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Zebediah:
Incidentally, Steve got the story slightly wrong. This is a deliberate error on my part. If you ask the average Massachusetts resident who hung the lanterns in the Old North Church, they won't know - but they will  know that Paul Revere had something to do with it. And I didn't want to belabor the point in the story, so I just gave the simplified version.

It was mostly a bit of fun on my part to throw that in. I originally wanted to have Marten and company see a super-sized John Hancock Center rising over Boston like the tower of Barad-Dur in Mordor, but the problem is that you can't actually see the Hancock Center from that part of Route 2. The part of Boston you can see from there is the North End, and the best-known landmark in that part of town is the Old North Church.

As for what happens  next - I hope to have that written by the end of the week.

Loki:
Hacking is not a simple matter of numbers.
Of course, this is Hollywood hacking...

Zebediah:
Finally got the next part done. I may be slow with the updates for the next few weeks - I have some other stuff going on that's occupying my time.


Adrenaline does wonders on tired old legs. We all ran as fast as we could down the middle of the road, keeping a watchful eye to either side for more borg-zombies. Somewhat to my surprise, I was the fastest, with Steve only a step behind me. May, however, could only go at a fast jog - "Goddamned cheap-ass chassis!" she growled when I encouraged her to step it up a notch – and Tortura got winded surprisingly quickly. So while we could easily outrun the borg behind us, I could see more coming down the ramp from the Pleasant Street overpass ahead of us.

Steve and I both got our rifles out and ready; Steve fixed a bayonet to the barrel of his, and I suddenly wished I had one too. The borg were coming at us from both sides, but there was still a narrow gap between them. We slipped through, Steve fending off one with a rifle butt to the head, and then we had left that group behind.

They didn't look like the old Star Trek borg, but more like somebody had replaced random parts of their bodies with the equivalent parts from anthroPCs. Which was probably more or less what had been done. The one thing they did have in common with borg, though, was the blank, emotionless expressions on their faces, as if nobody was home behind their eyes. That, and their slow movement – they walked, never hurrying, but coming steadily, relentlessly.

"Damn, they're slower than I am!" May said as we continued east. "As long as they don't cut us off..."

I gestured ahead. The Lake Street overpass was ahead of us was already swarming with cybernetic zombies. "It's going to be close," I said.

They had blocked the road by the time we got to Lake Street, but their line was thin. All four of us stopped, raised our weapons, and fired. Steve took one in the head, Tortura's shotgun felled two of them, while I got one square in the chest and May winged one in the leg.

"The head!" Steve shouted. "You've got to hit them in the head! They'll keep coming if you don't!"

One more volley and four more borg fell. That created a gap, and we dashed through it and continued down the highway. But when we got to the intersection with Alewife Brook Parkway, we stopped. The road was blocked in both directions by crowds of borg, and there were more coming up behind us.

"Quick! This way!" May shouted. We dashed down an embankment onto a narrow road that ran between a parking deck and an office building, but the end of it was also blocked by borg.

"Into the parking deck!" May started jogging towards it.

"What? That's a death trap!" I yelled back.

"I think I know what she's doing," Steve said. "It's the Alewife T stop. We can get out through the subway tunnels!"

"Unless borg down there too," Tortura said, gasping for breath.

"It's our only chance!" May said. "Let's go!"

We ran under the deck, and then down a broad ramp that led underground into the subway station. May crashed through one of the turnstiles, which objected with an angry buzzing noise, and we followed her through, then down a flight of stairs to the platform. The platform and the train waiting on one of the tracks seemed clear of borg, though we could hear them entering the lobby above us.

"Holy shit, the power's on!" May said.

"Fuck, we'll need to be careful of the third rail in the tunnels," Steve cautioned.

May grinned back. "No, I have a better idea! Head to the front of the train!"

The doors on the train were open, and we ran into the first car. May headed to the door of the cab, and tried to force it open. "Shit! Locked!"

"Try the driver's window," Steve said. May ran back out onto the platform and then dove through the open side window into the cab.

"Okay, now just hang tight while I figure out how to work this thing!" May shouted through the door.

"Better hurry!" I shouted back. I could see borg at the top of both sets of stairs, heading down to the platform.

"Damn it! No digital interface!" May shouted.

Steve frowned. "What did you expect? These trains were built in the Eighties."

"All right then, I'll just have to do this manually!" May said. "Friggin' hand controls..."

By now the platform was filling with borg. "May, shut the doors now!" I shouted.

"Just a minute..." May said. There were two loud beeps, and the doors started sliding shut. But one of the borg got an arm inside the rear doors of our car, and all of the doors slid open again.

"May, shut them now!" I screamed. Steve and I both attacked a borg trying to enter the car through the front set of doors, but our rifle butts only knocked it back a step. The press of the crowd behind it shoved it forward again.

"Fuck doors!" Tortura shouted. "Get this thing moving now!"

I heard a loud  hiss as the air brakes released, and the train jerked forward a bit, then began smoothly accelerating. Steve and I gave a final shove and succeeded in pushing the borg out the door and into the tunnel. The doors finally closed. But half a dozen borg had made it into the car through the rear doors.

"Shoot them!" Tortura ordered, and she let go with both barrels of her shotgun. In the enclosed car, the noise was deafening. But three of the borg fell to the floor, twitching spasmodically. The others stepped over their bodies and advanced on us, but Steve and I fired, then fired again.

"Son of a bitch," I said, breathing hard. "That was too close."

Steve banged on the door of the cab. "What's the plan?"

"The line looks clear ahead," May said. "We take the train as far as we can. If we're lucky, we're clear all the way to the Longfellow Bridge – there's a station on the Boston side just a few hundred yards from the hospital."

"Boys, we have problem," Tortura said. She pointed towards the back of the train car. We could see through the windows into the next car, and it was full of borg. And they were trying to open the door at the end of their car.

"If they get through there..." Steve began. As he did, their door slid to the side, and then they were crossing the narrow gap between the cars and trying to force open the door to our car.

"Block the door!" Steve shouted.

"How?" I shouted back. We both braced our shoulders against the door and tried to hold it in place.

We held it as the train sped down the tunnel, through one station and then another. But before we reached the Harvard Square station, they finally forced it.

"Drop!" Tortura shouted, and we both did. Her shotgun fired, and fired again. A borg forced its way into the car. Steve speared it with his bayonet, and I put a bullet through its brain. Then they were pushing through too fast. It was hand-to-hand after that, and I had no time to think – just strike with my rifle butt and shoot when I got a clear shot. We were forced back step by step towards the cab, as the borg's bodies gave off sparks from their mechanical components and bled from their organic parts.

Somehow we held out. There were only three left, and I raised my rifle to take one of them out. Then May screamed, "Oh shit! Hang on!" and the brakes shrieked. All of us were thrown against the front of the car. Then we slammed into something, the lights in the train went dark and I blacked out for a second.

When I came to, one of the surviving borg was clawing at my throat. I wrestled with it, but it was stronger than I was; its fingers closed on my neck, and it started to choke me.

And then the butt of Tortura's shotgun slammed into its head, hard. And then again, and a third time. Something crunched, and the borg went limp.

"Thanks," I croaked, gasping for breath. I pulled myself to my feet. I was sore all over and soaked in blood from the dead borg that littered the floor of the train. The train car itself was bent in the middle and leaned to one side. Tortura was on her knees, looking as bad as I felt. Steve sat on the floor, pulling his bayonet out of a borg's throat with one hand while holding the other arm tightly against his side and cursing softly. I heard something behind me, but it was May forcing open the cab door.

Then there was motion at the far end of the car. One of the borg rose unsteadily to its feet, turn to face us, and started limping in our direction. I grabbed my rifle, but as I raised it to shoot it, I head a small voice.

The borg stopped, and spread its arms wide. It looked strait at me, with eyes that were no longer blank, but full of fear. It – she – trembled, and whispered, "Kill me."

I stopped, and lowered my rifle. This was no longer a mindless cyborg in front of me, and I found myself reluctant to murder her.

She reached a hand towards me, and took a step forward. "Kill... me... please," she rasped. There was a pleading look in her eyes.

Then her expression changed, and the awareness faded from her eyes. The cyborg began walking slowly towards me.

I raised my rifle again, and put a bullet through its forehead. It dropped to the floor of the subway car, twitched once, and then lay still.

"Fuck," May whispered.

"Let's get out of here," I said.

We climbed out of the car and onto a platform. I looked up the platform, and saw that we had crashed into another train that had been waiting there.

"Sorry about that," May said. "I braked as soon as I saw it, but we were going too fast."

"Where are we?" I asked.

"Kendall Square," May said. "We're close – the train goes up to the surface a hundred yards ahead, and then it's just a quick dash across the bridge and we're at the hospital."

"Nyet," Tortura answered. "We are all hurt, and Stephen has a broken arm. Need place to rest before we attack hospital."

"She's right," I added. "The... whatever-it-is that controls Boston has to know where we're going. We're in no shape for another fight right now."

May thought for a moment. "All right. I have an idea. Follow me." And she headed for the exit to the street.

Loki:
I definitely get a Metro 2033-esque feeling from this.

Zebediah:
Hm, didn't know about Metro 2033 until now - I just looked it up, and it looks like it's worth checking out. It's funny, because apparently one of the factions in Metro 2033 is called the "Red Line", and the subway line I wrote about above is also the Red Line.

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