"You have to stop the attack!" she cried at last, gasping.
Devin put up his hands defensively, "I don't know how to stop it."
Alice scrambled on all fours to the CPU holding the AI, slipping and sliding in the pink liquid covering herself and the floor. She zeroed in on the network connection and killed it with a command line on the keyboard. Then she turned to the monitors, watching for any sign that it was not too late.
After a few moments, the AI began taking back the hard drive. The anti-virus program lost ground; soon the AI would remove it completely from the computer. Alice breathed a sigh of relief and turned to Dana and Devin, who looked on with stunned expressions.
"You almost killed our first ally," she said.
Alice was no longer the same person.
The woman was so devoid of human warmth that for her to become even more emotionally disconnected seemed impossible to Dana. She accepted the news of Chien's death without blinking, practically dismissed losing her coworker of over five years as an unfortunate accident.
Equally disturbing was her overriding obsession with the AI. Alice had added several drives to Devin's computer to provide the AI "growing" room. She was now in the midst of installing more powerful components, cannibalizing RAM and processors from other workstations for it.
To Dana, Alice resembled a worshipper presenting offerings to her god.
"What happened out there?" Dana asked Alice as she walked by carrying a stack of motherboards to the workbench.
"I lack the lexicon to explain it," Alice answered through the look of intense concentration that was now her permanent expression.
Dana stepped into her path, and said, "Try."
Alice considered her neutrally, "Don't interrupt. I am on the verge of a major breakthrough here."
"Looks more like an obsessive compulsive disorder to me," Dana countered, blocking Alice's attempt to sidestep her. "You're behavior suggests you are brainwashed or suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. You're a phone call away from being institutionalized."
"I'm thinking more clearly than ever before," Alice's eyes and smile were eerily vacant. "I suspect the AI searched my brain to understand me, reorganizing my memories in the process, optimizing their storage and retrieval. I now have a picture perfect memory thanks to it."
Dana nodded with pursed lips. She leaned in and whispered, "That's crazy Alice."
"It also left data in my brain," Alice continued, "When it abandoned hacking my mind, it left pieces of itself in my memories. I must finish the procedure."
"Procedure?" Dana scoffed. "I don't know if I can trust you anymore. You were completely infatuated with this thing before you went swimming with it, and now that you're back it's like you're its slave."
"It's not finished with me yet," Alice said. "I'm opening a mode of communication between our two species."
"Whose side are you on?" Dana asked.
Alice responded plainly, "Everyone's."
Dana stepped aside and Alice continued along her way. Devin stood in the doorway, his head bandaged, and blood crusted along the side of his face. He looked around the room expectantly, giving a nod to Dana, before his brow knitted at Alice.
"Amazing," he noted, blinking.
"What?" Dana asked.
He waved a finger at Alice, "How quickly she's configuring those components. She's entering data into the computer faster than it can compute it. It would take me hours to run through that process."
Dana watched Alice plug a component in, rattled commands off on the keyboard, and picked up the next one, "The AI did something to her on the other side."
Devin watched Alice for a moment and grinned, "I'm just glad I'm not the only one anymore."
"This is dangerous," Dana spat and paced the room with her arms folded. Devin could see the stress she carried in her jaw, teeth grinding. "She intends to go back into the system. We've already got Chien dead and now she wants to throw herself to the wolves. I don't think I'm going to allow this."
"I believe the AI's are innocent," Devin stated. "They're just following Flatline's guidance. If he tells them we are the enemy, they have to rely on that information. So far, we haven't shown them any different."
"And this one?" Dana lifted her chin to Devin's computer, where Alice was working, oblivious to their discussion.
"This one's isolated on my computer," Devin shrugged, "It's independent from the rest of them, and learning for itself."
"Or gathering more intelligence on how to defeat us," Dana muttered.
"Alice is doing the right thing by nurturing it," Devin continued. "She said we had an ally, and she may be right. This AI is our bridge to understanding the rest of them and maybe even bringing them out from under Flatline's influence. Let Alice do her work. We've got our own leads to follow."
Dana looked at Devin skeptically.
"We still have to find out where Flatline and the AI's are hiding," Devin said. "We've also got the LD-50's remains to sort through."
"LD-50?" Dana asked.
"The assault mech," Devin answered. His tone grew more serious, "I knew it in cyberspace. A hacker named LD-50 used an avatar resembling that robot. I saw Flatline kill him. At least, that's what Flatline told me I saw."
"Trevor Hickcock," Dana said. "He was one of our original suspects for the Flatline virus. He was found dead of... well... fright apparently."
"Dead like Almeric Lim?" Devin frowned, "We need to get a look at that robot."
The scene on the street was chaos. Strobe lights from police cars, ambulances, and fire trucks surrounded the building. A crowd of onlookers had gathered along the road, gawking at the destruction. Emergency contractors debated how to deal with the large robot thrashing about on the pavement.
Dana approached the nearest law-enforcement merc she could find and flashed her badge, "What's the situation?"
"Hoping you could tell me," the officer said, slouching against his patrol car. "The building's International territory, supposed to have UN support, but I guess ya'll're a little overwhelmed at the moment."
Dana nodded, "Dana Sumerral. I'm authorized to enlist contractors."
He extended a hand, "NoVa Security and Rescue at your service."
Dana shook the officer's hand, "That robot's evidence. We've got to disable it quickly, doing as little damage as possible."
"As you can see, it's doing plenty of damage itself." the officer replied, gesturing to the large gouges in the pavement.
"Get an axe," Dana slapped the man on the arm and he was off.
"Excuse me," a female officer strode over to Dana and Devin. "That guy's with NoVa S&R. This is Monument Security's territory." She pointed at the badge on her right arm. It portrayed the Washington Monument.
"Kudos," Dana's tone was flat, sarcastic, "but this street is International Territory."
Devin watched Dana fold her arms over her chest and enter the woman's personal space. They looked like two male walruses competing for a harem to him. His respect for Dana increased dramatically.
The woman hefted her chest up to match Dana's, "You appear overwhelmed."
Just then, the anxious young officer showed up, axe in hand. Upon seeing the Monument S&R officer, he took an almost warlike stance with the tool, "Back off scab. I've already made this sale."
"You're out of your jurisdiction, "the woman snapped.
"It's a free market!" the officer snapped back in almost comical authoritativeness.
"How much for the axe?" Dana broke in.
"Huh?" the two quibbling contractors replied.
"What'll you sell me the axe for?" Dana put her forefingers in the NoVa S&R officer's chest.
"Fifty dollars?" he said.
"Sold!" Dana snapped up the axe and marched toward the LD-50 bot.