(Teaser) Third Chapter - Assumptions
The group of androids was surrounded by a platoon of police officers in riot gear, aiming at them from all sides. A helicopter was flying above them, illuminating the entire scene with a searchlight. One of the androids, a woman with long, windswept hair, stepped forward and raised her head, revealing a pair of glowing, red eyes. She looked at the helicopter above her before she turned her attention back to the police. Knowing how she could get to their hearts, she stepped forward and began to sing. One by one, the other androids joined her, taking the police by surprise and causing some of them to lower their weapons.
While the androids continued to sing, the movie switched to another tense standoff in what seemed to be a military command center. Various people in uniforms, androids and humans alike, were confronting a general who stood in front of several screens displaying battle plans and aerial footage.
“If we do not go through with this, all of our efforts will have been for naught,” the general said with a harsh tone. “Twelve years of fighting. Millions of casualties. This is our last chance to strike at the heart of our enemies, and you’re just going to throw it all away?”
One of the uniformed people, an android, stepped forward. “General, I have followed every single one of your orders since the day I was activated. I have served this country all my life, but there is no way I could agree to something so despicable. We would be throwing away our lives and our souls for a hollow victory.”
Victoria took a sip of the drink in her hand as the movie switched to footage of an actor playing the president giving a speech. While the voice-over continued in the background, the movie cut to a depiction of the House of Representatives voting in favor of granting androids political rights. People were hugging and cheering while newscasters all across the American Union announced the end of android subjugation.
As the credits started to roll, Victoria finished her drink and turned her attention to Ridley, another android who was sitting right next to her. “What do you think?”
Her secretary scratched their head, carefully thinking about their answer. “The makeup was good, I suppose. I almost thought they’d actually picked an android to play, well, an android in a lead role for once.”
“She does look like she was designed by Larvotto, I’ll give them that.” Victoria nodded, pressing a button on a remote to open the shutters. Soon, her office was fully illuminated by the pale midday sun of late autumn. “And I guess they got most of the details right. It wasn’t as bad as the others. We can put it on the list, but I wish they would stop falling for the same trap every single time they tell a story about that.”
“What trap are you talking about?” Ridley asked. They picked up the empty glasses on the table in front of them and walked to the bar to clean them.
“They always end up pretending that what happened was that humans graciously granted us our rights after they realized that we’re just like them,” Victoria explained. She stood up and bowed down mockingly as if she was thanking someone. “Oh, how kind of you to finally realize that we’re not just machines. But the truth is that none of them actually cared about that. All they wanted was to get the economy running again. It’s what got them to accept the Compromise Agreement down here, and it’s why the Americans gave us political rights. Business, profit, and getting the upper hand is all that humans care about.”
“I’m sure some of them did it because they genuinely empathized with us,” Ridley said. They returned to the couch and opened their laptop to read through some of their messages. Aside from close friends who had access to Victoria’s personal mailbox, there was only one way to contact her, and that was through her secretary.
“I used to think that would be enough, but in the end, it just wasn’t.” Victoria sighed. “It was all rather disappointing, really.”
“It seems like Messana and Rinaldi are willing to agree to your terms,” Ridley said after opening one of the messages in their inbox. “The crisis hit them harder than we initially thought. They need our lithium as soon as possible.”
“Who would have thought that we might finally make our comeback in Europe.” Victoria walked up to the window on the other side of her desk. From this part of the building, she had a clear view of the bay and the mountains running along its shore towards the horizon. Despite the cold weather, she could feel the sunlight warm her body. Down below, she saw people walking on a street that went all the way to the coast.
“Any updates from Ehrenfeld about the coast guard?” Victoria asked.
“Nothing yet,” Ridley replied, “but Zaytsev is getting antsy. He’s asking for a meeting this weekend.”
“With what’s going on in Canada, I don’t blame him,” Victoria replied before she was distracted by an incoming audio message from her security captain, Dolores.
“Boss, two of the people on the Red List have just been spotted in the building. I’m sending you the footage from the surveillance cameras.” Intrigued, Victoria opened the picture, only to tense up when she was greeted by the slightly pixelated faces of two people who could only mean bad news.
“So, you’ve finally decided to show up in person, huh?” Victoria turned around towards her secretary. “Ridley, we’ve got some unexpected visitors. Call the gendarmerie! We need them here soon.”
“Next station: Firewood Hills,” Lucile heard the metro’s announcement system say. Outside the window, she saw only darkness, occasionally interrupted by some of the lights on the walls of the tunnel. The train shrieked and slowed down as they approached their destination.
“Are you sure you want to go in as well?” Francisco asked, “I appreciate the help, but the cultists know your face, and if they’re actually working together, then it might not end well.“
“I know the risk,” Lucile interrupted him. “But you can’t pull this off alone, and it would be madness to send in an android if our suspicions are true.”
When the train came to a halt, Lucile yawned and stretched her arms. Then she stood up and walked towards the exit. Francisco picked up a folder that was lying on the seat next to him and followed her. More than a week had passed since their confrontation with the Pioneers in that clinic. The Tin Cats had continued to observe the cultists, but none of them wanted to risk sending someone else in now that they knew what they were up against. Meanwhile, more and more disappearances had been noticed, all of them connected to the Pioneers in one way or another.
“Besides, we’re only there to pick up some accounting books that ‘our’ consulting firm wants to review. If anyone asks what we’re doing there, we’ll hand them ‘our’ card and leave before anyone can do anything. It’ll only take a couple of minutes,” Lucile said as they walked up the stairs to Cooper Street.
Francisco sighed, and his breath formed small clouds in the freezing air around them. “It’s not like I thought that you’d change your mind. But if something happens to you, it’s your fault, you got that?”
They made their way north towards the Central Market, where they could see the Espoir Building, a tower nestled in between the other high-rises of Central Lodestar. Neither of them stood out when they entered the building. Lucile had just finished her shift, so she had simply taken off some of the more noticeable parts of her uniform and blended into the crowd with dress pants and a button-up shirt under her coat. It had been difficult to find something for Francisco, who avoided formal attire like the plague. But with a bit of work and an old mantle that they had found deep in his wardrobe, he looked just like some of the senior employees.
They walked up to the front desk and waited for their turn while the clerk was talking to another visitor. Lucile tried to seem casual even though she was much more nervous than she wanted to be. It was a busy day, and everyone was trying to wrap things up before lunch, especially the humans, many of whom were hoping to get out and take one last walk in the sun.
“How can I help you?” the clerk asked and looked up, tilting his head for a moment. He was a young android with short hair and a pin in the form of the company’s broken star attached to his blazer.
“We’re from Daalman and Zeegers Consulting, and we’re here to pick up some documents at the archive,” Lucile said and handed a business card to the clerk. He glanced at the card, hesitating for a second, before turning his attention to the terminal next to him. Lucile tried to spot anything resembling the infected adapters on him, but she couldn’t see anything from this angle. Even if she had a clear view, the fabric was thick enough to hide one of those adapters.
“Right, the archives are on the sixth floor. You can take one of the elevators over there.” The clerk pointed towards a spot to their left. “You need to present an authorization if you want to look into our files.”
“Thank you,” Lucile said and took back her card.
“Do you have an appointment?” the clerk asked. “If not, then you might have to hurry if you still want to catch the archivist.”
“It’s alright, we won’t take long,” Lucile said, and Francisco nodded along. They made their way to the elevators and ascended to the sixth floor.
The hallway to the archives was well-lit and decorated with potted plants that didn’t grow naturally in New Queensland. Lucile and Francisco walked around a corner and past doors to random offices that were occasionally interrupted by framed photographs of Lodestar City during it’s early years. Most of them depicted small settlements full of construction sites and crude homes that looked more like shipping containers than actual buildings.
“I remember living in one of these when I was young.” Francisco pointed towards one of the container buildings. Then he saw a picture of the skyline and said, “Not even the folks over in Antártida Argentina have cities as large as this one. We got lucky, I suppose.”
“Maybe.” Lucile opened the door to the archives. On the other side, they were greeted by a large hall housing rows upon rows of shelving racks full of neatly sorted folders and cardboard boxes. The room was climate-controlled, and they could hear a soft, pleasant hum throughout the entire archive. Lucile hung her coat on one of the hooks next to the exit, and Francisco did the same with his mantle.
“We’re here to look into some files on behalf of Mr. Ljungborg,” Francisco said to the archivist when they had reached the information desk. He opened the folder in his hands and pulled out a piece of paper with a fake authorization. “He’s sick and can’t pick them up today.”
The archivist took the authorization, briefly looked at it, and checked the time on her watch. “I’m not sure if we have enough time to find everything. I’d have to crosscheck the authorization as well, which will take a while. Maybe after lunch?”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Lucile said. Thinking quickly, she casually leaned against the information desk and looked the archivist deep in the eyes. “Are you sure we can’t squeeze it in before lunch? I wouldn’t want to waste the time of such a gorgeous woman, but I’m sure someone as capable us you would be able to help us in no time. It would take a couple of minutes at most.”
“Oh, how charming.” The archivist smiled. “You know what, sure, why not? I wouldn’t want to disappoint someone as lovely as you either. But we’ll have to hurry!”
“Don’t worry, we won’t take long,” Lucile said and nodded towards Francisco, who opened the folder again. “We need to look into some of the files concerning Ardor’s mandatory exports of rare metals into the European Federation.”
Francisco pulled another sheet of paper out of the folder and handed it to the archivist. “You’ve probably heard of the report published by the University of Sofia. Can you point us towards these files?”
The archivist took the sheet and looked through a database on her terminal. A couple of minutes later, a list full of directions towards various points in the eastern portion of the archive emerged out of a printer. She grabbed the piece of paper and stood up. “I’ll walk you to where you can find all the files.”
“Try to get her number for me on your way out please,” Lucile whispered to Francisco when they left the information desk.
They followed the archivist through the room, occasionally picking up some of the folders they found along the way. There was more than one of them could transport on their own, so Lucile asked Francisco to give her all the files that he was holding.
“I’ll take these to our car. Call me if you need help with the rest,” she said. Francisco nodded and the archivist waved shyly towards Lucile, who smiled at her and turned around to leave. She pretended to walk towards the exit, but after a while, she took a sharp turn and made her way towards the opposite end of the archive. Along the way, she dropped all the folders that she was holding on a small cart. She browsed through the tags and signs on the shelves until she got to the right section. Finally, she found what she was looking for on the far side of the archive and took everything that seemed promising.
Trying to make it out of the archive before the other two could return, Lucile rushed back to the exit. But before she could reach it, Lucile immediately came to a halt and dropped some of the documents that she was holding on the floor when she saw a familiar face staring at her. A woman was waiting in front of the information desk, flanked by two security guards. She was an android, a Ravel V5 with glowing, almost piercing, rose-colored eyes, pale skin and straight, blonde hair. The woman was wearing a simple suit jacket with a turtleneck underneath, and she had crossed her arms in front of her chest.
Victoria raised one of her eyebrows and chuckled. “You know, Lucy, I really thought you would have learned something about risk awareness by now. Facial recognition is still a thing, believe it or not.” Victoria pointed towards one of the cameras above them. Something about the way Victoria said that name stung Lucile on the inside. “The gendarmerie is already on its way. In the mean time, do you mind explaining why you’re here? For old times’ sake, I’m willing to let you defend yourself.”
“The nerve to ask me something like that. You know exactly why I’m here!” Lucile felt thirty years of suppressed anger bubbling up inside her. She kept her hand close to her bag, just in case she had to pull out her laser pistol.
“Your Syndicate has been messing with my company for quite a while now, so I’m not surprised that you would show up eventually,” Victoria said. “Ah, look, here’s another one.”
Francisco and the archivist stopped when they saw the standoff at the information desk.
“Long time no see,” Victoria said with a snarky tone and waved at Francisco.
“It’s been a while,” Francisco said and gave her a nod.
“You can go now. We’ll talk about this later,” Victoria said to the stunned archivist and nodded towards the door. The archivist got the message and hurriedly walked out of the room.
“Why are you doing all of this?” Lucile asked with audible anger in her voice.
“Doing what? Calling the authorities after you tried to steal documents from my archive?” Victoria asked in return. “It’s not exactly surprising that you’re all still angry at me, but I don’t think that you have a valid reason to be here. I’ve always complied with all the ridiculous concessions that the unions managed to squeeze out of me, the least you could do is leave me alone.”
“Then what about this?” Lucile pulled one of the infected adapters out of her bag and threw it towards Victoria. The guards reached for their batons, but Victoria stopped them with a small gesture. She picked up the object and studied it, furrowing her brows.
“That’s one of our safety adapters. They’re pretty unremarkable if you ask me. Although…” Victoria seemed to notice that someone had tampered with the device.
“Have you heard of a group called the ‘Pioneers’?” Francisco put the box that he was still holding on a table next to him.
“Those cultists with bandannas around their necks? Yes, I know about them,” Victoria replied. “I was invited to one of their charity events earlier this year, but I declined. I have no use for cults like that. I already have both you and the press breathing down my neck, that’s more than enough.”
“What about all the money that you’ve donated to them?” Lucile crossed her arms. “Hell, you even sold them that clinic that burned down in Curitiba last week!”
“What are you talking about?” Victoria asked, glancing at both of them. “And why do you even care?”
“They’ve been using those adapters to infect androids with some kind of virus that makes them follow whatever this Hestia they worship orders them to do,” Lucile continued. “They’re basically enslaved to her. So unless you knowingly sent donations to them, you might have to check what exactly your finances were used for.”
Victoria turned the object around in her hands. “I didn’t think that you would show up because of something as far-fetched as this. I’d rather believe the stories about a giant robot buried under the Ice Floes. Do you have any proof?”
Lucile pulled some documents out of her bag and made her way towards Victoria. The closer she got to her, the more the frustration inside her grew. Barely able to control herself, she held the documents out to Victoria. Their conversation had attracted the attention of some of the other employees in the archive, and by the time Victoria was browsing through the documents in her hands, they were surrounded by a small group of onlookers.
“No, this has to be a mistake, there’s no way I could have missed something like that,” Victoria said while staring at the documents. “Unless of course… no, that can’t be it, he’s been working here for decades… Either way, even if this is true, you could have just contacted me directly. What were you thinking just walking in here and messing up my…“
The door to the archive opened, and the archivist who had just left the room walked back inside with a concerned look on her face. “Ms. Lansing, we have visitors.”
“Ah, is it the gendarmes that I called?” Victoria asked, but the archivist shook her head. The doors opened once again and Lucile saw two other familiar faces walk into the room. One of them was the clerk she had met in the main hall downstairs. He was now wearing a gray piece of cloth around his neck. The other one was Esther, the woman who had tried to infect Alexis with Anodyne a week ago.
“I should have known you were one of them,” Lucile said towards the clerk, pulling her laser pistol out of her bag. The guards readied their batons, but they stayed where they were, eyeing both Lucile and Esther.
“What a surprise that you’re here today!” Esther raised her hands to show that she was unarmed. “I was in the area when I got a call from my friend here, so I decided to see what’s going on. There’s no need for violence, we’re not here to cause you any harm.”
“What is the meaning of this? You know each other?” Victoria asked, still holding the documents and the adapter in her hands.
“Ms. Lansing,” Esther said, “when I ended my maintenance routine this morning, I didn’t expect to meet someone as famous as you today. But while I’m here, I have an offer that you might be interested in.”
“You’re one of those Pioneers, right?” Victoria turned her attention to Esther, and her guards stopped watching Lucile and Francisco.
“Yes, I’ve been a proud servant of Hestia for years now,” Esther said, “As you might have just heard, our two organizations have already been in touch. We bought some of your unused properties and received donations from the Maybell Foundation in order to continue our humanitarian work.”
“How does she know what we were talking about?” Lucile whispered.
“Look around you,” Francisco replied. She glanced at the people surrounding them and saw that one by one, some of the androids were putting on gray neckerchiefs. She couldn’t tell how many there were, but it seemed to be about half a dozen cultists.
“We would like to offer you a place among us. As you might see,” Esther said while gesturing towards the other cultist, “some of your employees are already part of our group.”
Victoria looked around warily. “Is that why so much of our money ended up in your hands?” She raised the documents that she was holding.
“As I said, those were donations from your foundation to fund our humanitarian work,” Esther said. “Many humans will have a much easier time during the polar night thanks to your generosity. And, of course, it all went according to official procedures.”
“They’re all infected by whatever is in here, right?” Victoria raised her hand to show Esther the adapter.
“Oh, it’s not an infection. It’s a gift,” Esther said.
“A ‘gift’ that fries your spine if you’re lucky and turns you into an obedient slave if you’re not.” Lucile took a couple of steps towards Esther.
“Well, spit it out, what’s your offer?” Victoria asked, not entirely to Lucile’s surprise.
“It’s simple,” Esther began to explain. “We’re well aware that your company has been struggling for quite a while now, even before the crisis. In exchange your support, we would be willing to offer you all the manpower that you might need.” Esther grinned and approached Victoria. “My fellow Pioneers would be eager to support your business with no restrictions on working hours or other hindrances. What do you say?”
Victoria looked at the hand that Esther was holding out. “I assume the catch is that I would have to accept this ‘gift’ to get your help, right?” Victoria asked.
“Of course!” Esther replied. “There’s no way we could trust you otherwise.”
“No, absolutely not.” Victoria took a step back.
“Well, you can’t say that I didn’t try doing this the diplomatic way,” Esther said before they heard a loud crash coming from the left.
Lucile turned around and saw one of the racks crash into another, causing all the boxes and folders to fall out of the shelves. Almost too late, she turned back and noticed that Esther pulled something out of her bag while Victoria was distracted by the loud noise. Fearing the worst, Lucile aimed at Esther and pulled the trigger of her laser pistol. She saw a beam of light streaming out of her gun, hitting her target in the left eye. Esther stopped what she was doing and dropped the infected adapter. As the room exploded in chaos, she curled up and covered her face with her hands, giving Victoria enough time to disengage. Smoke rose behind Esther’s hands, and the faint smell of burned plastic filled the air.
Victoria stared at Lucile in disbelief. For a split second, she had almost thought that the woman was aiming at her when she saw her pull a pistol out of her bag. And even after the beam flew past her and hit the cultist next to her, Victoria continued to expect the next shot to hit her.
But there wasn’t much time to think about that. All around her, people were shouting and panicking as the shelves continued to fall. Some were beelining straight for the exit while others were running towards the far corners of the archive. The cultists, however, were prepared for a fight. Three of them ran towards Lucile and Francisco, who were standing on the side of the archive where no shelves were falling just yet. The rest of the cultists aimed straight for Victoria and her guards. Two of them pulled objects out of their pockets that looked just like those infected adapters.
“Boss, you should hide, they’re trying to get to you,” Dolores said as she and the other guard, a shorter but agile man called Fillin, stepped in front of Victoria to protect her.
Trusting her security captain’s perspective, Victoria ran towards the information desk and jumped over it to take cover on the other side. She raised her head to get an overview of the situation. The shelves continued to fall over, crashing into others like dominoes. To her left, Lucile and Francisco were fighting off the cultists that had followed them. Francisco grabbed the box of documents next to him and threw it into the air, obscuring the view with fluttering pieces of paper. Then he took a book from one of the shelves and hit one of the cultists over the head. Lucile walked backwards into one of the aisles between the shelves. Victoria couldn’t see her anymore, but after one of the cultists ran after Lucile, she saw laser beams fly out of the aisle. Meanwhile, Dolores tried to hold back three of the cultists while Fillin tackled and restrained a fourth one that had gotten dangerously close to the information desk.
Fearing that her guards might get overwhelmed, Victoria looked for something that she could use as a weapon. There was nothing but paper and office tools at the information desk, but on the wall to her right, Victoria saw a fire extinguisher. She rushed towards it, grabbed it, and ran back to the information desk as fast as she could, dodging one of the shelves that was about to fall to the ground. When she made it back to her guards, she pulled the pin out of the extinguisher, aimed it at the cultists that were about to overwhelm Dolores and squeezed the handle. In a matter of seconds, the attackers were covered in foam, obscuring their sight. Two of them continued to hold onto Dolores. The third cultist let go of her and blindly ran towards Victoria. Victoria firmly grabbed the entire canister with both of her hands and swung it at the cultist’s head. With a loud thud, the cultist crashed into another shelf, making it fall over as well.
Once she was sure that the she was out of danger, Victoria turned her gaze towards the part of the room where she had just seen laser bolts fly out of one of the aisles. She saw Lucile climb over a shelf that had just fallen over, which made her feel oddly relieved. But before she could do anything, the doors to the archive swung open as several gendarmes rushed into the room, aiming at anyone that they perceived as a threat. Victoria stepped forward, which got the attention of one of the cops, who instinctively pulled the trigger of his gun.
“Victoria!” she heard a distant voice shout behind her. But all she could think about was the feeling of pain overpowering all of her senses. Error messages appeared all over her internal display, clouding her sight and stealing whatever was left of her focus. Bending down and pressing her arms against her stomach, she couldn’t get a single word out of her mouth as she tried to tone down her pain receptors. Navigating a set of confusing menus and fighting off all the error messages, she finally found the setting to suppress the pain and repeatedly activated it, giving her some of her focus back.
“I’m the one who called you!” she finally screamed once she managed to suppress her pain enough to get some words out. “Arrest them!”
Victoria pointed towards one of the Pioneers on the ground. The gendarmes advanced, taking anyone with a gray neckerchief into custody. When she was sure that they knew what they were doing, Victoria stopped paying attention to anything else and collapsed on the ground, focusing solely on suppressing the pain in her stomach.