Escape

Her walk to the door of the dimly lit room was brisk yet surreptitious. She could’ve warned me. Curse you Flora. Even if you didn’t tell me all this virus would do, you could have at least told me this. She opened the door and came face to face with a woman whose worried expression turned into a startled one within a heartbeat.

“Who are you?” She finally managed to squeeze from herself.

Margit was taken aback in a similar fashion, but the question caused her to recover. “I’m here to check the departments that were affected by the sudden power outage.” It was the best she could come up with on the spot, but seeing how they exchanged suspicious glances, she knew the jig would be up sooner rather than later.

“Wait, give us your name and department,” a man behind the woman said. There was a general murmuring of approval in the group.

Margit resigned herself to what was about to come next. “Right here,” she said and made as if she was about to take a badge out to show them. She got close to the woman, then shoved her into the group and ran down the corridor. The stupefaction held the programmers in place and gave Margit a slight head start, for which she was grateful. She already turned the corner by the time the shouts began. The incomplete map that she had managed to plot out on her way in was already covering the field of view of her ocular display. As she continued down the corridor she also began hearing noises in front of her. She ducked at the corner, listened for a second, then peaked around the corner.

Two security guards were talking to each other and looking around with a torch. She drew back as the cone of light shone where she had been just moments before. As it passed she waited a moment then looked again. It was good fortune that her exit wasn’t in that direction. She needed but to cross the corridor and continue. It took a minute or so of waiting and she had had to duck back behind the wall two times, but at last both of the guards looked in the other direction at the same time. Margit wanted to throw herself across the corridor, but to avoid being heard she ended up crawling on all fours. After she crossed over, she stood still and listened for a moment, but there was no indication that she had been seen or heard.

She got back to her feet and continued following the path that she had plotted. A few turns later she saw that a group of three were carefully approaching from the other side of the corridor. She looked around, but the bare walls offered no place to hide and trying to open doors that could be locked would draw too much attention. She decided to mimic the conduct of the group. As they came close she simply nodded and made an attempt to move on without any more interaction, one of them moved in front of her however and stopped her.

“Hey, do you have any idea what’s going on?” The man asked.

“Sorry no, I’m just trying to find my boss,” Margit replied. She made her voice sound alarmed but determined so that she would be able to move on soon. She tried to walk around the man, but he moved again to stand in her way.

“Wait, I just-”

“Hold there! Everyone present your wrist and badge. We will check your identity,” a voice said behind Margit. Even before she looked back she had already known that it was the two guards she had just sneaked past. She guessed they had met the group of programmers and were looking for her. The man in front of her was startled for a second, then began going through his pockets to find the document. Margit also began the same motion, then as the group was busy, dashed past them. The shouts followed her and she even heard the thumping of shoes against the hard floor.

She tried following the plotted path, but another security patrol cut off her escape. She took a turn into unknown territory. She passed some people in the corridors who stared at her in awe, while groups of guards forced her to change direction. She knew they would box her in sooner or later. She almost became resigned to the idea that this was likely her final mission. Then a strange thought invaded her mind. I can’t let them take me. The Shell depends on me. It asked me to save it and I agreed, even if I didn’t say it. It’s my responsibility.

After a while the yelling snapped her out of her strange thoughts. She looked around and saw her salvation. It was a bathroom sign. It wasn’t the same one she had been in before, but she was on the same floor. She entered and breathed a sigh of relief as she saw the window. She grabbed the handle, but was only able to tilt the window. Dread was beginning to take her over as her final minutes were passing by. She threw open a door to the stall, grabbed a toilet seat and wrenched it free. She swung the seat into the window with all her strength. The seat broke off in her hands, but the window shattered as well in a loud crash. She felt giddy with excitement, but soon a sharp pain broke the spell. She looked down and saw that there was blood on her hands. The cuts weren’t too bad, but the pain was intense.

She cleared some of the remaining glass and threw away the seat. There were muffled sounds coming from the corridor. She looked down out of the window and felt woozy, but as she knew her time was running out, she got a leg over the window frame, held on to it, and then the other. Despite her attempt to clear the window frame she could still feel pieces of glass digging into her hands. She could just barely reach the square pipe, that ran down next to the window. As she began putting more weight on it, it began letting out an ominous creaking sound. She thought about going back, but propped sideways against the pipe as she was, she didn’t have enough strength for a manoeuvre like that. She could only beg the pipe to hold on a while longer. She then tried moving a leg there as well. The stretching was painful, but as she approached the pipe, her other foot lost grip and she flew into the pipe.

Somehow she managed to hold on with her hands and grunted with a combination of effort and pain. The pipe was bent outwards where she held it and dented inwards where her legs and hip flew into the metal. She wanted to simply slide down the pipe, but her hands were already in a bad state and that friction would make matters even worse. I should have planned this better. There was nothing she could have done about it. She wrapped her legs around the pipe and descended one step at a time, but still in a hurry since she could’ve been found at any moment.

A slam of the door informed Margit that the guards had entered the bathroom. She dropped the last two metres to the ground. She landed on her feet, then plopped on her backside. It was slightly painful, but there were no real injuries. Without taking a break she rolled behind a concrete flower trough. Moments later sounds of glass hitting the ground rung out. Someone was looking through the window and shouting something. Margit didn’t dare to look up from her hiding place. On the other hand she was able to take a look around the premises. The building was surrounded by a fence. It was about half again as tall as Margit. The lucky part was, that the fence was designed more to keep people out rather than in, so the pointy ends were bent outwards. There was still the problem of whether the fence was also electric, but Margit hoped that the power disturbance that she had caused would take care of that.

As there was silence for a couple of moments, she chanced a peek around the side of the trough. There was still someone at the window, though she was leaning out and looking the other way. Margit took the chance to crawl over to the next trough. There she picked a blade of grass from it. The dense bush enabled her to keep her head up and watch the woman who was trying to find her. As soon as she was clear, she dashed for the corner of the building. After a quick glance around she ran to the fence and prepared to check the fence for electricity. Before she was able to accomplish the test, there was shouting all around her. Guards were coming from both sides. She hoped that if the fence was electric that it would at least kill her quickly.

She braced herself as she reached for the fence, but the only feeling was the pain because of her wounded hands. She dragged herself upwards with strength she didn’t know she still had and hurled herself over. She rolled when she hit the ground and was happy that she had been wearing long sleeved clothes, so that she didn’t scrape her knees.

She ran into the streets. Only after she had run for a couple of seconds did she look back. Two of the guards were just about to climb over the fence while the others were running in other directions. She felt just about ready to cry. Everything hurt and she knew that she would be gasping for air very soon. Some people were staring at her as she ran past, but must pretended not to see anything. Even an old man, who was trying to hand out missing person posters just conveniently looked away as she approached. Margit knew it would be wrong to expect someone to actually do something to help her, so she was just glad that no one tried to impede her escape. Even in the industrial district few concerned themselves with affairs of strangers if at all possible.

She turned into a side alley as soon as she was able. Her experience in avoiding people gave her the ability to navigate narrow winding roads without losing sense of direction. She took several turns and was already panting heavily and even felt pain in her teeth. She ducked behind a rubbish container and strained her ears. There were just barely discernible sounds of shoes slapping against the road. She wished she was back in one of the poor districts, where she could blend in with the shadows. Here even the side alleys were well lit and many of them weren’t even empty.

Margit heard someone walking towards her from the direction she had come from. She made herself as small as possible against the side of the container. The person walked by and it was a neatly dressed woman, who was apparently just going about her day. She made no indication whether she saw Margit or not. She walked past an intersection of alleys, still continuing straight on. Just as she entered the alley on the other side Margit heard shouts coming from the alley the woman had just crossed. Margit moved closer to the intersection and hid behind some stairs that led into one of the buildings. The fast footsteps grew louder by the second. The woman continued walking down the alley, not concerning herself with the action. She was just barely visible when a man in a guard uniform dashed into the intersection from the left side and barely made the turn without crashing into a wall. As soon as his back was facing Margit, she headed for the same intersection. She was walking as fast as she dared while making as little noise as possible. She peaked around the corner and saw nobody. She took a right turn and rushed onwards.

Margit kept close to the walls and made sure to take a surreptitious glance any time she was about to cross an alley. She passed bars, stores and VR experience centres and contemplated hiding inside, but felt that places like those were like streets with dead ends. Whenever she saw someone crossing an alley or coming her way, she took another turn, even if she wasn’t sure that it was one of her pursuers. Coming across any of the guards became more and more sporadic as she went. The pain reminded her to check on her bloody hands. She tore of tatters from her shirt and tied them around the bigger wounds. At least my coat covers up my new rags. She decided to return to the main street and proceeded to mix in with the crowd. She fought the urge to look around when hearing every sudden noise and give herself away.

As soon as she left the industrial district she began running again. She decided her best option was to take a ride on the Underground. At the station she saw a train that had just arrived. Without even looking where it was going, she sped and boarded the train. Most of the seats were taken, or at least they were if one were to count the empty seat most people left next to someone already sitting. She stood there for a while as the train accelerated and swayed gently as she held the metal bar and displayed poor posture.

After a couple of minutes she was able to still her speeding heart. She eyed a bench, then let her gaze flow further. It stopped on a man sitting by himself. He seemed even more isolated than most others. Something about him was bothering Margit. She stared for a while and he seemed to notice as she raised his own gaze. They made eye contact and at first he looked simply annoyed, but then recognition was painted over his face, which was then replaced with a scowl. Margit was hoping her own reaction wasn’t showing as much as she was feeling it. She tried breaking eye contact in a casual way as if she only stopped on her way to looking at something else, but to no avail. The man was standing up. His face seemed years older than it was a couple of months ago and his sunken face showed that he had lost too much weight. His eyes also showed lack of sleep, but were now shining in crazed determination.

Margit let go of the bar and started walking to the front of the train. She knew that he was following her. Oh no. Why Isaac? Couldn’t they just arrest him with all the others. She bit her lip in anger. I was almost in the clear. He doesn’t even have anything to do with this. It was useless to cry however, since Isaac’s purpose wasn’t to say hello and catch up. She was happy that he at least didn’t seem to want to make a scene on the train, but didn’t plan to stay still and find out. The train started decelerating and Margit stumbled. When she regained her balance she stared bolting for the door. It was an awkward feeling running on something that changed velocity. At least the tracks were more or less straight. The systemic forces that would be present on a circling train would turn heads and stomachs. No, stop! Focus Margit. I need to run away again. And anyway I’m a software developer, not a physicist.

The doors weren’t even completely open yet when she pushed through. She ran to the side alleys as soon as she emerged on the surface. She gave a wry smile. Earlier when she wished she was escaping from the guards in a poor district, she hadn’t known her wish would come true so soon. Perhaps the extra practice will help somehow. She employed the same tactics once again. This time there was just a single pursuer, so she was becoming confident her victory was assured. She was ducking behind some cardboard boxes and strained her ears. For a while she heard nothing, then a slow even walk sounded out in the street behind her. In no hurry I see. She crawled forward, making sure to keep the box between her and Isaac. She was looking behind her as she was about to cross into the next street, but she couldn’t see him coming. She got up and charged into the street to her left.

After just two strides she collided with something and squawked in surprise. She looked up and saw Isaac’s face staring down at her. He was holding one of her arms. The other one was resting at her side. She looked down. The hand wasn’t resting on her, but on a handle of a knife. She gasped as the realisation dawned on her. She staggered backwards and fell on her backside. She crawled backwards without getting up until she backed into a wall. Isaac was motionless and just stared at her. Her breathing was ragged, she knew she should run away, but wasn’t able to look away from him or even just break eye contact. She could only hold her hand to the wound that seeped blood.

Isaac kept staring at her. Drops of blood were falling from the knife and he began touching the blade, it seemed almost as if he was caressing the steel in a trance. An instant later he regained his focus.

“So it was you,” he said, but stood still. “You betrayed us. Do you have any idea what you cost us?” He stared at her for a moment in silence, but Margit was unable to produce a word. “You cost me, us, seven great men and women. I just hope they died fast. That is the best fate if you get caught in their system.” He went silent and had a contemplative look on his face. Margit tried to inch away, but she barely moved at all. “So, say something!” He shouted at her.

“I didn’t … I’m sorry I …” The wound was beginning to take its toll. Margit had to fight just to keep conscious, so the words came with difficulty. “It’s all a lie. The AI-”

“Oh great. Yes I know it was a lie. You never told a word that was not a lie. It looks like I will get nothing useful out of you now. Killing you won’t bring back my comrades, but it will feel just as satisfying,” he said and changed the grip on the knife. He started walking towards her, when a metallic bang rung out from somewhere behind them. In the silence that followed footsteps were clearly audible. Isaac gave Margit one last venomous look, but then turned and began running away, leaving her to bleed out in the street.

Margit’s vision was becoming blurry, but somewhere far away she could still hear the slow claps of shoes against the road. Her consciousness was fading and she didn’t know whether it was real, a dream or even afterlife, as a pale angelic face appeared before her. It was impossible to make out with her blurry vision, but it looked as if it was bathed in golden light.