Something was very wrong, that much she knew even before she opened her eyes again.
She was lying on something soft and surprisingly comfortable. And while her mind struggled to remember exactly what had taken place over the last few minutes, she was dead certain that soft and comfortable had played no part of it.
When Mech finally opened her eyes she found herself in what looked like a darkened room. She could make out the outlines of furniture; a sizable desk, chairs and of course the sofa she was lying on.
Her eyes needed a moment to adjust to the darkness.
Rays of light seemed to be coming from in-between a set of drawn suede curtains by the wall.
She stood slowly, not entirely trusting her balance at first. When she realized that there appeared to be nothing physically the matter with her, she walked over to the red curtains.
She took hold of them and drew them open.
The bright light was blinding and she immediately had to bring her hand up to shield her eyes. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust yet again. She couldn’t remember the last time her eyes had required such a long time to adapt to her surroundings. But then again she couldn’t remember much of anything that had happened before she had awoken just seconds earlier.
She did however recognize what lay beyond those windows.
It was her home.
Nyuchiba City.
The endless sprawl which covered most of the temperate surface of the small planet was unmistakable. City blocks after city blocks and skyscrapers after skyscrapers in every direction underneath a gray-blue sky and a piercing and hot orange sun.
The room she found herself in was in one of those many skyscrapers in which the inhabitants of this world spent the majority of their time. At least the more influential ones did while the poor and unfortunate dwelled in the sub-streets and the slums.
The mechanical wheezing of a machine powering up, forced her turn away form the window.
She found the source of the sound to be a square, wooden box in the corner of the room. It had an inset and curved screen which had just come to life with black and white images.
They were of a man in dark suit and an electric guitar.
She thought she recognized the man.
When she heard his song coming out of the small speaker of the device, she was certain she had heard it before. It was a song about a boy called Johnny who was a gifted guitar player and would someday become a big star. And just like the boy in the song, the man singing the song, strummed that instrument with the skill and rhythm as if he had been born to do it.
It was the most beautiful song she’d ever heard.
And while she wanted to do nothing more than watch and listen to that performance on that little fuzzy screen, something in the back of her mind told her that she had no time for it.
She glanced towards the far wall and found an old-fashioned clock hanging there with a big round clock face and two large hands. The bigger one pointed at two minutes before twelve while the thinner one had just passed the nine.
The hour hand seemed to be missing entirely and the one counting the seconds was running backwards, ticking loudly with each jittery move. The whole thing was clearly broken as three seconds seemed to pass for each second ticking away on that large clock.
The doors opened with a slight creak and Mech whirled around.
“Good, you’re awake.”
The man had a thick mop of dark hair and a confident smile on his lips. He looked to be in his mid-thirties with handsome features and a trim and fit figure. Those sparkling brown eyes hinted towards a wisdom and maturity far beyond his years.
He shot her just a passing look as he walked towards the desk, right underneath that loudly ticking clock and past the television screen, to sit in the high-backed chair behind hit. The desk itself was completely empty.
He looked up at her and then pointed at a chair by the desk.
Mech took a step closer but didn’t sit.
“I imagine you have many questions,” he said. “I am here to give you the answers you seek.”
Go Go Go, Go Johnny Go Go, she heard the man on the screen sing. She knew that song. She knew it by heart.
“See, I’ve been looking for you for quite some time and you have not made it easy for me to find you,” he continued. “Never staying in one place for very long, always covering your tracks on FedNet and taking every effort to stay off the grid.”
It finally clicked. His name was Chuck Berry. He had been a popular rock and roll singer on Earth in the mid-20th century, over three hundred years ago.
“You are a very special young woman, I hope you realize that. Most people would not have been able to evade my seekers for as long as you did. Even though I suspect that you had some help in the matter.”
The loudly ticking clock above his head made it fairly difficult for her to focus. The second hand had just passed the three.
“Was it that troublesome, moon-dwelling Farian? I find it difficult to believe that the likes of you would associate with such common criminal scum.”
The man in the chair. She knew him as well. His name was Michael Gary Grayson. A San Francisco businessman, activist and educator or so he liked to make people think. In truth he was nothing more than a common criminal himself. A stims dealer who peddled the new cybernetic designer drug to bored urbanites when he didn’t hold fiery anti-Federation speeches in what he called his Grayson Institute.
He had hatched a scheme with the help of Starfleet’s Captain Whren to have her killed. That had been the reason she had come to San Francisco in the first place.
But the man sitting behind his desk was not Grayson. Yes, he looked and sounded like him but that was were the similarities ended. She was convinced of that.
“Helcon, I presume?”
He smiled at her.
“Your name keeps coming up wherever I go,” she said, taking another step closer and instinctively reaching behind her back but unable to find her Glock there. “Who exactly are you and why have you been looking or me? Why do you want me dead?”
His smile widened. “My dear, you have entirely the wrong impression. I am not trying to have you killed at all.”
The second hand had now passed the twelve and the minute hand had moved to eleven. Mech was sure the clock was speeding up, the ticking becoming even more noticeable.
“I suppose you just drop quantum torpedoes on your friends on a regular basis then.”
“Ah yes, the incident in Nepal,” he said. “Consider it a test of your abilities.”
“For what purpose?”
“Why to see if you are as good as they say you are. Because if you are, I want you to join me. Together what we can achieve will be bound only by the limits of our imagination.”
She uttered a sarcastic laugh. “Is that it? That’s your sales pitch? I’ve heard more convincing holo-novel villains. I don’t even know who you are or what it is you are trying to do.”
“Who I am is not important. Not yet. And as for what I do?” he said and had that large smile on his face again. “The question should be what don’t I do.”
The song had stopped and Mech turned to look at the television set in the corner. Chuck Berry was gone but another face had appeared in the same washed out black and white colors. It was a woman just passed middle age. She was speaking but Mech couldn’t hear her voice.
Helcon, whoever he was, didn’t appear to notice. “I appreciate that you feel I’m being rather vague and mysterious. But until things are further along, I cannot risk revealing too much at this stage,” he said. “We both know that you are meant for something more than hacking your way through FedNet and chasing after stims dealers. You are special, Mech. Unique. And you could be so much more if you only allow me to show you your true potential.”
“And what would that be?”
The second hand had reached the six.
“Don’t be coy now. Don’t tell me you haven’t felt it yourself. You have been going through life like a giant among man. Vastly superior to anyone and everyone you’ve ever met. You have transcended humanity to become something much greater.”
She frowned at that.
“I see you still cling to those sentimental notions of humanity,” he said. “Don’t let it hold you back, Mech. You can be so much more if only you accept what you are.”
< Mech, don’t listen to him. >
She turned to look at the TV. The voice in her head belonged to the woman on the screen. A woman she had met before. The man at the desk, it appeared, wasn’t able to hear or see her.
< You have accessed the Source. Everything you see and hear is merely a construct designed to slow the passage of time. To give your friends a chance to escape the building. >
The building.
Fed Plaza.
Nyuchiban terrorists had taken over the building and taken hostages. She and her team had carried out an assault when she had realized that the entire building had been rigged to explode, killing everyone inside.
“I can help you overcome that last hurdle that is keeping you back. If only you let me.”
She had found the bomb in the sub-basement but before she had been able to try and slow down the countdown she had been incinerated by an explosion.
“If only you agree to join me.”
A voice had reached out for her then just like it did now. Mother’s voice.
< I am still in Fed Plaza, > she said.
< Yes, but not unless you disconnect from the Source. You won’t be able to survive, switch or otherwise, if you stay in the Source after the detonation. >
The second hand had passed the six. It was the countdown. Thirty seconds were all that remained.
“She’s talking to you, isn’t she?”
Mech focused on Helcon.
“Don’t believe her lies,” he said. “Mother has her own secrets and her own agenda. Do you really think she is been helping you all this time solely out of the goodness of her heart. Ask yourself, what do you really know about her?”
Fifteen seconds.
< Mech, trust me when I tell you that you have to get out of there now. >
“I on the other hand will gladly share all my secret with you. All I will need in return is your allegiance and your loyalty.”
Ten seconds.
< How do I do it? How do I get Helcon to let me go? >
< Mech, you misunderstand. You created the construct, Helcon has simply inserted himself to distract you. You are in control. >
Mech stepped up to the desk, placed her palms on the table top and leaned forward. “You have been looking for me all this time, chasing me through the galaxy and tried to kill me to keep me away from whatever it is you have been up to. Mark my words: I will change the rules to your game. Whatever it is. I will be the one chasing you down and exposing your dirty little secrets to the entire galaxy. You were worried about me before? I haven’t even started yet.”
She closed her eyes. “I’m coming for you Helcon.”
And then the world around her ceased to exist.