What do I do? He looked to the elevators. The distance wasn't that far. He could outrun Calen – or maybe not. The VE was in perfect condition, give or take a gunshot or two. And he was damn fast with a gun. Why are you so afraid? Nicholas is right – you're a danger to everyone like this. What if you're caught while getting to Prague?

     What if? What if?

     He put his hands to his head and groaned inwardly. The psuedo Mark said to silence the DEI. I was given that dream for a reason, by whom – that's anyone's guess. Guardian angel? Avalon member? Now he had to trust the one member of their Cabal he held the least amount of trust for.

     A Void Engineer..

     But in the past, Calen had come through. He saved your ass in Paris. He could have allowed that agent to capture you. But no…he'd been shot, and he needed you then to save his life.

     This was definately seven shades of suck.

     "Mac? Time's waisting. We need to do this now."

     With narrowed eyes, Mac gave one nod.

     Calen glanced back to the girl's suite. "Follow me."

     They stepped back into the girl's suite. Everyone, including Arden and Mark had left, either off to make plans or perhaps to find dinner. Mac's own stomach was less then happy – he'd eaten breakfast that morning, and that nasty tree-bark bar.

     Mac strode to the couch on the left and sat down. He tried to relax, but every fiber in his body was screaming in protest of what he was about to do.

     "You look like you're about to bolt," Calen sat down on the center couch. "Don't. Do listen to me. At it's simplest, I'm going to use the access codes Huang gave me to access the internal security measures for your implant. To do this, I have to connect directly to your neural net."

     "You mean you have to have a physical connection."

     Calen nodded. "We'll have too. There's no way to do this without that sort of connection, for security reasons."

     Mac reluctantly reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his small black bag. He pulled two sets of connectors out, one for VR as he's used with Johnny and the other a set he'd not used before. It was little more than a long black wire with dual male plugs at both ends.

     This was the one Calen pointed too. "That's it. Direct connection between our two implants."

     Mac eyed one end of the connector as Calen leaned forward and took the other one. "Look, don't make a joke out of this, but could you tell me where…"

     "Look on the bright side," Calen said, interrupting him. "If I screw up, I'll probably end up killing both of us."

     The Adept blinked once. Great.

     "Oh, where to put it? My port's behind my ear, along the hairline. That's standard.." He took his end and guided it behind is right ear. He gave no visible expression as he inserted it. "Easy."

     Mac took a deep breath, and with his left hand, brought the other end of the wire behind his left ear along his hairline. There, just to the left of the fold of his ear, buried beneath his hair, was a small, metal disk about the diameter of a dime. With the tips of his fingers he guided the wire's end into the slot.

     Everything went dark for a couple of beats, then Mac found himself standing within his Library. And there standing before him, was Nicholas Calen.

     He's in my Library. My place of sancrosanct.

     The VE was dressed in a bright, orange jumpsuit with the name Calen embroidered above the left breast. On the left shoulder was a unit patch with the numbers 5301 at the top and emblazoned with two crossing plasma cannons.

     Mac blinked at Calen's gear. "What's with the costume?"

     Calen smiled. "Standard issue. "

     "It looks like a prison jumper."

     "It's part of the big joke. The other Conventions tend not to take us too seriously when we all look like geek technicians." He glanced around. "A library. Should have guessed."

     Mac nodded and stepped back. He held up his hands. He felt…exposed. "This is my Navigator. I don't know how you're supposed to do your thing in here."

     The soldier shoved his hands in the pockets of his jumpsuit and began looking at the titles of books on a nearby shelf.
     Mac joined him, his own hands thrust deep into the pockets of his black pants. He felt he resembled a criminal in his black attire, especially compared to Calen's bright orange.

     "If I were a control room, where would I be?" the VE muttered more to himself than to Mac.

     The Adept watched Calen. "I didn't know I had one."

     "Yeah," Calen nodded. "It's here somewhere," he bent down to peer intently at a shelf of books. "It's just a matter of….aha."

     "What?" Mac moved closer to Calen as the VE tapped on a large volume of Peter Pan.

     "You're kidding."

     "Nope," the VE grabbed the book and pulled it toward them and muttered under his breath, "Second shelf to the right, and straight on till morning."

     Mac stared wide-eyed at Calen. "You read fantasy literature?"

     The VE elected not to reply.

     Something clicked, the sound resonating throughout the library. Abruptly the shelf began to swing out toward them. On the other side was a doorway.

     "Fuck…" Mac stood with his eyes wide, his arms at his sides.

     He followed Calen into a portal through time. The décor changed significantly from his own Early American taste to Victorian Elegance. The room was cylindrical, with an antique desk set in it's center. Modern LCDs were nestled amid the wood and period style, right down to the hall tree by the door which oddly enough, sported a full length British riding coat. Now who does that belong too? Two suits of armor stood sentinel on either side.

     The VE strode immediately to the desk in the room's center. "Hm…very Etherite. Not what I expected." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small access card.

     Mac looked around open-mouthed. "Etherite?"

     "Sons of Ether. Victorian, definitely to their taste. That juxtaposition of modern and classic." He looked at his card. "This won't work." He closed his eyes. The card morphed into a what Mac would call a skeleton key. The VE then slid it into a slot on the right side of the desk.

     The Adept moved to stand beside the soldier. Code of some kind scrolled from the bottom to the top of the display. "What's that?"

     Calen hummed quietly. "Administrative codes. Oh, hey, a self-destruct."

     Mac reached out and touched the VE's arm. "Don't…"

     But the VE only laughed.

     "You're not funny," Mac took a step back. Then he stepped back. "Do I really have a self destruct button?"

     "Remember what I said, my mind's in here too. As for the button, it's more of a command. I can remap that big lever over there to work as the destruct button."

     "Let's not and say we didn't."

     The VE turned and nodded, a large grin splitting his face. He looked back to the LCD. "Here we are. Aha, third switch, fourth row on the panel just opposite me. Should be a three position switch."

     Mac looked up and saw a switch panel directly in front of them, to the left of the door they had entered. "You want me to do it?"

     Calen nodded. "Labeled S, N, D. Right now it's on N."

     The Adept moved away from Calen and strode to the panel. He saw the switch, right where the solider said it would be. He put his left hand on it.

     "Mac, I've unlocked it. Slide it to S."

     He tried to turn it. The knob wouldn't move. He looked back at Calen. "It won't move."

     "Hrm?" the soldier frowned. "Turn back around."

     Mac did, and heard a resounding thwack. He spun back around. "What did you do?"

     The VE had adopted a look of guilty innocense. "Sometimes you have to hit them really hard…" He was mimicking Marvin the Martian? Well, that sort of fits for a VE.

     "You whacked the console? Stop that - this is my head your're abusing." This is definitely a side of Nicholas I've never seen.

     "Mac, try it now."

     The knob slid easily to the S position. He turned in time to see Calen turn his key and remove it. "Done." He frowned as he looked at the panel again. "Hrm…I wonder." He replaced his key and began scrolling through more screens.

     Mac moved back to the desk to watch what he was doing. "Don't wonder…not when you're futzing about in my head."

     The VE chuckled but kept scrolling. "There we are." He turned the key in the console another quarter turn and a small footlocker against one wall clicked audibly. "Perfect."

     "What the… " Mac moved to the locker and peered inside. It's interior was like a black void, devoid of light. "What is this?"

     "If you reach into that locker you should find a helmet of some kind. By the looks of this décor," he nodded to the two suits of armor standing sentinel by the door, "I'd wager it'll be a knight's helm."

     Mac looked at Calen with an arched brow. "You're kidding, right?"

     Calen shrugged. "Something. Flight goggles, touk, some sort of headgear, I'm sure. I'm only guessing knight's helm."

     The Adept paused as he looked inside the void. It's your head, why be afraid of it. He took a deep breath and plunged his hand into the inky blackness. His hand touched something metallic and cold. It was solid and he rapped a knuckle against it. "Hell," he stuck his other hand inside the void and pulled out the metal object.

     It was just as Calen predicted. He held a knight's helm in his hands. The metal was tarnished, showing the age of ill use. He looked at Calen over the object's top.

     The VE nodded.

     "Please tell me I'm not putting this on for some bizzare reason?"

     "One of the ways the access codes are protected is that the users genetic sequence is part of the encoding. I could hand you my key, as it appears…" Calen tapped the key slotted into the console. "But you couldn't use it. Because you don't have my implant's signature or my genetic sequence."

     "So…it comes to this?" He held up the helm.

     "Yes. If you put that contraption on, I can generate one for you. You'll ah, forgive me if I limit your access to your head alone." He smirked. "But you will have administrative control of all functions in here."

     Mac eyed the helm. I'm going to look silly in this. He glared at the VE. "Really?"

     The VE pointed to a large leather bound volume seated atop a pedestal behind the console. "I do suggest you read your manual." He grinned.

     Mac took the helm and stood. He moved to look at the book. He glanced back at Calen. "I have a manual?" But you knew that. Mannis said you did. You just didn't know where it was.

     "No one ever reads it. Unless something breaks."

     Mac shook his head. "I'll never live long enough to finish this. It's a boat anchor."

     "Well, the trouble shooting guide at the back if fairly helpful. What to do if you stop breathing, that sort of thing."

     "Can I take it out of this room?" he paused. "Stop breathing? Why would I stop breathing?"

     "It's your head you can take it anywhere," he shrugged. "Nerve gas?"

     Mac set the helm down on the console then turned to get a closer look at the book. He started flipping pages. "It's all in code."

     "There's an override here on the console for flushing your system with adrenaline. Just an example of what the book can offer. Anyway, let's generate this key. It's fairly processor intensive, so you'll probably feel a little sluggish. Best thing to do is sit down and relax. You don't have to do anything; just let the co-processor crank."

     Mac looked around and saw an old fashioned couch near the side where the foot locker had appeared. He took the helm and sat down. "I just put it on?"

     Calen nodded. His fingers flew over the console's controls. "Put it on and I'll start the keygen. Should take five to ten mintues. Not sure how fast your processor is."

     With a deep sigh, Mac slid the helm over his head. Luckily there wasn't a face plate to obscure his vision. But that didn't matter.

     "Here we go," Calen said.

     And Mac's world went dark again as he involuntarily closed his eyes. He felt himself lay back on the couch. There was a sligh tug from somewhere in his head. "Ca….len…" as the VE had mentioned, his speech was slurred. It was hard to move. Exausting. He knew he was being hindered by the pull on his implant's processor.

     "Just relax. Don't talk."

     Just relax. Be calm. Laugh at the fact yhou're in the hands of Nicholas Calen. Mac swaloowed. Oh that thought didn't help. The Adept felt his physical body relax as well as it went limp and lay backwards against the couch cushions. Guess it was a good idea to sit down.

     In a disjointed fashion, he could make out flashes of Calen. The orange jumpsuit by the console. Beside the couch. Bending over him. Behind him. Back at the console. Frowning. The pictures flashed in and out of his mind as his own thoughts slowly ground to a halt.

     "Mac?"

     He came back to conscious though slowly, his mind still a bit sluggish in responding. His eyes were even slower to react as he opened them in the VR environment. Is it done? He moved to sit up and found his movements still a bit slow, as if he were recovering from a nasty flu. Oh this sucks.

     As he pushed himself up on one elbow, the turned to see Calen standing by the console. The key Calen used was no longer in the slot, but replaced by a similar one, only silver instead of brass. He removed the helm and let it fall to the couch cushion.

     "Faster than I expected."

     Mac nodded to the new key. "That mine?" He sighed. Didn't seem very fast to me. He took a deep breath and pushed himself up into a wobbly standing position, then moved to the console. I feel…weird. He put a hand to his head. "Oh…fuck."

     "It could be a lot worse. This isn't a function that gets used often."

     Mac nodded. "I can see why."

     He picked up the key and handed it to mac. "Don't lose it." He smiled.

     "I won't," the Adept took the key and held it out to look at. The metal glowed as if just forged. "I keep it here, in the Navigator?"

     The VE nodded. "As an aside, I've locked access to your implant to all but the highest levels of Union control. Even with direct access, very few people will be able to access your implant now."

     Mac tucked the key into the interior pocket of his suit. "Thank you Calen. I owe you."

     The VE shrugged.

     "If there's anything I can do…"

     "Self-interest, like I said. Either you agreed, or I forced it."

     Mac found himself grinning. "Yeah, but as you know, I enjoy lying to myself. I'll just keep the thought you're a nice guy handy."

     Calen snorted.

     "But I'll make sure no one else knows."

     The VE nodded. "Tell Derrick that. It'll make it easier to shoot him in the back." With that, Calen's image faded from the VR control room.

     Mac frowned. Shoot Derrick? Wait…"Calen!" He pulled out of VR just in time to see the VE's back disappear through the suite door. He tried to stand and immediately fell forward onto the coffee table with an audible grunt. Damnit. With still sluggish reflexes, the Adept stood and haltingly ran to the door. He stopped in the middle of the hallway…

     But it was empty. He looked from his left to his right. Calen was gone. He caught site of something over his shoulder and realized he still had the connector plugged in. The end that Calen had used was tucked neatly into his left breast pocket. He pulled it out and began wrapping it around his hand into a lose loop.

     With a sigh, he turned back and retrieved his black bag. With a look around the empty suite, the Adept walked out, his mind busy on plans to catch a train and take a leisurely trip to Prague.

     But oh how the best laid plans are often...not.

Written with Blake Sorenson

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