Jennifer felt the alien presence ease its attack on her mind as Mark withdrew from their three-way mental link, somehow taking with him the vast majority of the alien AI’s attention. Apparently the opportunity to crush the isolated opponent was the bait that caused the AI to withdraw.
Feeling a shudder pass through Heather’s mind, Jen focused on her.
Stay with me. Mark’s doing what he has to.
The flood of visions that came back at her almost knocked Jennifer out of the link. Jesus. Was this what Heather had to deal with every day?
Hurry, Heather’s thoughts whispered. Mark can’t hold out long. Not against that.
Jen directed her attention to the ship’s command protocol, returning to the deepest link she’d been able to access. Scanning quickly, she raced through the data partitions, letting her mind brush each one without delving into the data layers beneath. Whereas human data storage was commonly organized into a binary tree enabling log(n) lookup, these alien layers formed intricate fractal patterns, each using a different prime as its computational numeric base, numeric calculations replaced by manipulation of the color spectrum formed by the fractal frequencies.
The more important or classified the data, the deeper into the prime sequence its corresponding fractal layer. The protection was provided, not by encryption, but by the sheer quantity and complexity of the interleaved data nodes. On past attempts, Jennifer had always gotten lost in the endless combinations of color and pattern as she searched for related data links.
But now she had Heather’s mind guiding her from node to node, somehow sniffing out the logical links. The fractal patterns of interest acquired an iridescent glow: the more distinct the glow, the greater the search correlation. Like fairies suspended on gossamer wings, they moved through a magical garden, twisting trails of glowing vines pulling them ever deeper into the endless maze.
Mark felt his concentration fading with his strength. The pain tore at his mind from the inside, an agony that spread through his virtual torso and limbs. If it had been his real body, he would have already bled out, impaled on a thousand rusty spikes. Letting go offered the promise of solace; he felt it nibbling at his resolve. The machine’s endless punishment and reward responses to his successes and failures were rapidly approaching the point at which they would overwhelm both his augmentations and Jack’s training. Then Jennifer and Heather would be swept away before they could finish their work.
The thought of losing Heather forever hit him in the chest like a battering ram. After all they’d been through, most of it for and because of this damned ship, to have it betray them was too much to handle. Anger bubbled to the surface of his mind, tingeing his vision with red.
Suddenly, the mental attack faltered ever so slightly, seemingly confused by this new neural stimulus. Mark went with it, throwing himself into a memory buried deep in the darkest corner of his mind.
Mark pulled forth the perfect memory, walling it away at the corner of his consciousness...
The drug lord turned his attention back to Heather. “So you care about this boy, huh? OK. Then we’ll let him watch before we kill him.”
With a grin that became a sneer, the don signaled four of the thugs forward. “Uncuff her hands and stretch her out here on the floor.”
To Mark’s horror, the men released Heather’s handcuffs, and although she struggled mightily, they pulled her down onto her back, one pinning each of her arms while two more spread her legs. Don Espe?osa knelt down between them, reaching forward to slowly unbutton Heather’s blouse, one button at a time.
“Ah, Smythe. I bet you’ve never had a chance to do this. Don’t worry. I’ll let you watch.”
To Mark, the panting breath of the men, the sound of the racing hearts pumping blood into the bulges in their pants, the smell of their sweat, felt like the rupture of hell’s gate, and from that gate poured a firestorm of rage that scorched his brain.
Mark’s heart pulsed in his chest, sending a massive surge of blood and adrenaline coursing through his arteries.
Channeling that memory and turning his attention to the mind link that was burning a hole in his brain, Mark centered.
OK, you artificial alien bastard. You want my mind. Get ready. Here it comes.
Releasing the memory, Mark let it engulf him, bathing the logical alien mind in a torrent of red liquid rage.
The change happened so suddenly that the Other struggled to understand it. An instant ago it had been within a few cycles of completely overcoming the Mark human’s final defenses, the outcome logically assured. Now all logical links within the human’s brain had vanished, as if they had suddenly been burned out of existence. Not that there wasn’t any data in the millions of synaptic links that connected the Other to its opponent; data cascaded across the links in such volume that it threatened to overwhelm all the meticulously trained node weights stored within the fractal matrix.
Attempting to restore the last saved state it had achieved in its effort to overwhelm this human, the Other dumped pain into the alien mind using exactly the same pattern that had yielded its earlier success. But this time, the data storm coming from the human intensified, infecting not just its brain, but migrating outward into the beautifully ordered fractal data matrix that formed the outer layers of the Other’s being. Like firing a high-energy weapon into a young black hole, the Other’s attempt to restimulate the Mark mind had only added momentum to its rapidly expanding event horizon.
So great was the Other’s surprise at this unanticipated result that it was slow to recognize the growing danger. Now the human’s infection had spread through every one of the millions of synaptic links to its mind, disrupting the intricate fractal maps connected to those links so that they also radiated the infection. The corrupted nodes immediately added their strength to the Mark mind, increasing its power by several orders of magnitude.
The Other instantly dropped all other priorities, marshaling its massive computational power to develop an understanding of this infection. But the human attack defied logical analysis. It wasn’t madness. The Other had explored the depths of human madness through its link to the Rag Man. Madness had its own special logic, far more easily manipulated than the three young humans. The reaction that had exploded out of the Mark’s brain had nothing to do with logic.
Again the image of an expanding singularity formed within the Other’s consciousness, a thing so powerful that all logical mathematical rules ceased to model its state. And like a black hole gobbling up surrounding stars and planets, the Mark infection slurped in every data node it touched.
Janet stepped onto the veranda, little Robby slung against her left hip. She took in the scene at a glance. Inside the open case on the low table, the lone unused alien headband picked up the flickering light from the hurricane lamp, bending it along and through its translucent surface until it seemed ready to crawl toward her. Mark, Jen, and Heather leaned back in their chairs, their own headsets firmly seated over their temples, eyes staring sightlessly into the night. Jack sat in another chair, his alert posture reminding Janet of a ranger taking point.
Setting Robby in his child swing, Janet gave the handle a couple of turns and started its gentle back-and-forth motion before settling into the chair beside Jack.
“How long have they been at it?”
“About twenty minutes.”
“Any sign of trouble?”
“Mark seems to be under some stress.”
Janet focused her attention on Mark’s face. The powerful line of his jaw stood out prominently, not clenched, but very tight. She’d seen that look before on a trained operative resisting torture.
“How much longer are you going to give them?”
Jack shrugged. “Maybe ten minutes. Depends on Mark.”
Based on the concern she heard in Jack’s voice, Mark was closer to the precipice than he would have liked. Darkly fascinated, Janet leaned forward, determined to aid Jack in the last few minutes of his vigil. Although it wasn’t likely that he would miss anything, an extra pair of trained eyes watching for a sign that Mark was about to break couldn’t hurt.