FourtyTwo
Tally Dor
Helo
ctrlsaltdel
Silent Showers
wanderingwolf
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TokyoPewPew
Chrys
KazAlkemi
Kais took his place in the yellow couch, lemon-flavored tea in hand. As he sat down his hand went to unbutton his suit's jacket, only to realize he was -thankfully- wearing more comfortable clothing again. Picked out by Nadia: beige slacks, brown turtleneck, sunglasses. Very classically '20s Parisian, she said, should work well for the setting. Aurora gestured at his eyes, but Kais waved the DH touch-up assistants away.
"Long night. Don't worry about it. Just shoot."
“Kais, welcome to Monaco, and back to Earth! With everything that happened on Luna, how do you and Layla find the comparison here in the bustling, manic streets of Monaco?”
"Thank you, Aurora, but I think you already know the answer to that. It's a pretty place. The Casino was nice, but I'm not so much a high-born socialite or betting man. I'm a... racer..." Kais glanced away from the camera ever so slightly. "Give me a direction, and I'll go straight at it. No holding back." He looked back at the camera. "That's all."
The long night before...
Kais had settled himself at one of the roulette tables, and played around with some betting chips. “Hit me with it,” he nodded at the croupier, then watched him shoot the little ball into the strange carousel, watching it go round and round until finally… a dull click and rattle locked it into one of the number slots. Of all his bets, he won some, he lost some, and though it was all very fascinating in a strange way, at the end of the day, he found it mostly frustrating. And so, he felt somewhat elated when, in the roulette wheel’s gold’s reflection that he couldn’t help keeping a constant eye on, he noticed a familiar face coming his way.
Picking the sight of Kais up, the purple haired Ava Villarosa, complete with her stylish new legs, going well with her lilac coloured dress, was gentle to drift across the carpeted floor. Glass of Moet champagne in hand, she had healed well after the incident, but wasn’t completely at her own best. In the gloriously opulent Casino hall, she was perhaps being more herself than her military version had ever allowed, but she let her hair down. Yet she had her mind on something else. Something since Luna.
“Hey, Kais. Have you got a moment?” Ava asked, offering a hand, the Chilean peeling the Egyptian away, whilst keeping her eye out for anyone else.
“Ava.” Kais returned the greeting, looking her up and down. “You’re active again.” He nodded in approval. “Your legs. They look… sturdy. Good on you.” Or should he have put it the other way around? This was difficult. “Taking a break from the spotlight?” Kais shifted the topic as he glanced at her hand, then took it with the most stately amount his heavy-handedness could manage. Something which, no matter how much black tie he wore, with how challenging he found venues like these and their height difference in addition, must’ve been quite the sight. “Heard you and Bea were getting non-stop attention. Must be getting a lot of questions, after the…” And he looked at her new Wiphala legs. “...incident.”
“Yes, it has been hard. It’s been relentless all day. Someone on my team handles it better than me.” Ava smiled in response, making a comment that was obvious, but just not directly mentioned, “And yes, plenty of questions.”
Holding hand away, Ava walked up past a couple of pillars, up a wide staircase, and up into the second floor, onto a balcony looking down on everything below, staying out of sight and out of view of a camera. Kais was significantly bulkier than her, more than any former soldier, he was refined, capable, yet a product. Ava’s more slender, taller nature perhaps was not what you thought of for a pilot, but the ratios for her legs fit what her true stature was, rather than turning her into a crane.
Walking up against the pillar, she leaned against it, knowing whilst cameras typically would be sprawling, especially in a casino, in this spot they were absent.
Kais let himself be led along. It was obvious there was something pressing on her mind. But in his scouting out the venue as they made their way to the balcony, it hadn’t escaped his attention that they were now in a blind spot, and that, he felt, was foreboding. “Ava…”
“Listen to me.” Ava interrupted. “That crash I had was the same as Amy’s stall in Portugal. I had the same thing happen to me that Amy had, a blank-out. That wasn’t a normal error, something tripped in my mind and I’m not sure what. The symptoms were like what Amy said she experienced. Not that anything at all came out in the official reports, not when my cortisol and adrenaline levels were already blasted sky-high, but I know what I felt, and trust me, there’s something up.” Ava glanced around. “I thought it was paranoia at first, but I gave you insight into your past, and suddenly, this shit seems to come back to me?” Ava didn’t even break. “So what the fuck is going on is my question.” Ava levelled a nuclear bomb of an accusation back, cutting Kais out before had the chance to think, let alone react, frantic.
The veiled accusation hit, and hit bullseye, and for a moment Kais felt his blood pumping, ready to do anything at all. Attacking him, here? But it seemed Ava was more frantic with questions, grasping, and Kais realized that no, she hadn’t picked up on the reason why he hadn’t come to see her at the medical center at Luna. She suspected another party besides him specifically after all. Or rather, she didn’t suspect them yet, not fully.
“You should know, those files I gave you on the chip? One of the engineers found it in some leftover data cached in our ECU upgrade after it came in from Silver Apex. On the down low of course, because even being vaguely around this is a nightmare. I kept it when we scrubbed the thing clean of anything we didn’t need, gave it to you. And now…..” Ava commented, realising over the last few days what had happened, and now dropping it onto Kais, “Something must be up with it. Someone knew about it, knew I contacted you, and…” She sighed. “This spider's web makes no sense to me. Must be someone either at Silver Apex, or worse, beyond. I’m thinking whatever is happening, they’re testing limits, or they’re figuring out what they can push with it, and right in that moment, they wanted to see what would happen. Or you just got fucking greedy. And I can’t believe that. I know you’re made for orders. Yet maybe not quite this.” Ava finalized, knowing in that moment, she most certainly had Kais’s attention.
“The leak came from Apex?” Kais shook his head. Leftover data, or had it been hidden, or even purposefully released? And more importantly: why? “A spy? Sabotage? Bait? Why? What would they have to gain?”
Ava shook her head, unsure even herself, but knowing she had to try the gambit. She had been played, had to be. She was smart enough to realise that, and like with any good intel, she now had to make sense of this, and be direct. No bullshit now. In a place where eyes were on the main floor, and no massive crowds were present, this was the only place to put her chips on the table.
“I think a part of whatever Amy’s setup dealt with, somehow got through to us. Via that data cache. Like… like something of a virus. Doesn’t take much to open, literally barely anything, so whatever your taps were in development, it must’ve triggered something. Something it was looking for, because otherwise, it was harmless. Well, until it hit us.” The bombshell was no doubt a lot to absorb, as Ava checked around the pillar that nobody was eavesdropping, looking back.
“Kais, I know you and Layla had something strange going on, with your neural upgrades. The FIAR can’t because they’ve never flown a hypersonic jet at Mach 10, but I know what it’s like, it feels like your head is about to explode, because there’s something inside you pushing on your synapses. I can tell. But racing is racing, we all do it, everyone pushes what they can get away with… Until this happens… fuck…” Ava realised Kais was confused, uncertain, unsure of what this meant.
“Please tell me you had nothing to do with this, that you don’t want this. Because I know you’ve seen things, I know you’ve dealt with people dying in your arms…and I…I can’t do that again.” Ava’s words were sincere, and blunt, stepped in that remark.
As Kais listened to her, his jaw clenched more with every word she spoke. He knew something about warfare, indeed, including some digital. Even mech-suits could be hacked, after all, so they were taught to recognize the signs of logic bombs back in the day, the little nudges in their computer systems that shifted their power packs or motor sensitivities into the red just enough, or their HUD alerts and stimulant dispensers to subtly redirect their very behaviors. But this was a different time, or so people said. They were at peace now… weren’t they? And at that moment the headaches, overheats, memory bleeds and handling troubles came back to him, and his eyes tensed up. Whether Layla and him had something to do with this?
A whisper escaped him. “I can’t be sure, Ava.” And for some seconds, Kais could only breathe. Kais looked across the casino floor. It may have been a different time now in many ways. But trust was as fragile as it ever was. Were they compromised? Was Ava? “You better be on my side, Ava. Don’t make me regret saying this, or I swear...” He said, forced through gritted teeth, agitated. But he had to speak directly. No bullshit now. Whatever happened, at least the fog of war would be cleared, and the enemy could be dealt with. And he looked from the Casino floor to Ava’s eyes like a hawk… Yes, whoever that enemy turned out to be.
“We’ve had trouble with our neural upgrades. Massive migraines. Neural connections shifting. Seemingly… melding with the ship’s A.I., even connecting with the race networks at times. That stall with Amy? I think our developments might have had something to do with it. I still don’t understand how and what happened with her, if they have the same kind of bond and it triggered something through that, but… it did.”
Kais paused before fully answering her accusation. “But you…?” And he thought back on Layla’s panicked denial on Luna. Could it have been him, then? But even subconsciously, what would he have had to gain? It wasn't like she had gotten in his way. That, and... Another person dying in his arms? And that’s when he knew. “No.” His answer was decisive. “I wouldn't take down someone on my own side.” Then, a look away, and, under his breath, where none could hear. “Not again.”
Ava shook her head, in total disbelief.
“Fuck… fuck.” Ava, usually stoic, usually precise and pointed, sharp as a tack, almost had a break of a moment there and then. He came out and said it, and the weight of it and his mannerisms immediately told her this wasn’t a lie, exhaling hard, gaining her thoughts.
“You think this was Amy’s doing, then, as payback?” Kais offered, his mind now running overtime unraveling potential motives and attack vectors.
“Amy is competitive, I’ll give her that. But even that makes no sense. She’s not so insane she’d cause that in return to keep her place. I hope. Fuck. I knew something was up. Thank you for telling me, but shit….this is playing with fire. Don't do anything with it, because I’ll take your word..this stuff kills people…..and there is no going back now.” Ava was clutching at straws here, not seeing a complete picture, and not even wanting to accept this. But she had to find a way. And that bombshell, a return warhead, felt like it was punching her in the gut.
“What you told me stays between us. It goes nowhere… because the fallout from this will be biblical. For everyone.” She wasn’t sure if the Stuxnet-like file was even an accident. Maybe even FIAR, in a wild, insane way of stopping these kinds pilot bonds, had done this. Nobody had arrested anyone if that was true. This felt even more off the rails. "We'll need to figure out who is behind this first. And who we can trust..." Ava turned back to him. "I have a feeling you aren’t alone in this. Is it you, or Layla too?”
“It’s…” Kais didn’t answer Ava’s question on whether it was him or Layla, not immediately. But Ava would for the briefest of moments have recognized his otherwise stoic mask dropping, his eyes flickering across the floor to his teammate. An admittance. “I have concerns. For her. For Layla. She's been affected most by the developments. But..." And he gestured towards her. “She's not a killer.”
Ava sighed, nodding in return, looking down at the floor, and where Layla was, chatting away to Cassie, before turning back to Kais, the purple-haired Chilean not subtle, but well, at least dressed for a party.
“Which stacks. It’s no secret what her aspirations are…they are noble. For Layla this is her dream, I bet. She has a heavy crown on her head, then. But still, if what you say is true, she is innocent in this.” Ava simply retorted, nodding, in agreement with his worry, his deep-lined concern, before forming thoughts.
Sighing, Ava drank more of the champagne, almost uncertain of what to ask next. The questions were tough, but this was beginning to make sense. But still, why? Did Apex want a backdoor into Al-Saqr, or was Amy trying to mirror her own advances onto someone else to call them out first? When Pandora’s Box of neural intrusion had been opened up, had the AI done something else of its own volition, or was someone trying to poke holes? Was someone else behind the scenes of it all, pushing Amy’s advances onto Layla to see what happened when thrown into the wild, on anyone crazy enough to mess with removing their neural dampers? It all felt unknown. But Ava had some semblance of thread.
“I have suspicions that Amy is in the same boat as Layla given her behaviour was more erratic than usual. Which scares me a lot more. I mean, thinking about you in particular, they implanted your memories, your abilities, your talents to begin with. But nobody’s ever asked if you don’t implant memories, rather, you put an artificial mind into a biological cradle. Blended in what learns faster than we can, with an intuitive, human body. I know that if you wanted a perfect test specimen, genetically, cybernetically, then… it is here in you two. There’s something to be said for that.” Ava replied, looking across, checking Bea couldn’t see her either, definitely couldn’t hear. She did not want her involved in this whole mess.
“Whatever is in your past, whatever it is that brought you here, I know it’s going to make more sense as to what is going on. If there’s something more behind this…..or if it’s just Amy. It doesn’t matter, it needs to stop while we’re ahead. There’s some incredible good that can be done with all of this. But the wrong person gets a hold, and it won’t just be a contractor that uses it nefariously, it’ll be worse than hell on earth. Nukes are nothing compared to this.” Ava did not understate her words- AI research and development was highly constrained for a reason. She knew of the AIs running against other AIs, to kill them on the Dark Web, but even that was a long time ago as people respected the rules now, or at least, made sure the firewalls stayed high. And not breaking that barrier between the brain and AI was almost as obvious to many as not dumping mercury into your bloodstream - not a great idea unless you had some novel application. She sighed, exhaling, thinking.
“Apex pushes pilots, the mods they’re taking on are silly,” Ava elaborated, “but even this by their standards seems stupid. So maybe even Amy doesn’t know what happened. Someone is seeing what comes next. Something Amy hasn’t even realised. It’s out of character, even for her.” Ava added, staying close within the pillar’s shadows.
“The only other thing I can think of is Amy having come from Zygon. That is the only other firm that has anything immediate to benefit. They’d do something like this. But maybe I’m misjudging.”
“Zygon, huh?” Kais rumbled under his breath as he stared back onto the main floor, to Amy... and Han. Yes, he always had an uncanny feeling about her... Something about her, beyond her unreadable mannerisms, something he couldn't quite put his finger on yet, something alien yet eerily familiar. And that, more than anything, made all his alerts go up on red.
“Find what you need to. But watch your back... If this goes into the wrong hands, we are screwed.”
“We already are…” Kais answered with a sense of detached acceptance. It was true, he felt, at least when it came to him. He was born a beast of sacrifice, and it seemed even now that was to be his fate. “So be it,” he nodded. “That’s when I do my best work anyway.” His tone was flat, controlled, but empty in a way.
“Well, it’s a good time to be resourceful then. I’ll keep my wits about me, but I have a feeling whoever it is will not try anything stupid straight after that mess.” Ava replied, she couldn’t help cracking a smirk, almost wondering if she should have expected nothing less since the doors opened. “I’m trusting you,” Ava added. “I wouldn’t go to anyone else about it, because right now, I think something else is going on. And sooner we rule things out, the better. Find the right people to speak about it to. And hope we played our cards right.”
Kais didn’t answer. He hadn’t expected the battlefield to actually find him again to this degree. He felt his heartbeat, controlled it. His hands, not even a tremble, gripped the railing tight, his eyes, never wandered from the scene below.
It was as if Ava could see through to his thoughts, taking his hand, looking up his wrist, right up to where some of his scar tissue still ran through him, unpolished even after all this time.
“Shall we head back?” she asked, as she put them hand to hand, and looked around, noticing if nobody had seen them gone for too long.
And Kais nodded a curt “hmm.” He readied his mind for what came next, and the two rejoined the rest of the drivers before long. The die had been cast. The subplot thickened. And throughout it all, one thought seemed to taunt him: why, of all things, did the next breadcrumb have to be Zygon...?
Soundtrack: Tommy Ljungberg - Full Circle
DELTΔ HYPER
Episode Seven: Roll of the Dice
