Ph3nix E-Book

Nalle Windahl

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Serie: M3rqrie
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 122

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2023

Beschreibung

Imagine a time, about 50 years after 914D00m. How would the world appear after the clash between DS and N3v3r!and? Is M3rqrie still a player in the game? This starts with an old fashion letter, arriving at a Skyscraper in a big city in Japan. It is addressed to: DS, 13th floor. The letter starts a chain of events leading to two inexperienced young men helping to create and train one of the most advanced artificial intelligence's there has ever been. Even if they have expert help, is it with good intentions or is it part of a bigger plan? Is it really a good idea to open P@nd00r@'s box and see what is unleashed out into the world? And what does an old Muddhedd track have to do with it?

Leseprobe

Unofficially 4th book in the M3rqrie series

Perhaps more to be considered extra material?

Either way, as usual, this is meant for entertainment only.

Oh, and spoiler alert! If you haven’t read the M3rqrie-series and you want to read them, it is a good idea to do so before reading this. This story contains spoilers for you if you have not! But as always, it is your choice, and yours alone!

First edition

This page would have been blank, if it had not been for these words.

Table of Contents

Part I: Ph3nix

Delivery

The strange letter

The hunt for the 13th floor (a k a Dead Bird)

The discovery

Elevated elevator

The tiniest light scatters even the deepest darkness

The green dot

Introductions

The letter

Goodbye

This cannot be undone!

Attempting to go back

What goes up, must come down.

Burger mayhem

Waiting and waiting again

What a start

Conspiracy

DS

Part II: P@nd00r@

Unlocked secrets

A catch

Heading for the first session

Session 1 - before start

Session one

The following sessions.

The unknownth numbered session

The next session

Over and over again

The last step

Part III: Ph3nix + P@nd00r@

The wait

Go fish

No luck

The contact attempt

Joint mission

No contact

Part IV: L3g@cy and Futr

The digital road map

L3g@cy

Futr

Part I Ph3nix

Delivery

Along a busy street in a mega city, a delivery truck is slowly approaching its next and last address. The afternoon traffic jam has already begun, and the driver more than once felt close to losing it, like Michael Douglas' character in the old movie Falling down. It had been almost 75 years since the movie premiered in 1993, yet it still was a cult movie in some movie enthusiast circles, of which the driver was not part of, and not in any way aware that someone decades ago had captured the same feelings he was currently struggling with, and made a small fortune from it.

Tempting as it was to just leave the car, take the last delivery for the day in his hands, the driver decided to stay in his car and try to keep calm for the next 200 meters until he arrived at his destination. Then, at least, he would get out of the car a little while, perhaps even sneak off to get another cup of coffee to last him the ride back to the central.

You would think that since Falling down, and the revolution in technology that followed over the decades, would have found ways to make things easier for people. But it seemed like the same challenges that existed back then still applied, and the bigger the cities became, the slower everything seemed to go. Not even the trains were punctual anymore. Just too many people.

Coming up on his target, the once glorious building, housing one of the old days most prominent technology companies, had lost almost everything of its former glory. Sure, the company still existed, but had since long lost its world leading domination of the chip-market.

According to rumors, which the driver was very tempted to believe, the famous iKing, with his brilliant strategic mind, had lost his mind after leading his family business in ruins. But only after cloning his consciousness in digital form, and was said to still be alive and thriving, hidden somewhere on the internet, still pulling strings trying to mend the company and returning it to its former glory.

The envelope he was about to deliver could in a way support that. The delivery job was registered with the buildings address and city, nothing more, and on the envelope itself just a single line:

DS, 13th floor

This was odd, the driver thought to himself. He had delivered things to that building several times before, some to the reception desk in the entrance floor, some direct to a person located within the building. This was one of the buildings that was living by the old western impression that Japan was superstitious and that they never had any 13th floor, since 13 would be considered bad luck. Stupid and ignorant foreigners. Not aware of Japanese culture at all. But nonetheless, there simply was no 13th floor in this building. Both the board in the entrance and the elevator buttons went from 1 to 12, then continued upward from 14. No 13 to push nor visit. Sure, this was not the only building that had adopted this foreign superstitious design. Still silly. And dumb. And… Well, not his problem! This letter was ordered to drop off, without signature, so he did not even have to try and find the 13th floor, he planned on just leaving it at the front desk.

Only a few meters to go now. Oh. So. Slow.

The strange letter

“Max!”

A boy in his mid teens ran through the door waving something in front of his friend's face, interrupting the video game currently on the big screen TV on the wall.

Annoyed from the interruption by his so called friend, Max, turned his attention to the unwelcome intruder who just prevented him from continuing a really good attempt on setting a new personal record in the racing game he was currently playing.

“What’s the fuss about, DoubleOh? Explain to me why you just robbed me of a possible record on this track?”

DoubleOh looked at the screen.

“Seriously, are you still racing? That’s like, so old school! It’s not even online! What are you, like 50 years old 50 years ago?”

“I happen to like the old games far better than the crap that is currently available. They are only designed to trap your attention for a short while, for money-gaining-purposes only. What does it really give to anyone?”

“Oh, no, I am not having this discussion again! We’ve already had it about a million times! Besides, take a look at this!”

He handed over the paper he held in his hand.

Max took it, looked at it, a white blank paper, then handed it back.

“What is it?”

“It is a blank piece of paper! Do you see anything on it?”

“No, like you said, it is blank! What’s so special about it?”

“I don’t know yet, except that it was delivered to our building and left at the reception desk. It was an unsigned delivery.”

“What’s so special about an unsigned delivery? I bet you get a thousand of those?”

“Well, yes, but this is special… look at this!”

He took out another piece of paper, which turned out to be an envelope.

The only thing he could see was one line written by hand on it.

DS, 13th floor

“What does this mean?”

“I have no idea! But don’t you see what’s odd about it?”

“You mean besides that it is a blank paper, sent to your building, without a recipient?”

“Well, what if it is addressed to a recipient?”

“What do you mean?”

“Remember when we were kids? Remember how we used to play with the elevators?”

“Yeah… I do…”

Max was quite a short moment, then continued:

“I see, it is strange because it is addressed to the 13th floor!”

“Exactly, there is no 13th floor in our building! Do you remember what iKing told us about the 13th floor?”

“Yeah, it was numbered that way to fool Europeans and Americans that visited your company!”

“Well, yes, but not that, do you remember when we spent an entire day going one floor at the time?”

“Yeah, I do! You mean the extra time that it took between the 12th and 14th floor?”

“Aha! Exactly what I mean! What did iKing tell us?”

“That it was an easter egg he had built in, and that it was not many people who knew about it, since most people did not just go from the 12th to the 14th floor, or the other way around.”

DoubleOh threw himself on the sofa next to Max.

“What if there is a bigger easter egg? What if there is a 13th floor?”

“You are nuts! How could there be a 13th floor that no one knows about? Seems highly unlikely!”

“I know it does, but how do you explain this?”

DoubleOh waved the envelope and the empty paper in the air.

“Prank?”

“An expensive prank, and to what end? Who would know where the envelope would end up after arriving? I mean, there is no one who would ever claim it…”

“But you have it! You claimed it!”

“That’s just because I saw when it was delivered and was curious. The receptionist was relieved to get rid of it! They protested loudly as the delivery guy left it at the desk, but he did not listen, just left and said it was an unsigned delivery.”

“Are you sure it was supposed to be at your building? I mean, there are other buildings around yours, they probably have a 13th floor?”

“I have thought about that too, but I cannot say. There is no address on the envelope, no sender, no tracking number, nothing but this line.”

He looked at the envelope again.

“...and why would anyone send a blank piece of paper to a building, without a recipient, just naming a building-floor that does not exist?”

“Don’t know DoubleOh.”

The boys sat with their own thoughts for a while. Then Max looked up and smiled.

“There is one thing we can find out!”

“What do you mean?”

“We can, once and for all, solve the mystery of iKing’s easter egg!”

“I don’t follow!”

“Let’s go back to your place and play with the elevators again! But this time, I’ll be on the outside, and you on the inside!”

“What?”

“I figure I can use my drone and watch you get off on the 12th floor, and then on the 14th floor.”

“Brilliant! Let’s do it right away! Get your gear and get going already!” DoubleOh exited the room like he entered, like a strong, unstoppable wind.

The hunt for the 13th floor (a k a Dead Bird)

Max and DoubleOh stood outside in the street looking up at the tall building before them. Sad to see the decay of the once glorious pride.

Max had his gear in a locked case and opened it and went over all preflight preparations and checks equally accurately as if he was flying an actual plane carrying passengers.

“Ok, DoubleOh. I’m just about done. You go to the 12th floor and come to the windows. I’ll send up the bird to get a good look at you! Wait until I flash the lights, that will confirm that I have seen you. Then go ahead and move to the 14th.”

“Will do, Max!”

And with those words DoubleOh crossed the street and entered the building and headed for the elevators.

After some more preflight preparations, Max fired up his bird and enjoyed the sensation of the beautiful floating object in front of him. Sure, an old bird, old tech, but still a beauty!

As he linked the hovercraft's camera to his visual interface, the image of himself appeared right in front of his eyes, looking straight at a transparent copy of himself that seemed to float mid air along with the drone.

Max turned around to face the building he was about to make a closer inspection of, and saw himself from behind layered with the real world. Then with minimal effort, he raised the drone upward and counted the windows he passed to estimate what floor would be the 12th.

A few minutes passed and then he saw movement inside the building, and sure enough, Max appeared and walked towards the window and started to wave his arms like crazy. Max activated the flashing light and then…

The first thing he noticed was that the image link was severed. And when looking up, he saw his beautiful bird in a sinister fall towards the ground. And as if in slow motion, he followed its final journey downward until it landed and scattered into a million pieces.

It was just a thing, but Max’s heart also scattered into a million pieces along with the drone. And it wasn’t even a neurolink feedback reaction. It was genuine feelings of pain and sadness.

He turned his gaze upward to where the bird started its deadly fall. Max was still standing in the window, apparently looking down.

Bling!

Incoming message.

DoubleOh: W’zup? Where’s your bird at?

Max: Dead. Fell. Unrecoverably dead.

DoubleOh: What?

Max: Don’t know. Just come down here.

DoubleOh: Ok, dude.

It took a few minutes for Max to pick up whatever pieces he could find, amongst pedestrians and passing cars. Luckily, it did not hit anybody. It could have been a double death if it did. Now it was ‘just’ the bird. DoubleOh arrived and joined in and collected what he could.

“What happened, man?”

“Don’t know, as I was about to flash the lights, it just dropped dead. Perhaps a system malfunction or a shortcut or something.”

“But wouldn’t you have discovered something that obvious in your preflight check or diagnostics?”

“Yeah, I guess!”

“Then what happened?”

Max did not answer right away, and DoubleOh let him be and continued the pursuit of scraps. Perhaps there was something salvageable in all this junk.

“Hey DoubleOh?”

“Yeah, w’zup?”

“Do you think your uncle would have installed some kind of perimeter security to prevent espionage from drones?”

DoubleOh thought about the question.

“It is possible. But I have never seen any control system for it anywhere.”

“Then perhaps just around the 13th floor?”

“You mean like protecting a secret?”

“Something like that.”

Both boys stopped what they were doing and like on cue gazed up towards the building.

The discovery

“Do you see what I see?” Max asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Do you see someone about halfway up the building standing and looking down at us right now?”

DoubleOh took a second look.

“Yeah, I do! Why?”

“Perhaps I’m crazy, but I think that is you!”

“How could it be? I’m standing right here fool!”

“Yeah, I know, but when you walked out towards the window you waved like crazy, remember?”

“Yeah! Just wanted to make it easy to find me!”