Foundation of All

“When do you think the Creener will wake up?”

“Shut it. Reg is coming soon.”

Emily blearily opened her eyes only to be greeted with a coarse cloth. She shifted slightly and felt something tighten around her wrists. She was sitting down on a cold concrete floor and her arms were chained behind her around a pole that she now felt pressing against her back. What… what was happening? Where was she? She blinked again, still coming awake and trying to remember how she got here.

“Well, what do you know? Creener’s up early.”

Emily heard a door open and there were footsteps into the room, the two men from before going silent.

“Remove her hood.”

Someone grabbed the cloth bag over her head and gave it a hard tug to rip it off. Emily hissed as some of her hair painfully went along for the ride along with the bag. She blinked a few times at the sudden light entering her eyes from the surprisingly well lit room around her. Bare concrete walls and the metal door along with the single metal pole in the center where she was sitting, but the lights above were strong. Lighting up every inch of the small room. Three men stood there, two on either side of the door with a single man in the center. Reg probably.

“Creener. I see you’re awake already,” Reg said, “Get her up. We’ll have to do things quick this time. No time to waste.”

“Boss, is that a good…”

Reg glared at him, “We got lots of heat on this. You know that. We got to do this fast or we’ll get caught. Is that what we want?”

As they argued, the other guard came forward and unlocked her handcuffs to release her from the pole. She twitched and a gun was being held to her head a second later. She froze.

“Don’t get any ideas, girl,” the guard said and the two arguing men turned to the scene, “Stand up.”

Emily stayed frozen, not wanting to move with the cold metal pressed to her temple.

“Up! Stand up.”

Emily unfroze and complied and the guard shifted so his gun was pressed into the base of her spine now.

Reg and the other man opened the door and without another word Emily was led into a hallway, internally panicking the whole way. The hallway was lined with dozens of other metal reinforced doors like the one she had been in. Was this a Revival Empire remnant? Creener… That’s what they called people like her and her parents. People who had fled the country after the first round of racial ‘purges’. Or basically anyone that they didn’t like.

They moved through the hallway until they reached another series of doors, the cold metal of the gun pressed into Emily’s back the whole way.

She noticed that the lights were flickering and the area was looking much more worn down the more they traveled. Was this an old facility of some kind that they were in? Some old Empire facility that wasn’t found by the democracy faction after the war?

Suddenly they reached a door that looked much more advanced than the others, and well maintained. The light above them flickered, but Reg finished inputting the code on the door and it hissed open. Emily was led into a lab that was surprisingly advanced. And her heart sank as she saw the large canister mounted in the center. The guard in the back remained by the door, his gun no longer touching her as she took another few steps forward.

“No…” She said, “It was you? You stole the virus? Killed all of those people? Why?”

Reg shook his head, “Hey, not that I mind killing some Creeners. But the lab wasn’t me. Lost a lot of good pure men in the assault. Whole damn thing self-destructed as soon as the virus came out of its housing. Lucky us that me and a few others were able to get away in time, ey? You see, that’s the problem we got now, girl. All your scientist friends at the lab are all dead now. You’re the last one that knows all about it and can change it to do what we want.”

“A— And what is that?”

“Make it into a weapon of course. Those damn democracy fools don’t know what they’ve lost when they destroyed the Empire. If we have this in our hands, we can rebuild. No one will dare mess with our people again if we can release this in response. We’ll rebuild this nation into what it needs to be. After we’ve demonstrated its power to the world first of course.”

Reg looked at the canister with stars in his eyes for a few moments looking almost proud before he frowned again and turned back to her. “Unfortunately, right now it’s toothless. Big infection like wildfire that does jack squat once it's in a host. You go in there, do your little changes, make it have a little more bite. You get it?”

“N– n— no!”

Reg got real close and Emily shrunk back. He scanned her up and down and after a few seconds snorted.

“Figured. I could threaten to kill you, but you seem to have some spine to you after all. I’ll have to bring out the big guns.”

He gestured to three screens behind him which flickered on.

Emily stiffened as he leered at her, “Recognize anyone? Want to try saying no to me again?”

Emily stared at the three screens. It was her parents and Sean unconscious. They were tied up in all different rooms like the one Emily had woken up in with the poles in the center. She could see guards standing just behind them with their guns.

Emily heard the whispers and voices around her and for once in her life, she welcomed them. A way to retreat from reality and her building panic. She held her head and screamed in frustration as her head felt like it would split in two. Reg got a slightly disturbed look on his face and took an instinctive step back.

Suddenly everything went silent and Emily stared to the side where Sinestra and the ghost man crawled out of portals suspended a few feet off of the ground in thin air. Reg and the guards lips were moving silently, but Emily ignored them.

“Sinestra,” Emily said, not caring if her captors heard her, “Please, tell me what to do. I can’t help them. But they have my family. Th-they’ll kill them if I refuse.”

“Oh, EMily,” Sinestra said, “I’m- I’m so soRry. It’s all my fAult. AGaiN. I could hAve, I shOuLd haVe… Oh, it’s all my fauLt aGain.”

Sinestra fell to the ground and buried her face in her hands, “I- I’m so sOrry, I tHoUght I could save tHem all,” She said, muffled through her hands and tears.

The male ghost put a hand on Sinestra’s shoulders for a few seconds and stood there. Then he looked back up to Emily.

“Emily, I tHink you kNow that thEy won’t reLeaSe you aliVe if tHey get whAt they wanT. Or yOur family. You may Have to chOose betWeEn exTenDing you and your faMily’s livEs a littLe lonGer or dOoming the eNtire world. You Know whAt that viRus could do if it beCaMe lethal.”

“I know! There isn’t anything? Nothing at all? What the hell are you two even for if you can’t– can’t help me now? When I need you both for once in my life? Please, there must be something? Something that I can do, use…”

Sinestra had calmed down slightly and looked up from where she lay on her knees. She shot to her feet in an instant.

“Use! That’s it! The laB eQuipMent, it’s advAnced isn’t it? Most of thoSe coNNect to a ceNtral databAse for their iNforMation, right? I rEmeMber you saying sOmeThing like that a few yEars ago?”

“DoN’t reply, Emily,” the male Ghost suddenly warned her, “Your cApTors are waTcHing you, even if tHey can’t sEe or hEar the tWo of us.”

Emily opened her mouth before looking around and realizing that she had forgotten about the three men standing around her giving her uncertain looks and shooting each other glances. She shut her mouth.

“If we can cOnnEct to the dAtabaSe, get a meSSage throUgh soMehOw…” Sinestra continued, feverishly talking while ignoring the male ghost’s interruption, “Then CODA can coMe and sAve us, our faMily, Emily. We… Yes, it’s nOt too laTe. We can still sAve thEm all. Stop the viRuS, save our FaMily. Yes, we-we can still do it.”

Sinestra’s sudden burst of emotion was disturbing her. Sinestra was supposed to be the alter ego to provide balance to the male ghost. If Sinestra was so upset and panicking, then what could Emily do? Emily glanced between the two of them and shrugged to try to communicate with them. She didn’t know anything about how to send the message. She didn’t know any coding at all besides some basic courses. How was she supposed to figure all that out with her captors looking over her shoulders?

“Just cAll us out,” Sinestra assured her, “Make sOme kiNd of sigNal that we cAn see. Try to fiNd a sourCe tab or a way to see the rAw code and scRoll all the way thrOugh. We’ll be watChiNg if we can, and I’ll fiGure out a soLutiOn. We may not… not be able to coMe every time. But hopefully we can come. I’ll tell you exActly what to do. OnCe we’re rEady.”

Emily scrunched her brow. That didn’t make any sense. How would Sinestra know something that she didn’t?

“Just trUst me,” Sinestra said, “I can do it. But… you’ll hAve to woRk on the VirUs in the mEanTime whiLe you wAit for yOur chaNce. And as you wAit for CODA to cOme saVe you.”

“No way! I… what if…”

“Do you hAve aNother oPtiOn?” the male Ghost said bluntly, “Emi-Sinestra’s right. It’s the bEst chance of your faMily making it out aLive.”

“Okay.”

“Then we’ll be gOing for now,” the male ghost said and put his hand back on Sinestra’s shoulder. “Sinestra?”

“Right,” Sinestra replied, “Stay stroNg Emily. We’ll be BacK soon.”

Then with a soft pop, sound returned to Emily and Sinestra and the male ghost were gone.

The three of Emily’s captors were gathered together, whispering to each other softly.

Reg noticed her looking at them.

“Girl, what the hell was that?” He demanded, “Who were talking to you? What were you doing?”

“Myself,” Emily said, still feeling a little odd as she cooled off from the strange state she entered during her hallucinations, “Didn’t you look me up? Without my meds, expect that to start happening a lot more often. I’ll start hallucinating and lose grip on reality. Again.”

They glanced at each other and huddled together again. Emily could just barely hear their whispered discussion.

“Think she’s faking…”

“...pretty damn convincing. I threatened to shoot her… She didn’t even flinch.”

“...Maybe she’s not faking. Didn’t you hear rumors, Reg?”

“You think someone that important is off their rocker? No way. Has to be fake.”

They unhuddled and Reg stared at her.

“What medicine do you need?” He asked suspiciously.

Emily listed off a list of six medications. Four of them she had to take daily and were what she actually needed. One was a strong painkiller that she sometimes used. The last was an antidepressant that she didn’t actually take. If she used the lab equipment here she might be able to turn it into a powerful poison to use against the guards. She didn’t think it was a large chance that she could get away with it, but it was worth a shot.

Reg glanced between the two guards. “Fine. But you better not be lying about it, or you’ll be in for a world of hurt, Creener. Now, are you going to get work on the virus or will we have to continue the threats where I left off.”

“F-Fine,” Emily said, her strange state coming to an end as her panic and emotions came rushing back to the front of her mind, “Just don’t hurt them.”

Reg eyed her for a few seconds, “Don’t even think of delaying. We’ve got ways to know if you’re going in the right direction or not. I’ll be going to check your story. Pray that I like what I find or your family is in for a world of hurt. You two–”

He gestured to them, “Keep an eye on her and keep her working. I’ll be back soon.”

He left and the two guards stood there. The one on the right raised his gun and gestured towards the lab around them.

“What are you standing around for? Get to work.”

Emily hesitated, but at seeing the two men begin to shift their stances she looked away and started fiddling with a spectrometer and the digital screen in front of it. Where was it… Source… Okay. Here was something. Lines of incomprehensible text popped up and Emily started slowly scrolling down, not understanding it in the least bit.

The two guards stood there and frowned at her.

“What are you doing?” One of them asked, “That doesn’t look right.”

“I’m looking over the code. Have to make sure its the same as the old ones in my lab. They’re different sometimes.”

All three of them jumped as a speaker clicked on from above them. A distorted voice played through it.

“Let her work. An excessive check, but plausible. Make sure that you do not… linger too much Ms. Stenson. We are watching, and know enough to detect any attempts by you to waste our time.”

The speaker clicked off and Emily wiped sweat off of her brow before putting her finger back on the screen and continuing to scroll without saying another word. After she was done she did the actual normal checks veeeery carefully to make sure that the machine was working properly. She then moved to the next one and did the same process.

“You already checked that one, Ms. Stenson,” The speaker crackled again, “This delay is still only minimal. There are four machines left. Chop chop. Or chop chop we go on your Creener family.”

Emily grit her teeth, but moved again to the last four machines. It had already been hours now. When would Sinestra appear again to help?

These last four machines were the ones that she thought were most promising to have an outside connection that her captors might have missed. They were mostly machines for modeling proteins, much more digital and complex hardware than most of the rest of the machines combined. It would be easy to miss some outside connections even if they did their best to purge as many as they could.

Emily sat down at the first machine and began typing on the attached keyboard to find the code. This one was much more complex as she scrawled through it. She did the usual checks on the program. She moved onto the next and did the same. Again. Again.

She reached the last machine, knowing that Sinestra was just a hallucination. Sinestra had just told Emily what she wanted to hear. Of course Sinestra would have no idea how to send a message through these things. Emily didn’t have the experience to pull it off.

Emily stood around, looking around the lab, thinking of what she could do next. The machines were checked again, the voice from above knew that so she couldn’t pretend to do one of them again.

“Ms. Stenson. I believe you should start with the emulsifiers and benzoic acid perhaps?”

The voice from above said. Emily paused and tried to think of anything else to do, before silently walking over to the lab bench and grabbing the chemicals she needed. Whenever she made a mistake, intentional or not, the voice from above called her out about it.

Emily intentionally mixed up the proportions, and didn't clean her pipettes between use. Sloppy mistakes that she hadn’t even made on her first day in the lab at CODA international for her internship.

“Ms. Stenson. We see what you are doing. We do not think you understand this situation. This is your last warning. No more delays. Next time you try a trick like that or intentionally bumble as you have been doing, one of your family members will die. We are on a tight schedule, and we have three hostages to work with. We can afford to lose one or two to prove our conviction.”

The whispers started around Emily as she stood there, trying desperately to think of another way to delay. But her family! Somehow the voice above knew enough about her work to tell when she was faking. What could she do?

“What do you even need me for if you know so much?” Emily said in frustration, “I’m fucking nervous about my family. Of course I’m going to spill shit and make mistakes!”

“I was one of the top virologists in the Empire before it was destroyed by the jealous Democracy fools, Creener” the voice replied, “I know many of these methods and techniques. I could make the modifications myself given a few years. But you know the subject intimately and can do the changes in mere days as its primary designer. I know enough to tell if what you are doing is working towards the larger goal or not, even if I am not familiar enough with your work to do it myself. Don’t try to fool me, that was far beyond the mistakes someone of your caliber would make from mere nervousness.”

“Great. Just great…” Emily muttered. The whispers grew louder and louder and Emily groaned again as her head throbbed again. The portal opened and Sinestra poked her head out of the portal. But she didn’t continue through, remaining there floating off the ground with only her blurred head pointed Emily. Her voice was clearly enunciated with every word spoken clearly even through the normal distortion.

“I have it. Now, do exactly what I tell you. I’ll go away again for a few minutes. Tell the voice above that you need to make some dummy models to test if the software is working correctly. Convince it as best as you can. The last machine you checked, use that one. I’ll come back after a minute or so and tell you what to do. The base code I’ve decoded shows that it’s taking in an eXteRiOr siGnaL! If we pUll tHis off theN we can seNd a mEssage for HeLp!”

Emily tried to control her expression to stop herself from reacting to the news as Sinestra’s voice grew more excited and more distorted as she finished speaking.

“We’re gettiNg thrOugh this, EMily,” Sinestra promised, “Be bAck in a feW.”

Suddenly the world popped again and Emily was back.

“Creener? You there?” The voice from above said, “I’ll have to talk to Reg about those medications. It’s clear your condition is degrading rapidly without them. That won’t do at all…”

“I’m going to do some protein modeling,” Emily announced as she walked over to the machine that Sinestra had indicated, “Make some dummy proteins to test if the modeling software is working properly.”

The voice above paused for a moment to consider.

“Very well,” It eventually said, “But no more than one as a test case. Proceed.”

Emily sat down and as the device was booting up, she tried to keep herself as still and stony faced as possible as the whispers and pain in her skull washed over her. There was an almost primal urge in her to make a noise as her skull radiated pain like someone had drove a giant spike through it. But she kept completely silent and stiff as she watched the progress bar go up on the screen to load the program.

Eventually everything went silent around Emily and she just barely managed to suppress her gasp of relief as the pain went away.

“Alright,” Sinestra said a few seconds later in her careful voice that was easier to understand through the distortion. “This will be a bit strange. First you have to name the file a long string. About thirty characters long. Try to make it look like you’re just putting it in randomly. There, in that menu. Alright, so its A4326JRB6Y…”

Emily copied Sinestra’s long string of characters as Sinestra used her intangible finger to point to exactly where she wanted Emily to click with her mouse on the screen if it was relevant.

“Okay, next. You’ll start the base sequence by using the importer. Be careful here, we have to select specific options in the menu to make the connection two way between this device and the central server. It’s normally used to make sure that if you lose the device the file isn’t lost. They disabled all the external connections in the hardware, but this one has an extra backup transceiver in the case of power loss and they seem to have missed it.”

Emily followed Sinestra’s instructions for the import of the completed protein.

“Good job, Emily. Doing great so far. Now, edit the amino sequence this way, altering the beta folds and alpha helices at the 32-70 amino acid junction region…”

Emily altered the imported protein according to Sinestra’s instructions, until it looked almost unrecognizable from the beginning.

“Good, good. When the server reads the file name it will unpack the protein and create an error on the server side. The error will contain the message I encoded into the structure you just built up just now. Now there’s just one last step. You have to go back to the source code and change a few things. It will ask for administrator access, and I’ll give you another string of characters that should exploit its codebase to automatically let you in even without the right password. Sort of like a factory default password for the machine. Now repeat after me out loud to create an excuse to look at the source code, ‘Something’s off. I’ll have to check the source code to fix the problem’.”

Emily obediently repeated after Sinestra and flipped over to the source code screen. She went in and typed something into the administrator popup after she went to perform edits.

“Quick, we have to go through before they catch on. There, change no to yes. There, replace that set of characters with... There, yes to no. Another replacement… There, all done. Go to the bottom and click confirm changes.”

Emily jumped as she felt a hand on her shoulder, but quickly clicked the button, sending the screen in front of her to rapidly flicker and pixelate for a few seconds before resolving itself on the homescreen.

Emily looked behind her and saw that one of the guards was behind her, looking irate as he spoke to her. She watched his lips for a few seconds, but she didn’t know how to lip read to figure out what he was saying.

“Okay, EmiLy,” Sinestra said from the side. Emily felt a ice cold brush across her scalp from Sinestra’s hand putting her hand over it, “It’ll all be fiNe nOw. The mEssaGe is seNt. We just hAve to wAit and maKe sure our fAmily is saFe until thEy arrive.”

Emily looked away from the guard and towards Sinestra.

“Thank you, Sinestra. If you were a real person, I think we might have been good friends.”

Emily saw Sinestra’s body shift in the way that Emily could tell that she was smiling.

“Thank you, little Emily. You hAve yOur wHole life aHeAd of you. If this is the lAst gOod tHing I can do bEfoRe I am gone foReVer, then I’m gLad that it wAs this. Now, you haVe to wOrk hard now. Don’t deLay yoUr work too mUch. We can’t risk any hArm to our family, and CODA is coMing soon. The siGnal is active and inCluDes your loCatiOn here as well as the sitUatiOn. Who knew that pRotEins could contAin lots of inforMation, right?”

“S-Sinestra?” Emily asked hesitantly, seeing out of the corner of her eye that the guard had backed off and had stopped speaking even if he appeared disgruntled in being forced to do so.

“Are you going away?” Emily continued as she refocused on the ghost… no, the hallucination that was part of her, “Am I going to see you again?”

Sinestra shrugged, “If nOthiNg happEns this yeAr, then my pUrpOse is seRved. Both me, and Sean. That’s the mAle one by tHe way. Funny you nEver asKed for his name liKe you did for mE. What a cOinCideNce that he’s naMed afTer our bRotHer, huh?

“Sean?” Emily said surprised, “That’s strange. I don’t think about him like that at all. Sean wouldn’t just yell at me for no reason.”

“How stRanGe.” Sinestra said with a shrug, “I’ll happiLy go to the loNg reSt knoWing thAt I’ve savEd you, Emily. Go, live yOur life out tHere. FrEe of us, free of all tHe suffeRing we’ve put you thRoUgh in the nAme of this.”

Emily felt tears stinging the corner of her eyes, “Thank you, Sinestra. For being my friend. I’ll miss you, even if it’s just because I like talking to myself so much.”

“I’ll be gOing noW. Live yOur bEst life out tHere, Emily. And mAybe fiNally get sOme of thAt datiNg aDvice from LukE…”

Emily opened her mouth to reply, but with a pop Sinestra was gone and sound returned to the world.

She closed her mouth and looked down at the keyboard in front of her blankly. Why did saying goodbye to Sinestra hurt so much? Hadn’t she wished for her to go away forever nearly every time she had ever appeared? But now that the real possibility of Sinestra disappearing was upon her, Emily didn’t want her to go anymore. Somehow Emily sensed that Sinestra really believed that she would disappear forever, and it might be the last time they met. It was only a delusion, and alter ego in Emily’s own mind. But Emily still felt a sense of loss as she considered Sinestra being gone from her forever.

“Creener? You awake over there?” The guard said and Emily jumped in place.

“This is unacceptable,” the voice above said with irritation, “Her condition degrading far more rapidly than we ever expected. I wonder how she even functioned at the old lab if a single day without medication is reducing her to this. No wonder Reg dismissed the rumors as absurd if they matched the severity of what we’ve been seeing in real time here…”

“What should we do, sir?” One of the guards asked.

There was a long pause, before a sigh from the voice above.

“Put her to work. We’ll just have to make sure she is stopped from working once she enters one of her delusions and starts doing random nonsense. Like that nonsense protein that she just built. We can only hope she will be lucid enough to describe the required medication dosage when Reg finally gets the medication from his contacts and delivers it back here. Hopefully she’ll be more functional by that point.”

Emily sat there at the computer not moving, hoping to drag out her work for a few more minutes longer.

“You! Ms. Stenson, get to work. No more delays. You’ve checked your models, checked the machines. No more excuses. I expect progress on the real work soon or we’ll start torturing your family members for some extra motivation.”

“B-But what if I drift off again?”

“We can tell the difference. If you attempt to fake an episode then one of your family dies. Now get. To. Work. Now! No more excuses.”

Emily turned to the device in front of her and glanced at the three screens showing the tied up forms of her family. She closed her eyes and took a deep shuddering breath before opening them and creating a new protein model file. She had no idea what the voice above would be able to detect… So she would just have to go as slowly as she could while still doing the work. It was a complex change even in normal conditions, so it should take her a while. Enough time that CODA should come before she got even close to a solution. Hopefully.

— — —

Emily was sweating as she frantically tried to think of more ways to delay. But she couldn’t actually make up tasks, and she had already pursued too many alternative methods already. If she did more the voice above might catch on what she was doing and finally make good on their threat. Where was CODA? It had been nearly two days and she had heard nothing out of the ordinary so far.

To sleep they had brought a beaten up mattress to the dingy cell she was in before. Her arms were cuffed to the pipe above her head and they turned her lights off when it was time to sleep. She had trouble sleeping obviously, but somehow still managed to sleep quicker than she thought possible in the complete darkness of the cell.

Food was tasteless mash and they told her that they put a camera in the bathroom. So she couldn’t delay in there either without them storming in and dragging her out again. Damn perverts, as if kidnapping her family wasn’t enough for them.

The camera was by the door and she could see it, so hopefully the way she uncomfortably scrunched her body on the toilet had made sure that it didn’t get a good angle on her butt while she went to the bathroom. As if she needed any more reasons to hate the Empire and these people that just loved them so much.

Her clothes were filthy and she smelled absolutely rank right now, her captors had offered her a shower… But knowing that there was a camera recording her in there, she had elected to stay filthy instead. At least the guards kept a larger distance from her now due to the smell. That was good.

She really couldn’t delay much more. She was starting to worry that she would actually finish one of the modifications that would make the virus lethal, even if by accident while fiddling around with the models. The voice above might be smart enough to know when she stumbled upon a winning combination. Hopefully not.

She already had to divert away from a few promising branches already when she started making too much progress. She could only do that so many times before it became obvious what she was doing. She felt she was on the edge of being caught already.

The voice above was growing impatient, although it didn’t seem actually suspicious of her yet. It accepted her excuses that it was more complicated than she had thought it would be. It accepted her excuses for the delays. For now. Who knew when that would change.

Emily hoped CODA would come soon. She felt the thought creep back… But no, she brutally suppressed it. Somehow Sinestra had known what to do to send a message. Sinestra wouldn’t lie to her, not about this. But what if… No! CODA was coming.

Damn her logic trying to tell her that it was impossible for a hallucination being able to do something Emily had never learned. She just had to delay a bit longer and she and her family would be saved…

CODA was coming.

They would be saved any moment now.

They would.