The Dreamweb, part 12
Part 12
Behind the safety of three inches of bullet-proof glass, the Supervisor and the Chirurgeon observed Pentos as he danced through the training room, dodging the endless streams of bullets that were flung at him by the machineguns mounted on the wall. He moved about effortlessly, proving that the Chirurgeon had done a perfect job in building him. Even now his creator watched, a strange glint of affection in her eyes.
Meanwhile, the Supervisor was more interested in the report in his hands. It held a series of tactical dilemmas inspired by some of the great battles of human history. Pentos had solved them all within an hour after waking up. Had the construct been in command then, human history would have progressed quite differently indeed. Despite the Doctor’s treason, the reconstruction of Pentos’ mind had been as perfect as the construction of his body. Still, the Supervisor was not a happy man.
The phone call had come in the middle of the night. This irked the Supervisor, who wasn’t used to having his daily routine disturbed, especially if the disturbance meant bad news. The team that had been following Tetra reported that she had had contact with a priest. Furious at their failure to stop Tetra from contacting the outside world he ordered the team to eliminate the priest and intercept the rogue agent. Half an hour later came the second phone call, again with bad news. The team had found Tetra’s tracking device, still covered in the dark fluids that replaced her blood. The serrated lid of a tin can, glinting with the same substance, indicated that she had cut the device out of her arm. The team followed the trail of spatters for about twenty yards, but by that time the wound had been knitted shut and they lost their track. With no idea where she could have gone, the Supervisor had no choice but to dispatch more teams and hope for the best. This was bad. This was very bad. The Facility’s cloak of a medical research institute was flawless, but there were always conspiracy nuts out there just looking for a good story to hunt, and a bio engineered humanoid walking the streets was just such a story. Still, his team was good at what it did, and he doubted Tetra would remain out there for more than a few days.
The Supervisor was pulled from his musings by the sound of a dozen bullets connecting with the glass. He looked up and saw that Pentos was already on the other side of the room, still moving. The glass had barely been dented. As he turned his eyes to the report again, the Chirurgeon spoke up.
“Have the cleaners returned Tetra yet?”
“No, not yet. There appears to be a… slight delay.”
The Chirurgeon nodded, hesitating for a second before asking another question. “Do you think it was a mistake to send her out?”
The Supervisor’s eyes shot daggers at the Chirurgeon. “Are you questioning me?”
Instinctively, the Chirurgeon regressed to the role of sycophant. “Of course not sir, I was merely wondering why-“
The Supervisor bit back angrily, showing far more emotion than the Chirurgeon was used to from him. “Why? You’re not hired to bother with the whys of how this place is run!” The Supervisor found some relief in the fact that raising his voice still had the effect it always had. The Chirurgeon had almost visibly shrunk, her eyes fixed on Pentos again.
Why? Because he needed more research data. Because he trusted the cleaners that followed Tetra to follow the mission parameters he had set out for them. Because he hadn’t expected the girl to be smart enough to cut into her own arm to dig out the tracking device. Because he had thought the Doctor’s work had been more professional than this. The Supervisor knew that parts of Tetra’s old personality still remained, but the Doctor had assured him those parts had been buried.
With an angry sigh, the Supervisor shoved the reports back in the Chirurgeon’s arms before turning on his heels and leaving the observatory. He walked through the halls to his private elevator, which took him directly to his office. The doors slid away, revealing the luxurious room beyond. The room felt warmer, more alive than any other space in the Facility. More organic. Still, the room was just as sterile, and the Supervisor only allowed himself the luxury because it made him feel more comfortable, allowing him to work and think faster.
As soon as the Supervisor let himself sink into the large leather chair, the terminal came to life. Each of the teams had sent in a report each fifteen minutes just as they had been ordered, but a quick glance at their subject lines told him that Tetra hadn’t been located yet. He shut down the program and accessed the Facility’s security cameras. He opened camera #392, a room deep inside the menagerie. The Doctor still lay strapped to the table. If it wasn’t for the occasional twitch of an eye and the barely noticeable rise and fall of his chest, the old man might as well have been dead. In a few hours the process would be completed, and the Doctor would be little more than a computer. All useful knowledge would have been preserved, along with a basic comprehension of the English language. A feeding tube would be installed, and a machine would take over the functions of the heart and the lungs. To all intents and purposes, the Doctor would simply be a living computer.
The Supervisor watched the screen for a few more minutes before shutting it off. The only matter that required his direct attention was Tetra, but there was very little he could do about the situation from his office. The full cleaning staff of the Facility was out there, and with the government’s new anti-terrorism laws there would be no way she could leave the city. If she hadn’t been found in three days, he would start calling in favours. In four days she would be dead, nothing but an unpleasant memory. The Supervisor pulled up a notepad and a pen, and started scribbling. However, halfway down the page the pen left nothing more than dry grooves. Close inspection revealed that it was empty. Sighing softly, the Supervisor discarded the empty pen in the waste bin and reached inside the top drawer of his desk for a new one.
A brief flash, just a glance, caused the Supervisor to throw the drawer shut in horror. He was sure he had gotten rid of it… Slowly, almost fearfully, he pulled the drawer open again. It had just been his imagination. Still, now that he had seen it the image wouldn’t go away. The picture of the young girl, not a day over fifteen, smiling softly, a thin, angular face framed by long strands of black hair, wire frame glasses lining her eyes. No. Just his imagination. She was a memory. She would be a memory. It was just a matter of time. For all his investments in her, she was still a failure. Always one step behind. The Supervisor sighed and closed his eyes as he leaned back into his luxurious chair. All too often these days he was hindered by incompetence, and it was beginning to wear on his nerves.
“Are you sure she is what you make her out to be?”
“How many girls do you know that could name every single bone in the human skeleton at the age of four?”
“Again I’m trusting your word, but I’ll need more evidence before taking her in…”
“Her grades-“
“Her grades prove nothing. No… I’ve set up a test of my own.”
A button was pushed, and a wall in the back of the room slid away quietly. Behind it was what appeared to be a small laboratory, with all the basic instruments that could be expected and a large collection of reagents. The Supervisor smiled as the girl behind the glass read the note.
“What are you doing?”
“Quite simple. During our breakfast I’ve had your tea spiked with a mild neurotoxin. Your little prodigy has exactly two hours to work out an antidote. If she succeeds, she stays. If she fails, we’ll send her back, and you’ll be… fired, I suppose…”
The man sputtered a request, but the Supervisor ignored it. His associate knew the price of failure, and he also knew that the Supervisor always had ways to investigate opportunities for investment. Finally he settled to watch Claudia’s progress through the one way mirror. She had read the note, and without showing any outside signs of distress she had begun to work.
“Does she… did the note say why she’s making the antidote?”
The Supervisor gave a light chuckle. “Of course it did. A little pressure never hurt anybody… Besides, compared to what we’re expecting of her, this is child’s play…”
“Well she is just a child…”
“You didn’t seem to care about that when you brought her to me…”
“Of course sir, but you have to understand-“
The Supervisor gave an angry wave with his hand, and his associate shut his mouth immediately, slumping down on one of the metal chairs that was standing besides the mirror. As he sat down, he noticed that his hands were trembling slightly. Whether it was from the tension of the moment or from the supposed neurotoxin he had been poisoned with he did not know, but both possibilities greatly worried him. Behind the mirror, Claudia worked as quickly as she could. She had been told that she would have to complete a test, that she had to prove that she was worthy of the education that would be offered to her here. She was a bit annoyed at the little story of someone actually being poisoned. She thought that by now the grown-ups would have realized that she didn’t care for stories, only the simple facts. Still, they had told her that this institution was leading the field of medical research, and the tour they had given her had impressed her very much. If she could follow her education here, it would be her way out. All she had to do was complete this relatively simple test…
The Supervisor grimaced at the memory. It left a sour taste in the back of his mouth. Such waste… Maybe one of these days, when Tetra had been collected, Thomas Gaelen had been killed and Pentos had been put to work in the field, he would ask the Chirurgeon to cut it from his mind.
Behind the safety of three inches of bullet-proof glass, the Supervisor and the Chirurgeon observed Pentos as he danced through the training room, dodging the endless streams of bullets that were flung at him by the machineguns mounted on the wall. He moved about effortlessly, proving that the Chirurgeon had done a perfect job in building him. Even now his creator watched, a strange glint of affection in her eyes.
Meanwhile, the Supervisor was more interested in the report in his hands. It held a series of tactical dilemmas inspired by some of the great battles of human history. Pentos had solved them all within an hour after waking up. Had the construct been in command then, human history would have progressed quite differently indeed. Despite the Doctor’s treason, the reconstruction of Pentos’ mind had been as perfect as the construction of his body. Still, the Supervisor was not a happy man.
The phone call had come in the middle of the night. This irked the Supervisor, who wasn’t used to having his daily routine disturbed, especially if the disturbance meant bad news. The team that had been following Tetra reported that she had had contact with a priest. Furious at their failure to stop Tetra from contacting the outside world he ordered the team to eliminate the priest and intercept the rogue agent. Half an hour later came the second phone call, again with bad news. The team had found Tetra’s tracking device, still covered in the dark fluids that replaced her blood. The serrated lid of a tin can, glinting with the same substance, indicated that she had cut the device out of her arm. The team followed the trail of spatters for about twenty yards, but by that time the wound had been knitted shut and they lost their track. With no idea where she could have gone, the Supervisor had no choice but to dispatch more teams and hope for the best. This was bad. This was very bad. The Facility’s cloak of a medical research institute was flawless, but there were always conspiracy nuts out there just looking for a good story to hunt, and a bio engineered humanoid walking the streets was just such a story. Still, his team was good at what it did, and he doubted Tetra would remain out there for more than a few days.
The Supervisor was pulled from his musings by the sound of a dozen bullets connecting with the glass. He looked up and saw that Pentos was already on the other side of the room, still moving. The glass had barely been dented. As he turned his eyes to the report again, the Chirurgeon spoke up.
“Have the cleaners returned Tetra yet?”
“No, not yet. There appears to be a… slight delay.”
The Chirurgeon nodded, hesitating for a second before asking another question. “Do you think it was a mistake to send her out?”
The Supervisor’s eyes shot daggers at the Chirurgeon. “Are you questioning me?”
Instinctively, the Chirurgeon regressed to the role of sycophant. “Of course not sir, I was merely wondering why-“
The Supervisor bit back angrily, showing far more emotion than the Chirurgeon was used to from him. “Why? You’re not hired to bother with the whys of how this place is run!” The Supervisor found some relief in the fact that raising his voice still had the effect it always had. The Chirurgeon had almost visibly shrunk, her eyes fixed on Pentos again.
Why? Because he needed more research data. Because he trusted the cleaners that followed Tetra to follow the mission parameters he had set out for them. Because he hadn’t expected the girl to be smart enough to cut into her own arm to dig out the tracking device. Because he had thought the Doctor’s work had been more professional than this. The Supervisor knew that parts of Tetra’s old personality still remained, but the Doctor had assured him those parts had been buried.
With an angry sigh, the Supervisor shoved the reports back in the Chirurgeon’s arms before turning on his heels and leaving the observatory. He walked through the halls to his private elevator, which took him directly to his office. The doors slid away, revealing the luxurious room beyond. The room felt warmer, more alive than any other space in the Facility. More organic. Still, the room was just as sterile, and the Supervisor only allowed himself the luxury because it made him feel more comfortable, allowing him to work and think faster.
As soon as the Supervisor let himself sink into the large leather chair, the terminal came to life. Each of the teams had sent in a report each fifteen minutes just as they had been ordered, but a quick glance at their subject lines told him that Tetra hadn’t been located yet. He shut down the program and accessed the Facility’s security cameras. He opened camera #392, a room deep inside the menagerie. The Doctor still lay strapped to the table. If it wasn’t for the occasional twitch of an eye and the barely noticeable rise and fall of his chest, the old man might as well have been dead. In a few hours the process would be completed, and the Doctor would be little more than a computer. All useful knowledge would have been preserved, along with a basic comprehension of the English language. A feeding tube would be installed, and a machine would take over the functions of the heart and the lungs. To all intents and purposes, the Doctor would simply be a living computer.
The Supervisor watched the screen for a few more minutes before shutting it off. The only matter that required his direct attention was Tetra, but there was very little he could do about the situation from his office. The full cleaning staff of the Facility was out there, and with the government’s new anti-terrorism laws there would be no way she could leave the city. If she hadn’t been found in three days, he would start calling in favours. In four days she would be dead, nothing but an unpleasant memory. The Supervisor pulled up a notepad and a pen, and started scribbling. However, halfway down the page the pen left nothing more than dry grooves. Close inspection revealed that it was empty. Sighing softly, the Supervisor discarded the empty pen in the waste bin and reached inside the top drawer of his desk for a new one.
A brief flash, just a glance, caused the Supervisor to throw the drawer shut in horror. He was sure he had gotten rid of it… Slowly, almost fearfully, he pulled the drawer open again. It had just been his imagination. Still, now that he had seen it the image wouldn’t go away. The picture of the young girl, not a day over fifteen, smiling softly, a thin, angular face framed by long strands of black hair, wire frame glasses lining her eyes. No. Just his imagination. She was a memory. She would be a memory. It was just a matter of time. For all his investments in her, she was still a failure. Always one step behind. The Supervisor sighed and closed his eyes as he leaned back into his luxurious chair. All too often these days he was hindered by incompetence, and it was beginning to wear on his nerves.
“Are you sure she is what you make her out to be?”
“How many girls do you know that could name every single bone in the human skeleton at the age of four?”
“Again I’m trusting your word, but I’ll need more evidence before taking her in…”
“Her grades-“
“Her grades prove nothing. No… I’ve set up a test of my own.”
A button was pushed, and a wall in the back of the room slid away quietly. Behind it was what appeared to be a small laboratory, with all the basic instruments that could be expected and a large collection of reagents. The Supervisor smiled as the girl behind the glass read the note.
“What are you doing?”
“Quite simple. During our breakfast I’ve had your tea spiked with a mild neurotoxin. Your little prodigy has exactly two hours to work out an antidote. If she succeeds, she stays. If she fails, we’ll send her back, and you’ll be… fired, I suppose…”
The man sputtered a request, but the Supervisor ignored it. His associate knew the price of failure, and he also knew that the Supervisor always had ways to investigate opportunities for investment. Finally he settled to watch Claudia’s progress through the one way mirror. She had read the note, and without showing any outside signs of distress she had begun to work.
“Does she… did the note say why she’s making the antidote?”
The Supervisor gave a light chuckle. “Of course it did. A little pressure never hurt anybody… Besides, compared to what we’re expecting of her, this is child’s play…”
“Well she is just a child…”
“You didn’t seem to care about that when you brought her to me…”
“Of course sir, but you have to understand-“
The Supervisor gave an angry wave with his hand, and his associate shut his mouth immediately, slumping down on one of the metal chairs that was standing besides the mirror. As he sat down, he noticed that his hands were trembling slightly. Whether it was from the tension of the moment or from the supposed neurotoxin he had been poisoned with he did not know, but both possibilities greatly worried him. Behind the mirror, Claudia worked as quickly as she could. She had been told that she would have to complete a test, that she had to prove that she was worthy of the education that would be offered to her here. She was a bit annoyed at the little story of someone actually being poisoned. She thought that by now the grown-ups would have realized that she didn’t care for stories, only the simple facts. Still, they had told her that this institution was leading the field of medical research, and the tour they had given her had impressed her very much. If she could follow her education here, it would be her way out. All she had to do was complete this relatively simple test…
The Supervisor grimaced at the memory. It left a sour taste in the back of his mouth. Such waste… Maybe one of these days, when Tetra had been collected, Thomas Gaelen had been killed and Pentos had been put to work in the field, he would ask the Chirurgeon to cut it from his mind.