A Little Gift from ENCOM

Chapter 8: Under control

 

 

Emergency situation at ENCOM.

 

There was a virus raging in the main servers, attempting to spread and to infect every other system too. None of the important systems was working anymore. And even the most skilled employees, the best programmers and IT specialists, couldn’t handle the situation.

Neither could Ed… He was at his wit’s end, and the only thing he could do was helplessly handling and shielding the backup systems. It was the worst virus in ENCOM’s history. It was overpowering and it was relentless.

Having a huge experience in fighting viruses directly in the Grid, Sam Flynn had decided to go in there. That was three days ago now. And since then he hadn’t returned...

Usually it took him and his assistant only a few hours to kill a virus. But that was something else now, something dead serious, something unprecedented.

If ENCOM would be able to catch the hacker who was in charge of this, they probably had to … hire him!

 

Ed was angry and strained. None of his skills had helped, none of his security programs and firewalls – his legendary firewalls – was able to halt the virus, even less to kill it, and that made him furious as if somebody had insulted him personally. The fact, that there was someone out there, more skilled than him, making a fool out of him and the entire company, was driving him nuts. And he had to face the truth, that there was absolutely nothing he could do.

Except from one thing: Going to the Grid himself.

He had passed some courses for that, but yet he didn’t feel entirely secure and comfortable with going into the system. He preferred to command the programs from outside, from afar, rather than going into the computer, walking around in this strange world where programs were like people with whom he had to talk with in order to type in commands.

But he was determined to handle it by himself. So he volunteered to get access to the Grid to fight the virus. Not even for ENCOM, but for himself, for his self-confidence, for his ego, his pride.

 

As soon as Ed got the green light for his mission he informed Judith about it. She had her own office now and Ed just had joined her there to discuss his plan with her.

She was standing behind her desk, looking over to Ed who was looking out of the window, restlessly pacing back and forth, his body tensed, every muscle champing at the bit to do something about the situation. He was agitated like a greyhound anticipating the race.

“I’m going with you”, Judith stated, with a firmness and convincement in her voice as if it was a matter of course.

Ed froze in the middle of his pacing, piercing her with a rather distraught expression in his icy gaze.

“No, you won’t!” he commanded, his words harsh and dry, but trembling underneath in covert fear. “It’s too dangerous!”

But Judith didn’t let herself be deterred by Ed’s insistence. “I’m your assistant. It’s my duty to help and to support you.”

Ed was approaching her desk. “Yes, you’re my assistant, my substitute. And that’s why you have to hold the fort here in case something happens to me.” He was standing right in front of her now, emphasizing his statement by tapping on the desk’s blank surface with his knuckles.

Judith moved closer to him. “You need any help”, she answered, calm but persistent. “You can’t handle this on your own.”

“It’s too dangerous, Judith! You stay here, understood? I’ll get me some assistants for support.” Ed attempted to walk away, to leave Judith’s office. And this unpleasant discussion…

But Judith wouldn’t give in. She moved in his way and she argued: “I’m skilled enough for this. I passed all of these Grid exercises brilliantly!”

“You won’t join me, and that’s my last word!” Ed tried it again, with commanding authority and force. Which was the wrong choice...

“I’m one of the best regarding Grid matters, and you know it! To take me with you would be the most deliberate decision in this case,” Judith replied, blocking the access to the door with her body.

“For the last time, no!”

Judith raised her chin until the back of her head touched the door, looking up to Ed in an impression of confident truculence. “So you want to get your emotions involved in work related affairs?” she calmly spoke. “I never would have guessed… “

Ed pressed his lips together, tongue-tied, his jaws tensing, his every expression faintly trembling with resentfulness – and anxiety, but refusing to concede it.

“You always seem to get what you want, don’t you?” He hissed, his tone nuanced with asperity in order to fear.

“It’s not about what I want. It’s about what is required!” She concluded their discussion sternly, moving away from the door and giving Ed room to pass. And Ed realized that she was keeping the point more than him. As much as he detested himself for this, he loved her for it.

“See you in five minutes in the Grid Operating Department”, he dryly spoke, leaving her office.

 

 

And there they were at the G.O.D., sitting in the chairs, two digitizers aiming at them while the instructors where preparing the procedure. Judith realized that this would be the first Grid visit together with Ed. She wished the circumstances would have been more pleasant.

 

They found themselves in the main arrival area, which was a bare, semicircular room with a very high ceiling, almost forming a tower. A huge column of white light was casting from top to bottom: the initial point, the portal to which they had to return with their memory disks, the only point that would lead them back to the real world after their mission.

In the front of the room there was a wide, slightly curved slide door made of glass from which one could see the Grid’s city and landscape. And the ever-starry nightsky.

 

Judith, just having overcome the usual state of feeling dizzy after getting digitized, turned her face to Ed. Looked at him. And for a moment of pulsidge-increasing captivation she had to hold her breath. For he was beautiful.

The shiny black, lusciously shaped, sleek suit gave him the look of a dashing, slender, futuristic warrior.

And his circuitry… it had the same color as his eyes…

Ed was looking at her as well, the same dazed, rapt expression on his face.

“We have to go”, he said, breaking the ban of mutual tender admiration, bittersweet regret in his eyes and in his voice.

 

 

They were walking through the alleys and streets of the Grid city, huge, monumental, shiny, light-striped buildings all around them; dazing beauty which they couldn’t enjoy for now. Ed was explaining his strategy, his plan of battle to Judith while they were searching the streets for any sign of virtual life.

Ed had quite an accurate plan of the ENCOM’s systems in his head and he roughly knew where he was at the moment because he had the ability to ascribe nearly every building and every place in the Grid to the respective point in the server. He was a genius at switching from abstract to objective. And the first thing he was checking out was the state of his firewalls.

 

The sight that met their eyes was grievously dire… The fortresses which were forming the barricades to protect the important programs and functions were damaged, the gates torn down, dashed to pieces. And the firewall programs themselves – there was no sign of them. Or was there?

“Over there!” Ed shouted, running towards a portal which was leading into darkness. There was a program lying on the ground, a tall, well-built, male program clad in heavy armor, a shield to his side and a lance in his hand.

“Oh no…” Judith whispered as she saw that most parts of the program’s body just weren’t existing anymore, havocked, dissolved, by the virus. And the process seemed to proceed right before their very eyes, proceed rapidly. The program was steadily losing shape, losing substance.

Ed was bowing over the derezzing firewall program. “Where’s the virus gone?” He asked in severe hurry. An expression of shock and terror was flashing over the programs face as he raised his lance. Ed was backing off one step and in the same second the program was dissolving completely.

Ed turned to Judith again, starting to move on. “This is bad…” he grumbled while they were passing all the other fortresses. “That was one of my latest firewalls from which I actually had assumed to be impeccable. But at least it shows that the virus must be near…”

 

As they had examined every single fortress and had to face the fact that every gate was destroyed and none of the other firewall-guardians were existing anymore, they started hurrying through the streets and across the places again. The whole Grid city seemed to be lifeless and empty…

“It can’t be that the virus has killed every single program!” Ed was shouting at the naked walls as they were walking through a dark alley. “There must be some programs left!”

“Maybe they are hiding…” Judith suggested hopefully. And just as she turned around a corner she spotted a movement on the other side of the street. A program, lying on the ground, also dissolving … They hurried towards it. A female program dressed in white and grey, an expression of mortal agony arising on her face as Ed tried to talk to her. But she was dying away without giving any hint about the virus’ location.

And after they had witnessed another deceasing program a few streets further Judith had a guess: “Could it be that the dying programs are leading us in the virus’ direction?”

Ed was nodding in confirmation. “You’re might right… Looks like kind of a pervert paper chase.” With an expression of disgust he gazed into distance. The boulevard on which they were standing was leading straight to the huge plaza with the gigantic Grid arena. Judith followed his gaze.

“You think it’s there?” she said.

“I’m afraid, yes…” Ed murmured. “I’m really not in the mood for gaming now.”

 

 

 

They entered the arena through the huge main portal. Empty and lifeless as it was now, dark and shadowy under the starry, cloudy Grid sky, it gave the impression of a baleful, forbidding shrine and not of a place of fun and games and noises.

Watching out for the virus in cautious heed they were walking into the arena, backing each other, slowly striving across the field, their memory disks gripped from their backs, holding them at the ready.

 

“The virus! There!” Ed suddenly hissed, grabbing Judith’s arm, tearing her to him in an instinctive gesture of protection.

And Judith was staring over to the virus approaching, her heartbeat growing faster in agitation, every nerve tensed, every of her senses wide-awake.

First she could only spot the glow of a yellow circuitry in the shadows of a dark angle right below the rows, steadily moving towards them like an eerie luminous skeleton with two unnaturally big, semilunar shaped eyes glaring in the same yellow. 

The slender vision was slowly, smoothly, stepping out of the shadows then, approaching at a casual sauntering, revealing its shape, revealing the plain, irrefutable fact of its identity. His identity.

The same salient, dazzling, body form accentuating circuitry, but pulsating greenish-yellow now like veins polluted with poison.

 

“Oh my god…” Judith was moaning breathlessly, bewildered and shocked. “I thought you have deleted him!” she added, flashing at Ed reproachfully.

“I did…” he answered, gazing at the virus in an expression of stunned blankness. “He turned into a virus...” His voice was trembling between shock and fascination.

 

Darek stopped about fifteen yards before them, fixing them through yellow tinted glasses, a broad grin on his pale face.

“Ah, Judith! At last!” he shouted, spreading his arms in an exaggerated gesture of welcoming. “How many programs do I have to kill before you finally show up?”

Instinctively Ed moved one step forward, shielding Judith’s body with his own.

“And finally I get to know my creator”, Darek said, his voice dripping with disgust and cynism.

Holding his memory disk at the ready Ed replied: “I haven’t created a damn virus!” His voice was slightly flaring with anger, as if Darek had insulted his impeccability by turning into a virus.

“Actually I was about to talk to Judith”, Darek said, rather detached, while slowly and widely circling, sweeping, around Ed to sheer up Judith.

“What do you think, eh?” he asked her, with a strange, dry enthusiasm in his voice. “Enough free will for your taste?”

“Oh no…” Judith huskily whispered, distressed, grasping Ed’s arm, while she felt her knees shaking as if collapsing any minute. “It’s all my fault…Oh god… Ed! It’s my fault!”

Totally confused Ed glanced at her, shaking his head, furrowing his brows. “What are you talking about?”

“I was…” Her voice ran dry as Ed suddenly pushed her backwards for Darek was approaching them at a brisk pace, shortening the distance rapidly. Ed raised his memory disk, aiming it at Darek in a threatening gesture. “What’s this all about, Darek? Killing programs, raging the Grid?”

“Don’t call me by this silly name! I’m not your gift anymore!”

 

Darek stopped, aware of the fact that getting hit by the memory disk’s sharp blade would kill him, would derezz him. He reached for his own disk, holding it to his body like a shield. Or a potential weapon.

“Out of my way, Creator!” he commanded him, a veiled threat in his deep, strident voice.

“What went wrong with you?” Ed asked him, commandingly forcing him to explain. “What are you up to?”

“You, Creator!” he called him once more, like spitting out a disgusting taste, pointing his yellow glowing index finger at him, while pacing back and forth like a tiger in anticipation to attack.

“You fed me on this ravenous woman because you weren’t able to satisfy her hunger yourself. But now I have emerged a hunger of my own.” His glance was flashing from Ed to Judith and back to Ed. “I want her. And I get her. And there’s nothing you can do, weak User that you are.”

 

Judith felt pure, cold fear overpowering her body and her mind like a nasty dizziness. And for some moments she could do nothing but standing there on shivering knees, staring at the program that once had offered her pleasure and gentleness, but now was threatening her.

Ed was stuck in motionlessness as well for some heartbeats, but finally acted. “Quick, Judith, get behind him!” he spurred her into action, giving her a slight shove which finally brought her back to conscious again. Her disk at the ready she swiftly circled around Darek until she was facing his back while Ed was positioning to parry him head-on. But Darek reacted promptly by trying to break from the circle in which they were containing him in. And while he was speeding backwards, intending to gain space to face them both, he was transforming his memory disk with some quick hand grips to an S-shaped boomerang-like object, beating off the beginning attacks from Ed and Judith with staggering dexterity.

Waiting for the right moment, Darek then started to attack them as well, throwing his remodeled disk towards Ed, who managed to avoid the deathly weapon at the last second by cowering down swiftly. Taking advantage of Darek being unarmed and defenseless for one second Judith reacted promptly, slinging her disk at him, missing him by only inches for he was avoiding her attack, striding out of the firing line with the smooth reflexes of an infallible warrior. In the same second as he was gripping the boomerang returning to its owner he succeeded to parry the attack coming now from Ed.

 

“Hand her out to me and I will do you no harm, Creator!” Darek shouted in between attacking and fending. It was no suggestion, no agreement. It was a threat.

For a brief moment Judith again felt anxiety affecting her movements, her force, her skills. But she repressed it, focusing on the one important matter; to help Ed killing the virus, to protect herself and her lover.

Not reacting to Darek’s insistent threatening, Ed kept up his attacking, for his breath was just too precious to waste it on responding to a maniac virus.

“Judith!” Darek was turning to her now. “Leave him and come with me!” Again there was nothing but cold demand in his voice. But Judith didn’t respond to him either.

So the fight went on.

 

Darek, although fast and skilled, had to deal with two opponents being a perfect team. And their attacks where getting increasingly better, with every new try. Steadily keeping him between them, bottling him up, he had always someone in his back, had to watch out on both sides for attacks coming now in shorter intervals.

And slowly realizing that he couldn’t fight them in the open field and that he wasn’t able anyway to get want he wanted in so doing, he changed plans, quickly, within the blink of an eye.

He took the stick tapped to a holster on his right leg, extended it, grabbed it with both hands, bowing over in full career while – within seconds only – a yellow striped light cycle was materializing around the stick which was forming the handlebars. And even before it had taken up its whole shape he already set the virtual machine in motion, speeding out of the arena.

“After him!” Ed commanded, materializing his own light cycle, Judith following him by doing the same. The helmet just had closed around Ed’s head as he was speeding forth and Judith felt her own helmet covering her head now as well.

 

Muted through the helmet she heard the engines of her cycle growling as she was picking up pace. For some moments Darek was out of sight. But finally they spotted him again, driving towards the outlands.

They were chasing him through the canyons, passing dark rocks, driving through narrow ravines. And slowly it became clear that Judith was a way better driver than Ed. It was like in the video games or the training sessions; Ed was just not good at this. So Judith sped up, skillfully and smoothly guiding her light cycle through the meandering canyon, catching up with Darek bit by bit, while leaving Ed lengths behind.

She was now very close to him, her disk already in her hands to beat him from behind, gaining on and on, adrenalin pulsing through her veins like a drug while she was fixing her eyes on Darek’s back, on the lines of his circuitry as if they were the target she had to hit.

Out of the blue he made a U-turn, leaving Judith no room to react.

Taken aback she was moaning a hollow gasp into her helmet, her body stolidly driving the machine further in an instant of torpidity. It took her only seconds to finally turn her cycle around, to follow him, but it was seconds too late.

She saw Darek driving towards Ed’s light cycle in deadly speed, saw him cutting in on him, saw him jumping off his cycle in the moment it was crashing into the wheels of Ed’s machine, making it skid, letting both cycles crash and shatter to pieces at the rocks, tossing Ed out of his seat. His body slid across the rugged ground, coming to a stop, lying there, moveless.

Judith was jumping from her cycle in breathless panic as she reached him, not caring about making her self vulnerable to Darek, not caring about anything but her lover’s life.

“Ed!” she was shouting, over and over again, as she approached the motionless body. “Ed! Oh, Ed ... please, no!”

A sudden grasp on her lower abdomen was chocking off her breath, her every word. With relentless force Darek was tearing her away from Ed, mercilessly fast. And with every inch of room growing between her and her lover Judith’s heart got ripped apart a little more.

“Get off of me!” she yelled at Darek, struggling against his clutch vigorously. But standing no chance. She was nothing but a puppet in his arms of steel.

Darek came to a stop, but only to brutally rip the memory disk from Judith’s back, slinging away carelessly the object which might could pose a threat for him.

 

Suddenly there was a movement stirring Ed’s body. He raised his shoulders, his torso, shivering, while his helmet was dematerializing, and Judith saw that his head was not injured. A rush of relieve was pulsing through her body like the very first breath of life.

Ed sank on the ground again, too weak to raise, but conscious. There was an expression of pain on his face as he was helplessly gazing after Judith, infinite pain, but not caused by any injuries.

Although it nearly tore her apart inside, Judith withheld any gesture, any word or any action, that could have told Darek that Ed was still alive. Because she feared that if Darek found out, he would kill him straightaway, easily, wounded and helpless that he was.

And so she let herself be dragged away by Darek, facing that she couldn’t struggle him anyway, for his force was beyond nature. Let herself be dragged away to give Ed time to recover, hoping that he would.

Darek forced her to sit on the one remaining light cycle, the one of Judith, then he took place behind her. And as he started the engine and they were driving he was bowing over her body, pressing it down, bending it brutally into the seat while gripping both of her wrists harshly with his left hand to prevent her from struggling.

As if she would do that at full speed! She might was distraught, but she wasn’t suicidal.

 

 

After about half a mile he stopped the cycle abruptly, descending from it in a smooth, nimble move while pulling Judith carelessly after him, letting the machine drop on the ground, unconcerned. He walked a few steps further, tearing Judith into the first cleft that came along, pressing her against the bare, cold rock.

 

“Finally…” he whispered, stroking her hair, her face, her shoulders and hips with a slow slide while looking her up and down possessively as if she was some sort of an exotic hunting trophy.

As if lunging out he suddenly kissed her. A kiss like a raid; invading, forcing, infringing, his hands clutched around her shoulders harshly. The same hands that once had caressed her so full of gentleness…

He stopped kissing her, looked at her like a predator that just had taken a first mouthful of his prey.

“Darek… please let me go!” Judith insistently spoke to him. He just furrowed his brows in an expression of incomprehension. “Why should I do this? Can’t you see: I’m finally able to feel! I can feel love, Judith!”

Her eyes were widening and she didn’t know if she should feel shocked or totally bewildered. “That’s… that’s not love…” she breathed.

A hint of anger flared up in his eyes, which were glistening green behind his yellow tinted glasses. “Why not? You told me it’s about free will. You told me you wanted someone who chooses to love you. Well, I chose to love you for I have my own will now!”

She gasped. “But to force your will upon me has nothing to do with love!”

He narrowed his eyes, piercingly looking at her, his one forearm leaning against the rock beneath her face.

“I’m sorry but I’m really not familiar with the finer touches of the User’s language. All I know is that I feel that virus you have told me about, that fever. There’s a heat burning in me and there’s a strong, incontestable urge to share that heat with you, to brand it into your body until you burn as well.” Not noticing her moan of protest and her body stiffen in repulse, he bended over again to violently kiss her while both of his hands where grasping into her hair to fix her head to his liking. And not even her struggling, her arms pushing against his chest, trying to shove him away from her, could hold him back. She could have fought against the bare rock instead…

While kissing her still he let his one hand glide from her hair to her throat, gripping his fingers around it. And for one brief moment of pure panic Judith thought he wanted to strangle her. But his fingers slid further, grasping the collar of her suit, pulling it open a few inches, denuding her neck completely. The two yellow pulsing fingers on his right hand were leaving a sickeningly hot burn on her skin, and she shivered with disgust and fear at the thought what it must feel like if his touch would reach the more sensitive parts of her body.

“I don’t want you! So let go of me!” she yelled at him huskily as he had released her from his breath sapping kiss.

Now there was plain, hot anger flashing up on his every expression, arising in his body like a wildfire. “I don’t understand, Judith! Why are you refusing me? Why?”

“You are virtual. You are not my kind, not human. And I don’t feel anything for you!”

“But I’m looking exactly like him! So why don’t you want me?”

“It’s because…”

She couldn’t speak on, for she began to tremble, began to feel dizziness addling her mind, felt like fainting any moment.

Darek’s words echoing in her mind.

I’m looking exactly like him…

And she suddenly had one thought arising in her mind, emitting through her whole body like an electric shock: The painful awareness that, if this was over, she wouldn’t be able to enjoy Ed’s touch, his caress, his love again like she did before. Because looking at the spitting image of her violator while making love to Ed would taint forever any tender feeling. And she knew one thing: She wanted to defend that precious jewel of love and tenderness between her and Ed at any price. She wouldn’t let Darek take that away from her, would halt him whatever the cost.

But what could she do? Darek’s physical force was beyond her own...

 

Darek grasped her shoulders again. “Explain!” he commanded her.

“It’s not only about looks! I simply can’t love you like I love a human being! Like I love Ed…” Judith insistently spoke to him. “It’s this, simple and plain.”

 He was shaking his head, not seeming to be satisfied with this answer, his lips pressed together along with his clenching jaws. “So why did you make love to me as I still was that program? Why were you handing over your body to my control so willingly, but refuse me now? What’s different now?”

“You’re brutal and you’re forcing me to, that’s different!”

“I don’t understand you Users…”

“You never did…” she whispered low, sighing, shaking her head, looking away from him, slowly realizing that she couldn’t talk to him like to a human being, for he had no soul, no conscience, no comprehension. And that scared her even more.

He grasped her chin, forcing her to meet his eyes again. “But I know one thing: After I was always ready for you to satisfy your needs, you shall be there for me now as well.”

Judith’s knees began to shiver and she probably would have fallen down to the ground if Darek’s clutch hadn’t been that strong it just kept fixing her to the rock.

“No! No, please…” she was panting out in sudden weakness as he began to let his hands slide all over her body as if it was his possession.

 

Suddenly she had an intuition like a ray of hope flickering through her despair and her fear.

“Ed! He can create you a female program after my image! And with her you can do whatever you want.”

But in the same second she had spoken out her last word she regretted her hasty talking, for she realized what a dumb hint about Ed’s physical integrity she just had given away.

Darek however didn’t seem comprehend anyway. “After that collision he is either dead or seriously injured”, he just answered, dryly, showing not a hint of emotion.

“Then let’s go and help him!” Judith promptly reacted, insistently urging him to move, hitting his chest with the palms of her hands in emerging hope.

He didn’t budge an inch. Callously he gazed at her. Then he spoke, low and calm but cold as ice.

“Why should I content myself with a virtual woman while you are refusing me because I am virtual? That doesn’t make sense, User!”

She ran out of words and she felt like running out of hope as well…

“And anyway,” he continued. “I want to have a human woman. I want the trembling, sweating, delicious tasting and smelling body of a User. Now that I tasted you I don’t want anything else.” As if in a gesture of affirmation he let his tongue slowly slide along her neck, licking away the drop of sweat that was running down her skin as if it was the finest wine. She was shivering with disgust, but he didn’t notice, didn’t understand, just went on.

With his index finger fondling faintly he slid her suit open a little more, watching another bead of sweat dripping downwards bit by bit, from her throat to her chest and through the valley between her breasts, slightly vibrating from her quivering and breathing. Gradually he undid the suit, following the trickle of sweat making its way down, until it finally came to a stop, somewhere in the space between her ribs. He bended down, catching it up, licking all along the salty trail it had left, up to her throat again, disregarding Judith’s moaning and grasping his hair and his shoulders in desperate efforts to push him away from her.

While breathing hot and fast an lustfully on her neck he grasped one of her breasts, peeling the suit away from it, his breath growing to a feral moan as he clenched his palm around the sensitive flesh.

Forthwith Judith grabbed his brutal hand with insistent force to halt him. “Don’t you…!” she snarled at him grossed out, digging her nails into his arm and tearing away his hand from her maltreated flesh. But causing only the reaction that he grasped now both of her wrists and pressed them over her head on the harsh wall of rock. A grasp like a manacle…

Then he made another foray to invade her mouth with forceful kisses. With both of her hands fixed, Judith lifted one leg to fight him, attempting to slam her knee into his stomach, his crotch, wherever. Only to helplessly witness that he repelled this attack as well by gripping her knee and effortlessly spreading her leg aside, causing an electrifying twinge flashing through her tendons.

Judith screamed out in pain and despair, but still fighting him back vigorously. “Please just let go of me! Can’t you see – can’t you feel – that I don’t want this?!! What happened to your gentleness, your ability to read my mind, my wishes, to only do what I like, to never hurt me, Darek? I’m suffering and I don’t want this!! So why don’t you stop?”

“Darek has been deleted,” he explained dryly. “What’s left of him are the ideas of love and passion and free will you planted into him, which had been fermenting inside of him – until I have evolved out of it.”

“This is not love…This is not love!” she repeated over and over again, shouting herself hoarse, while tears where running down her face now and her fists where hitting Darek’s chest, steadily but pointlessly. She didn’t know what else to do. Her mind was offering her no more ideas to shuffle out of this situation, and her struggling was only driven by plain survival instincts in the end. She was screaming, hitting, punching, slapping and kicking him with all of her might. And as she felt the suit gliding from her every bodypart, her mind was facing the inevitable, while her body still was defending itself with feral determination.

Suddenly there was a second of hesitance in Darek’s movements, a blink of stagnation. And reflexively Judith took advantage of it, squirming free from his clutch, fleeing two trembling steps. But he halted her by grasping her forearm. She was stumbling at the heavy tug, falling to the ground, and he was moving over her, pressing her down with his entire weight. Suddenly there was this hesitance in his moves again and his body was shivering and twitching as if in pain. His back and his neck were bending and his fingers were clenching into the ground. Judith lifted one leg, slammed her knee into his torso, managing to shove his body from hers. She expended her last bit of energy on crawling away from him hurriedly. And as she was out of his reach she watched him writhing there on the ground, her head and her naked back leant to the wall of rock, breathing hard.

She noticed Darek seeming to get weaker and weaker. Just once he bestirred his self to try to get up again, managed to walk two, three steps in Judith’s direction, stooping, shivering. Holding her breath, looking up to him in anxious stir she crawled away some inches, but before he could reach her at all he collapsed again, ending up squirming on the ground in kind of a silent agony.

Her heart beating fast, her pulse racing in her throat and rushing through her veins, but steadily subsiding now that she wasn’t in danger anymore, she watched him, her arms clenched around her bare shoulders, which were trembling like crazy as if in aftershock of the threat she just had experienced.

For many minutes she was just sitting there, her eyes closed, not able to do anything but waiting for her body to settle down, to regain power.

 

 

“Judith!” she suddenly heard Ed’s voice, so throaty and weak and painfully worried. “Ed!” she yelled back, but her voice was weak as well and she couldn’t even manage to rise and walk towards him for her body had lost all of its energy on trying to fight against an invincible creature. So she just bended forward a little, reaching out her one arm, her hand, while he was limping towards her for his left leg seemed to be injured, casting only a cursory, almost unconcerned glance at the squirming shape of Darek to his right.

Falling down on his knees he enfolded Judith in his arms, letting her memory disk, which he had taken with him, drop right beneath him.

“Did he harm you?” was the first thing he asked, fear and anguish and guilt dripping from his every syllable.

“No. I’m fine”, she answered, a weak, confirming smile on her lips. And with a moan of infinite relief he closed his arms around her even tighter.

He reached for her suit then, nothing but a silky cloth now, and draped it around her shoulders gently, whereupon it was closing itself around her naked body, re-covering it as if by magic.

“I’m sorry…” he mumbled into her hair, his embrace growing equally stronger with realizing and regretting what he has done. “I’m so sorry… so sorry…”

Judith reached up to touch his cheek. “It wasn’t your fault, Ed”, she affirmed.

Ed furrowed his brows in slight confusing. “But I have programmed him! I never should have done this… never…”

“But it was me who gave him the idea of love and free will. His interpretation of it was just wrong…”

For some moments Ed was looking at her wordlessly, tying to figure out the meaning of her words. In the end he understood. “You seem to do this quite often”, he said, whisperingly, his voice only a breath. “Raising emotions in an emotionless being…”

Judith softly smiled. “You can’t create something out of nothing.”

 

Ed was casting a quick glance over to the virus that once had been a program, created for reasons of weakness and self doubt. But love, too.

He had his back turned to them. His constantly twitching shoulders were moving up and down as if breathing hard and his yellow circuitry was flickering like a light bulb impending to die away.

“The Devast Dart…” Judith whispered, referring to the small, slender object that was poked into his back. “When did you have time to apply it?”

Ed snorted a quick, dry laugh. “At no time, actually... It was more or less an instinctive move. A reflex… Maybe only luck. Somewhere between Darek cutting in on me and crashing to the ground.”

 

The Devast Dart was the prototype of a piece of hardware which Ed had constructed, hastily and tentatively, only days ago, just after the virus catastrophe had occurred. It was intended to be an ancillary weapon, along with the disk. A small, concealable weapon which the virus wasn’t expecting and therefore couldn’t fend as easily as the disk. The object could only be used directly in the Grid and was meant to be attached on a virus’ body. Simply put, it was working a bit like a virus itself, for it was implanting his own lethal matrix into the virus’ body and thus destroyed it from inside, byte by byte.

Initially, Ed hadn’t been entirely sure if it was working at all. But now he knew. What a horrible trial run...

 

 

Suddenly Darek was turning around, facing them, his one arm reaching out in their direction, his fingers helplessly nailing into the ground while endless quivers where shaking his twitching body, some parts of it already beginning to dissolve.

Judith briefly winced.

“Do you think he’s suffering?” she asked, her voice trembling with concern. The agony in Darek’s face was so real...

“I don’t know”, Ed answered, straight and neutral.

“He looks like he’s slowly dying…” she said, her words subsiding to a sore, pain-filled sobbing.

“Don’t look!” Ed softly ordered, turning her face away from the deceasing virus, turning her face to him. A single tear was running down her cheek as she was blinking. And she laid down her head into Ed’s lap, slowly, gently caressing his thighs in a gesture of soothing herself.

Until he stood up and she as well, and she saw that the virus was gone.

 

 

Leaning on each other in gentle caring of their wounded bodies, they were walking towards Judith’s light cycle.

“How are we supposed to explain that to ENCOM?” Judith asked.

Ed slightly shook his head, grabbing the cycle’s handlebars to hoist the machine from the ground. “I’ll probably get fired…” he grumbled.

“I would lie for you!” Judith promised, a small but bold smile on her lips.

“I think I have to handle this on my own…”

“No you don’t, Ed. Get used to the fact that we are a team.”

“Well then. Let’s cook up a story… A damn good story,” he said as he sat down on the cycle.

“May I?” Judith positioned herself in front of him, pushing him backwards a bit to gain space while gripping the handlebars. He just raised his hands briefly, letting her do. “Oh well… as you will!” he mumbled.

“Flynn!” Judith suddenly remarked. “We have to find him!”

Ed rolled his eyes. “Do we?” he said, ironically. But Judith already had started the engine.

 

As they were at full speed he rested his head on her back trustingly, lovingly, his arms gripping tight around her waist, enjoying the touch, thinking about might visiting the Grid together for some leisure activities as soon as they had recovered from this dreadful mission. What a pleasure would that be.

 

 

* * * * * * * * * * *

 

The end.... so far. I haven't planned anything beyond this. But if I have any ideas, this will get continued.

Dear readers: What do you think of this story ? Did you like it so far ? I would love to hear your opinion. :3