they were obviously far too big to fit in the bag.

He carefully placed them against a link in the fence and pushed on the oversized handles, trying to close the blades. In the real world the cutters would have had no problem slicing through the thin wire. Josh could see the effort Toby was exerting; he was breathing heavily, but when he gave up there wasn’t even a mark on the fence.

“I take it, your ‘Kung Foo’ is no good here either.”

“I don’t understand it.” Toby panted. “This should work.”

“Do you think clapping will work now?”

“I’m not sure actually. I tried to wobble my glasses before, but they don’t seem to be there.”

“What are we going to do?”

“I don’t know. Maybe our minds are so confused by the sensory input that they won’t accept the fact that our bodies are sitting in my bedroom.”

“Are you sure we really are in your bedroom, Toby? This all seems so real.”

“True.” Toby looked uncertain.

“Oh, come on. This is stupid. Let’s get out, Tobe. Geigerzalion will understand. He can’t even get this close to the factory.”

Toby’s face lit up, as if he’d suddenly had a great idea. “That’s right! There may be too much security surrounding this place. If we get far enough away from it I think clapping might work.”

“Really. After everything that’s happened you can still believe that?” Josh asked doubtfully.

“Yeah. Look it makes sense. Geigerzalion can’t get near here because there’s something powerful stopping him. That same thing is what’s stopping my hacking from working.”

“You’re not just saying that?”

“Nope.”

“I hope you’re right, Toby.” Josh felt uneasy rather than scared now. Nothing seemed to be immediately threatening and he remembered the desperation in Geigerzalion’s face and thought how he would feel if someone he hinged all his hopes on, just gave up.

They trudged through the snow around the outside of the fence looking for a sign indicating what this place was, but there was nothing to break the chain-linked monotony of the perimeter. Josh was beginning to think that they would be able to go back and find Geigerzalion with a clear conscience. As soon as the thought entered his head, he felt ashamed.

Toby had stopped and was poring over the notebook, tracing his fingers over the pages again and occasionally squinting in apparently random directions.

“I think we need to go over there.” Toby indicated a small hillock about fifty metres away from the fence.

“Why?”

“I think that’s where the backdoor is. Programmers often build one into their systems. Just so they can get in and out without having to go through their own security while they’re writing the code. And most programmers leave them open after the system is in operation so they can get into the system in an emergency.”

Josh nodded, surprised by Toby’s succinct answer, and they crunched off towards the hillock. The snow was deeper and as they got closer they found themselves wading through waist high wet snow. Josh’s legs and feet felt like articulated blocks of ice.

Eventually they reached the base of the knoll and Toby re-examined the notebook once more.

“I’m sure it’s supposed to be here.”

“Maybe they’ve closed it. Everything else seems secure.”

“Hmmm.” Toby was lost in thought again. Josh knew there was no point in trying to distract him from his calculations, so he clambered a little way up the hillock trying to get a better view of the surrounding wintry landscape. It was hard work and he had not gone far when the snow suddenly gave way beneath him and he fell into a shallow depression in the side of the mound of snow. The wind had been knocked out of him and it took him a few seconds to recover.

“…and according to my calculations there should be a hole right about… here. Ah, Josh. You’ve found it.”

Josh’s fall had created a small avalanche which had revealed an old fashioned wooden door that wouldn’t have looked out of place as the entrance to a secret garden.

“Is it locked?” Toby asked as Josh hauled himself onto his numb feet.

There was a brass handle on the door that Josh tried to turn, but he pulled his hand away quickly as if he had been burned. “It’s freezing.” Even though he had pulled his fingers away as soon as he had touched the handle the extreme cold made his hands feel raw.

Toby produced a pair of huge, scaly gloves from his magic backpack and pulled them on.

“I hope these work. They’re my best dragon hide gauntlets from Shiver. They cost me a thousand galactic credits.”

“They’re from a different… virtual reality world?”

“Oh Josh you sound like such a noob when you say stuff like that. You may as well call them Vrealms, seeing as though we’re in one. But yes, they are from a different Vrealm. None other than Rose Cormack programmed these. If her programs don’t work here then nobody’s will.”

Toby reached for the handle tentatively and Josh held his breath, absently rubbing his still aching fingers. Toby’s hand wrapped around the handle and he grinned as he heaved the heavy door open.

“Ha!” Toby exclaimed. “At least we have some power here. We can touch cold things.” He reverently placed the gloves back into his backpack.

Behind the door there were steps leading into darkness. Josh looked questioningly at Toby who shrugged and cautiously they began to descend. As they picked their way down the stairs it got darker and darker until they could barely see each other. Water dripped rhythmically in the darkness and Josh hoped that the ragged breathing he could hear was Toby’s or his own.

They continued blindly, trailing a hand along the wall of the tunnel and stretching the other ahead to ward off anything they might be about to bump into.

The end of the steps took them by surprise and Josh, who was leading, felt his knees buckle as the floor levelled out. He stumbled again within a few feet when they came to some steps leading back up. It was easier going up the steps. Josh clambered up them on all fours like he had climbed stairs as a child.

Then, painfully, Josh banged his head against the ceiling. The stairs had ended abruptly. They groped around in the dark but could find nowhere to go except back they way they had come.

“Perhaps we missed a side tunnel.” Josh whispered, not wanting anything unseen to hear him.

“I don’t think so. Can you push upwards? There must be a trapdoor or something. It might just be stuck.”

Josh squeezed as far up the steps as he could and pushed up with his back against the ceiling. He strained for a moment and felt something give. He collapsed back panting.

“It’s too heavy, but it is moving.”

Toby clambered up beside Josh and after a count of three they both strained against the trapdoor. Inch by slow inch, the door rose until suddenly there was no resistance and they burst out of the hole. There was a loud crash as a barrel that had been resting on the trapdoor toppled over and began leaking its dirty contents into the pristine snow.

Toby and Josh crouched low expecting alarm bells and searchlights to erupt from the stillness of the night, but silence settled back over the complex and they started to breathe again.

Heartened by their success they climbed out and crept towards the nearest building, which squatted darkly ahead of them. The building was low and wide and made of rusting iron. Huge rivets held it together at the corners. Josh had never seen anything that looked so solid and secure. There was no sign of an entrance anywhere. It might well have been a block of solid metal.

“We’ll never get in there.”

“Perhaps it’s just a generator or something. There are plenty of others to look at.”

Most of the buildings were the same as the first and these were interspersed by tall chimneys that reached up dizzyingly high into the black sky, but soon they found one that looked like an office building. It had glass panels covering it and, more importantly, a door.

They were expecting it to be locked, so they were more than a little surprised when it slid open invitingly as they approached.

“This must be a trap.” Josh whispered.

“We can just peek inside. The whole place seems to be deserted anyway. Perhaps there’s nothing here at all.”

“Yeah. Maybe.” Josh had begun to feel a bit safer now that nothing had happened for so long.

They crept through the open doorway which closed smoothly after they passed. Reassuringly though, it reopened when they stepped back towards it. They had entered a reception area furnished with black leather and steel couches, low tables covered with magazines and a high desk which curved out from one wall. Two corridors stretched away into the distance and Josh realised that they were much too long to fit inside the building.

Toby picked up a magazine and showed it to Josh. “Look! It’s a corporate brochure. Tech-Tonic own this place. It makes sense I suppose, they are one of the biggest computer companies in the world.”

“It doesn’t make sense, Toby.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, Tech-Tonic are trying to help Geigerzalion I think. That’s what he told me, and yet he thinks this is the place that’s hurting him.”

Toby shrugged. “Yeah. Well maybe he’s wrong. Let’s take a look down one of these corridors. We’re bound to find something.”

They made their way slowly along the seemingly endless corridor until they came to a junction. Another corridor stretched out before them, again impossibly disappearing into the distance. This one, however, had countless doors on both walls.

“Let’s look into the first one Josh. It can’t hurt.”

“You keep saying that, but sooner or later I’m sure it will.”

“Come on. There’s no one here.”

Josh rolled his eyes, but he did want to see a little bit more, so he said nothing.

The door was shiny metal with a narrow window at eyelevel and a keypad positioned in the centre. They peered through the slit and saw a bright cell containing a central glass column connected to the walls with hundreds of cables and tubes. Within the column, floating in a cloudy, luminous liquid and surrounded by more tubes was a child.

Help me. Please help me.

The child’s voice echoed in Josh’s head.

“Did you hear that?”

Toby nodded. “We’ve got to help.”

“How?”

Let me out. Please.

“How can we open this door?”

You must have the code. Do you have it? There was a note of desperation in the question that was so pure that Josh couldn’t answer. Toby was rooting around in his backpack again and this time he pulled out the notebook they had found in the F.B.I. agent’s pocket.

“We may have.” Josh said.

Hurry, I can feel the guardians stirring.

Toby had found the page where the highlighted numbers were, and he ran his finger along the lines and lines that followed. There was a serial number on the door above the keypad and Toby kept looking from the number and back to the notebook.

“It’s almost too simple.” He mused. “This number corresponds exactly with the numbers in the book.”

A sudden metallic shriek made them jump. It seemed to echo from all around them.

They are coming.

The grating scream was getting louder and louder. Josh could not work out if whatever was making it was between them and the entrance or if it came from further down the corridor.

Toby had pressed some numbers on the keypad and the door, accompanied by a sudden outpouring of steam, slid upwards into the ceiling.

“Get in!” Josh shouted. A metal claw had appeared at the cross section of the corridors and more sharp metal was following it. The two boys dived though the open door, which immediately slid shut behind them. They heard the grinding, shrieking thing pass the door without stopping.

“What was that?” Josh gasped.

“It looked like the virus checker. Only worse.”

They are the guardians. They protect this installation and keep us prisoners.

“Who are you?”

The boy in the glass column could not have been any older than nine or ten. His arms and legs were painfully thin and Josh could see blue veins through his translucent skin.

I am ZX82.

Toby was inspecting the surrounding panels of the door. The whole room was made up of complicated looking equipment, but there was nothing that resembled the keypad lock that they had used to get in.

“Can we open this door from inside?” Josh asked.

No.

“So we’re trapped?”

I can open it. But you must release me from this cocoon. If you free me I can help you.

The voice was pleading now, and Josh could see the boy trying to clutch his hands together in the column, but the numerous tubes and wires made the movement impossible.

“Can you live without all this equipment?”

I…I think so.

“How can we get you out?”

Detailed instructions for how he should disconnect the cables and tubes, and how to drain and open the cocoon flashed through Josh’s mind like a film playing at high speed. For a moment, he staggered from the sudden influx of information, sure that his mind could not accept this much information, but when it stopped he remembered everything that he had to do.

He moved to the first console and his hands raced over the strange buttons and switches as if he had done it a thousand times. Toby had given up looking for a way to open the door and came to watch what Josh was doing.

“Do you know what you’re doing?”

“Yes. He told me.”

“In the same way that Geigerzalion communicates with you?”

“No. He just put the information I needed into my mind.”

“You’re letting him out? I thought you were opening the door.”

“No. We’ve got to help him.”

Josh’s hands had not stopped moving while he spoke and just as Toby finished speaking he pressed the final button.

All the lights went out in the room, which meant that the only illumination was a thin sliver of light from the corridor. Pressurised snapping noises punctuated the darkness as the cables and tubes fell away from the central column that contained the boy. There was a bubbling, gurgling sound as the cloudy liquid started to drain away and clouds of gas or steam billowed around the floor. A rusty scraping signalled the opening of the column and as it twisted the last remains of the liquid splashed out onto the floor, followed by the crumpled body of ZX82. He looked even frailer without the liquid surrounding him.

He lay there as still as death.

Then a claxon started to wail and the lights blazed back on. In the distance the unmistakable shriek of the guardian rang out like an savage hunting horn.

“What have you done, Josh?” Toby breathed.

They were both too frightened to move. They just stood there with the sirens howling and the grinding and shrieking getting closer and louder. Then the door slid open.

Josh suddenly knew what he had to do. He must shut the door and keep the guardian out of the room. Images flashed once more through his mind and he raced across to a different console and let his hands race over the controls. The door slid shut again, but it was too late. A mighty claw had stopped the door from closing all the way. With the high pitched screech of metal scraping against metal the claw rotated and started to open, which forced the door upwards. Another claw joined the first, and another and slowly, inexorably the door was folded away as easily as a tin opener opens a tin of beans.

Toby’s legs had folded beneath him and he was now sitting with his back against the wall, staring hopelessly at the metal monster breaking through the door and frantically clapping his hands together.

“Please, work. I want to go home. Please.”

Josh pressed a few more buttons, but he knew they wouldn’t do anything and a few seconds later the guardian had come completely into the room.

It stood perhaps eight feet tall on four powerful legs like a dog. Metal, segmented tentacles writhed out from around its head all ending with sharp snapping claws or lethal blades of varying sizes. More powerful, solid arms jutted forward from its sides. But its head was the most terrible thing, because unlike the shining cybernetics that made up the body the head was human and Josh had never seen an expression of such malicious hatred.

“Intruder alert in sector ZX!” The monster’s mouth writhed.

It looked from Josh to Toby assessing the dangers of each of them and an evil grin spread across its face. It advanced towards Josh, each leg pounding the metal floor as it moved closer.

Then a bright light erupted from the centre of the room and the tiny, emaciated form of ZX82 was standing between Josh and the monster. He held his hands outstretched in front of him and a shimmering nimbus surrounded them. The aura elongated into a blade and with a strength Josh couldn’t believe came from the small, wasted body, he plunged it into the monster’s chest.

The monster’s mouth opened inhumanly wide, and a howl of frustration and pain emerged from within. The guardian’s front legs collapsed beneath it and it fell forward in a shower of sparks and arcing electricity.

“We must go. Quickly. Many more will come. I am too weak to do that again.” ZX82 whispered hoarsely.

“Where to.”

“There is a way out.”

Josh’s mind was filled again with a kaleidoscope of images. They were mainly of drains and sewers and long corridors, but instantly Josh knew the way out of the complex.

“Come on Toby.”

Toby was just sitting there clapping feebly. Josh ran across to his friend and tried to pull him up to his feet, but he was too heavy. “Come on, Toby. We haven’t got time for this.” Toby looked up at him and Josh could see tears in his friend’s eyes. “I can’t move, Josh. I’m too scared.”

Another howling shriek came from the corridor, quickly followed by another.

“Look, ZX82 can get us out of here. He’s shown me the way, but we must go now! More of those things are coming. They’ll catch us if we stay here.”

Toby hauled himself to his feet and looked about wild-eyed. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Josh turned and made for the wrecked doorway. He thought he would find ZX82 outside, but he was nowhere to be seen. Toby crashed into his back.

“Oh, great. Where is he?” Toby had regained some composure, but he seemed dangerously close to panicking again.

“He’s gone. But it doesn’t matter. I know where to go. Come on.” He dashed down the corridor further into the building, hoping he understood the information ZX82 had downloaded into his mind. They ran as fast as they could until Toby started to wheeze and fall behind.

“Where are we going?” He panted.

“Just a little further. We need to find the control room for this sector.” Just as he said this the corridor opened up into a large room, with dials and screens lining each wall. There were thousands of them, but Josh immediately selected one particular control panel and pressed a few buttons.

There were four corridors leading out of this room stretching into the distance. Josh thought now he could see movement down all of them. Metallic things a long way away were coming nearer and nearer.

“Josh, they’re everywhere. And they’re coming.”

“It’s alright. We’re going to get out a different way.”

The grinding and shrieking was getting louder and louder, accompanied by stamping metal legs coming from every direction.

Josh opened a panel next to a double set of sliding doors. Behind the panel was a large red handle, which he pumped vigorously. The sliding doors jerked open revealing an empty elevator shaft. He sank down to his hands and knees and pushed his legs backwards over the edge of the shaft.

“Come on.”

Toby didn’t need telling twice.

There was an access ladder on the inside of the shaft and they scrambled down as quickly as they could. They slipped occasionally, but their fear gave them strength.

The shaft was getting darker as they got deeper and further away from the light of the control room. Then suddenly it got darker still, and looking up Josh could see that something huge was blocking the entrance to the lift. He could see the glint of numerous claws extending rapidly down the shaft after them.

“Come on. Faster.”

They tried to speed up, but that meant they started losing their grip more often until eventually Josh lost both feet from a rung and was left dangling by one hand. Still the claws extended towards them.

A dazzling whiteness suddenly blossomed from the top of the lift shaft and everything started to disintegrate as if it was being sucked up by a gigantic vacuum cleaner. Pieces of the walls broke off and flew up and away out of sight. The disintegration of the world continued and the remains whorled around in a vortex of chaos. The rungs of the ladder trembled and it became harder and harder to hold on until Josh’s fingers were rattled free and he fell backwards into the seemingly infinite lift shaft. Toby held on for only a few seconds more and with a terrified scream he followed Josh.

Let yourself fall. You will come to no harm.

They fell away from the light until eventually it became nothing more than a pinpoint in the velvet blackness; a single star in the dead of night.

And then they were surrounded by water.

They didn’t fall into it or break any surface; one second they were falling in air, the next they were submerged in water. Their epic fall was slowing as the viscous liquid cushioned them, and somehow they could breathe. The light above them was growing again and shimmering as though it was just at the surface of the water.

As they began to rise they tried to struggle back down, but the water forced them up until, exhausted, they gave up and floated to the surface. Their heads emerged into what looked like a torch lit swimming pool. There was no sign of the destructive white light that had chased them here.

They swam to the side and hauled themselves out onto the cold granite slabs and lay there panting.

“Where are we now?” Josh said eventually.

“Vienopolis.” The voice was deep and hollow.

They both scrambled around to see who had spoken. Three cowled figures stood on the opposite side of the pool, the one in the middle was two or three feet taller than the others.

“What are you doing here? This place is forbidden to everyone except the Doge and his servants. Explain yourselves immediately.”