The Nero Protocol Read online

  "I'll make some phone calls. Get in touch with the college and get everything set up. First semester has already started, but I think you're smart enough to play catch-up."

  Elias let out a long sigh and headed to the shower. Ario's touch was like a ghost on his skin. The memory of hands trailing across his chest didn't seem to wash away with the warm water. Elias hoped that wherever Ario was, he was safe.

  *~*~*

  Ario wandered down rainy highways, wondering just what it was he intended to achieve. The logical part of him had insisted he stay on the bus, but it was too late to pick apart his impulses now that he'd stepped off. The city held only capture and death for him, but somehow he hadn't been able to stand the thought of leaving Elias behind.

  The docklands loomed closer and closer as Ario walked. Soon, he was wandering between dilapidated houses, searching for a place he could call home for a while. He thought about returning to Elias's squat, but it was too risky. No doubt the Department of Synthetic Affairs had surveillance on the place. Elias's laptop had probably been taken in as evidence, so there was no chance he could use it.

  He climbed through a battered window frame into an abandoned two-floor home. Paint and wallpaper peeled off the walls and rotting floorboards creaked and cracked beneath his weight. He slid down against a wall, finding a sitting position, even though he did not tire or suffer from fatigue. There was a different weight bearing down on him, the weight of feelings he did not understand.

  If he'd had a laptop, he would have hooked himself up and checked his source code, even if he was unable to alter it. What numbers made a machine into a man? What had changed so drastically about his code that in such a short time, the stable programming that had served him for years had been changed beyond recognition? He no longer felt like the same gigolo synth that had been beaten to pieces by a synth-snuffer. Had the baseball bat to the face fractured something in his neural network? Had coming so close to permanent shutdown—to death—altered something irrevocably?

  Then there was Elias. Elias, who had transformed one synth already into something else, with disastrous results. A man who carried around so much pain that Ario hadn't even been able to process it, let alone ease it. There was something about Elias that was different from every other human he had come into contact with. Ario had been treated like a human being for just a little while. As an equal. It was like seeing through a window into another world. A world he would never see again.

  He wanted to stay close to Elias, but he couldn't interfere with his new life. Elias deserved a second chance. Ario wouldn't stroll in and ruin that. But it was nice enough just to remain close by. Perhaps he would look in on Elias, check that he was happy once in a while. That would have to be enough.

  Right now, he simply wanted the time to pass. Lonely hours trapped in a broken house with no purpose or meaning to guide him along were not something he savored.

  He stood and walked to a closet in the corner, door wide open. He crammed himself inside, closing the door until darkness washed over him. He knew it was a risk to put himself into maintenance mode, but he could think of no better way to pass the time. Elias would no doubt be looking into colleges. Elias didn't need him anymore. He had a future of his own to attend to.

  A part of him wondered if perhaps it was time to hand himself in to the Department. His useful life span was over. His purpose as a gigolo synth was finished. The thought of going out and turning tricks to earn cash repulsed him in a way it never used to. Elias had changed something. He half-wished he could change it back. At least giving pleasure had given him a reason to exist. Now there was nothing.

  As he initiated maintenance mode, Elias's face was foremost in his mind. His brown eyes twinkling with a heavy sorrow. His shaggy hair. His stubble and the way it had felt against Ario's fingers.

  For the first time ever, Ario six-four-nine-one dreamt, and it was glorious.

  *~*~*

  Elias stood in a waiting room. Steel and glass seemed to be the decorative theme of Avarin University. It hadn't changed much since the last time he'd been here. A synth sat behind the desk: a male with shocking pink hair that sat in contrast to his chiseled face. All Elias could think of was Ario and the blue patch in his hair.

  A door opened and a familiar professor wandered out into the lounge. He beckoned them into his office. "Ah," he said. "I recognize you. Elias, right? You were a promising student before you dropped out. Come back to give it another shot?"

  "Yeah." Elias nodded. His father sat down, watching the exchange with curiosity.

  "We'd be glad to have you," the professor said. There was an odd spark in his eyes that Elias couldn't read. "There will be a re-entry exam. You can take it today if you wish, but if you want to study for it, we can set a date."

  "I'd like to take it now," Elias said. He tried to keep his hands still, hoping he was the only who noticed they were shaking. Part of him wanted to run and track down Ario. He didn't need an education. He knew more about synths than the professors could ever hope to teach him. But the certificate was the only way to get a job as a registered synth technician. If he wanted to have a future with synths, he had to go through the correct channels.

  "This way, then." The professor held open the door and Elias walked through it. The professor caught up, walking ahead. Elias followed him through tiled corridors. Blueprints of synths and related technology covered the walls. Elias knew them all by heart. They were early synth models, back when synths were only capable of cleaning floors. The modern A.I. that synths possessed was a Cybot Corporation trade secret. Elias had delved into those secrets, twisted and modeled them, but that was something he could never tell the professor standing right in front of him. He'd end up in jail—or worse, Cybot would hire him, and he'd spend the rest of his days trying—and failing—to fix the problems Brynn had. How many synths would pile up dead in his lab, tormented to suicide by the fact that they were nothing more than objects?

  On that thought, Elias almost turned on his heel and fled. He hadn't had dark thoughts about Brynn in a long time, but confessing his sins to Ario had flipped a switch. Ario had been different—he might have held the answers, for all Elias knew—but he was gone now. Perhaps that was for the best. Self-awareness and emotion could never be a good thing for synths. Even if that's what Ario had—and even if he could handle it—perhaps it was better left alone.

  Elias lingered in the doorway to the test room. Young men and women sat at desks, taking the exam with puzzled expressions on their faces. Elias knew the test was likely to be a breeze, even if his abilities had some rust on them from years of disuse. The question in his mind was: should he pretend to be less than he was in hopes of evading undue attention, or be honest and possibly skip several semesters of boredom?

  Elias wordlessly took a seat as the professor gestured to an empty desk in the back of the room. The man set down a cheap tablet computer. He set a timer for an hour and placed it on his front desk. A young man in front of Elias pushed out his chair and stalked out. Clearly, the course wasn't right for him. But this was what Elias had wanted his whole life. Ever since he'd laid eyes on his first synth in a store, he knew he wanted to be a synth tech. The expressionless face staring back at him had seemed more human than any of the people around him. Synths were something he could understand. They weren't random and unpredictable, like people. They did things for a reason embedded in their code.

  Elias looked over the first page of questions. They were child's play in the face of his abilities. He rushed through them and turned the page. Slightly more difficult questions gave him a moment's pause. The paper soon became a mass of complicated equations. He turned the page, sinking into the zone as letters and numbers flowed through his mind. He forgot about his desire for restraint, simply feeling the problems and their solutions. The rust was gone from his mind, a spark ignited in his soul. This was his purpose. He kept flipping the pages. He wasn't Elias any more. He was Nero once again, the youth who had reprogrammed
Brynn, and hung out on shady Dark Net forums sharing fragments of source code. Lifeblood surged through his veins. His heart rate was elevated.

  He turned to the back page of the exam booklet. The final question stared him down in bold print:

  What is the equation for humanity?

  A large blank page sat underneath, awaiting his response. Elias checked the timer. Twenty-five minutes remained. He sighed. There was no chance he could hide his talents. Cybot or the Department would surely come for him and that thought gave him pause for a moment, but a piece of him knew if he didn't step up now, his true abilities would remain hidden. Someone else would write the code, if he didn't. Someone who didn't care as much about synth agency and autonomy as he did.

  He documented the changes to Brynn's source code. He wrote down the equations for free will he had devised during many sleepless nights poring over textbooks and running simulations on his laptop computer. It was imprinted in his memory almost perfectly. The memories had become warm instead of painful. He smiled a little as he remembered Brynn resting on his bed, curiously wondering how Elias's code would change him. Those had been good days, filled with promise and hope for the future. It had taken Ario to remind him he could still have a future.

  Elias finished the paper, then used the remaining time to go over his answers. He corrected a couple of errors before the timer went off. He folded his arms, crossing one leg over the other as the professor came and collected his tablet. He was dismissed quietly. He walked out of the room, suddenly nervous about his answers now that the adrenaline was wearing off. What would the professor think about his responses? What would the future hold for him?

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Heavy dread swept over Elias as he climbed the stairs to his father's apartment. What had he done, and why? Had he been that desperate to rebel against his father's control over his life that he had jeopardized his chance at a happy future? Cybot would come as soon as they saw his test paper, there was no doubt about it, but would their offer be sweet or salty?

  He barely ate as he sat at dinner with his father. After the interminable meal was over, he retreated to his room—which was not as he had left it. His posters were gone. The walls had been painted a respectable magnolia, and his comforter was no longer the vintage Megabots one he had treasured for so long.

  "Dad, what did you do?" Elias asked.

  "Come on, now, Elias. You're twenty-eight years old. You can't keep living in the past forever. It's time for a fresh start. I've agreed to let you be a synth tech, but keeping all that paraphernalia around… It's not good for you. Besides, it's rather juvenile, isn't it? Time you had a room more fitting for an adult. I think your therapist will agree. Speaking of, I've scheduled your first appointment for next week. It's a nice, private clinic where I've been assured everything will remain confidential—even illegal activities like synth sex."

  "You expect me to just go in there and spill all the details about Brynn?"

  "In time, Elias. Don't look at me like that—I'm trying to help you. I'm putting down a lot of money here. Meet me halfway, please."

  "Okay." Elias sat down on the bed as his father left. The room was normal and respectable now that his father no longer wanted to use it to charm him into coming home. He had no doubt his collection of vintage posters, action figures and comics were probably languishing at the bottom of a dumpster, and it physically hurt to lose them—not the objects themselves, but the part of him they represented. The young idealist who had been willing to do anything to change the world. Anything to draw closer to Brynn and feel like he was special and loved, instead of the outsider he felt himself to be. The room he sat in now was lifeless, devoid of personality, like the corporate drone his father wanted him to be. Perhaps his test had been one final act of rebellion, but he couldn't help but feel he had only laid out a trap for himself. As an independent synth tech, he could have had some autonomy, like Mariko, but as a genius, Cybot would want him in their R&D department, where they could use him and keep tabs on him.

  His mistakes haunted him, keeping watch from the shadows in the corner of the room. Twenty-eight or not, he wanted Ario to hold him like a child and tell him everything was going to be okay, that he hadn't sold out and betrayed his ideals in the process, because he was beginning to doubt his own motives.

  Burying his face in the pillows, he fell into a light sleep and dreamt that Ario took his hand and led him onto a bus, which drove away into the sunset. Eloping with a synth, such a foolish prospect—but perhaps staying had been the worse decision.

  *~*~*

  Ario watched the black van. It sat outside the apartment building, seemingly doing nothing. Occasionally a black-suited man or woman would emerge, cross the street for some takeout, and return.

  The first time Ario saw Elias, it took all his newfound willpower to remain rooted to the spot. Only the knowledge that it would doom them both stopped him from approaching, though seeing Elias without being able to talk to him or touch him was almost physically painful, as impossible as that should be for him. Elias looked handsome in new black jeans and a blue turtleneck sweater. Unfortunately, Ario was pretty certain he wasn't the only one watching Elias. His suspicions were confirmed when the black van waited a few moments, then slowly started to crawl down the street behind Elias. Elias looked behind him and saw the van, which made no effort to hide itself. He walked a little faster, and the van kept pace.

  What had Elias done to attract the attention of the Department of Synthetic Affairs? Or was it simply that they still believed that Elias knew his location? Perhaps returning to the city had been a bad idea, after all. Ario turned his back on the sunny day and headed into the dark back alleys of the Business District. Elias needed help—and Ario knew of only one person he might be able to call an ally.

  *~*~*

  Elias knew the black van was trouble the second he saw it. Not Cybot, but the Department, though they were pretty much the same thing these days. The message was clear enough: they considered his actions criminal. But rather than arrest him, they seemed to want to play a game of intimidation first: drain the fight from him, drive him to stupid mistakes, leave him taught and wrung out so that he would cave the moment they finally brought him in. Whether it had to do with his exam or Ario's whereabouts, he didn't know. If they thought he'd give up Ario to save himself, they were shit out of luck. Elias curled his hand into a fist and kept walking, occasionally looking behind him to make the Department think he was troubled by their presence. He couldn't lie—it was rattling him. He had to make himself content with the knowledge that Ario was far away by now, in some unknown location they couldn't strong-arm out of him with threats or promises.

  Elias ducked into an alleyway too narrow for the van. He stood behind a dumpster, leaning up against the wall and gathering his thoughts. The van passed by the end of the alley, purring quietly. Elias heard the tiny squeak of aging brakes. The alleyway had no outlet—and they had time. The agents could wait.

  Elias closed his eyes, thinking of Ario. He yearned for Ario's embrace, or even just his presence.

  "What am I doing?" Elias asked himself. As if in answer, the leaden clouds that had threatened rain all day finally unleashed their load, the sudden drizzle turning into a torrential downpour. Elias left the alleyway, head down, sodden hair sticking to his face and rainwater streaming down the back of his neck. It felt good, even with the van slowly following along behind him. He lifted his head and kept walking, shedding the shame that had weighed him down for so long. So he loved a synth. So he wanted to help synths in a world where even human life was cheap. Did it truly matter if it was an impossible dream? The flood of hope that trickled through his veins made Elias feel alive, like a neural network booting up after a long deactivation.

  Yet as Elias realized something was right, he also realized something else was wrong, in the way his new clothes hung from him like they didn't really belong, and the way his synth tech textbooks seemed heavy in his bag. He shrugged it o
ff. Things would come together, as long as he had the spark. As long as he continued to care in a world that stopped caring a long time ago.

  He just had to stay the course, and cling to that tiny sliver of hope until he had the power to use it.

  *~*~*

  A digital chime sounded as Ario opened the front door of Mariko Electronics, hoping this was the place Elias had mentioned. He stepped into the dingy store, the synth workshop seeming more like a pawn shop for synth parts. There was something macabre about it that affected Ario in a way he struggled to understand—perhaps it was like how a human would feel walking into a store full of body parts. The way a head sat on the front counter, its lifeless eyes staring forward and seeing nothing, elicited the same reaction Ario had felt in that hotel room, faced with a baseball bat and the knowledge his life was a commodity for sale. His circuits told him that coming here had been a bad idea, and yet, at the same time, the best idea he could come up with.

  "How can I help—" Mariko stepped out of the back room wearing overalls, with a wrench in one hand. She paused when she saw Ario, almost dropping the wrench, which she carefully placed down on the counter. "What are you doing here?" There was a quiver in her voice that suggested fear, but Ario could not discern the source of that fear. Was his visage still something that frightened people? Was it the fact that he could cause Mariko a lot of trouble, or had the Department made it here first? If they were already waiting for him, he was finished.

  "I require your assistance," Ario said. The store seemed to close in around him, the memories of his imminent death and destruction surfacing at several images per second. The door seemed to loom behind him, beckoning him to abandon his crazy scheme and leave. Elias was beyond that door, but all Ario could do was endanger him. Maybe, in the future, things would be different. If his neural network ever returned to life, that is. If he wasn't instantly disassembled and sold for parts, or worse—melted down and lost forever.