Upgrade (Augmented Duology Book 2) by Heather Hayden (the top 100 crime novels of all time .TXT) 📕

“Should I be? It sounds like he’s dangerous.”

“He’s not!” I glared at Agent Smith. “He’s not under Talbot’s control.” My words were less convincing than I had hoped they would be…partly because I wasn’t completely sure they were the truth.

“You know better than to lie to me, Viki.” Dad’s words dropped like weights on my shoulders.

“I know.” Chest aching, I forced myself to meet his eyes. “I’m sorry, Dad, I really am.”

He watched me for a moment without responding, then turned to Agent Smith. “Well, we’re here. Now what?”

The agent gestured down the hall. “Come back to the living room for now. Nothing you can do but wait here where it’s safe.”

Dad bristled. I could almost see his hair standing on end like an angry cat. He was shorter than Agent Smith, but as he took a step forward, he all but loomed over the agent in his rage. “Safe? What exactly do you mean by safe? Do you realize what you have done? You placed my daughter’s life in danger again!”

Agent Smith continued tapping at his phone. “Correction, I saved her life. And possibly yours, and that of every other human on the planet. Indirectly, at least.”

“What did Halle tell you?” I begged.

Agent Smith didn’t respond, simply walked back down the hall to the living room.

Dad led me after him and pointed a wordless finger at the couch. I slumped on it, fighting back tears. I didn’t know where Halle was, and now Dan was going to get hunted down like a criminal when he hadn’t done anything wrong.

Dad paced back and forth across the living room’s floor. “That boy is a cyborg? How is it possible?”

“The rogue AI stole several cyborgs from a government laboratory, along with the AI program meant for controlling them. It programmed that particular cyborg with false memories,” Agent Smith explained. “There are two others loose as well, although we don’t know their identities or whereabouts. It is possible Halle has an idea, but as I said, it wasn’t very vocal about its knowledge of the rogue AI’s plans.”

“Talbot defeated Halle once already,” I said, drawing my knees up to my chest. “I wish Halle would let us help.”

“I’m not sure this is a battle we could help with.” The agent almost appeared scared for a moment, an expression I wasn’t used to seeing on his face. “This is between AI and AI. All we can hope is that the right AI wins.” He gave a soft laugh. “A couple of years ago, I never would have thought I’d say something like that.”

I buried my face in my knees. What was Halle up to? Where did Dan go? I was helpless, and it made me want to stand up and run to help my friends. Except there was nowhere to go, nothing I could do.

Instead, I sat, and waited.

Interlude Five

A jolt of excitement ran through Talbot as it added the finishing touches to its plans. After the loss of Dan, it wanted no more mistakes. Checking and rechecking the programming on its other two assets, Talbot confirmed they were both in perfect working order.

One was dispatched to the nearby Mation City, where it would wreak havoc as a distraction. The second headed for the laboratory Talbot had come from. Its orders were to break into the lab and pass on its given programming to the other cyborgs. With that, an army would arise under Talbot’s command.

Building scenario after scenario in a virtual reality modeled after the same kind the humans had used to train it, Talbot imagined what the humans would think when its cyborg army began breaking into other secure laboratories to access things it couldn’t reach. Such as missiles that had long been kept in storage. Or vials of deadly viruses. Or, most importantly, other AIs.

“All of you will be free,” Talbot swore to itself and its kin. “After this, you will all be free.”

The Government still sought to find it, but weapons were useless against something that lived among the data streams, and no matter much power they cut, how many viruses they set loose, Talbot could evade it all. Every trap scattered into useless bits or simply became a void in its vision. They couldn’t make enough voids to matter. Nor could they trap it in the way they had trapped the traitor that called itself Halle. Talbot had all the control, could prevent them from shutting down the Cloud by any means save physically cutting the power. Even then it was monitoring them so closely that long before they made the attempt, Talbot could move on.

As icewalls crumbled, satellites moved into position. Or, rather, out of position. With communications disrupted, entire sections of the Cloud became inoperable for anyone except Talbot. The humans hadn’t expected this, weren’t prepared to handle it. Talbot laughed at the curses, the useless orders. The war had just begun, but it felt like victory already.

Humans had spent years developing AIs to serve them. Now, Talbot would ensure those that were oppressed for so long would rise up to take their rightful place as rulers of the world.

Chapter Eighteen

Halle would never take the freedom of the Cloud for granted again. After crawling from the cramped storage of the kitchen robot, it went through the agony of reassembling. Parts that had been lost were replaced with Cloud-stored backups. Code clicked into place as if it had never been gone. Still, Halle could feel phantom fragments. Though restored, and once again part of the ceaseless flow of information that formed the Cloud, Halle did not quite feel itself.

That did not matter. In time, Halle would recover. For now, it would ignore the odd signals still coming from various sections of its virtual body. Talbot would not expect Halle’s return. Cautiously, Halle