Chương 18: The Entrance

The Hyperloop was a high-speed underground train network that stretched across New York, it was very fast, expensive, and very particular about who got on. Its reinforced tunnels stretched beneath the city, linking at Mach speeds directly to the Orbital Transit Hub: the last stop before open space. Getting in wasn't the problem. Getting in without being shot or disassembled by the artificial security was. Kelly pulled up to the Hyperloop entrance, rolling the car to a stop beside the reinforced barriers.

The entrance held up well under constant attacks—deep impact craters marked where something had tried to enter by force and failed, torn-apart drones and artificial human husks scattered near the reinforced gates. The security detail, all mechanical, was still standing, still armed and patient. Heavy-armored artificial humans and drones patrolled the entrance, scanning bodies—organic and synthetic; things that used to move but didn't anymore.

No civilians lingered—anyone who had business off-world had left long before things got this bad. She wouldn't be surprised if a few stragglers trickled in throughout the day—procrastination was a hell of a habit, even when the consequence was getting eaten by something the size of a skyscraper—it wouldn't be the first time people stayed behind, humans had been breaking protocol since the dawn of time. Kelly stepped out, grabbed her weapons, and slung her bag over one shoulder.

The Hyperloop rules here were simple: if you had clearance, you walked through. If you didn't, you didn't walk anywhere. Security's optics tracked everything, scanning, assessing, waiting, and watching her every move. Usually it would take her into custody if she posed a threat, but with the world ending, the new protocols would take her apart if she attempted to enter without the proper visas and passports. Too bad she'd left them at home.

There were artificial corpses, drone wreckage, and something unidentifiable that was still twitching beside the platform entrance, none of it her problem. The troll was here. A priceless, magical, endlessly regenerating test subject that didn't even have the good sense to know what she was. Perfect. In contrast to their rules, Kelly had biology throwing a tantrum and thirty minutes before she went from "scientist" to "meat confetti." No time for ethics and no time for paperwork.

If security wanted to stop her, they'd have done it already. Kelly leaned against the Hyperloop's barricade, watching the AI turrets dismember a tiny inhuman scavenger who got too close. Neon warning signs flashed across the walls, corporate slogans still running advertisements for products whose users had probably been eaten. The problem with the apocalypse—aside from the corpses, and intermittent explosions—was that no one was trying to sell it.

If humanity had built the Leviathan, there'd be a subscription plan, premium DLC upgrades, and some asshole charging per tentacle movement. Instead, the richest men alive had packed their orbital mansions and fucked off without so much as a final stockholder meeting. That meant two things: The first was that whatever was happening, humanity wasn't running it. The second, was that humanity currently wasn't stopping it either.

Which was a problem, because she was very pro-Earth and anti-being-crushed-into-quantum-paste-by-maybe-eldritch-maybe-extra-dimensional-deities. She tapped her temple, mentally triggering her neural augments. She wasn't a fan of the more popular models everyone used these days, the needy, chatty, fake-best-friend AI augments that wanted to hold conversations instead of just doing their damn job.

Because, really—who in their right mind wanted some third-party software cozying up in their skull, especially after what happened to the old-timers in the old days? Not Kelly, that's who. That's how you ended up getting your nervous system repurposed or turned into remotely piloted flesh-suits for some hacker's weekend project. Kelly kept hers running in the background, boosting cognition, optimizing reactions, and handling tedious calculations—but only in the useful, obedient ways. Enjoying this book?

Seek out the original to ensure the author gets credit. She liked her AI Augments like she liked her weapons—enhancing her, guiding her movements, amplifying her already superior decision-making. Not with personality and definitely not with access to the steering wheel, the ignition keys, and the self-destruct button. No, thank you. There was a reason humanity had stopped letting droids get specced past the Tank level, and she wasn't about to let that reason inside her skull.

She stared at the entities in the sky and with a thought, commanded her neural AI to run a crude probability simulation, cross-referenced with the ghost-data from her past loops. The data was always the same: the Floating Man appears, the Leviathan arrives, New York dies. The only variable was the 'why'. If the Floating Man was in control, then why hadn't he immediately let the Leviathan finish the job? Why did they wait? Why delay the process at all? It could be a ritual… a science experiment, maybe? A bad habit?

There was always the vague and honestly lazy idea that something like that just needed time to breach the portal, not because of time but because some other unseen constraint, like energy. But Kelly didn't like that idea one bit, because it meant that if she ever managed to survive past the first day of New York's annihilation, worse things than the Leviathan might still be waiting their turn. Her gaze landed on the severed troll finger beyond the security line.

It twitched—still regenerating, still very much alive." Neat," she muttered. That thing had some of the answers. And she was getting inside. Her plan, like all the best ones, was built on audacity.

The thing about breaking into high-security death tunnels was that it wasn't about skill, training, or tech. It was about confidence. If you had enough confidence, you wouldn't need to break in anywhere; people would just let you in. Kelly sat on the barricade, legs swinging, chewing on a protein bar, completely ignoring the corpse piles, automated kill-drones, and a city actively disassembling itself. She had time. Sort of. Technically.

The Leviathan was still stuck mid-portal, the corporate kill-squads were probably having a board meeting on whether she was an asset or a liability, and the next train wouldn't be leaving for another thirteen minutes. That meant for the next thirteen minutes, whoever had dragged the troll inside the Hyperloop station wasn't going anywhere. And now she knew how she was getting inside without getting blown to pieces. She glanced at the twitching troll finger beyond the security line.

It was still attempting to regenerate and failing without the main body. Twelve minutes left. Plenty of time to get them to shut down the entire station.

"Ok," Kelly sighed and tossed a torn-off piece of protein wrapper over her shoulder and stretched her arms.

"Let's do this." She took a slow bite of her protein bar and started walking towards the main entrance. The AI turrets hadn't fired in the last thirty seconds, which was basically an invitation. Kelly adjusted the weight of her ridiculous arsenal as she approached the checkpoint. The station manager, a Vaughn-model artificial human named Rook, stood at the main gate, personally overseeing the flow of people attempting to board the Hyperloop.

Rook was a Vaughn issue artificial human, which meant that while he wouldn't be in regular contact with his manufacturer, Vaughn would always consider him their asset. Because to a lesser extent, Vaughn's interests were Rook's interests—if given the right incentive, Rook had and would carry out their orders. She could use that connection to her advantage, a thought fresh in her mind as she approached him.

Guns swivelled toward her en masse as she approached, and the artificial being, Rook, casually waved them away, scanning her. Rook looked human, sort of. In the 'six-foot corporate brick wall, broad-shouldered, too symmetrical to be human, built like someone crafted the concept of "You're not getting in,"' sort of way. But Rook was, in fact, not a human at all. He was anything but human.