Aneka Jansen 7: Hope Read Online Free Page B

safe? That virus was supposed to be–’
    ‘Some of the differences would make the Xinti virus more virulent and harder to isolate, and we have a few generations of advancement on the Xinti. The countermeasures we have are way better. We’re safe. Though…’
    ‘Lena?’
    ‘Well, even with the mutations… I took a good look at the Xinti virus when the match came up. I don’t get how they failed to stop it. I don’t get how these machines mutated into that form either. It’s almost like someone did it on purpose and then decided not to put their best efforts into countering it.’
    Ella was silent for a second, considering her response. ‘Have you made any notes about that?’
    ‘No, just a passing thought really.’
    ‘Don’t. Keep it quiet until we can present it to the AIs. The Xinti are gone… I’m just not sure suggesting that some of them may have engineered their transition to digital minds without consulting the rest would be a great idea.’
    Lena gave a slow nod. ‘You may be right, but it was a long time ago and–’
    And then the world exploded.
    PLC-3472, 23.10.559 FSC.
    Ella became aware that she was conscious, but she kept her eyes closed while she assessed her situation in case it was particularly bad.
    The last thing she remembered was a lot of noise and the wall of the lab rushing at her. She was fairly sure it had been part of the wall which had been moving. According to her implant, that had been over two days ago. She had been out for two days and the injuries from the impact would have been severe… And there was something which felt a bit like a medical brace around her neck and she could not move.
    No… She could move, but not much. She was in restraints of some sort. Cold. Metal. She was fixed to a hard mattress at the waist, wrists, and ankles. The brace was cold against her skin, probably more metal, and it seemed to curve around her neck at the back leaving her throat exposed. More like jewellery than a neck brace.
    Wondering whether she was going to regret it, she opened her eyes. It was not an especially illuminating experience. The room was well lit and very grey. At a guess, she was looking at a room on a spaceship, but it did not exactly look like a cabin. In fact, it looked more like a cell and turning her head just confirmed that perception. The door was very solid with no obvious means of opening it, and there was a toilet and sink in one corner. Checking the ceiling again, she located a small, black dome in the opposite corner which had to be some form of visual sensor.
    All right, so the camp had been attacked. There was nothing on site with the explosive power to rip the lab building open, so it had to have been something from outside. They had been attacked, she had been hurt, possibly badly, but she had been healed if her biological readouts were telling the truth, and now she was clamped to a bed in a cell. And it was going to be several days before anyone on Shadataga even knew she was gone. She really should have insisted on a five-day check-in cycle; Aneka was going to be so sarcastic about this…
    The door opened with a hiss of heavy-duty hydraulics. Ella noted the arrival of a man in a grey uniform, but she was distracted from a thorough analysis by the muffled screams she could hear before the door closed. It had sounded like a man, and it had been a man in a lot of pain.
    ‘Can you understand what I am saying?’ the new arrival asked, speaking slowly.
    ‘You’re speaking a dialect of English,’ Ella replied. ‘I understand English.’
    He sniffed. He was well equipped for it, having a fairly strong, Roman nose mounted on the front of a moderately handsome face which had once been more handsome. Guessing ages was generally a pointless exercise just based on looks, but he was not in the flush of youth. The physique was powerful: he was tall and strong, and the muscle looked natural on him rather than bulked up. His voice was good too, resonant. The