Sunday, October 26, 2008

Complete Chaos

As the city lights powered back up a huge swelling of cheering was heard below. Rishi said, "we heard them all the way up here? That sound must have been deafening."

Terrie6 jumped off Rishi's lap as Terrie5, Terrie7, and Terrie8 walked into the observation deck of the translator station.

Terrie8 said, "Six, quit hogging the hubby."

"Look, I take opportunity when it presents itself," retorted Terrie6.

Terrie5 said, "Look. We are all activated and we each want to stay that way. We know our husband knows how to shut us down so I suggest we at least pretend to get along and stay on his good side."

Paul looked and Rishi and said, "this is like a bad science fiction movie from the twentieth century."

"Tell me about it," said Rishi.

Terrie8 had pulled her hair into a pony tail and wore a business suit. Terrie7 had her hair pulled back with two barrettes and was wearing a mans business white shirt with men's jeans.

Terrie6 said, "how did you gals get such nice clothes?"

Terrie7 and Terrie8 said simultaneously, "We've been to street level and managed to borrow some nice things from some looters."

Terrie5 looked baffled and walked out the door.

"They were looting already?"

"Yeah. Sad really." said the pair of Terries.

They looked at each other and then looked away, trying desperately to get out of sync. Then they sighed together and failing to lose sync they collided trying to get out the door. Terrie8 fell over as Terrie7 ran down the hall. Terrie8 stood up, walked to Terrie6 and they each said, "I can't wait for that to be over. Oh damn, not again."

They turned away from each other and Terrie8 walked out of the room.

Paul, temporarily transfixed by the synchronicity, watched as Terrie6 attempted to re-tie the surgical gown around herself. He stood agape at the machine before him.

Rishi stood, looked at Terrie6, and said, "you duplicated her speech on purpose."

Terrie6 smiled and said, "Heh. There is way too much competition around here. I've claimed you and intend to keep you."

Rishi frowned, sighed and said, "This is another problem with my marriage. Terrie actually thought she owned me and I suppose, until she left, I thought I owned her too."

Ted and Red were bemusedly quiet. Then Red said, "I guess dying has its pluses and minuses. Not having to learn about relationships is one of the pluses."

Paul said, "We should head to the capital and see what assistance we can offer."

"Agreed" said Rishi.

Ted said, "there is no point in staying here, can we tag along?"

"Sure," said Paul, "but you better put on some clothes. Meet us back here in fifteen minutes, we'll round up the rest of the Terries for safe keeping."

"Hmmmph," said Terrie6. "I've already told my sister's the plan and they are on their way here. We do not need to be kept safe."

Red and Ted ran down the hall as fast as they could go.

Terrie7 and Terrie8 entered the translator station with some clothing for Terrie6.

"We each are giving up something for you," said Terrie8, "I hope you appreciate it."

"Absolutely!" said Terrie6 ecstatically as she saw the nice outfit her sisters offered.

She disrobed unabashedly and dressed in a blue cotton, button down shirt and short blue skirt.

"Where are the other Terries?" asked Rishi to Terrie6.

They will meet us at the street entrance. They are keeping a low profile. Its chaos down there and there's no telling what the crowds would do if they realized there are multiple copies of an individual around.

"Oh!" said Paul. "I hadn't thought of that, they might think they are clones and take the law into their own hands."

The crowd who'd been outside Terrie's lab showed up and one doctor stepped forward and asked, "What do we do now?"

Rishi answered, "Go back to life as usual, lets let the politicians sort this out."

Another doctor, a woman that Rishi recognized as one of the doctors who treated him, said, "According to news reports, which we've been watching in the break room since the power came back on, President Rubinic convinced Presidents Gleland and Zinfidel that it would be safer to go with him. They really didn't have a choice."

"That means," replied Paul," that Vice President Vowel is the acting president.

"Oh no," said Rishi, "not that idiot. I can't believe Gleland chose him."

"I understand he was under pressure from President Rubinic," said Terrie5 and Terrie7 at the same time. They looked at each other, shrugged and then looked at Terrie6 and Terrie8 wondering why they hadn't spoken.

Rishi replied, "That's not good, that means its likely that ..."

All the Terries interrupted Rishi at the same time, "Wait. There's something going on. The virus is receiving commands from the outside. We have to add a new layer or protection."

Terrie8 said, "how shall we encrypt it?"

Terrie6 and Terrie5 nodded and they all closed their eyes. The city power blinked off for a long ten seconds and then back on in a wave across the city.

"Excelent!" exclaimed Terrie6.

"What did you do?" asked Paul.

Red and Ted stormed into the room with clothes in arms. They stripped to their underwear and dressed while huffing and puffing.

"So glad. Huff Puff. We didn't. Huff Puff. Miss you," said Ted.

Terrie6 smiled like the cat who ate the canary and said, "Six of us each designed an unique layer of encryption and implemented it in the virus' main code."

"And the seventh?" Asked Paul.

"Terrie2 created a layer that pretends to be the virus so the virus controller still thinks he's in control."

"Great work," said Rishi. "You'll be able to make Rubinic think he's shut down the power."

"More importantly," said Terrie6, "we know who's feeding Rubinic information."

"Who?" asked one of the nurses in the background.

"Vice President Vowel of course. Right now they are talking to each other while we sensor what they say. Currently President Rubinic thinks the power is off and that there is a revolt in progress. Vowel thinks he's been stabbed in the back by Rubinic."

All the Terries in the room flinched at the same time.

"Well, that settles that, one less idiot to deal with," said Terrie8.

"What happened?" Asked Paul.

"Vowel stopped transmitting. He must have either removed the virus from his implants or died. Either way we're able to feed false information to Rubinic. We've completely taken over the conversation."

"Surely you won't be able to continue this forever," said Paul.

"He's already on to us, but that's okay, the rioting has made it to the senate and a mob is about to kill the vice president. Oh, I'm too late, he's already dead. We made sure to transmit his last burst of information. Rubinic should be convinced we are without power."

"What if he has other insiders?"

"We'll know," said Terrie6. "In other news," continued Terrie8, "the rioting in the streets stopped after that ten second power glitch. I think people realized they had better behave or the power might go out again.

The Terries, Paul, Rishi, Ted and Red got into a translator.

"One moment, please," announced the Cube, "I am performing power up diagnostics. There is a damaged section of track, we can only go down or south from here."

"We want to go down," said Rishi.

"Very well, then," said the Cube, "down it is."

The translator shot downward and its mechanism announced, "I like elevator mode better than translator mode, but I rarely get to run as an elevator."

"Good for you," quipped Terrie8.

As the doors opened at the bottom, Terrie2, Terrie3, and Terrie4 welcomed everyone to the ground floor.

Rishi saw Terrie2 and said, "I'm sorry." She cut him off and said, "We are so beyond that, let it go. I'm not your wife, I get that. We have got to get to the senate. Vowel really did kill himself and the senate is in disarray."

"Where's the speaker?"

"They don't know where she is."

"Wait," said Paul to Rishi, "Didn't Mayor Hawthorne mention she was in a safe place?"

"Yeah. I remember that," replied Rishi. He said, "Jenny and Coren were safe. Coren could be Coren De Salt, the speaker of the house."

"We have to find her," said Paul. "She's in command of this mess now."

At that moment a light appeared over the horizon brightening the blue sky.

"What the hell?" Asked Paul.

Red shouted, "SUNRISE?"

"Oh no!" said Terrie2, "that's not supposed to happen for at least six months."

Red said, "who cares why, we have to get below ground fast!"

He and Ted ran toward a subterranean translator entrance with the seven Terries, Rishi and Paul close behind. People from above ground poured in like rodents running from a sinking ship.

The ground shook and everyone felt the planet accelerating under their feet.

"Something must have gone wrong with the planetary drive system," said Paul as he and the others huddled into a circle.

Rishi asked Terrie2, "Is the virus in it?"

"No. Its been independent since day one. Gleland knew it had to be off the network because of Rubinic's reach."

Terrie3 who'd had her eyes closed opened them and said, "its a bug in the guidance software. It started the gentle move toward the planet's new orbit when it shouldn't have. It also started the rotation which should only start once the planet is about a sol length from the star. They just announced it on the news network."

The ground beneath them lurched again, dragging everyone about six feet across the floor. The planet was continuing to accelerate.

Terrie3 continued, "Apparently the scientists in charge are making the planet spin faster to limit the damage of the suns energy."

Red asked, "why were we that close to the sun anyway?"

"Efficiency," replied Paul. All the solar arrays were on the bright side with the population living on the dark side. With the advent of the life we're planting, we knew we were going to have to park the planet in a new orbit, but obviously my guys got their code wrong."

Red ran to a Cube door and said, "Open."

"I can't let you in now young man," replied the Cube, "can't you feel the earthquake?"

"We need to get to the senate as fast as possible."

"No," said Paul, "we have to get to CyberBio corp. I'm sure that's where Coren is. We have an area that is free of electronics. Its a model of the ecosystem we've been designing for the planet. That has to be where they are."

As they stood up to walk to the translator, the planet lurched and knocked them down again.

"I cannot take you anywhere," said the Cube.

Paul stood up walked to the door and said, "System override. Bossman Paul speaking. Code 745321."

"Code accepted, its your lives after all."

"CyberBio systems."

The Cube shot off northward as the planet lurched again.

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