Proxy, page 30
Just when Ray felt certain they were lost, he caught sight of a wooden-framed gate set into a tall wire fence up ahead, lit by the moonlight. A camera, angled away from them, stood on top of a fence post.
In that same moment, a shadow emerged from amidst the trees close by the nearest side of the fence. The shadow resolved into a figure, moving quickly towards them.
Ray instinctively reached into his pocket for the gun Zero had given him, wrapping his fingers around its grip.
Whoever they were, they were entirely bald and rake-thin and of indeterminate age or gender. Facial tattoos reached down their neck and beneath their sleeveless T-shirt. Their arms looked toned and muscular.
“Isaac, Ray,” the figure said, coming to a halt before them. “Please wait here a moment.”
A proxy, then. Ray felt himself relax. Their voice offered no further clue to their gender.
The tattooed proxy turned away and stepped towards a tree close by the fence and out of range of the fence-mounted camera. As Ray watched, they jumped up with the lithe grace of an athlete, grabbing hold of a low-hanging branch and hauling themselves up and out of sight amidst dense foliage.
Ray craned his neck upwards to see the proxy crawl along a thick branch that hung over the fence. His heart crawled into his throat when he saw the proxy hang upside down, gripping the branch between their thighs.
The proxy, now directly above the camera, reached down to it. They had something in one hand that glittered in the moonlight.
Reaching down, they touched it to the camera casing.
Nothing happened that Ray could see, but after another moment the proxy pulled themselves back up onto the branch, then worked their way back to the main trunk before dropping down to the forest floor with practised ease.
Under less potentially lethal circumstances, Ray might have applauded.
“I shut the camera down,” said the proxy, stepping towards the fence and touching the same device they had used on the camera to the gate’s electronic lock.
Ray heard a faint click, and the proxy gave the gate a slight push. It swung noiselessly open.
“The estate security will send someone out to fix it, of course,” the proxy offered over their shoulder. Ray watched as they walked over to a tree some metres away and picked something up from the grass.
At first, Ray thought the object they had picked up was a rifle, but the barrel looked odd, like some kind of cartoon blunderbuss.
“That means,” the proxy added, returning to them, ”that we have to move fast.”
“Wait a minute,” Ray said to the proxy. “You’re coming with us? What if Markov tries to take you over?”
“I consider it a limited but acceptable risk,” the proxy replied. “You’ll need my help, that much is certain.”
“Zero’s right,” said Isaac, glancing nervously around. “I’ll need his insight once we find Markov. And as he says, we should hurry. This way.”
Ray’s mouth and throat felt bone-dry when he followed them through the gate. Looking more closely, he saw that what the proxy was holding was a microwave-gun with a bell-shaped barrel.
“What do you need that thing for?” he asked Zero.
“We may encounter drones,” the proxy replied.
Soon, the trees gave way to gardens divided into sections by tall hedges. David Markov’s mansion loomed above a cluster of outbuildings.
Isaac appeared to know exactly which way to go. He kept to the shadows alongside a tall hedge and Ray and Zero followed behind him, moving inexorably closer to the main building.
At one point Isaac halted and turned to look at them both. “I don’t know how much things have changed since I was last here,” he whispered, “but there were always three guards patrolling the grounds at any one time. They usually had one foot patrol doing the rounds and another two guards driving around the estate in an SUV. Plus maybe one more in an office in one of the outbuildings, to monitor the feeds from security drones. The most they ever had to deal with, to my knowledge, were journalists trying to sneak in or local kids on a dare. I don’t think they’ll be expecting us, but we still have to be careful.”
Isaac led them down a narrow, rutted path past a cluster of whitewashed buildings. Pale blue light illuminated the interior of one. Isaac stopped long enough to point at it, then put his finger to his lips.
Five minutes later, headlights flashed on a road leading to the mansion. Isaac once again brought them to a halt.
“We’re in luck,” he whispered. “That’s the next shift arriving, I think. They’ll be too busy switching over to be paying much attention to drone feeds or anything else for at least the next ten minutes.”
As if drawn by Isaac’s words, Ray heard a faint rumbling like a buzzsaw heard through a soundproofed wall. He glanced upwards, seeing something black and circular come flying low above the path they were on.
Zero, working through his proxy, slipped the microwave gun from their shoulder and waited. The drone looked like it might not have seen them, but as it flew past them it slowed to a halt, hovered for a moment, then began to come back towards them.
The proxy aimed their microwave gun at the drone and squeezed the trigger. The gun made no sound, but the drone fell out of the sky and onto the path, landing with a wet thud amidst mud and tangled grass.
“Between that and the camera you hacked,” Ray whispered, “that’s definitely going to get somebody’s attention.”
The proxy nodded. “Agreed. Let’s get moving before anyone gets here.”
Isaac stepped towards the corner of a building, looked around, then ran in a low crouch towards the house. Ray came next, the proxy close behind. He joined Isaac on the other side of a door at the rear of the mansion.
“You seriously did this a lot?” Ray whispered to Isaac.
“More often than you think,” Isaac said with a grin, his teeth pale and long in the moonlight.
Isaac reached for the door handle, but Ray stopped him and motioned him back. Ray took his place, easing the door slowly open. Peeking inside, he saw rows of silent washing machines and empty baskets on shelves: a laundry room.
“Remember,” Ray whispered to Isaac. “Once we find Markov, it’s up to you and your pet computer to figure out whatever it is you need to do to shut him down. I’ll keep an eye out for trouble, but make it fast. I’ll lead the way, but you need to tell me which way to go. Understood?”
Isaac nodded. “That way,” he said, gesturing to a door at the far end of the laundry room.
Ray opened the door as quietly as he could and saw a short passageway on the other side, no more than a metre in length, connecting at a right angle to a corridor. He glanced back at Isaac and Zero and motioned for them to follow.
Stepping up to the corner of the passageway, Ray realized he could hear someone speaking somewhere to the left. He turned to look at the other two and put a finger to his lips.
He waited. A few seconds later Ray heard a door open and several pairs of feet crunch across gravel. Car doors swung open and shut, followed by wheels rolling over that same gravel. He guessed this was the security changeover Isaac had mentioned.
Now everything was silent.
“Where now?” Ray whispered back to Isaac.
“Go right,” Isaac whispered back. “There’s a stairwell in a foyer. We need to go up to the second floor.”
Ray nodded, then led the way. The stairwell was a claustrophobe’s nightmare, most likely built for the use of servants in an earlier and very different age.
“Let me go first,” said Isaac, as they reached the second floor.
They emerged into another corridor, to where they could see light seeping from beneath a closed door at its far end.
“I think that’s where we’ll find him,” Isaac whispered, nodding towards the door.
“You’re certain?” Ray whispered back.
Isaac motioned with his chin at a wall-mounted notice to which Ray hadn’t paid any attention: MEDICAL STAFF ONLY BEYOND THIS POINT.
“Quite certain,” said Isaac.
Isaac started to move towards the door, but the proxy stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. “Allow me,” they said.
The proxy stepped nimbly up to the door, its odd weapon pulled over one shoulder by a strap. They knelt to study a keypad.
“Can you get through?” Ray asked as he came up behind the proxy, speaking as quietly as he could.
The proxy reached into a pocket and withdrew what Ray suspected was the same device they had used on the camera. They pressed it against the keypad, and after a moment a red light above the keypad changed to green.
Ray heard the lock disengage, and when the proxy reached for the door handle and pushed, the door opened. Ray tensed, expecting alarms to start whooping, but nothing happened.
“Good work, Zero,” said Isaac, squeezing their shoulder before ducking inside.
Ray had to give it to Isaac: the man had balls of steel. He’d come straight out of his safe house to confront both him and Elijah before he had any idea who they might be, and was practically charging into a heavily guarded private estate belonging to a man with every reason to want him dead.
Hopefully, that bravery wouldn’t wind up with all of them dead.
Following behind the two others, Ray found himself in the same, brightly lit room he’d seen in Amy Cotter’s hastily-snatched video.
David Markov’s shrivelled form still lay in its large, mechanized bed, apparently unaware of their presence—or of anything else, Ray suspected. Those few seconds of video, however, had barely hinted at the full horror of what Ray now found himself confronted with.
The twisted, wetly glistening filaments rising from within the blackened ruins of Markov’s skull looked to the detective’s eyes like a machine-organism born of plastic and metal. It was almost as if the machinery were feeding on the old man, drawing unholy sustenance from the body’s fading life-force.
Ray turned away, swallowing down phlegm that burned the back of his throat. The tattooed proxy, meanwhile, had taken up a post by the door, keeping a watchful eye back along the corridor.
Isaac stepped up close to the bed, peering closely at the machinery embedded within David Markov’s skull. He then turned to regard the rest of the room with equal concentration. His lips moved silently as if he were talking to himself.
“Could we fry all this machinery with Zero’s microwave gun?” asked Ray.
“I’m afraid it’s a one-shot device,” Zero said without looking around. “I would have discarded it, but I was concerned it might be discovered by a patrol. Besides,” the AI added, “doing so would only destroy the interfaces. Until we know exactly what we’re dealing with, we need them intact and functioning.”
“Zero,” said Isaac, moving away from the bed, “I need your help over here.”
“We could just smash all this the hell up,” said Ray, his mouth twisted up in disgust. “Or start a fire and burn the place down.”
Isaac and Zero exchanged a look. “That’s not what we’re going to do,” said Isaac.
Ray turned to stare at him. “Why the hell not?”
“You’ll to have to trust me on this,” said Isaac.
Ray’s expression became incredulous. “I thought the idea was to come here and stop Markov.” He gestured at the body in the bed. “So let’s stop him!”
Isaac’s gaze slid away from Ray’s. “It’s not that simple.”
“Mr Thomas,” said the proxy, “perhaps you should keep an eye on the corridor while I assist Isaac. There isn’t time for detailed explanations.”
After briefly considering demanding an explanation regardless, Ray instead acquiesced, taking up station by the open door.
Zero immediately joined Isaac next to a console. Isaac tapped rapidly at a keyboard and in response, several wall-mounted displays flickered and shifted until their predominant colour was red.
Ray still had one hand wrapped tightly around the pistol in his pocket.
It was becoming increasingly clear to him that both Isaac and Zero were keeping something back. Ray eyed the glistening machinery that acted as the conduit for all of David Markov’s aspirations—the means by which the man who had once ruined his life intended to achieve immortality.
That thought in itself was enough to cause Ray to slide the pistol out of his pocket. He could end all of this now, if he wanted, and to hell with these other two.
By carrying out this action, he stepped slightly to one side—thereby, he later calculated, saving his own life.
The sound of gunfire filled the air, loud and close enough that it felt like a cannon had gone off next to one of Ray’s ears.
His police training kicked in and he dropped into a crouch, turning and aiming back down the corridor to where he could see a uniformed guard standing at the top of the stairs, holding a pistol in a two-handed grip.
Ray’s fingers compressed around the trigger of his own pistol. It clicked uselessly in his hands.
Shock gripped him for a single moment, and then he threw himself down flat as the guard fired more rounds.
Moving quickly, Ray scrambled backwards and out of the guard’s line of sight, cold sweat bathing his skin. His breath came in harsh, frantic gasps.
He worked the slide of his pistol uselessly and realized what Zero must have done.
The fucking machine took out the firing pin.
“Don’t move!”
Ray looked up to see the same guard standing just outside the room, pistol steady and aimed at his head. Then he shifted his attention to the others.
“You two!” he screamed at Isaac and the proxy. “Get down flat on the ground!”
Ray let the useless pistol slip from his grasp. The guard took a shuffling step forward and kicked it out of reach, then took a step back so he could keep all three of them within his line of fire.
Ray heard someone groan and looked around. The proxy had collapsed to the floor. They sat upright against a shelving unit, one hand pressed to an upper arm that was sticky and dark with blood.
Ray hadn’t realized the proxy had been hit. At least it didn’t look like a fatal shot.
Isaac, however, had chosen to ignore the guard. He stood with his back to the man, his fingers moving rapidly across a keyboard beneath a screen.
Charts and figures on the screen suddenly flared red.
“I said stop!” the guard shouted again, training his gun on Isaac’s back. “Step away from there or I’ll shoot!”
Isaac ignored him. From where Ray sat, he could see the scientist’s lips were moving silently, his skin bright with feverish sweat.
“Do as he says, Isaac,” said Ray, his voice tight.
“Not just yet.” Isaac’s voice was hardly more than a mumble. “Just one more—!”
The guard shot him.
The sound it made felt like a physical blow to Ray’s own skull. Isaac span away from the screen and the wall-mounted keyboard, red blossoming in the centre of his back as he collided with a wheeled trolley next to Markov’s bed.
The trolley fell on its side, plastic trays full of shiny steel utensils spilling onto the floor. Isaac collapsed, his hands grasping at the floor and his face twisted up in anguish.
Ray acted without thinking, pushing himself upright and forward in one swift motion.
The guard turned towards him, but not fast enough: Ray slammed into him hard enough to send the guard staggering back against a set of shelves. Boxes of medical supplies crashed to the floor around them.
Ray pulled back just enough that he could slam his fist repeatedly into the side of the guard’s head, his other hand grasping his opponent’s wrist to keep him from bringing his gun to bear on him again.
Ray brought one knee up and drove it hard into his balls. The guard folded up, sliding bonelessly to the floor.
Ray just kept hitting him, again and again, until the guard at last stopped moving. Ray stood over him for another minute, panting hard, his muscles trembling with fury and terror.
All he could think about was the sound his own gun had made when it failed to fire.
He leaned down and checked the guard’s pulse: still alive. Then he stood back up and turned to face the proxy.
“Zero,” he hissed through gritted teeth, “why the fuck did you give me a gun that wouldn’t fire?”
“We need to tend to Isaac first,” said Zero. The proxy, despite its injury, had stumbled back upright and had positioned Isaac so that he was upright against the wall beneath the screen at which he had been working.
“I suggest you restrain that guard however you can and keep an eye out for more on their way,” Zero said to Ray. “We are extremely limited for time.”
It took an effort of will for Ray to suppress his fury. Zero was right: there wasn’t time, but he didn’t trust the machine any more—if he ever had.
Or should he blame Isaac, with his insane desire to avoid hurting even the very people who’d murder him without a second thought? Yes, he thought, recalling the argument between the scientist and his creation: it most likely had been Isaac’s decision, not Zero’s.
Ray got to work, opening drawer after drawer until he found several computer cords and a length of cotton bandaging that might serve as a gag. Working quickly, he bound the guard, first checking to make sure he was still breathing.
“As far as I can tell the guard isn’t proxied,” said Zero. “Or at least, I can only assume that’s why I remain in control of this body.”
Ray didn’t answer. The side of the guard’s face had turned a nasty purple-blue.
Ray muttered an apology to the man, then dragged him into a corner where he’d be out of the way. He paused only to relieve the guard of his weapon which, he now knew from experience, very much fucking worked.
Tucking the guard’s pistol into his waistband, having first checked it still had ammunition, Ray closed the door and shoved a chair under the handle to keep anyone else from opening it.
There were questions Ray wanted to ask. Very important questions.
But Zero was right: they first had to take care of Isaac.
He could see Isaac was badly wounded, probably fatally. His skin had turned deathly white and his eyelids fluttered spasmodically. Even so, he remained conscious, a look of fierce intent on his face.
