Max: Life At Low G, cont

I will finish this damn story! You can go hunting for previous posts or read the whole thing (so far) here.

I was vaguely aware of Andy and Cassie talking. I felt an arm around me every now and then. Mostly I was just thinking about my comp. I thought about how I had carefully customized, hacked through legally mandated lockouts and made it into something more precious to me than my left arm.

After a while, I started to look around me. Andy were sitting next to each other on the floor. They glanced at me as I glanced at them. I then turned and looked at the vidscreen. The next thing I knew, my foot was through the vidscreen and Andy and Cassie started talking in loud, anxious voices. I was too busy to pay attention. I widened the hole in the screen so I could get to the electronics and wiring behind. I then slowly, methodically, started dismantling the components of the vidscreen.

"So, what are you doing there?" Andy asked

"Taking the vidscreen apart," I replied.

"Any reason why?"

"Probably."

"Neat. Well he's lost it."

"Let him do it," Cassie said. We probably aren't leaving here alive. If that makes it easier for him..."

Eventually I had dismantled as much of the vidscreen as I could without tearing into the walls. So I started tearing into the walls. The internal walls of the room were separated from the concrete walls behind. It wasn't easy going. This really wasn't my thing, physical action. But over the course of a few hours I had several cuts and blisters. I also had almost all of the wiring out of the wall - I wasn't so out of it that I was going to mess with hot electrical lines - and neatly organized on the floor. Most of the inner wall was also stacked neatly around the edges of the room.

"Feel any better?" Andy asked.

I just sat down and stared at the wiring.

"The door seems to have electromagnetic locks," Andy observed. "Couldn't we open the door by yanking the power line?"

"Yeah," I replied.

"That's weird," Cassie said. "In a company that is so uptight about security would have such easy access to wiring and such an easily defeated locking system. It could be trap."

"Well we certainly don't want to fall into a trap," Andy replied.

"There goes your chance for a last blow job before we die." Cassie seemed uncharacteristically hurt by Andy's comment.

"I still have him," Andy replied, pointing to me.

I grabbed some of the thinner but better insulated lines, bunched them together and walked over to the line feeding the lock on the door. I was able to work them behind the line. Making sure I wasn't touching anything but insulation, I pulled on my wires. I expected the line to be hard to yank out. In fact, it can out on my first tug. As the wire came loose, the door swung open.

An armed security detail was waiting for us.

"Come this way," one of them didn't so much say as threaten.

"Is small talk still a security threat?" Andy asked.

Their answer was a quick stun blast. All three of us were on the floor and I felt like a elephant had taken a beer shit inside of my head.

"Get up and come with us."

So we did.

They led us to a room similar to the one I had just dismantled. The main difference was a well dressed, well armed woman was waiting for us.

"Please sit," the disembodied voice that has shown our apartment complex burning down came out of her mouth.

Before I could say anything about my comp, we were hit with another stun blast.

"I would recommend learning to follow orders quickly," her voice swam into my head. We all managed to climb up on the couch.

"First, let me offer my condolences on your deaths. I know that your passing must have been difficult for you."

It would seem I was the only one who found this a confusing way to start a conversation.

"That's why they torched our apartment. We, meaning either clones or some other bodies burned with it."

"What about my comp?"

"You will be issued a new one. One that you will only use according to Incremetech policy. You are all now Incremetech employees. congratulations."

All of a sudden, I was very confused as to whether Cassie's plan was working or not.

"You will be taken to quarters where you will be given orientation material and await your first assignment."

We were ushered out and led to the transport that had brought us there.