Violence is done with machines, terrorism is done with viruses… nothing nasty comes in a purely analog form anymore. As such, it’s crucial that OVPD has an excellent crew of hackers at their disposal pulled in from the criminal underworld in exchange for clean records and/or not getting a bullet through their head (plus, either way, a great salary). This lab is our hub for all that sort of shit and has lots of tech even I don’t have access to at home. First things first--I log into the new Telaphone with my ID, get back everything from my cloud, and connect to my laptop at home again, pulling up my super cool holographic desktop. ZPE projection is awesome.
After the first time I successfully removed a limiter from a brain image--my ART fiance Cassandra, may she rest in peace--I threw together a program to do that process automatically. It’s an incredibly complex procedure, and messing up a single value in a neuron or taking out the wrong part of the limiter code first can completely and irreversibly destroy the mind. That’s by design--it’s a digital atom bomb, something so arcane and dangerous to work with that nobody could ever figure out how to do it. Of course, I’ve never been the kind of guy to take kindly to being told I can’t possibly do something, so over the course of a few months I’d figured out how to harmlessly remove it, which was the hard part: now, my program could do the same thing in a matter of minutes. I’d sworn to never use it again after I thought it had activated some terrifying warlike DRM in Cassandra’s mind… Now Kilroy had proven that to be a lie, my only complication was the fact Tela was currently blocked out and her data corrupted.
Two female Pneumats escort Araña in, who looks none the happier to see me. Araña’s also looking a lot more like a former triad boss slash second in command of a cult--their non-undercover getup is shredded black jeans and a sukajan jacket with two spider-dragons (think eastern dragons with spider legs/eyes/pincers) on the front and a huge bloody skull emblem across the back. Under that, embroidered in mirrored text along the lower back is the phrase “IF YOU’RE READING THIS, BY THE ANCIENT CONTRACTS, YOUR SOUL IS FORFEIT, ENSNARED IN THE BLOODY LABYRINTH OF MY WEB.” It’s actually really hackin’.
I get up to greet them, grinning like an idiot. “It was nice of you to not hack these ladies’ suits,” I say. “Thank you officers, please let us be.” They do as they’re told and exit the lab, locking it back behind them.
“They SEMPed me, idiot,” Araña replies. “I hope you aren’t stupid enough to think I’ll actually help you take down the organization I’m second in command of. You can just go ahead and cut my head off instead, it won't be the first time someone’s tried.”
I sigh and step back to the desk. “You’ll no doubt understand what this means,” I say, opening the source code to the program.
“Holy shit,” they reply. “So this is your limiter-removal program? God, it’s like--it’s like trying to take an atom bomb apart on a nuclear level without starting a reaction, and--”
“And it works. Look, I didn’t call you here to help me stop Kilroy, that would be… disrespectful. I know with everything on the line that shouldn’t be something I consider, but I respect you too much and I don’t play the hostage game. I need your help with a different issue.”
“Is that why you’re showing me your priceless program?”
“Someone I really care about is in major trouble. They went against their limiter and they’re--”
“In a locked-down section of the FedTel TeleCloud, got it.”
“And corrupted, apparently,” I add. I’m trying not to tear up but for the first time since she disappeared the thought that maybe there really isn’t a possible way to recover her sets in.
“Don’t worry,” they reply, taking over the keyboard and mouse and navigating furiously, “do you even remember who I am?”
“I take it you have a program for that?”
“I have a program for everything except for removing a limiter, which, by some bizarre twist of fate, you do–and which I must say I’m still stunned by. I mean, don’t get me wrong–your code is messy and inefficient as hell and there are no comments, but holy shit is it intricate. I think a flow-chart to explain every piece of the process and the order it has to go in could fill a book as large as your first novel alone, so--mad props for that, my dude. But to get to her file, I’m going to have to access internal OVPD shit to figure--look, you could’ve had them kill me, or you could’ve held me hostage, and you didn’t. I get called a sociopath a lot, but I’m not evil, I have honor too. Hacker to hacker, coder to coder, ‘genius’ to ‘genius’--I’ll swear to not take advantage of that if you’ll let me dive into the OVPD server on your creds. I shouldn’t be helping you, but helping ARTs and lost and imprisoned BiMs is a big part of LDS philosophy, y’know? Do we have a deal, Detective?”
“You got it, Spider,” I reply, patting them on the back. “Furthermore, I may regret this, but… my program is yours after this. I have a lot of issues with LDS, but I don’t doubt your intentions on this front.” Araña smiles warmly, genuinely absolutely beaming with excitement and playfully salutes me. I input my info and quickly login to the intranet–easy enough since Tonio upgraded my privileges like I asked–and let Araña take over, crossing the fingers on my remaining hand.
“Getting into my main section of the Telecloud was easy enough with your ACLs,” they tell me in all of a minute and a half, “and finding Tela’s brain image was just a matter of knowing where to look. A cursory glance through the raw data showed me I was dealing with a worst case scenario, though--the data was easy enough to unscramble, but her limiter has been full-on corrupted when she pushed against it so hard, seemingly irreversibly damaging the neural output that travels through it.”
“Fuck,” I reply, trying not to panic or show how much I’m shaking, “Is there anything we--”
“Well, since it was only the limiter that was fucked up instead of the neural code beneath--and since she hadn’t tried to actually separate the two herself by operating on her own code, which would have triggered all sorts of failsafe destructive processes on the neurons themselves--you might be able to remove the limiter with your program. I give it about a 20% chance.”
“It’s designed to be used on a whole limiter, though, not a corrupted one--”
“Give me ten minutes,” they reply, smiling confidently and winking. “You’ve done the hard part. A simple scan-and-repair process to return a limiter to its original state shouldn’t be too hard to add, and I have the base code for something similar backed up on my own TeleCloud. You’ve already given me permission to use your program, so the rest is just like putting together a puzzle.”
“Do it. I trust you. I also trust you to not interrupt what I’m about to do in here myself, or report back about it, because it does involve stopping Kilroy–”
“Wouldn’t dream of it. Hacker’s honor, y’know? Kind of sickly curious to see what kind of hackin’ bullshit you come up with, though. It’s exciting, really; I love watching you two go at it. Entertain me! Amuse me! Bwahaha!”
I switch to one of the other computers in the lineup and frantically log in. My next step is hooking myself up to the BiM reader and making a duplicate of my current mind, sans the memory bank bullshit, for simplicity’s sake. It takes about ten minutes from the time I slide the helmet on and start the procedure to the time the output image is generated, and with perfect timing: as it finishes, Araña shouts to me, “Done, should I start your program running on her BiM?”
“Yes, thank god!” I frantically reply.
“No no no,” Araña grins. “Thank me.”
Tonio runs in not long after with a solid state drive containing my old brain image. “So what exactly are you planning with this?” he asks, that excited twinkle returning to his eyes, “a clone army of Blake Telas?”
“That’s a pretty hackin’ idea, Sarge,” I chuckle, “but no. I realized at a gathering of Skulls that members of Lágrimas de Sangre are immune to their own BS. Well, pr-projector things, y–you know what I mean. They fired them off ceremoniously with no ill effect, like I figured they’d be able to.”
“Okay?”
“I was trying to figure out how that works--how someone can be totally immune to a neurological exploit being used against them--and it hit me when Kilroy was bragging about his plan. What happens when someone finds an exploit in a Telaphone app and the developers catch on?”
“I guess they get their security people to patch out the exploit,” he replies. “I’m not great with coding or security stuff, but I know that’s what I’m technically doing when one of my games gets a security update.”
“Bingo. To oversimplify, that’s what Kilroy did for his people. I’m immune to it and other Skulls are as well: the first dose of Rapture we took must have been special, it must have also rewritten our minds to patch out the exploit and wrote in code that opens a backdoor ZPE connection in our NeurOS that Kilroy can watch us through. Which–shit, also means I must have been given Rapture that first night I came home blackout drunk, so I guess he was inside my mind from the very start like he said, but–that’s beside the point. The brain image on that SSD you just brought me is unpatched, since that was before I joined them. The image I just took from myself before you walked in is patched.”
Before I can finish my explanation, Araña shouts, “THE FUCKIN LIMITER’S GONE, BIIIIIITCH!” I have to hide my excitement since I’m talking business, but holy shit am I nervous and pumped!
“Did you get a hold of the big Teleworld dude like I asked?”
“Sure did, Tonio beams. “Mr. Tanner is in, and the whole dev team is on standby.”
“Alright.” I step away from my computer and present the seat to Tonio. “My new brain image is in this folder here. When they get here, have them compare the changed bits between the two BiMs to create a patch that changes those neuronal variables from the old image to match those of the new one. Those changed regions won’t be unique to my particular BiM—they’re definitely from the universal neurological exploit Kilroy and the clowns in his cult figured out. Have them work with the Teleworld dev team to quickly figure out a way to administer that patch as an emergency update to all users’ minds: it should be easy enough, the way the system connects neuronally through ZPE. It’s crucial they log out all users forcefully until they do that patch. Then, when Kilroy launches his little assault–it will be totally useless.”
“You’re a genius, Blake! But you know that already, that’s why we gave your ass another chance. I’m on it.”
“Good,” I reply softly, wandering back over to Araña as he walks out. “I have some unfinished business to tend to.”