42

JC entered interrogation room 5 and at first thought himself to be looking into some bizarre circus mirror. JC looked coldly at himself wondering what could created the creature that claimed to be him. "There isn’t any way in hell I’m gonna give humanity over to that thing!" JC stated flatly to Tracer and Alex. "Whatever ungodly force turned him… me… into that bastardized son of a bitch is not getting its claws in our world!" JC screamed furiously at the command staff punctuating his remark by shattering off the corners of the five-inch thick, thirty foot long conference table. "It is unlikely that their stories contain any truth. It is, however, highly probable that some element of Page’s group created them." Tracer hypothesized. "Not to mention that their DNA matches identically with your own and Pauls." Jaime blurted out before realizing JC was off in his own world. "You don’t understand. We pulled a neural schematic from my... his… whatever or who-the-hell-ever it is’s brain. The memory circuits are unlike anything we have ever encountered. Even Gray technology is not this advanced." JC muttered blindly to the air. "I believe them." Paul noted walking into the war-room. "Not only do I believe them, but I think we had better prepare for the worst. A scouting party just arrived and took down over a dozen of my best before being blown into whatever corner of hell they came out of. JC, whatever suggestions our other-selves have we had damn well better listen to them."

Medical personnel and armed guards escorted JC and Paul into the boardroom. Board members gasped at what had become of "The Others" as they were being called. JC looked like death corporeal with his flowing burgundy cloak, his glowing emerald eyes, and extensive modifications that made their JC look like a puppy. Paul was repaired the best they could manage, but the once blue lines that accompanied nanoaugmentation were replaced by greenish ones. The briefing lasted several long hours as memory files burst forth their sorrowful tale, but in the end, all agreed on what action would follow. "Helios did something to me when we merged that made it possible for me to rid myself of this diabolical AI, but not the memories –never the memories," JC trailed off. "Tracer’s team is working to intensify the affects so that you cannot be corrupted as I was." JC tearfully stammered out as images of SHODAN converting him into his present form flashed on the monitors and his screams filled the cathedral-like boardroom. "My life support systems cannot support me for more than a few hours, but the temporal stabilizer implanted into me will allow you to move between the infected worlds one by one." JC strained to say. "But, all this aside. How are we to reach this being and destroy her? You claim that this SHODAN entity is at this moment infecting other worlds with her cancerous visions. Therefore, if you are right, she will have total control over the gateways to prevent any from entering the reality from which she is operating." Tracer shot quizzically at the Other JC. "Simple," the Other JC shot back coldly, "The gateway accesses parallel realities based on their harmonic signatures. SHODAN was developing a means to link them together. Her primary force will create a gateway control upon entering the new reality. These gateways will form a chain leading back to her originating reality where we came from. Getting the gateway control codes from her Avatars will let you instantly update the temporal stabilizer and move to the next link on the chain." "What the hell do you mean by looking at me like that you son of a bitch. This is your goddamn mess. I say we throw your ass back to her and fill the subway tunnels we found you in with EMP dampening ferrocrete." JC fired accusatorily actually incensed by his grotesque twin’s stare. "Again, I am dying, but you are very much alive. You will have to severe the connections she has with the other dimensions until you finally reach and stop her from what she..." JC forced past his lips as his emotionally broke, shrouding the room in darkness. "Let me show you…" the Other JC screamed as his augmentations hummed to life materializing weapon pods, blades, and energizing his body with a sickening red glow as if his veins were filled with fire. He sprang on JC and projected a communication laser into JC’s right eye sending image after image and scream overlapping scream of the experiments SHODAN forced him to carry out on those he had served with, those he had known his entire life, those who had trusted him to keep them safe from harm. "THIS IS WHAT WE ALL FACE. DO YOU SEE HER? DO YOU SEE HER EYES IN THE ABYSS? DO YOU SEE."

The overload fried the Other’s neural pathways and his cerebral arteries ruptured flooding his brain. JC threw his lesser twin down the table and stood with an expression of absolute terror and horror on his tear stained face as what remained of her slithered out of his memories and into the monitors.