Read Online Code Breakers: Beta by Colin F. Barnes - Free Book Online

scanned the ID database registration and Mags delivered the search result: Steven Chiang , Nineteen years old.
    Gerry cut off the feed of information. The name rang a bell instantly.
    That was the kid who worked on reception at Cemprom , Gerry thought. What the hell was he doing here?
    Inside the basement, a single windup lantern illuminated one. Shadows doused the rest of the room. A boy, like a rat in his nest, sat slumped in the corner, shrouded by rags and boxes.
    Gerry stepped inside, and didn’t make a sound. The darkness of the corridor ensured that the boy wouldn’t notice the open door. The place was almost as Gerry had left it. It was mostly used for storing various technology prototypes from his job at Cemprom, and boxes of rations just in case of an emergency.
    Although City Earth was self-sufficient with its own farms and food production, The Family insisted all citizens carried a certain amount of dried sustenance in the event of any mechanical problems with the Dome.
    It was also a way of controlling the populace. Keep everyone afraid that one day the food supply might run out. The hand that fed had power of not just the air they breathed, or the lives they lived, but also the food they ate.
    The more he thought about this, the more he realised they were lab rats running around a big shiny maze for their ‘superiors’ to study. Despite The Family, and especially Amma, his mother, explaining their vision and their commitment to the human race, he felt the familiar loathing for them return. He’d seen and experienced too much to ever think they were doing this for the good of humankind. It was for the good of The Family only.
    They only did what suited them. And right now, having Gerry hunt down and deliver Petal was good for them, but he’d be damned if he’d hand her over so easily.
    Gerry slithered through the room as if he were made of shadow. He got within a few feet of the boy. Gerry shielded himself behind a storage locker. The boy’s limbs were thin, his cheeks gaunt, and the obvious collarbones, plus the rags, indicated he hadn’t camped in the basement for long. He wouldn’t be in that condition with the supplies available to him.
    As if finally sensing something was wrong, the boy turned to face Gerry’s direction.
    Gerry activated the basement emergency lights via his network, and said. “Steven? That you?”
    “Mr Cardle? I thought you were—”
    “Dead? I was, sort of. What the hell are you doing in here? What’s happened to you?”
    Steven crawled out of the blankets around his thin and scarred body. The skin around his dermal implant on his right wrist was red raw and covered in deep scratches. Dried blood caked around the network of cuts. He’d clearly tried to remove it.
    The boy opened his mouth, but no words came. He looked up, his eyes full of tears. Gerry moved to the kid, sat him back down, and covered him up, no longer wanting to look upon the scars and welts that hadn’t healed properly upon his chest, arms, and legs.
    “Who did this to you?”
    “Jasper. He came into Cemprom with his heavies. The security, they, they didn’t do anything. He needed information. I tried, Mr Cardle. I really tried not to give it to him, but—”
    “It’s okay, I understand.”
    The kid stunk of ammonia and faeces now that he had opened the blankets from around his body. “What happened after?”
    “I managed to get out, but I knew The Family would come after me, so I kept on the move, mostly in the sewers. But it was too late!”
    “The lottery?”
    The kid let his tears trace slivery lines down his dirty face. His back heaved with sobs as he blurted out, “I’ve only got two days left before it snuffs me out. I don’t want to die Mr Cardle!”
    “None of us do, Steven. Have you tried uninstalling your AIA?”
    “It won’t let me, I’m stuck. I tried to stop them, tried to do my job. Why am I being punished?”
    Before Gerry could find some comforting words, Steven carried