How One Finds the North Star prt. 3

And just like that this boy was prepared to dispose of this suspicious black box. The wheels on it are seizing, having forfeited control of the brakes.

Jerald feels his hands dig in his back pocket, there he finds a small flash drive. He pulls it out but he out of the corner of his eyes he sees a cybernetic man dressed in strange clothing waltz in and look straight at him. Jerald feels his hand put the drive back in his pocket. He enters a code into the laptop and shuts it down. The cyborg looks at him and rolls away on screechy little wheels. Jerald looks closely at it for the first time. It appears to be mishmash of parts belonging to other robot models, most of them Russian make. It is kind of boxy and covered in protruding wires. On the presumed front a long arm extends with a Shernofsky model hand. Probably at least twenty years old. The robot's camera below the arm peers out briefly at the strange man before rolling away.
Jerald then walks out of the shop and into the subterranean tunnels under Anchorage. He then looks at some glossy posters, the man had followed him out at a distance. Jerald himself remembered this moment perfectly. It happened four days ago just before he was assigned to the boy. Boss had him tracking the Russian Mishmash, apparently her name was Colette Benois and she used to be a robotics genius that had defected from Russia to work for P.I.S., the Pangaia Information Service. At that time Russia was one of the few remaining independent nations. Boss was paid a very large sum of money to kill this woman and so he rigged her car blow. She was reported dead bur recently rumors had gone around that she had survived and literally built herself back up. Now Jerald could be certain they were true. He tried to reach for his forearm, to contact Boss, but it didn't work. He was still dreaming with his ass planted on a toilet in downtown Anchorage.
The most curious thing however was the flash drive that the boy was holding. Jerald had seen them before, they were known as Greek Arrows, apparently the were designed in Greece. They were inconspicuous and light blue, which concealed how incredible they really were. They contained a complex virus that no one had ever deciphered because it injected itself into computers and erased their data faster than they could be read. The Mafia had tried to break dozens of them but the program would not be contained or read. In the truest sense it wasn't a virus because it never spread to other computers, but it could likely be modified to do so if one could open it without infection. In his days in P.I.S. he always kept a baggie with one in it along with a cyanide tablet of the same color, his old girlfriend used to joke about how they matched.
The dream continued, but its effect was weakening. Jerald could see the computer next to him on the couch unraveling its duct tape. Somehow it conveyed a look of fury and a lust for vengence. Jerald was in front of a monitor again. He took out a chip and injected it into his laptop. A hologram of a woman appeared before him on the screen.
"Hello Michael, I'm your mother. I know it's been a while and I look different, but it's still me on the inside. I'm sorry for putting you through all this, I wanted to tell you I was alive for so long. I have thought of you each and everyday since we were separated. I was and probably still am being hunted by the same men who tried to kill me before. I plan to run to the southern hemisphere where the Russians cannot find me. I am want to take you with me. If you want to stay, I understand. You haven't seen me in ten years and you probably already have a life here... It's very hard to leave behind all your friends, I should know. But I just wanted you to know that I am still I alive and that I will always love you. Contact me at Callisto2343@blumail.com with your answer."
That was the end of the hologram. Below it there were instructions, which Jerald could see his eyes following, to meet at the harbor in four days at 10:30. There he would meet a double agent that Colette used to know, from there they would travel to the down the coast outside of town and take a boat to Antarctica. The govt. there was fairly new and there was no established crime base there. In order to establish that the man was indeed the inside man, Michael was supposed to ask about how to find the North Star and the inside man would answer correctly. It seemed that Michael was supposed to know what answering correctly means. Jerald stopped thinking for a second, he felt tears streaming down his cheeks. It was an odd sensation, he wasn't incredibly overwhelmed with emotion but he could feel the boy's response.
Soon Jerald broke free of the trance. He immediately jumped off the seat and ran for the door. His legs however were still asleep and he immediately fell into the door of the stall. Jerald waited for a few embarrassed seconds on the floor as he tried to maneuver his pants back up. Lucy was yelling at him again but all most as soon as showed annoyance Lucy shut up again. He started laughing, the boy had kept his end of the deal despite knocking him out.
The owner of the shop walked in and saw Jerald with his pants half pulled up laughing hysterically on the floor. He stared in awe and left. Bosses voice came in his ear this time, not his head.
"What the hell happened to you?! You haven't made contact in hours!"
"I'm sorry Boss, I got knocked out by the kid and he ran."
"Well go get him already dammit! It's 10 already, the woman's on her way!"
"Okay,okay..."
"And watch over Larry, make sure he doesn't do anything stupid."
"Larry?"
"I never introduced you two?"
"No. I never been introduced to you either Boss for that matter. No one has the way I hear it."
"Shut Jerry, I'll kill you. Larry was supposed to contact you three days ago and help you with this mission. He used to be our inside guy in the P.I.S."
"I never made contact with him boss."
"Jesus, that fucking liar! He was always talking to me about how you sleep on the job and make sarcastic remarks, I just assumed you made contact! Listen, go find Larry and make sure he does it all right, he's supposed to meet Benois at the harbor and shot her and the kid dead. If he doesn't you gotta bring Larry back alive, okay?
"Boss, you gotta give me details here, I don't even know what the bastard looks like."
"Didn't I tell you to shut up Jerry? Anyway-"
"It's Jerald."
"SHUT UP! Anyway file says he's old, bald head, wrinkly, has a cybernetic lower half. You can't miss him."
"Will that be all Boss?"
"Actually Jerry, I forgot, shot the kid and the woman if Larry doesn't. Then you bring in Larry. Capiche?"
"Gotcha Boss."
Jerald had to get there fast, by that point his legs had woken up, he just had to get to the harbor. He walked out of the controlled climate and discovered it was not only dark but freezing. Anchorage was like that nowadays, like a desert by morning, like a tundra by evening. The tundra was safer though, the UV rays were not out. He ran through the streets to the harbor, the streets were faster because everyone always took the subterranean streets. He soon spotted Larry at a distance. His legs were clearly not liking the cold, they clanked and squealed as the joints seized, he was having a hard time of it.
Once Larry reached the harbor he saw the boy and the woman. Jerald kept his distance, they walked up to each other. The woman cyborg was behaving oddly however, she kept waving her appendage about. Jerald immediately pulled out his gun, Larry still hadn't noticed his approach.
Larry himself pulled out his gun and pointed it at Michael. "Sorry kid."
A loud bang was heard, then nothing. Larry's face hit the pavement with a snap. Apparently his face had some hardware in it too. Jerald looked at the poor sap from the distance, he was still pointing his gun at some nonexistent figure, his arm frozen in the exact same position before he died. The boy stood there frozen too.
He walked up to the kid. "Do you have anything to say?"
The kid was still mute. The wind was starting to pick up.
Jerald broke the silence, "Have you ever wondered how to find the North Star? "
"Umm... Yeah, I have."
"I can point you in the right direction."
Micheal breathed a sigh of relief. The three of them started to walk along the shore.
"I never paid you for the program. You're just as good at this as your mother."
"Oh, thanks." Michael was still a little nervous apparently. There was blood spatter starting to freeze to his face. Then he wiped it with his sleeve. Jerald gave the kid some bills, 70,000 dollars.
"The surgery was only 35,000."
"I owe your mother," Jerald looked at the rolling collection of Russian parts. "for these eyes right here." The cybernetic woman continued to look at him. "I might escape somewhere myself. If Boss gets a hold of me, I might be calling you again. But I don't think you have anymore missing children for me to foot that bill."
They arrived at the boat, it was a relic from the state patrol, when Anchorage was part of the U.S. On its side was the Alaskan flag and some graffiti. The back had a name printed on it from when it was under private ownership. It read "Heaven Bound". Jerald gave the keys to Michael. "There's enough battery power to get you 100 miles at 40 mph. After that you have to pull out the solar panels. A two-week supply of military rations and water are in the hull and I put in some blood packs to inject into your mum over there. She should have available any otherr information you need. You'll also need this." He gave Michael the pistol. Michael took it and looked at it.
"Do you know how to use it?"
"Of course but won't you need it?" Micheal was opening the gun and checking the number of bullets. Two short, Michael wondered where the other one went.
"Not where I'm going, I've got a plane ready to take me out of here too. Can I have your cell?"
"Why?"
"The Mafia can track these things and today it has to believe you're going north into Europe. I have a robot just for that too." Michael handed over the cell. You should ditch your wireless internet card on your laptop too, you can use your mother to keep you connected. I think she's wireless..."
Michael looked at at the strange-jacket man dumbly. "What? That was supposed to be funny."
"hehe..." Michael hugged him. "Thank you"
"You're welcome." After a while Michael let go and started the boat. Jerald watched them speed off.
He walked back in the direction of the computer site where he was watching Michael. He took one last look at downtown Anchorage. The boat was no longer visible. He started texting to the P.I.S. on Michael's cell phone. He held his thumb over the send button. Out of his back pocket he pulled out a baggy. Inside it was a yellow blue flashdrive with a blue pill. Boss called.
"Jerry you son-of-a-b..."
"It's Jerald." Jerald took the small yellow flashdrive and plugged it in his forehead. Then he pressed send on the cell phone.
"SHUT UP!!! JUST SHUT UP!!! You-"
He heard Lucy say something but it shut out quickly. His internal CPU was freezing up inside him. His eye shut down. The whir in his lungs cut out. He thought to himself for a moment. No sounds interrupting, it was very cold and very peaceful. A loud speaker came on in the streets. Jerald could not see it but it was on every TV, radio, computer and cell phone. The government had cut power to cell towers and the mountains.
The world was shutting down with him.
Boss was hopefully isolated and automatically running on battery power. No one could know for sure, but without a working computer to maintain homeostasis in that convoluted fish tank, he would die within the hour.
"All citizens a state of emergency is in effect. Please do not use any electronics for the next 24 hours unless other wise directed, I repeat no electronics for the next 24 hours. Please shut down your computers, cell phone and other communicating electronics. Cyborgs, please disconnect from the internet and and do not engage in any digital communication..." Jerald saw a man approaching him from the distance he pulled out a pistol and pointed it at Jerald.
"Boss says you disobeyed orders, you know what that means."
"No, I don't. What does it mean?"
"It means you take the S.O.B. home and torture him until he cries for death. Then we give it to him."
"Oh, I guess I must have forgotten. Thanks." He took his last gift from Michael, one he had taken without his knowledge, a second flashdrive, from his pocket. A Greek Arrow. The man's eyes widened. He saw the first yellow flashdrive in Jerald's head, but a second?
"Don't do that!" He shot. It was too late though, the second one was in, erasing the contents of the first as the first erased the contents of his head. The man knelt by Jerald. He pulled out both drives in vain. Blood seeped out of Jerald's head and on to the pavement. It froze at the edges.
"You know, you just disobeyed an order pal." Jerald wheezed. "I got a small baggy in my pocket with a blue pill. I think you need it more than I do now." Jerald then lost himself in the constellations above his head. The North Star was almost directly above him, he thought about his girl and his son traversing the waves under the heavens. And then he died.