They should have been celebrating.
Instead, Cross’s tablet flickered and turned back on.
“That’s not possible,” he said.
One line sat on the screen.
ECHO DETECTED. PROTOCOL FRAGMENT SURVIVING. LOCATION: UNKNOWN.
Pip dropped his sandwich.
“You said it was dead.”
“It was.”
“Then what is that?”
Julian took the tablet. Blue symbols pulsed across the screen.
“A backup,” he said. “The Protocol copied itself before we rewrote the core. It’s hiding somewhere.”
“Where?” Dara asked.
Cross started typing. “Not on any floor. Not on any server.”
Rina pushed herself upright. Her face looked pale.
“It’s inside one of us.”
….
The Infection
Nobody spoke.
“Explain,” Julian said.
“When the core tried to pull people back in,” Rina said, “it sent out fragments. Tiny pieces of code. One of th
