“There’s been a change of plan,” I told him.
His eyes flashed with fear. “What are you talking about?”
“You said the first program immobilizes all the Plants, and the second one kills them, right?”
He thought for a second, then shook his head. “Not really. It doesn’t work like that. It’s not two separate programs, exactly, more like a two-part program. The first part breaches the network and immobilizes them, but it also destabilizes the entire network. The second part, the part that was meant to kill Wells, but now will kill all of them, that also closes the breach and stabilizes the network again.”
“So what does that mean?” Claudia asked.
“It means if the second part isn’t uploaded within thirty seconds of the first one, instead of immobilizing the Plants for forty-eight hours, the entire system will shut down and reboot into a diagnostic mode.”
“And what does that mean?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. Meaning it will take a long time to get it started back up again. A lot more than forty-eight hours. It might kill some of them anyway, especially the people who have had Wellplants for a long time. People can get pretty dependent over the years. We don’t really know what impact shutting it down will have on them. They could be immobilized until the network is back up and running.”
“How long will that take?”
“The upload and execute should only take a few minutes. Then it has to propagate through the network. That could take a little longer, but not much I wouldn’t think.”
“No, I meant the reboot.”
“I don’t know. Days.…Weeks. And each Wellplant will have to be reactivated individually. That could take months. What’s the new plan?”
“We want to run the first program, then disconnect this thing or destroy it before the second program loads. Do you think it’ll work?”
He thought for a second. “Yeah, I guess. But like I said, I don’t know what the long-term impact will be on the Plants who survive.”
Rex and I both looked at Claudia. The fate of the world was on the table, but so was the fate of her father. She thought for a moment, then nodded.
“Okay,” I said, “let’s do it.”
Ogden pulled a stool up to the computer tablet. As he started typing, the screen came to life, then we all jumped as a voice behind us boomed, “Very impressive!”
FORTY-EIGHT
Cronos and Roberta were standing by the doorway to the other stairs, both holding handguns. Roberta wore her usual smirk.
“I can’t imagine how you could have possibly found us,” Cronos continued. “Unless of course, someone told you where we were.” He laughed. “I was wondering if I should have left someone to make sure you didn’t cause any more trouble.”
Ogden pushed himself away from the keyboard, looking guilty and terrified. “I…I was just…”
Cronos stared at him. “Someone I could trust, that is.” He raised his gun in Ogden’s direction.
I stepped between them. “Cronos!” I said. “There’s no need for this.”
Roberta’s smirk suddenly looked more intentional as she moved to the side, getting another angle on Ogden. Rex moved with her, blocking her shot.
“We have a better idea,” I said. “We can just use the first part of Ogden’s malware, to immobilize all the Plants and shut down the network. It will stop Wells and all the Plants. It will shut down Wellplant Corporation and stop Wells from starting the pandemic. His plan will be exposed. He’ll be ruined.”
Cronos shook his head. “A temporary fix at best.”
“No! Each Wellplant will have to be individually reactivated. Once people find out how the network has run amok, they’ll never agree to it again. It’ll be over. There’s no need to kill them.”
Roberta’s eyes went wide, like she’d swallowed her gum. “Kill them?” Then her smirk returned, and she shook her head. “We’re not going to kill all the Plants, stupid. Just Howard Wells.”
“Apparently that plan changed,” Rex said.
Ogden stood up behind him. “It’s true,” he said.
Roberta turned to Cronos. “Is it?” She stepped forward, into his line of sight. “Is it true?”
Cronos ignored her. “I always knew you were weak, Ogden, that you would never see this through to the end. That’s why I insisted we make the process simple. So that you would be expendable.”
As he raised his gun and tried to sight Ogden, I spread out my arms and said, “No!”
Roberta moved closer to Cronos, partially blocking whatever shot he thought he had. “Is it true? You’re planning on killing all the Plants?”
“Of course!” he snapped. “It’s the only way to accomplish our goals.”
“But…so many people.”
He glared at her. “Precisely. Millions of people bent on oppressing chimeras, making us less than human. CLAD’s mission is to put an end to that oppression. This is how we accomplish that. Once and for all.”
She took a step back, away from him. “I never agreed to that.”
Cronos spun on her and snarled, “You swore an oath!”
She shook her head. “Not to that.”
He took a step toward her. “To me.” His head whipped around toward Ogden again. Toward me. “Jimi,” he said. “I don’t want to shoot you, but I will. You know that, right?”
Looking down the barrel of his gun, I felt a strange sensation on my neck and realized it was the hairs standing up. I was terrified.
Then Roberta abruptly raised her gun, as well. At Cronos.
Rex raised his arms and shouted, “No!”
But Roberta fired, a single shot, the sound of it deafening as it echoed off the brick walls.
Cronos spun on her once again, with a roar, and backhanded her across the face with such force she landed several feet away.
As Cronos went after her, I heard Claudia’s dart gun spitting over my shoulder, and I raised mine, as well. The darts were so small, it was hard to track them. They seemed to be hitting him, but then falling to the floor, like they couldn’t penetrate his clothing.
In three strides, he was standing over Roberta.
She raised her gun, and snarled, “Get back!”
But he kept going, and she fired, holding the trigger, releasing a dense spray of bullets, even as he kicked the weapon out of her hand.
Bullets pinged and ricocheted off the brick walls. One of the big stained-glass windows disintegrated, a few large pieces and thousands of tiny jagged shards of multicolored glass raining like gemstones down onto the floor, and down the outside of the tower. Through the opening, I could see the Philadelphia skyline, and at the center of it, the tallest building in the city: Wells Tower.
Cronos kicked Roberta in the ribs, and she groaned, then curled up on the floor, unconscious.
He tensed, as if he was going to kick her again.
“No!” Rex thundered again, running toward them. “That’s enough!”
Cronos stumbled slightly and dropped his gun. I thought maybe a few darts that stuck had penetrated his clothing, after all. I turned to see if Ogden was working on adapting the malware, and if not, to tell him that now would be a good time. But he was lying on the floor bleeding from his upper arm. Claudia, kneeling next to him, tore off the bloody sleeve of his shirt, revealing a round bullet hole. She looked up at me. “Give me a hand here.”