Naomi and Brendon were back in Cody's office.
Cody hunched over his desk, working to attach Riley's headset to a series of wires and ports that connected it to his setup. His stripped-down wheelchair moved effortlessly as he reached for various tools and cables.
"This thing's a mess." He muttered, picking gunk out of a port with a toothpick, then blasting it with canned air. "Look at this shit. I've never seen…" Cody stopped himself, sensing Naomi shifting uncomfortably over him. He slowly looked up to meet her gaze. She was somehow holding back tears while glaring at him for his insensitivity.
Brendon tried to break the frost. "Can you make it work, Cody?"
Cody didn't answer; he just carried on.
He connected the final cable and turned to one of the keyboards. His fingers fired up and flew over it in a whir. Naomi stood beside Brendon; her expression unreadable.
On the main screen, Cody navigated through layers of data. The screens flickered, with terminal windows displaying lines of code and digital readouts that produced so much data, that changed so fast, Brendon couldn't believe it was making any kind of sense to Cody. Yet it seemed to be.
"Alright," Cody said after a few minutes, leaning back in his chair. "I've managed to access the log files. Let's see what we've got." He clapped his hands together and rubbed them gleefully. He was in his element.
One of the big screens fired up in the centre of the wall in front of them. It was split vertically into two halves. On one side was a video playback of some kind that was slowly compiling, and on the right was a window split horizontally in two. On the top half was a map with a compass and pin. Underneath it was a terminal window with a table of information, and underneath that, lines of code running in staggered spurts. Brendon squinted to see if he could make sense of it. He couldn't.
Cody adjusted his glasses and re-rendered his face with an expression of concentration. "Wow," he exclaimed. "The Sanctuary is definitely one of the most secure communities I have ever seen," he said, his voice tinged with a hint of admiration. "Whoever set this up knew what they were doing. This level of encryption, the firewalls..." He trailed off as he continued studying the code.
"But Riley managed to get in?" offered Brendon.
"Barely," Cody replied, tapping a few keys and bringing up a graph that rose exponentially to the right. "See this?" He pointed to a band highlighted in red. "That's where Riley's CPU in his V.R. set is working overtime, running a ton of plugins just to keep him undetected."
Cody ran a hand over his spiky dreadlocks. He brought up another window with a list of file names. "These are all my custom scripts that Riley was using," he said, pointing to the screen. "For masking his signature, faking credentials, continuous IP hopping... you name it, he was using it all on this one. Look, his CPU's almost fried from the effort.
"He probably had two or three minutes max before his headset burnt out," he paused and then concluded dimly. "Would've probably saved his life."
Brendon felt a knot tighten in his stomach. "And yet they still found him," he said. Cody nodded solemnly.
"Yeah, which means they are running some serious countermeasures. Riley knew how to weave the tech to do what he needed, but these guys are on another level."
Naomi stepped forward, her eyes fixed on the screen. "Can you see what he was trying to do?"
Cody adjusted his glasses again.
"Yeah, give me a second." He clicked through a few more windows and initiated the playback on the left-hand half of the screen that had just finished loading.
The screen flickered and then steadied, showing Riley's point of view.
The video started with Riley pushing open a large oak door. It was daytime and the room inside was an opulent foyer. Marble floors, two-story windows bathing the entire hallway in an amazing light.
Cody pointed to the lower right corner of the screen where a series of icons and data streams were active. "He was running several protocols simultaneously. See these? Stealth mode, data extraction, and..." Cody zoomed in on a particular icon that was blinking red. "That's an alarm trigger bypass. He was trying to disable some kind of security feature."
On the screen, Riley was looking around at the grandeur of a sprawling, renaissance-style palace. High ceilings were adorned with frescoes depicting scenes from mythology. Marble statues stood guard along the walls. It felt like somewhere that had been designed by Leonardo da Vinci.
Riley moved cautiously through the ornate space, his eyes darting to his phone every few seconds.
"There," Cody murmured, pausing the feed and zooming in on Riley's phone. "He's following some kind of signal. He's looking for something." As Riley moved, the pin on the map reoriented to match his position.
Riley continued up a grand staircase that wound its way to a second floor. The banister was carved from rich mahogany, polished to a shine. Each step he took echoed.
The trio watched intently as he reached the second floor. His movements were deliberate and precise, he scanned each room before passing it. He walked through an archway into a long hallway lined with portraits of stern-looking aristocrats whose eyes seemed to follow him.
Naomi nodded silently, her eyes never leaving the screen.
Riley's phone beeped. He paused at a large set of double doors made of more dark wood and reinforced with heavy metal accents. Glancing down at his phone one more time to confirm, he pushed one of the doors open enough for him to slip inside.
Inside was another room equally as opulent as the last but filled with rows upon rows of bookshelves. Above a vaulted ceiling with skylights.
"He's in some kind of library," Cody said, adjusting his glasses as he enhanced the video feed for clarity. Riley's detector beeped more insistently now, leading him deeper in. He came to a stop in front of a particular bookshelf and began examining it closely.
"What's he looking for?" Brendon wondered aloud. Riley's hands ran along the spines of old tomes until he found one that seemed out of place. He opened it. Inside the pages were blank, if it had pages at all, in the middle was a single USB-sized port.
"Found something," Cody whispered, leaning closer to the screen. Brendon shot a side glance at Cody, not appreciating the running commentary. Riley continued.
He fished out a cable from his pocket and connected his phone to the port. The phone's screen lit up as it established a connection. Riley's thumbs danced over his phone, initiating a series of commands. Lines of code began scrolling down the screen.
Cody paused the playback on a shot of his phone.
"He's running a script," Cody said, "It's a worm of some kind."
"What's it do?" asked Brendon, not looking away from the screen. Cody leaned forward.
"I think he's trying to find the IP address of the community admin," Cody looked up, "He's trying to find the real-world address of whoever runs this community."
Riley's view was transfixed on the screen, ensuring everything was executing as planned. The first two dozen lines completed without issue. Then came an abrupt beep, a flashing red alarm notification appeared at the top of the phone.
"Something has triggered!" Cody exclaimed. Before Riley could react, glass shattered around him. The tall windows lining the library exploded inward, shards came raining down. From above, the skylights burst open, sending fragments scattering across the carpeted floor.
Riley spun just in time to see Sentinels leaping through the openings. Their sleek forms landing with unnerving precision and speed. Glowing, angry red lights flickered menacingly from their visors as they locked onto Riley.
"Shit!" Cody swore under his breath. Riley disconnected his phone from the hidden computer with a swift motion. The first bot reached him in seconds, its mechanical arm extending towards him with blinding speed. Riley ducked just in time, rolling to avoid another swipe aimed at his head. The Sentinels' movements were synchronized with Riley's counters, delivering an attack that left no room for error. Riley scrambled towards one of the plush silk couches for cover, narrowly dodging another bot's grasp.
It was hard to understand exactly what was happening. The footage was shaky and jarring, but it was clear that Riley was looking for an exit. For now, all he could do was run and evade as best he could.
Riley saw an opening and darted out of the room, his footsteps echoing through the grand corridor. He didn't look back, but the bots were relentless. Their metallic limbs clanking loudly as they pursued him.
Riley's breath came in sharp, ragged gasps, but he pushed forward. He burst into another corridor, only to see more bots smashing through the tall windows lining the walls. Shards of glass rained down again, catching the sun and creating a chaotic symphony of light.
Riley made it to the landing at the top of the stairs, his eyes scanned for an exit, any possible route that would lead him to safety. But all he saw was a group of bots now charging up the marble staircase towards him. Their glowing red visors locking onto him with mechanical efficiency.
He was surrounded.
A glance at the console on his arm, his last resort. His fingers flew over the interface, initiating a logout sequence that could pull him out. His fingers struggling with the surge of adrenaline to hit the right buttons.
Just a few quick taps was all he needed.
He didn't get the chance to finish.
Bots closed in on him from all sides, their limbs moving with an eerie synchronicity. One bot lunged forward, its grip clamping around Riley's wrist, forcing his hand away from his console.
Riley let out a shriek of pain and struggled, thrashing against its hold, but it was futile. The bots overpowered him with ease. They pinned him to the floor, immobilizing him completely. One on each limb spread-eagling him on the marble floor.
The last thing Riley saw was a bot standing over him, its visor glowing a deep bright red as it looked down upon him. Riley was transfixed on it, as he watched it slowly crouch down over his chest and raise its right arm towards his face. As its hand drew closer and closer, its finger and thumb started to reconfigure and transform into some kind of scepter. Two prongs at the end started to become electrified, holding a dancing blue current. The bot took its time to draw back its arm, and then with a sudden forceful movement brought it down into Riley's face.
The playback ended, the screen went dark.
Suddenly, bright lights shot from the goggles of the headset on Cody's desk. The room was bathed in a sharp, almost blinding light. Cody recoiled in surprise, his chair rolling back as he instinctively raised an arm to shield his eyes. One of the beams shot past Naomi, missing her by inches. She gasped and stumbled backward, barely managing to avoid it. It hit one of the large screens at the side of the room, burning and cracking it.
"Fuck! Get down!" Brendon shouted over the chaos and fell to the floor.
Cody frantically typed on his keyboard, trying to override whatever was happening. Sparks flew as the beams continued burning. The room filled with an acrid smoke as more equipment began to burn. In his panic, Cody's hand swiped the table the headset was on, sending it crashing to the floor. The device landed, whipping the beams around the floor like a crazed snake.
"Damn it!" Cody yelled, scrambling to instinctively retrieve the fallen set.
Naomi stumbled backward, landing on a leather sofa at the back of the room. As she fell, the beams whipped past, scorching the upholstery and etching a line right where her legs had been.
Cody had spun his chair around and was frantically back on his keyboard trying to disconnect the power. Sparks continued flying. More chaos.
Brendon then dove across the floor and grabbed the bucking headset, managing to orientate it to a side of the room where no one was. It etched a burn line in the walls and furniture as it went. He then grabbed a fistful of cables and firmly yanked them out.
The beams abruptly ceased.
The room fell into an eerie silence, broken only by the sound of Cody's heavy breathing and the occasional crackle of damaged electronics. Brendon stood up slowly. "You okay?" he asked Naomi. Naomi nodded, her eyes wide with lingering shock. Cody slumped back into his chair, wiping sweat from his brow, readjusting his glasses.
"You ever seen anything like that?" asked Brendon, slowly getting up from the floor.
"No, never," replied Cody.
Brendon helped Naomi to her feet. Cody rubbed his temples, trying to process what had just happened. Naomi, her breathing steadying, stood by Brendon.
Brendon gingerly picked up the headset from the floor and put it back on the table. "Do you think someone tampered with Riley's headset, or is that in every headset?" asked Cody. "Some kind of fucked up failsafe or something."
"I don't know," offered Brendon. "Those screens are pretty powerful. I've seen people with damaged retinas, or burnt corneas before, but never anything like this." Brendon drew breath. "If that's a feature of every headset out there, then that's terrifying."
"I told you it was no accident," said Naomi, looking at both of them fiercely. "You see, Riley was murdered." Brendon nodded slowly in quiet agreement.
The room was still coming to terms with what they all had just seen.
Brendon had managed to join the dots first in his mind. "Grace needs help," he said to himself quietly, looking at the carnage. Naomi crossed her arms over her chest, her eyes narrowing in thought.
"We need to get these fuckers," she offered. Brendon's jaw tightened.
"We need to figure out what Riley was onto before they got him," she said, looking at Cody. "Did you get everything you need from the download?"
"Everything to do what?" asked Cody.
"To get us in there, we need to pick up where Riley left off."
"What?" exclaimed Cody, wheeling his chair towards the both of them. "You wanna get your eyes burnt out?"
"You need to make sure we don't," said Brendon, nodding his head and stepping forward.
"Shouldn't we go to the police with this?" asked Cody strongly. "I mean, they murdered Riley."
"The police aren't geared up for this. It will take them months to just understand the tech, let alone ID any suspects," replied Brendon.
"I need to get to Grace now," said Brendon, now in a trance-like state. Then, turning to Cody, he added, "Like right now."
Cody could see there wasn't much point arguing with him. Instead, he just looked around his wrecked setup. "The boss is going to shit a brick when he sees this." Brendon snapped back and picked up an overturned wastepaper basket. He started filling it with debris.
Naomi joined the clean-up.