It's impossible for a human to catch a computer virus. Any child could tell you that. So that little smart-arse would probably be confused if they were told that a computer virus had created the squad of the part human, part cybernetic, horrors that were currently trooping in my direction.
Honestly, I would have liked a smart-arse kid to have been with me at that moment. A good little distraction to push out so I could make a break for it while the little shit was getting pulled apart by steel fingers in search of raw materials. Sadly, I had no such distraction at hand. My pitiful excuse for a hiding place, along with whatever god might be listening, was all I had.
My silent prayers were not for myself, though. They were for Ajay to get in position and drop the trap. Until then, I'd be stuck trying to mould myself to the underside of an office desk, listening to the bionic footfalls that had been chasing me for the last half a mile get closer and closer.
Suddenly, those sounds were drowned out by part of the ceiling dropping like a giant's sledgehammer. The Hivers were crushed beneath it and I scrambled to get clear.
'Got em!' I heard Ajay crowing from above, 'worked like a charm.'
I coughed and spat through the dirt and dust.
'Great,' I managed to choke out, bitterly. Next time, I promised myself, she could be the bait. Though, if all went well, there would not be a next time.
I ran forward to do my part of the job, pulling out the folding shovel from my pack. There had been six Hive cyborgs so we just had to hope that one of them was intact enough. I began heaving chunks of debris out of the way. This wasn't helped when Ajay hopped down from the floor above, sending rubble cascading down the pile.
Finally, I was able to unearth enough of one of the Hivers to drag it out.
'Is it okay?' Ajay asked, sounding concerned. I knew that concern wasn't for the Hiver itself. Even if we had cared, anyone could see from a glance that it was smashed beyond repair. Broken bone and bits of reinforced endoskeleton jutted out of it while blood and fluids pumped out of ruptures in the thing's skin. It was what I was prying out of the steel plated skull that she was interested in.
Sparks flew, and I knew that what passed for a brain in there was trying to send a signal for the Hiver to grab me. The cyborg's one remaining arm twitched, its steely fingers closing and opening, but I wasn't too worried. I yanked out our prize and the red lights behind the Hiver's eyes went out.
'It's okay,' I answered, grinning. Ajay widened her eyes and had to stifle a whoop.
'This is it,' she said, excitedly, 'now we can track the signal to its source. We can end this all at last.'
I smiled at her, carefully putting the intact GPS chip into my pocket. As far as I knew, it was the only one to ever be successfully recovered. Normally the whole brain self-destructed when the unit registered serious damage. Which was why we'd set up the trap. Kill them quickly and get the chip out before it could register the Hiver had been crushed.
'Time to go,' I said, straightening up. There was no sense hanging around waiting for another patrol. Ajay nodded and made for the hole we'd come in by that would lead us back to the sewers. Not exactly safe, nor sanitary, but better than above ground.
I hesitated before following her. My eyes had landed on a blank computer terminal, the keyboard thick with dust, the screen behind barely visible. It was amazing to think it had been machines like this which had caused this plague.
To this day, no one knew how he'd done it. How he'd made that virus. But with countless people staring at their screens, it couldn't have failed to work. They had all seen the pop-up and been hit with the same hypnotic signal. We found out later that it had shut down the higher brain functions of everyone who saw it, leaving only the basics that would keep the body going long enough to get them to one of the Hive's newly opened factories. And there they were transformed into Hivers. Arms and legs replaced with augmented steel limbs, eyes and ears enhanced with bionics. The brains were stripped of everything human. They were turned into the world's most powerful CPUs.
