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to almost nothing. It looked like the ruins of
a toilet block, an artefact from when the City still had trees and
camping grounds.
    Irradiated dust swirled
in the headlights. Six pulled up the handbrake and shut off the
engine. If he was in the wrong place, he would know soon
enough.
    The silence was
overwhelming. As crowded as it was, the City still had deserted
spots, usually because of a bad smell – or, in this case, the
half-life from a long forgotten nuclear test.
    Six got out of the car,
closed the door, and moved quickly toward the shelter. The index
had probably tried to break into the systems of various other
organisations. There was always a risk that someone else might show
up. He had to move fast.
    The gate screamed as he
pulled it open. A startled rat darted between Six's feet and
scuttled away into the fog. He hesitated for a moment, but heard no
other movement. So he slipped through the gap and crept down the
concrete steps toward the shelter.
    A titanium door stood
at the bottom of the staircase. It looked thicker than Six had
expected. He hoped there was enough gas in his cutting torch to
slice through it.
    But when he got closer,
he realised that he wouldn't even need the torch. The bolts weren't
engaged. He gripped the handle and heaved, dragging the door open
centimetre by centimetre.
    The darkness loomed
before him. He could hear hundreds of tiny fans whirring, keeping
the servers cool. The building wasn't connected to the power grid,
so he could only assume that a reserve battery had somehow kicked
in. If he waited long enough, the index would probably switch
itself off.
    But he didn't want to
give ChaoSonic the chance to find it. So he crept forwards, eyes
adjusting to the blackness–
    Click. A harsh neon glare filled the
room. Six ducked, looking for the motion sensor which had triggered
the lights. There could be an alarm, he thought. I have to shut it
down.
    He didn't see a sensor
or an alarm panel. Instead, he saw row after row of server towers,
connected to the concrete ceiling by a coloured web of cables. And
he saw the person standing in the shadows – but not before she saw
him.
    Two barbs punched
through his clothes and dug into his skin. He didn't have time to
feel pain. Suddenly his limbs were shivering, his fists clenched,
his teeth rattling in his mouth as thousands of volts ran up the
wires and darted through his body.
    He couldn't move as the
woman approached him. He couldn't avoid the approaching syringe. He
couldn't even widen his eyes as he recognised her.
    'Agent Six,' Soren Byre
said. 'You're right on time.'
    The syringe plunged
into his neck. Everything went black.
     
    * * *
     
    When he woke, the cuffs
were so tight around his wrists that his hands had swollen up. His
ankles were chained. He couldn't lift his head to look at the
restraints – a metal band around his forehead held his skull to the
operating table – but they felt strong. He wouldn't be able to
break free.
    The ceiling was made of
pockmarked concrete. He could still hear the servers running, so he
hadn't left the fallout shelter. How long had he been unconscious?
Long enough for Kyntak to come looking for him?
    Soren
Byre's face floated into view above him. 'You were right,' she
said. 'I did need
ununoctium.'
    Six stared at her as
though her presence were an astonishing magic trick. There was no
sign of scarring on her face. 'How did you survive?'
    Byre scoffed. 'You
should know better,' she said. 'We were trained by the same people.
It takes more than a collapsing building to kill me.'
    'I watched you die,'
Six insisted.
    'It doesn't matter what
you saw, or what you think you saw. What matters is that the
machine has been rebuilt. My work can continue, and this time, you
won't be able to screw it up.'
    'Byre,' Six said. 'Time
travel is impossible.'
    'Just because we can
only perceive one moment at a time, that doesn't mean that the past
is gone. Every particle in your body is entangled with every other
object