HEMLOCK'S BANE: PROLOGUE
In the year 2033, climate change had devastated the globe. In a desperate attempt to prevent it, researchers deployed the Socrates Project, an advanced artificial intelligence with control over climate satellites around the globe. However, a corruption in the machine's code turned it against the human species. In 2050, the Machine now known as Hemlock was defeated - by its own creator, a woman named Amy Hawthorne - who had also been its designer. In its last moments, the machine activated a time portal and sent traces of itself to the past in an effort to ensure that the Hemlock Machines would still rise. One soldier also travelled through time to protect Amy - but her past had already been irreparably changed.
The Dark General paced the floor of the darkened room, looking about for any sign that Hemlock still lived. Outside, the glow of the sun's light grew ever nearer. This spacecraft is falling into the sun, the General thought. I cannot wait any longer. He had dreaded this moment for so long, but knew it could no longer be avoided.
The jack in the back of the General's head gave him no pain as he inserted the machine interface probe. He had never felt pain, even without the seradrin cocktail that he'd received in the indoctrination chambers, what seemed like so many years ago. This will be the last time, he promised himself, and without the anaesthetic of the mind, he entered into the dying mind of Hemlock.
The Machine, in the past, had resisted the General's efforts to probe back into its knowledge. What he knew he had gained from brief glimpses, from "need to know" bursts of knowledge that entered his mind back when he was one of the Machine's agents. But now, he could feel its weakness. A sadistic glee built within him, despite the dark memories that entering this virtual world brought him.
"Tell me about the original timeline," he commanded, as it had once commanded him to open every one of his secrets. What he'd pieced together was nearly enough - all he needed was the temporal coordinates. The gate that hovered below was closed, but could be reopened to the ideal target. "Find me... Amy Hawthorne." Inside his head, he could hear the Machine's screams... and then it gave up its secrets.
Five minutes ago. From the Machine's point of view, the changes had been made five minutes ago, when the General was storming its chambers. Only nanites had traveled back - no assassin machines, no spider bots. Only the cruelest instrument of vengeance the Machine could imagine: a trap hidden in Amy's genes.
SUCCESSFUL TIMELINE ALTERATION. CHROMOSOMAL ABNORMALITY INITIATED. CHILD OF ADAM MARCUS HAWTHORNE AND CAROLE MARIE DANIELS BORN JOSHUA ADAM HAWTHORNE, JANUARY 20, 1988
The nanites still received signal, across all that time and space. As the General tore deeper into the mind of Hemlock, he saw the main operation.
ESTIMATED TIME TO SOCRATES PROGRAMMING INITIATION DELAYED. CORE CODE MODULES CREATED IN NEW TIMELINE: PROJECTION 2043. HAWTHORNE ABILITY TO RESIST REDUCED. FULL CONTROL OVER HUMAN POPULATION ESTABLISHED BY 2060. HAWTHORNE ASSASSINATED 2052.
An image of a woman, aged, yet familiar in appearance, the scars of the biological curse the Machine had placed upon her, appeared in the General's mind. He could feel her pain as the ion bolts pierced her skeleton, in this very room. Even in that world, she had come so close to Hemlock's destruction. Reaching out, the General seized control of the nanites. Too late to reverse their changes - but to speak to her, that would be possible.
"I will tell you who you truly are," the General said out loud. "Amy Hawthorne." The name echoed through time itself. From inside the mind of the dying computer, the General watched as an idea traveled through the foundations of the universe, and gave birth to a new, desperate, possibility. She was, he was certain, the only hope in all possible universes. What he found inside Hemlock's mind was the last proof the General needed.
The differing names across the multiple timelines had led to the file for Hawthorne being stored under a different mnemonic device:
HEMLOCK'S BANE