A Free Online Science Fiction Novel- “Liberty”- Chapter 21

*Note- A short prologue is on chapter one. Each chapter has a link to the next to make reading it easier.

This is chapter twenty-one of an online novel, Liberty, A Daughter Universe Novel.

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Tony rushed inside the attic, stopped himself with a hand on the door frame, wiped sweat from his brow. Dex had lines of code scrolling through three monitors.

“What are you doing?” Tony asked.

“Entering commands,” Dex replied. “The military’s satellites’ encryptions can’t be broken with this server, but I think I’ve found a way to confuse their spy drones.”

“That’s good,” Tony said. “But what about the armed drones? Aren’t those the ones we need to worry about?”

“Yeah, they’ll send armed drones -- if they can find us,” Dex said. “But what they can’t see, they can’t target.”

Tony smiled. “If you blind the spy drones, the military won’t be able to find us.”

“Exactly,” Dex said. “I’ve already gotten one unit of four-thousand drones flying circles around the city with their sensors sending false reports to the AI that controls them. My program’s propagating through the system now and the other nine units ought to be doing the same thing in the next hour.”

“That explains it,” Tony said.

“Explains what?”

“On my way back from the Council, one of those tiny spy bots was following me and I tried to lose it by cutting through alleys, entering buildings then leaving through the back doors,” Tony said. “But I couldn’t shake the thing; no matter what I did, it was waiting for me as soon as I showed my face.”

“Then why’d you come back here if you were being tracked?”

Tony shrugged. “I wasn’t sure I could. But then the bug just flew by me real fast, turned and crashed right into a brick wall.”

“Just like that, it turned and crashed into the wall?”

Tony shook his head. “Yeah… I’ve never seen that happen before, so I went over and stomped it to pieces where it fell, just to make sure the thing was dead.”

Dex smiled. “That proves the program’s working. Surveillance drones will be dropping like flies, literally, all over the Alliance, soon.”

“And once the government realizes their spy net is down and they don’t have any leverage, the Council can deliver our demands.”

“You think they’re going to give up so easy?” Dex asked.

“They’ll have to, or we can just stop everything in the city. The Council’s had the new charter drawn up for a long time and the government leaders will know they don’t have a choice.”

Dex nodded. “I guess you’re right. They can either accept the Council’s proposed charter or reject it and get run out of office by angry mobs. With close to a billion people going without water and transportation for a couple of days…”

“And people starting to get hungry,” Tony interrupted.

Always count on Tony to remember to eat well, Dex thought. “And start running low on food supplies, a lot of riots are going to start. And the government’s shiny new towers downtown will be the first buildings to burn.”

“Things are definitely going to change,” Tony said. “And speaking of water, I’m going back to the to where the Council met today; I really need a shower, and they’ve got some water stored.”

“Me, too,” Dex said. “It’s like an oven up here. I’m dripping with sweat.”

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Next Chapter

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This was originally posted on Simily.co

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