“Petya!”
Boyband’s shout was the last thing I heard until my mind was overtaken with a cascade of code. The few sensations I was spared were the centipede’s razor legs tearing at the roof of my mouth and burrowing upward. It felt as if cankers covered my mouth and salt had been poured over every surface.
I didn’t care if I failed Deleon.
End this.
Take my arms.
Take the kid.
Kill everyone I love.
Whatever you need.
Please end this.
Kill me. Kill me. Kill me.
I vomited red chunks, not knowing if they were pieces of my mouth, across my naked body. I contorted with shivers as the centipede returned to his owner. Moans escaped and I shook my head, eyes blurred with tears. How many hours had they kept me in that hell?
I looked up to see the centipede plug into Bank. “Zeg!” he shouted.
“What?” asked Jackson.
“He’s zegging ridden with viruses encrypted beyond anything I’ve ever seen.”
“Did you wipe it?”
“No, it was a zegging neuroblocked.”
“Maybe you should have taken longer? What was that, thirty seconds?”
Bank grumbled. “Fifty two. I’ve never seen cybersecurity like that. We’ll need a wipe mod.”
“Need help grabbing it?”
Bank nodded and waved for him to follow.
I continued to cry, regretting every desperate thought that had passed through my mind. Still, I felt I would cry again if the centipede returned to purge my mind.
Boyband spoke my name. I turned to look at him but saw that Naoma hadn’t left. My eyes were clear. So were hers.
She stood and walked over to us, standing in between our metal beds.
“Please,” I whimpered. “Please just let us go. You’re not one of them. You''re as much a follower as we are.”
She laughed. “You don’t know anything about me. If anything, I own them. The poor dolphins wouldn’t accomplish much without me.”
They wouldn’t, would they? I turned to Boyband. “It won’t work on the Finians, but it might on her.”
He furrowed his brow. “Huh?”
“Use your mod.”
His eyes widened and he looked up at Naoma. His breaths quickened.
“They’re coming back, you know,” she said. “Trying something will only make it worse for you.”
Her eyes shot back and forth between us.
I smiled. “Do it, Boyband.”
His voice was mechanical and as direct as thunder. “Unplug us.”
She whimpered and leaned over. Her eyebrows arched and she grabbed the sides of her head. Her cosmetic light flashed in a variety of shades. She faced Boyband, stepped towards him.
“Now!” he demanded.
Her inhibitions dissipated and she moved to the back of Boyband’s head and pulled it free. Bloody wires came from his skull and the skin of his scalp regenerated to cover the plug’s entry point. If his Bite hadn’t healed his wound, she could have ended it all for us.
Shivers shook my being as she unplugged mine.
“Now the light bindings.”
She hesitated.
“Zeggin’ shacs—shoulda–right?” Jackson spoke down the hall, but his voice fell away.
Naoma walked towards a control panel on the right wall, checking on us frantically. Her movements were shaky. Her face lacked the confidence that it had held before.
She tapped on the pad and the lights on Boyband vanished. He sat up. “Thank you. Thank you.”
Her eyebrows were still arched. Her previous condescension was the antithesis of how she now appeared. “Please help me.”
Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.
“Let Petya go!” Boyband demanded in a powerful whisper.
I moved from the bed immediately after the lights disappeared. “What did you say?” I asked her.
“Get me out of here.” She ran to peek around the corner, then ran to grab my shoulders. “Please. I let him free. I helped you, you have to–” She stopped speaking as footsteps approached the room.
Her hands were warm, a comforting contrast to the frigid table.
“Remember what I said when they take me back. Don’t forget to help me.”
“What?” Boyband asked.
I grabbed her arm. “What do you mean?”
“You zegging shac!” Bank shouted as he ran to pick Naoma up.
“Hey, hey!” Jackson held Bank back until he lowered her down. “She’s a lot more than an advertisement.”
Bank nodded, then charged at me. He seized my throat and shoved me back down onto the metal table. “Anton, turn the light bindings back on.”
Violet lights rebound me to the table. My head pulsed. The black shock from the slam dissipated just in time for me to see Bank do the same thing to Boyband.
Naoma shook in the corner. “Please, Bank! Anton!”
Bank launched his neon centipede at her and it burrowed into her mouth.
I cringed and turned away as she experienced the same torture I had mere moments ago. What had caused her to betray them? Why was he using the centipede on her? What data was there to force from her neurospace? She hadn’t absorbed any of our data when she freed us, had she?
Naoma coughed and vomited as Bank retracted his centipede.
I strained my neck looking up at her.
She wiped her mouth and smiled, confidence pumped itself back into her. “Sorry, were you saying something?”
Bank sighed and looked at Jackson, who smiled. “Naoma, yah good?”
“Uh, yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” She scowled at me. “What are you looking at? Anton, get that perv to look somewhere else. I don’t like it.”
“Naoma?” I uttered with desperation.
She scowled. “Got your eyes off of me.” She pointed at Bank. “Why don’t you use the centipede on him?”
“We already did,” Jackson said. He looked at Bank. “Settle down.”
“I did what we had to. I don’t care how much you value her. If we didn’t do something quick, it could happen again.”
Naoma smiled.
Bank walked over and twisted Boyband’s head, dug through his hair, then dropped the kid’s head with enough force to leave a pounding headache.
“Look at this, Anton!” he said. “She unplugged them and corrupted all the data.”
“Then just plug them back in!”
“I can’t. They’re… healed or something, I don’t know.”
Jackson stepped up, turned my head, then let go. “Naoma, come on girl, what did you do?”
She shrugged and shook her head. “I have no idea what you are talking about.”
“We’ll take them to the Red,” Bank said.
I stopped breathing. He couldn’t have said what I think he did. I turned to Boyband, finding that he looked as astounded as I was.
“Why?” Jackson asked.
Rather than scream my futile refusal, I listened in paralysis.
“They should have been bleeding after she unplugged them.” Bank turned Boyband’s head to show the back to Jackson.
“Do you think their owner jacked in a derm-web?”
“No chance. This penetrated further than the skin. I wouldn’t go as far to say that they are invincible, but I think these shacs can help us with extractions in the Red. Techvax will pay a lot for them.”
Techvax. Was that one of the companies Ralia mentioned? Zeg. I can handle not messaging Deleon, but I needed her.
“Are you giving up on extracting the data from their neuros?”
Bank shrugged. “Seeing this, I think we can get more from them in the Red. Moles are always in abundance, but these things are something else.”
“If you think so.”
Bank nodded. “Give me a minute.” He walked towards the wall and leaned on it with folded arms. His eyes flashed as he tapped into his neurospace.
I looked at Boyband again, knowing that a conversation would be unwise, but defied my inhibitions. He stared up at the ceiling with eyes wide. I laid my need to speak to rest and did the same.
“Naoma, what was that?” Jackson said in a hush.
“I’m sorry, did I do something?”
“Ah, my girl, I either want to kiss you or hit you. I’m sorry for Bank. You’re still with me, right?”
“Of course.”
“Did you do anything to help these shacs?”
“Pfft, those zegging junkies? No chance. I couldn’t stand their filth on me. Those lower districts are ridden with viruses. I don’t want to risk anything touching my neuro.”
“You are compliant?”
“I am compliant.”
“Just a glitch then, I guess.”
“If you think I missed something while you and Bank stepped out of the room, then yes. I guess my neurospace glitched.”
Bank clapped as he stood, his eyes refocusing. “The execs want them in the Red for an extraction. They need Reef’s street team as well, film crew included.”
“Why? What do they want, a music video?”
Bank shook his head and looked at Naoma, then back to Jackson. “An ad. I told them about your girl’s unstable system and they want to utilize her before she goes haywire permanently.”
“You want what now?” Naoma asked.
Bank gestured toward her but looked at Jackson. “See what I mean?”
“Nah, man. She’s under control. That''s how she always is. You don’t make the calls, I do.”
“Don’t ignore what happened just a minute ago. I don’t care if you can rewire her. She’s a risk. You want to argue with the execs?”
“Zeg, no.”
“Then you’ll get her and her film team. Techvax wants her face on their product.”
“But the Red, du, really? I ain’t goin’ there, especially with this prize of an artist.”
“She’ll be fine. Any risks will be left to these two. They’ll keep us on the edge and well protected.”
Jackson looked at Naoma. “You good to come with us?”
“I am compliant.”
Jackson clicked. “Zeg, du, this’ll be a wild ride.”
Bank clicked. “I’ll grab some other light bands to help us keep these two secured. I’ll meet you and Naoma on the first floor. Our ride should be here in fifteen minutes.”
“You–”
“I knew you would agree, Anton. But when it comes down to it, neither of us has a choice.”
“I guess you’re right.”
Bank left first. Jackson did something on the wall’s control panel, then waved for Naoma to follow him from the room.
She gave me a passing glare as she turned the corner to leave. Her eyes were bitter and her sneer condemning. The girl who had freed us was no longer present in the face of the Neon Idol.