Ghostcode

04. Splinter.

Filaments of light appeared and spun themselves into the likeness of a touchscreen. Alex reached out her avatar hand toward the glowing icon showing her father's face. The tile flashed for an instant before turning dull grey.
"Dad's disconnected his terminal," said Alex."He never does that."
"I can trace it," said Sphinx. "But first we must hide ourselves."
A sheen of light swept around them, wrapping the two avatars in a translucent silver bubble. Alex reached up to touch the inside of the bubble and it rippled like quicksilver.
"A Stealth Bubble?" said Alex. "I thought they were illegal."
"It is only illegal if we are caught," said Sphinx."And I have no intention of getting caught." She swished her tail as a bright thread of blue light appeared beside the touchscreen. "Take hold of the datathread. It will lead us to your father's terminal."
The thread responded to Alex's touch with a flicker and they began to move, the line of blue light pulling them forward.
The dataweb was like a vast glowing city, its layout mirroring the crystal skyscrapers of the citadel. Corporations stood the tallest; pale green blocks of light rising up into the dim sky. Schools were yellow cubes, while shops and entertainment centres came in every shape and size; pink pyramids, glittering silver spheres or intricate rainbow palaces. Around the towers of data wound the datalanes; ribbons of light along which the myriad avatars of the city's inhabitants moved; a carnival procession of shimmering figures: humans, animals, fantastic creatures and the geometric shapes of system avatars. The lanes lay ten layers deep in places, with new avatars joining the flow from doorways in the datastores as others swooped away along looping side lanes. The glowing towers were covered in bright advertising panels that turned their vast, smiling faces to all who passed.
The wall of the nearby building flickered and resolved into a breathtaking view of stars and the earth rising over the rim of a lapis blue swimming pool where sleek, suntanned young people lounged and swam.
"The Artemis Spa is out of this world!" whispered a husky female voice.
The camera zoomed out to take in the diamond glass wall of the orbital station and the shimmering silver struts of its vast curving hull. The pool shrank away as a shimmering green park swung into view. To one side was a tree covered hill, to the other, a waterfall cascading down a tall cliff. The scene swirled and changed, the green of the grass becoming the shimmering eyes of Venus Divine, her flawless smile filling the wall.
"Come and join us on Orbital Three and we'll make you twenty years younger!" she crooned, blowing a kiss and fluttering her eyelashes to release a cascade of stardust.
The image faded, to be replaced be a jumble of brightly coloured dancing cupcakes.
"Hey Mom!" squeaked a comic voice." Looking for something to give little Johnny in his lunchbox? Try Ma Murphy's Mini Muffins - packed with vitamins! Now only ten creds for a family box . . . "
Alex turned away from the singing muffins and gazed down the datalanes where avatars flashed greetings to each other as they passed, reaching out filaments of light to exchange data. No-one paid the slightest attention to Alex and Sphinx as they moved, invisible, through the swirl of light and sound.
At a turn of the lane, Alex recognised a girl from her school moving towards them; Persephone, one of the Fashion Queens from her own year. Persephone's avatar bore an idealised version of the her own face and was dressed in the shimmering gold robes of an Egyptian princess. She moved arm in arm with a Greek god, an impossibly handsome boy with rippling muscles and flowing golden hair. Alex wondered if the golden god really was a boy, or just one of Persephone's girlfriends dressed up for a joke? People changed their avatars as often as they changed their clothes.
School wasn't exactly Alex's favourite place; she preferred to study online from her bedroom rather than meet her schoolfellows in person. She couldn't stand the bitching and the cliques. She preferred books, or the virtual friends she made for herself in Sapphire. Real people were generally a disappointment. She was happy enough with her father and Sphinx.
Alex braced herself for one of Persephone's snide put downs but the Egyptian Princess and her Greek god swept past without a flicker of recognition.
"I like being invisible," said Alex.
"We need to move faster," said Sphinx."Hold on."
Alex took hold of Sphinx's neck and the silver bubble shot forward, rising through the sky traffic, past the tops of the tallest datastores, until the whole citygrid was spread out below them.
"I didn't know you could go this high!" said Alex.
"I'm no ordinary avatar," said Sphinx. "Your father made me, remember? I'm the best there is."
Alex could see dots of light moving on the ring of the expressway, circling the city like a shimmering bracelet, and the lines of the Maglev running out beyond the city limits. Above it all arched a night-black sky alive with stars.
"What are those?" asked Alex, mesmerised by the unexpected beauty of the datasky.
"Ares security systems, orbitals and military installations. Out of bounds."
"Even to you? I thought you were the best?"
Sphinx laughed. "I could go up there if I chose, but there's no need. Look at the thread."
The gossamer line of blue light ran ahead of them, falling back toward the citygrid.
They landed in a shadowy area at the edge of the city. There were no datastores and only a few light lanes, all of them empty of avatars.
A warning ribbon of orange light appeared but the silver sphere moved straight through and they slipped into a dim, shimmering mist. The light lanes had gone but the grid was still there; a network of gossamer threads of light marking out the empty space. In the far distance glimmered dim shapes that might have been far off datastores. The only bright thing was the blue thread, winding away from Alex's hand into the mist.
A clot of darkness rose up from the mist; a human-like figure, cloaked and hooded, with eyes like flames. The sinister shape glided forward, moving fast, coming straight at Alex and Sphinx. It reached out its shadowy hands and the stealth bubble bent inwards like rippling rubber.
"It's trying to get in!" Said Alex.
She saw the flaming Ares arrowheads of the shadow avatar's eyes. It raised its hands, steel talons flashing bright in the mist.
"Hold on!" hissed Sphinx.
Alex buried her hands in the fur at the Snow Leopard's neck and they lifted away, the lights of the city blurring like giant Catherine wheel. She turned look back over her shoulder to see if the shadow was following them but they were going so fast that she had to close her eyes to stop herself from being sick. She felt her physical body jerk in its chair and the sudden lurch of dislocation that comes from being in two places at once.
"Get ready!" said Sphinx. We're clicking out just here -"
The web of light disappeared and Alex was spinning in silent darkness.
She took a deep breath and reached up to release the goggles. Her heart was racing and she was shaking, as if she had been delving too long in a horror show sim game. She blinked down at the little cat curled up on her lap.
"Did that really happen?"
"It did."
"What was that thing?"
"Shadow avatar. High level Ares security."
"Did it follow us?"
"We're safe for the moment," purred Sphinx. "But we'll have to search for your father in the real world from now on."
"Where?"
"The thread was leading us into Trashtown. I can locate you father's terminal more precisely once we are closer."
"Trashtown? That's where people live in houses made of rubbish?"
"We'll take the Maglev to the end of the line and walk the rest of the way." Sphinx leapt up onto the desk. "We must leave at once. The shadow avatar will find our exit point eventually. We must be far away by then."
"What about the blue thread? They'll find dad and - "
"I snapped the thread before it could be read. Look in your bag, Alex. There's a pocket hidden in the lining at the back. Inside is a wristband and a terminal with a false identity coded into it."
"What?"
"Your father put it there."
Alex found the pocket, slipped open the seal and slid a package out. Inside was a flesh coloured wrist band and a cheap looking terminal with a pink case and an earpiece shaped like a butterfly.
"Dad usually has better taste . . ." said Alex, scowling down at the terminal.
"It will draw less attention than a phenomenally clever and expensive MechAnimal like me," said Sphinx.
"Aren't you coming with me?"
"Of course I am. I shall hide in your bag. We'll talk through the earpiece."
The terminal unlocked with Alex's fingerprint and told her that her name was Indigo Ocean.
"I thought the idea of a false identity was to keep a low profile?"
"The name was chosen carefully. No-one will pay you the slightest attention."
"Dad really thought this through, didn't he?"
"We both did. Put the wrist band on. It has a false tracker chip embedded in it."
"When are you going to tell me what's happening."
"Soon," said Sphinx.
Alex pulled the flesh covered band over her wrist, pulling it over the place she'd cut with the scalpel. The band melded to her skin as the Derma Strip had done, leaving a slight bump on the back of her wrist.
Sphinx leapt up into Alex's shoulder bag. Alex heard a click in her earpiece and Sphinx's voice in her ear:
"Let's go!"

The girl in the shop looked up from her vidsceen.
"Done already?"
Alex nodded. She thought of what would happen if whatever was behind the shadow avatar came to the shop.
"Something happened while I was delving," said Alex. "It could mean trouble for you. They might trace me ..."
"We're used to that," said the girl. Alex gasped as the girl's eyes changed, the irises of her contact lenses morphing from pale green to golden yellow, slitted with darkness. The leaves on her dress disappeared and the fabric turned night black with a pattern of velvety bat wings. The girl grinned. "What bad things did you do?"
"I don't know..." stammered Alex. "Just watch out, that's all."
"You too," said the girl. "I'm Splinter, by the way."
"Indigo Ocean."
Splinter raised a night black eyebrow. "When did you trade in your fancy kitty for that piece of junk?" she asked, scowling down at the garish pink terminal clipped to Alex's belt.
"Mech tends to get you noticed, " said Alex. She reached for the door handle. "I need to keep a low profile."
"Don't worry," said Splinter. "I never saw you."