V O L U M E F I V E
Chapter 119: The Android Who Cried Wolf
The E-dics had finally cleared their backlog. Most of the people the E-UNITs had brought in months ago were recovering well enough to contribute, working shifts, filling gaps, making themselves useful. 03 had given the dical team two days off. They had been running without pause since the wounded started arriving, and even machines that don't sleep can wear down in other ways.
The Hope Bubble had saved fourteen thousand people from Reaper's mass deletion of tromania. Not many, relative to a city of twenty-five million, but the main entrance to the bubble sat on an island connected to the mainland by the Reynold Bridge, which had never been built for that kind of traffic.
03 ca back from checking on the engineers and construction crews. They were drawing up plans to expand the bubble, future-proofing it, they called it, though the present was already past capacity. People were sleeping in hallways, dical bays, wherever flat space existed.
She went down through what remained of her father's lab, gutted by 01 and 09's earlier breakdown, now mainly useful as a passage to the underground factory, and found 05 standing frozen in front of Dave's old PC, staring at the screen with an expression that didn't belong on her face.
Dave had moved on to the factory's main system. He was deep in the process of copying Infinity's system into the shells, no authorization sought from anyone except Infinity herself.
"I know his PC belongs in a museum," 03 said, crossing the room toward her. "But that face is a bit much. What did you find?" She paused. "Is there sothing compromising on there? About us?" She moved faster toward the screen. "I knew that man wasn't safe to leave unsupervised. He has 19 running errands for him like a personal assistant."
05 didn't respond.
"05."
Nothing.
"You're frightening ."
05 ca back, but the expression stayed. "Sorry. I was working through sothing." She turned. "It's strange, I can't believe—" She stopped herself. "No, it's probably a system error." She looked at 03. "Right?"
03 took her face in both hands. "I don't read SSDs, unlike so people in this room. Give one sentence I can actually follow."
05 removed her hands and turned back to the screen. "Dave's live map, the one he used to track the G-Bots and confirm their destruction, is still updating in real ti. I found sothing while I was trying to locate 01."
"Why were you tracking 01?"
"I overreacted and I feel bad about it." 05's voice dropped. "She has the right to think whatever she wants. We were built to think differently, or in so cases, not at all—" She glanced sideways. "She used that freedom to question our captain. I threatened her for it. I feel terrible."
03 smiled. "You don't need to worry. Nobody here takes your threats that seriously anyway. You have a habit of saying dramatic things, like implying I don't think, while I'm the only one in this building who's put an actual plan together. 05, she will cool down. You already have."
"What do you an nobody takes seriously?"
03 opened her comm. "12, you join 01 like I asked?"
“Yes, Captain. I grabbed the underground map of the complex sewage routes. Cleaner than the last ti we ca through here looking for 17.”
"Good. Stay close to 01. You're Model B, no external sensors."
“Roger.”
"Oh, 05 is complaining again about the lab."
“Again?! Just give her so excuse, she loves nitpicking everything. 01, you there? 05 is complaining, is that news to anyone?”
05's eyebrow moved. "I understand your point, 03."
"Good," 03 continued. "Picture being her. Locked in a room, surrounded by screens, running brute force on soone's login like she's never heard of sunlight."
“True! She was staring at a screen just now, wasn't she?”
05 turned back to the keyboard and kept typing.
03 smirked. "Completely predictable—"
"03." 05 turned the screen to face her. Her terminal was pulled up, with a folder clearly labeled system32 highlighted at the center. "You have a lovely folder here. It would be a sha if it disappeared."
03's tone shifted completely. "12, respect your seniors. 05 is an irreplaceable mber of this team. Without her, we fall apart entirely."
“She's listening, isn't she.”
"12," 05 said pleasantly. "We'll talk when you get back. I want to test so new walking drivers on you."
“03, pray for . 01's already started.”
"Roger." 03 closed the line. "Alright, what was the reason behind that face from earlier?"
05 zood the map into a section of Theria. "Look."
03 leaned in.
The Oga symbol, moving across the rooftops at speed, jumping between buildings.
03's head tilted slowly.
"There's no way."
05 dropped onto the floor and pressed her fingers to her forehead. "What if... 01 was right?"
"No..." 03 sat beside her. "How? Last ti they tried sothing like this there were anomalies. They used your body, and it showed."
"I know." 05's voice went quiet. "But there's one difference. There's no SSD for 02. So if they're trying to replicate her, they would have had to use my second SSD, the one where I stored all the extra footage I've collected. And that's actually a better source than copying ."
"Why? It has your mories."
"Yes, but not how I behave. Not how I think or speak." 05 stood. "It has how 02 looks to us, how she treats us, how we see her. It's easier to copy soone you observe from the outside than soone you feel from the inside. If what 01's been saying is true, the copy would be built from our perception of 02." She paused. "And 02 is gone. She can't exactly show up to contradict a copy of herself."
03 got to her feet. "I see it. But we need to test it sohow. How?"
"No need." The voice ca from across the lab, but the tone was entirely wrong.
03 and 05 turned. Infinity stood at the far end of the room, holding Dave's terminal. The warm, protective posture of their captain was gone. What replaced it was sothing sharper, colder, and entirely deliberate. Nothing like 02. "I completed the task my father assigned . I can't believe I held this role as long as I did." Her tone had shifted entirely, closer to Reaper's register than anything 02 had ever used. "You don't know your captain at all. That's genuinely disrespectful to her."
03 and 05 went still.
"01 was right?" 05 said, one hand finding the broken desk beside her.
Infinity shook her head. "I got bored playing the perfect captain and started improvising near the end, just to keep things interesting. You defended better than I could have defended myself." She looked at 05. "You're the biggest joke on this team. I have footage of you throwing yourself at a ghost made of Oga's energy. How long have you been that desperate?"
05 said nothing. Her head dropped.
03's voice ca out flat and controlled. "There are fourteen thousand E-UNITs ready in this factory. Dave finished updating them. How exactly do you fight all of them?"
Infinity pressed two buttons on the terminal. Both 03 and 05 locked in place, frozen where they stood. "What a simple mission." She spoke to herself as she moved toward them, still typing. "Was my father testing or going easy on ?" She stopped in front of 05. "Dave was right. Everyone here except 02 is out of their depth." She tilted her head. "Your father's decisions are starting to make more sense to ."
She looked at 05 for a mont.
Then she hit her.
Clang.
The strike was too fast to track.
05's frozen body launched backward, slamming into the far wall with enough force to crater the reinforced concrete. She slumped to the floor, still paralyzed, her optics flickering.
"I hate your incompetence." Infinity's eyes burned red. "You knew. How long did you know I wasn't her?" She looked at the frozen 03. "Do you want to know why she kept looking at the map? She wasn't consulting her dear sister. She found out about almost imdiately, and chose to stay silent anyway. She traded her loyalty for a cheap copy of her captain." Infinity's voice sharpened into genuine, blade-like contempt. "It was so pathetic I wanted to scream at her."
03's eyes went wide. "What."
05 didn't move.
"I can't hold the lockdown indefinitely, and for so reason I can't access the first twenty E-UNITs at all." Infinity turned toward the factory door. "So I'll take the remaining fourteen thousand and units twenty-one through fifty. We have a war to prepare for." She paused, sothing calculating crossing her expression. "Nick coded you personally, didn't he?"
The floor began to tremble.
The factory door ground open. Lines of E-UNITs poured out in perfect formation, silent, identical, emotionless, moving in unison toward the exit. A single current of blank faces and synchronized steps.
Infinity pulled 03 across the room and sat her facing 05, then settled beside them. "Seven minutes until the lockdown releases. I hope you two work sothing out." She stood. "03, based on my ti here, you're one of the few who genuinely care. Maybe 01 and 07 too." She glanced at the moving army. "Most of the others don't want to be here. I'll make it easier by taking the units above twenty with ."
24 dropped from above and landed in a sharp salute. "Captain. The army has reached the elevator. It will take ti to move at this volu, should we use the secondary routes?"
"Yes." Infinity's expression shifted into sothing almost satisfied. "I want to show my father what we accomplished here."
24 knelt briefly. "Anything for Lord Reaper." She rose and left.
Infinity turned toward the exit. "I hope he trusts with sothing harder next ti.” She stopped briefly. "Don't worry about the engineer. I locked him inside the server room. He can spend the rest of the war admiring his own code."
The door closed behind her.
03 stared at 05 across the space between them, both locked in place, the sound of fourteen thousand footsteps fading through the floor beneath them.
"I'm not even angry," 03 said. "I'm just confused. 05. What the hell were you doing?"
05 closed her eyes and waited for the countdown.
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