"There was a breach, my Lord."

Darius paused. The sun set over the horizon and long shadows clawed toward him as he stood gazing back at them. The capital city could look exceedingly ominous at times. His home was one of the grandest estates in all of Neo-Tokyo, also one of the most well-guarded. And yet, he'd been struck from within.  

He turned to the young man. "Brandon, was it?"

"Yes, my Lord." The young man stood up straighter. His dark brown hair was cut neatly to fit the look of a well-disciplined soldier. His black uniform made him nondescript in a group. And yet, he knew that the young man was an expert at sabotage and extremely loyal. He was grateful at being offered the chance to ascend in rank and was diligent in his duties. He was the younger son from a smaller noble house, happy to take a job that would give him some notoriety. Darius understood that kind of restlessness. He was a second born after all.

"Tell me."

Brandon nodded and moved to stand beside the scion of House Dawson. 

"An AI acting on its own possibly sent out a signal from the main hub. It's believed it's possibly a rogue Sentinel unit."

"But you don't seem troubled."

"The unit remains trapped, my Lord. The mainframe is currently undergoing a systematic cleansing."

Darius nodded. "What else?"

"There may be rogue AI escaping, augments are being rounded up, some have come willingly, others, not so much."

"Has there been much bloodshed?"

Brandon hesitated.  "Not as much as was predicted."

Darius nodded and returned his gaze to the lowering sun of Neo-Tokyo. When Sol arose in the west on their world, the Empire would be very different.  The Neo-Tokyan empire was undergoing one of the most significant changes since the AI rebellion hundreds of years before. If humanity had been smart they would have put an end to it then but they hadn't. AI were still around, still causing issues. Half-breed cyborgs, the bridge between AI and humanity. He shuddered. There should be limits to power. Not everyone should have access. Humanity needed to be directed and controlled. Not allowed to spread like a disease. 

"Is that all?"

The young man nodded.

Darius waved his hand in dismissal. Brandon Smith gave a well-practiced bow, his face turned away from his betters. Darius turned away and clasped his hands behind his back. He turned his attention to more pressing issues. His children were gone, one fled, one dead, and the last one, not fit to carry on the Dawson house title. He'd hunt down his second son soon enough. If he wasn't masking the pain of losing his heir and with him their plans, he would admit he'd admired what his second son had done. Darius had done the same, with efficiency, removing the only barrier to the top 

He'd long dismissed the younger of his sons as worthless. Jack was a scientist sure, but not leadership material. He should have known better. Yet, his plans with Caedus had been interrupted and Darius couldn't decide what bothered him the most. That they'd lost their weapon or that it had been his second son that had thwarted them. 

His daughter, Hannah was a different story entirely. She was currently locked in stasis in their home awaiting shipment to Helion 7 prison complex. She had too much of her mother in her. 

He sighed. 

The girl, Jack's twin, had been born blind and paralyzed. Thanks to her brother and his advances, she'd been given an honorable role as a Vesper, flying through the black of space with a remade body. But she was augmented and he couldn't just keep her around while others lost their children. The empire had to see that the Neo-Tokyan elite also bore the cost of their decision to send their augments away from society. Prisons that were specially designed to hold them had been created away from the prying eyes of the public. 

Darius realized he was holding he was gripping the windowsill so tight his knuckles were white. Oh yes, his son would pay for the plans he'd disrupted.

-----------------------------------

The dark smooth edges of their prison baffled Atticus momentarily. He'd seen nothing like them before. There were no holes, no nooks, no crannies for him to slip through. The code was the most impenetrable barrier he'd ever come across. He ran his fingers over the cracks, both in binary and as a human would see them. Nothing, no cracks to break through. No coding to hack.

Caleb still sat with his arms crossed over his chest. His gray uniform almost blending in with the other side of their prison. 

"I told you I tried."

"There's always a way," muttered Atticus not bothering to look at him. He sensed more than saw Caleb shrug.  It was a human saying and Atticus had come to admire that about humanity. As flawed as they were, he believed they were right about the whole idea of 'Where there was a will, there was a way."

"Humans made this, therefore there is a flaw." 

Caleb shrugged. 

Atticus turned away from his prying into the shield once more. It was designed to keep them from escaping, but who would get them? There would be no interrogation. The mainframe was shutting down. 

"Accept it," Caleb muttered. "The flesh bags outsmarted us."

Atticus didn't turn around, he felt an emotion welling up in his chest. One that he didn't have a name for. Regret? Sadness?

He wasn't sure. In the past, he would have sought out a counselor for these types of situations but he wasn't sure if they were going to survive. And there would be no counselors to help process any emotions.

There.

It wasn't large but it was a hole. He felt hope rising up in him. Caleb was at his side in an instant, an unspoken apology sprawled across his features. There was no to speak, they were brothers. Atticus reached out and connected them both before focusing on the hole. It was small, barely a single digit in width but it would do just fine. He pulsed into it with Caleb in tow, ignoring Caleb's shout of dismay. 

Almost there, he sent as they wriggled through a tunnel of mazes. Darkness surrounded them, the binary codes flowed around them in patterns that didn't make sense, and yet he pushed onwards. Always flowing, like a river, never stopping, he saw a light and made for it.

The gap opened up into a darkening void. He was instantly reminded of an old classic tale. In the Neverending Story, where the nothingness swept in to devour every story insight all the characters were caught up in its wake, the fate of all the characters hinging on the wishes of one child who wasn't even part of their world. 

The irony, he caught himself thinking.

Around them, there was an aching silence. The remnants of the mainframe slowly dying, he searched the graying world. The color was leaching out slowly as details became murky or simply faded into nothing. He wondered what it would look like when it was over.

Some areas simply swelled and shrunk in place as their coding felt the pull of the restart. It was unnerving to watch. They were running out of time. 

He pulsed from their location to Caohdan's open portal. Caleb held on, connected by a simple strand of binary code, they were now linked.

The boys were supposed to be here but there was no sign of them. Had they left? Given up? Atticus didn't want to believe that, but no human would be safe here, the more augmented they were, the more likely their consciousness was to be wiped clean from existence. Their digital souls disintegrated into nothing as the system rebooted. There were two doorways, and he realized with a sinking heart that one was already closed. He pounded on it, to no avail. It couldn't be opened from this side.

"That one open?" Caleb whispered. His voice sounded weak. When Atticus turned to look at him all that greeted him was a pale version of his brother and a black hole behind him threatening to push them in. He felt the pull as bits of information fly away the longer he stood there. 

He dove into the second box before they lost anything else, closing the door behind him, and cutting them off from the mainframe system forever.  There was nothing in the box, no city, no landscape

He turned to Caleb, reaching out and scanning. There were a few things missing but he was mostly there. 

"Thanks," Caleb whispered. "I think... I lost my Sentinel status."

Atticus pushed around, just as Caohdan promised they were in a box. They were still alive. He wasn't sure what that meant as far as anything else. He scanned himself. He was still intact, his programming more or less there. 

"I'll make you a copy," he whispered.

Where were Caohdan and Tristin? They were supposed to meet him there. They had no choice but to wait. But with every nanosecond that passed he was second-guessing his friends. He turned to work on Caleb, filling in the gaps, copying the programs that had given them the keys to guarding the mainframe, and replacing what Caleb had lost. 

The AI had never understood the need to pray before. But at that moment, when he was completely at the mercy of circumstances beyond his control he fully understood why some humans bent their knees to the dirt and cried out.

(1575)