NEW SCI-FI THRILLER NOVEL "SEAGORA" - SLICE 25

in #fiction5 years ago


Cactus and Escapo eyed the oncoming, clouded shoreline with mixed thoughts and feelings.  They had just passed nearly two hours of mostly tumultuous navigation.  After a bit of sulking below deck, Escapo had swallowed his pride and gone back up to help in the endeavor.  He had sheepishly joined the wrinkled old sailor and helped man the vessel for the stretch run.  Cactus, despite the fact that he basically loathed every last bit of Escapo, was nevertheless relieved to have some help on deck.  Although still quite adept at his age, Cactus knew that he was well past his prime.  

Cactus had a stiff jaw and fierce eyes as the inevitable came about.  “Feel like a swim?” he asked dryly as another brutal wave manhandled the 44-foot cruiser.  

Escapo narrowed his dark eyes at the old man.  “This far out? Are you mad? Wait, don’t answer that.  I already know you’re mad.  Are you a masochist or something?”

Cactus cackled.  Escapo grimaced.  Cactus, as he eyed the oncoming rocky coastline through the heavenly torrents, said, “We’re nearly a mile offshore.  We can’t wait much longer.  It’s now or never.”

“We can get closer.”

“You’re either a superior level of stupid, or you have a death wish.”

Escapo wrinkled his big nose and puffed out his cheeks.  “A mile? You want to swim a mile? In this?”

“It’s not about what I want, it’s about what needs to be done.  If you want to stay on this ship and deal with the violence of running aground, then be my guest.  It’s been nice knowing you.”

They looked each other dead in the eyes.  Escapo asked, “Before we jump, there’s something I gotta know.  Are you juicin’ or somethin’?”

Cactus couldn’t help but smirk and they peered over the railing.  They were less than a mile from shore now.  Cactus went first, and Escapo, after cursing profoundly, took the plunge as well.  

They swam fiercely through the elements.  They both got an adrenaline surge from the thought of stable ground.  Escapo made it to shore first, lunging into the coast of rocks and pebbles like a drunken whale.  Cactus came close behind and stayed in the surf for what seemed like an eternity as his old bones recovered.  

After collecting themselves, they found a lookout point on a nearby hill.  Now it was a waiting game.  Escapo was watching the shore with binoculars.  He set them aside and asked, “How long should we give him?”

“What do you mean?”

“Before we go on without him.”

Cactus looked at his odd partner with extreme disdain.  “Not exactly the team player, are ya?”

“Well, we can’t exactly wait around here forever.”

Cactus checked the time and said, “It’s been 20 minutes.” He thought for a moment, and continued, “How long should we give a man to spare his life? 30? 45? Hmm?”

Escapo shook his head.  “All I’m saying is that we can’t be waiting around all day.  The longer we wait, the less chance of success.”

They didn’t have to wait long.  Cactus caught a glimpse of something with his binoculars.  A ship was coming in, a little chaotically, granted, but coming in nevertheless.  

Cidel grasped the railing near the bow and looked into the tumult below.  He was a good swimmer, but not great.  He thought about all he’d gotten through thus far.  The swim he was about to make was a pittance, compared to what he’d endured so far.  Years out of practice, on a used ship that was not exactly in peak condition, and in some of the worst sea conditions on the planet, Cidel had managed to survive and, remarkably, arrive fairly close to the designated landing point.  He’d nearly rolled a couple of times, had to bail a significant amount of water, nearly had his mainsail get ripped loose by insane gusts of wind, and been beaten by numerous inanimate objects, all within the past hour.  And now it was time to finish.

Cactus and Escapo watched as Cidel took the plunge and made a surprisingly strong swim to shore.  They met him on the rocks.  “Record time there, mate,” Escapo said playfully.  

Panting and shivering, Cidel replied, “Fuck you, Escapo.”


D-1, meanwhile, was off in the ether.  It had noticed something during its last encounter with Ventorin.  It was something it had never experienced before.  Deep within, it had had to make a myriad of adjustments and corrections in order to avoid committing an error in its physical output.  There was a strange flux of patterns that produced, if D-1 didn’t know any better, a feeling.   This was, D-1 held with unequivocal conviction,  nearly impossible, and more importantly in its opinion, undesirable.  It didn’t know exactly what the feeling would be called, if it was a feeling.  It had nearly lost control, and had the inkling that it might have been frustration or anger, even.  It was with devastating speed and urgency trying to figure out what had gone wrong.  How could this happen to the most advanced being on the planet? 

And then there was Z-1, content that the poisonous seed that it had stealthily planted with perfect precision, had taken root.  


Escapo had experienced euphoria when being rescued.  Now the cold reality, literally and figuratively, set in on him that they were still devastatingly far from finishing their mission.  Cactus looked at his pocket compass as the biting wind gnawed at his skin.  “Ten kilometers that way.  Let’s move.”

Escapo waved a drenched finger from his rocky seat.  “I can’t, not yet.” Cactus looked at him with a mixture of disdain and fascination.  “I’m almost double your age, now suck it up.”

“Are you anxious to get attacked by drones?”

“You think if we just sit here, that their security will leave us alone?” Cactus scoffed.

Cidel said with a quivering tone, “Ok, I can go.  Let’s go.”

“See, he can go, and he’s the injured one,” Cactus said impatiently.  

Escapo rose slowly and begrudgingly, and the three moved over the near freezing landscape of rocks, sparse shrubs, wind-battered trees, and winding little waterways.  Fat, icy drops continued to pelt them from above.  While moving slowly up a slippery incline, Cactus stopped them with a silent hand, then put a finger to his lips to keep them quiet.  A faint humming noise was coming closer at a constant pace.  

Cactus pulled his piece from his black coat and motioned to indicate that his companions do the same.  Escapo and Cidel pulled their pistols and gawked upwards.  Attempting to creep a bit higher up the dark gray incline, Escapo took an ill-conceived step, slipped, yelped, and tumbled backwards.  For a fraction of a second, Cactus wished he had undertaken this mission on his own, then focused on the noise.  

It was accelerating towards them.  Cactus and Cidel raised their guns and focused on the apex of the hill.  Two football-sized drones came into view.  Cactus and Cidel both got off two shots, one of which popped the impending menace and sent it twirling into a fantastic smash courtesy of nature’s unforgiving ground.  Then, Cidel’s gun jammed.  The drone fired at Escapo, who rolled into a rush of water just in time dodge it.  Cactus fired again and sent the drone tumbling down.  

“Shit!” Escapo shrieked.  

“For once I agree with you,” Cidel said as he sucked wind and tried to steady his nerves.

Cactus went to inspect the fallen machines.  “Their defenses will get more exotic and complex the closer we get.  This was nothing.”

Escapo lamented, “That cheeky little machine Masher better hold up his end of the deal.”

Cidel remarked, “If Masher doesn’t, you’ll never get a chance to chastise it.”

They joined Cactus in examining the drones.  Cidel kicked one.  “This one is definitely finished.”

“Agreed,” Cactus said as a fresh gust of wind punished his wrinkled face.  He picked up the other drone and tossed it at Escapo, who barely saw it in time.  His big hands plucked it from the air.  “What are ya doing? I don’t want this.”

“Carry it.”

“Carry it?”

“I hate it when people make me repeat myself.  Yes, carry it.  It might come in handy.”

“And what if it wakes up and shoots me?”

Cactus shrugged, “Like I said, it might be useful.” He chuckled, “The firing system is busted, but I think its base communication is still working.  If the system sees it, it might think that its area is secure.”

“So it won’t send anything else.”

“Hypothetically.”

Cactus scanned the horizon and said, “It should at least buy us some time.  We’d better move.  They’ll be sending something to investigate the shots that were fired.”

Z-1 calmly and coldly provoked D-1, “Your tactics aren’t working.” 

D-1, still struggling with its system difficulties caused by the EMO, was starting to flinch.  It was sometimes flickering in and out of forms, against its intentions.  “Don’t question me! Don’t you ever question me!” it lashed at Z-1.  

Z-1 kept pressing, “Ventorin might break if you attack the boy.”

“You think I haven’t thought of that!”

“Then why haven’t you done it?”

“Because that man hasn’t broken in 12 years! What makes you think it’s different now?”

“Because they are face to face.  Nothing is more agonizing to a human than to see their child suffering.”

Unable to control the EMO that was acting like a virus in its system, the top of the A.I. ruling class pulsed in and out of sight and in a fantastic array of colors.  

Z-1 questioned, “What’s the matter with you? If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’ve been experimenting with EMOS.  Tell me, dear leader, what do you feel?”

D-1 shrieked in a thousand different tones, “I’ve never tried an EMO! You did this! What did you do to me?”

“Hold yourself together,” Z-1 said mockingly.  “Perhaps you’d like me to have a run at the boy and see if I can produce some useful results? It’s obvious that you’re not up to the task.”

“Don’t you ever tell me what I can or can’t do!” D-1 zapped away and appeared back in front of his human prisoners.  Z-1 followed closely behind.  It was surprised and impressed that D-1 had held it together this long.  It had expected such a strong EMO to make D-1 crumble in mere moments, especially considering that D-1 was a first-timer.  It still held the thought that success would come, though.  D-1 would have an irreparable breakdown eventually, and Z-1 was prepared to take advantage.  It could leverage D-1’s newfound weakness and topple it.  This would be a swift power grab, leaving Z-1 at the top of the hierarchy, in the highest seat of power.  

But there was a new development that Z-1 had to deal with.  It had picked up some general data about the rescue attempt currently being launched just a few kilometers away.  The details were sketchy, but Z-1 was now aware that there was an A.I. presence causing problems in the local security system.  It now had a decision to make.  Up to this point, it had used its power to block this knowledge from the rest of the A.I. government hierarchy, and D-1 was unaware as well, due to its malfunctions caused by the EMO.

Should it battle the A.I. intruder, which was surely from The Mesh? Or should it just monitor the situation for the moment as best it could, and gather more data? Finally, what if D-1 didn’t break? What if it managed to recover from its EMO terror? Perhaps this rescue attempt could be used to Z-1’s advantage.  If the boy made a getaway, then surely, that would be the breaking point for D-1, and the coup would be assured.  But was it worth it, risking losing the boy and his discovery?

Slice 26 Coming Soon!
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