Crack

Melliburn walked slowly to the main door of the complex. There, the two guards (Clint and Burlock) waited for him with mildly amused faces. Meliburn had a reputation for humoristic remarks and entertaining gossip. He usually chatted a bit with the guards, and was rewarded by the feeling of safety he experimented. Noone feels safe around guards you are not acquainted with, especially guards with this weapons. He put down the package he was carrying before crossing the metal detector and was welcomed cordially. He was in the middle of a pun he had come up with during the morning regarding a chemical and a fat lady scientist working in the complex when the lights went out.



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The people in the complex referred to them as the Family. This was mainly because this is the name they sometimes used to identify themselves in the religious services they held in their meeting center. It was also said that the nickname arose after some rumors about them being just a conceptual cross between hillbillies and the Old Amish in every respect.




The Family kept to themselves. They were an agricultural community, with knowledge of agronomy and small electric generators setting them appart from savages. They had moved to the hills near the complex slowly since the price of the land dropped due to the building of the complex. Appart from being noisy, a thing that scared away most of the animals that were part of the diet of the previous owners, it was rumored that it was going to be a radioactive plant. A cheap one, the kind that killed plants and people some years after they were constructed. Besides, there were the soldiers.




The Family allowed, with just a slight twitch of their faces, the presence of people from the complex in their services, which were a mixture of science class, sermon and townhall meeting. Problems (From arguments to difficults in building) were solved in the light of the Reason of God. To the people from the complex that were in charge of keeping an eye on them, they seemed a reasonable folk, that paid no attention to the complex affairs. A peaceful community if it wasn't for their lust for hunting.



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Melliburn walked in the dark to where the package was. He pushed the button just as the flashlights on the guards weapons turned off. The flashlights turned off immedaitely.


-My nightvision is off!-said a guard.- Dr. Meliburn, are you alright?


Melliburn knew he had to hurry. The Pentone was everywhere. He might have impaired one with the shockwave, but the other four arms would be looking for everyone, and once he shot the guards and went out of the complex he would be the main target. He felt a pang of guilt, shot, and ran out. Fear was everything, except the little bundle of hope under his arm.

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First the power went out, and all became one. Rather, every part of what they were became individuals for the two seconds it took for the emergency power to restore the repeater antennae. And one of them had dissapeared. It was as if you realized that some of your memories and that the range of all your senses diminishes from one second to the next.

This was not normal. It took more than two seconds to die; not to receive a lethal injury, but to stop feeling and for your brain to stop sending signals. The part of the pentone that was in charge of the front of the complex tonight had been...erased. Obliterated. The Pentone moved to the front yard.

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The front yard was dark and empty save for one sad figure. The former Pentone arm was on his knees, rocking back and forth.

-I am blind. Blind, I am blind I'm blind, help me, I'm blind...

Melliburn shot him and kept running. The four other arms of the Pentone were coming. he couldn't see them but he heard their vehicles. He ran without looking back. he didn't have a chance of hitting one of them in these vehicles when the others were there. They knew exactly where to move, their formation for perspective was flawless.



He was at the foot of the first hill now. Any moment now his backup would get there. The noise from the vehicles was too close now. He turned and shot twice. The arms moved as he had seen so many times before in their trainig sessions. They shot him, surgically. Left knee, liver, right shoulder, left elbow. He collapsed immediately and screamed. He only felt red frustration before he fell unconscious. The bundle fell with him, with a soft plastic sound.

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After half an hour, the soldiers were still where Melliburn's body was.

-He couldn't have killed them all- Said a corporal

- Of course not!- Said Liutenant Trell- He didn't kill any of them. Look at their bodies.-

The Liutenant put his hands in his face. This was not supposed to happen. They were not ready yet. It was all over now, and it was his fault.

Corporal Gleen was running down the hill.
- I told you to come back with a wittness! - growled the Liutenant
-There is no one - said the Corporal - The Family is gone.

Climbing to the cliff

Carmen Regber looked at the woman directly to her eyes, and bit her lower lip.
-Well... there are rumors, but the technology is not available to the public. Sleeptech is the closest we have, but the brain activity of your husband is too weak to detect anything.

The woman, her eyes red but a determinate expression, asked Regber almost without a pleading tone
- Is he dead? Is his brain dead?
- No- Regber paused, feeling awful for being an actor at this moment- But only just. He is in a deep coma. The rumors have given rise to people working on this-
- Is there a way to go into his brain?
-it is more complicated than that... but there is an experimental group that is using the Communion platform
- But that is for children and perverts! it is not a tool for medicine!
-What you say is true- Said Regber - and this is not really safe. Forget I ever mentioned it.
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Three days later the woman came back to Regber, and she explained how it was possible. The brains were connected binary and an adaptation had been made to use neurotransmitters and generate responses from others.
-In a way they will instruct your husband's brain to do what is necessary to come out of the coma. Or that is what they say at least. Believe me it is not a safe thing. His brain has sustained enough damage.
-We will do it- said the woman.

They always did. Choose right, and they always said yes. Regber felt horrible. But she was not harming anyone. These were scientists that were working to help other people, and the money she was receiving was helping more people. It was only helping everyone. What could go wrong?

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Project Lazarus had enough test subjects, and they already had enough success rates to make it public. Nathaniel Thame, the director of the group, was about to derive some money from their investors in advertizing, and afterwards donating the knowledge of the process to the UN, or other entity that could distribute it for free. Or at the lowest price possible. they were in for a Nobel. It had all come so obviously as he played in those sci-fi servers. Neurotransmitters. Decoding, understanding and sinthesizing or stimulating their production.
They would need some people that would probably die. but some people were unplugged for no better reason than saving money to their families. No real problem there, when you looked coolly.
The name "Lazarus" was Dean's idea. It was bigger than they were, but it was good advertizing. Two weeks from now, he decided. Then he would show this to the world. It was almost perfected; he would get more funding, and everything would be better. And this could only be the beggining.

Thame went out of the shelter.
-Don't move!- Said a soldier holding a gun. There were many other cars arriving at his place. Everything will be alright. What we are doing is perfectly legal.

"We just want to talk"
The man woke up with the feeling that his nightmare was still going on. He was badly bruised and the involuntary movement involving waking up with terror made him immediately aware of this.

He slumped backwards to a lying position. He was in a hill, apparently. There were some trees, but nothing much to really cover him. He felt foolish, by falling asleep like that. Had he fallen asleep or just fallen unconcious?

The voice said "are you awake? We just want to talk. We could have killed you. but we don't want to. We don't want you running either. We don't even want you to join us"

The man didn't know where it came from. He looked around, but there was no one to be seen.

"We want you to know, that we are not fighting you if you stop fighting us"

"And then taking me by surprise and making me one of you, right?" Yelled the man, trying to stand. He used a fallen branch as a walking staff and walked in the direction of the voice.

"No. We would leave you alone if that is your decision" the voice was clear and devoid of emotion as they usually were. It came from an old walkie-talkie that was among some branches.

He recognized it. It had been part of the equipment of his pack before the raid of the unified.

"It is only you fighting. Did you know? You are the only one left".

The man heaved the branch and crushed the walkie-talkie.
He fell and stayed there for some time.
------------------------------------------------------------------------

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Warwick (I don't remember his name, the main scientific of the first part)

looked at the trinity. Each as an independant man had done things that apperared to be random, but Warwick had been listening to the neural turmoil in his children, as he thought of them.
Ever since they discovered what they were, they avoided each other, and they had changed radically from one another. (One) had grown big muscles, and had dwarfed the other two, and (two) had had a car accident and his face had been disfigured. Nobody would have said they were triplets now.

Nobody had thought about it for a long time, except the nine. Not even the boys' parents. The experiments and tests had stopped when the boys were around 13, and the money still got to the parents, so why ask?

Sometimes Warwick thought that the phisical meetings that his boys had from time to time were just a show for him, so that the ones who were paying attention didn't dismantle the hardware for their communication. He watched the escape, gripped by this historic moment, thrilled at the impossible feats of coordination, multiplying in his head all that could be done, if only-

"are you going to let them?", asked Klein calmly.
"Of course I am. What are we, com kind of slavist monsters? They are free, after all, and they are proving it"
"One of them killed his family when they were disconnected" said Klein coldly.
"They deserved that and more. It was fair"
"I didn't know you knew what that concept meant" Said Klein with only the trace of a smile.
"All this years I have dedicated only to the idea of Justice. We have been working to make a fair world"
"I thought it was just to see what happened." said Klein, now the smile in her wrinkled face more noticeable.
"That too, Klein" Said Warwick, smiling despite of himself. "I am a scientist after all. Would you say "success"?"
"Certainly. I don't know how Lang will react though. I will accelerate the media coverage, and we can start again. For real this time".
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The Convergence

He walked slowly through the dimly lit corridor. He was waiting for the noises, and then he would run. He had planned this moment since he found about the trinity and knew nobody would ever be able to believe he had done it without external help. But he had, after all, many ears and many eyes, and a keen mind. He had always been encouraged to learn about everything, and although some things were hidden, he had learned.

The cry was not very loud, but he had been expecting it, so he ran. He plugged his transmitter and blocked the main transmision. The planes of the University had been difficult to get, but he knew how to look for things, how to convince people.

The off-campus repeat antennae had been discreetly sabotaged some time ago now, and he knew where to leave the little car so that it was never found again. He put on the wig, and signaled a taxi to stop.

He got off a mile away of the motel and walked. He had the time. A busy lifetime in front of him. He was waiting for himself in the room, and the communicator made him remember the trip of the rest of him.

He saw his bloody hands from the door and the part of him that was in the bed wiped them absentmindedly on the cover.

"I had concluded that not killing them was a better idea, but another conclusion was reached when we separated. I 1- Individuality 0 .

The three bodies moved in the small as a group with clear instructions and a prohibition to speak. They ate, slept and went away. The world was waiting. It always had been.
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