Chapter 19: Local Admin

  The London rain was freezing, cutting through Alex’s torn windbreaker like tiny knives.

  He stood in the alleyway behind the Heron Quay substation, staring at the repaired Helios tactical radio in his hand. The green LED blinked steadily. He wasn't hallucinating. The Golden Code—the underlying operating system of the multiverse—wasn't just an Aurelian phenomenon. It was here. It was everywhere.

  He shoved the radio into his pocket and pulled out his own cell phone. The screen was shattered, and the device was completely waterlogged from his tumble through the subterranean mud earlier that night.

  Alex closed his eyes, his mind naturally slipping into the Architect state he had awakened on the other side. The world around him shifted. The brick walls, the rain, the distant streetlights—they all gained a faint, underlying wireframe of data.

  He looked at his phone.

  [ASSET: CELLULAR_DEVICE] [STATE: WATER_DAMAGED] [BATTERY: 0%]

  Easy, Alex thought. He mentally grabbed the parameters, the strain behind his eyes barely a dull ache compared to fighting malware beasts.

  [STATE: OPTIMAL] [BATTERY: 100%]

  The glass screen seamlessly knitted itself back together. The water evaporated instantly. The Apple logo flashed on, bright and pristine.

  As soon as the phone caught a cell tower signal, it vibrated violently in his palm.

  1 New Voicemail.

  Alex tapped the screen and pressed the phone to his ear.

  "Alex, it's Sarah," her voice was frantic, breathless, and backed by the sound of wailing sirens. "I don't know what you found down there, but men with guns just scorched the Grid servers. I have the data. Whatever you're doing... run."

  Alex’s blood ran cold. The voicemail had been left nearly an hour ago. Helios Dynamics hadn't just ambushed him; they had raided his office. They were actively wiping the existence of the Bronze Doors from Earth’s databases, and Sarah was caught right in the middle of it.

  "I'm coming, Sarah," Alex whispered, shoving the phone into his pocket.

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  He sprinted out of the alleyway, hitting the rain-slicked pavement of the main street. Heron Quay was completely locked down. Two blocks down, a massive, matte-black Helios Dynamics mobile command vehicle was parked across the intersection, its heavy floodlights sweeping the streets. Four heavily armed corporate mercenaries stood guard around it.

  Alex didn't duck into the shadows. He didn't hide. He was the IT guy, and they were trespassing on his grid.

  He walked straight down the middle of the street toward the barricade.

  "Hey! Civilian! Halt!" one of the mercenaries shouted, raising his assault rifle. The red dot of a laser sight danced across Alex's chest. "This area is under corporate quarantine! On the ground, now!"

  Alex didn't stop walking. He didn't even blink. He let his Architect vision expand, washing over the entire Helios blockade.

  [ASSET: H-DYN_RIFLE x4] [ASSET: TACTICAL_FLOODLIGHTS] [ASSET: COMMS_NETWORK]

  Delete, Alex thought.

  He didn't just break their guns this time. He executed a localized system wipe on their electronics.

  The laser sight on his chest vanished. The four assault rifles sparked violently, their internal firing mechanisms fusing into solid, useless blocks of metal. The massive floodlights on the command vehicle exploded in a shower of sparks, plunging the intersection into darkness. The tactical radios strapped to the mercenaries' chests shrieked with a deafening burst of static before going dead.

  "My weapon is bricked!" one of the guards panicked, racking the slide of his rifle to no avail. "Comms are down! What the hell just hit us?!"

  "An EMP?" another shouted, drawing a combat knife.

  Alex stepped into the radius of the broken floodlights, his eyes glowing with a faint, residual green light. He didn't break his stride as he walked right past the terrified, disarmed mercenaries. They shrank back, completely unnerved by the calm, soaking-wet civilian who had just neutralized a million dollars of military hardware without raising a finger.

  Alex stepped up to the heavy, armored door of the Helios command vehicle. The biometric lock flashed red.

  [STATUS: LOCKED_BIOMETRIC]

  Alex placed his palm flat against the scanner. [STATUS: OVERRIDE_GRANTED].

  The heavy door hissed and swung open. The driver inside, a shocked Helios operative, scrambled for his sidearm, but Alex simply looked at him.

  "Get out," Alex said, his voice carrying a strange, resonant echo of the Golden Code.

  The driver didn't argue. He dropped his gun, scrambled out the passenger side door, and ran into the rain.

  Alex climbed into the driver's seat, pulling the heavy door shut. He grabbed the steering wheel, his Architect vision interfacing directly with the vehicle's GPS and internal network. He could see the path Helios had taken to the London Grid Authority.

  [DESTINATION SET: LONDON GRID AUTHORITY]

  [IGNITION: FORCED_START]

  The massive V8 engine roared to life. Alex slammed the vehicle into gear, the heavy tires screeching against the wet pavement as he tore through the barricade, heading straight for the heart of the corporate cover-up.

  He was going to get his friend back, and he was going to show Helios exactly what a Reality Hacker could do on his home server.

  The King of the Real World!

  Alex is an absolute menace on Earth! Now that he understands the code behind reality, Helios Dynamics has no idea what is coming for them at the LGA building.

  As planned, we are leaving Alex speeding toward the LGA and shifting our focus back to the Aurelian server for Chapter 20.

  Lyra, Thorne, and the unconscious Agent Locke are surrounded by Grandmaster Alaric and the elite Paladins at the absolute peak of the Silver Spire.