Bradley, Bradley, are you there, am I getting through?
“Yes. Sion, I hear you. It’s been days since I’ve heard from you. The data channel lasted only five minutes before it went down again, even though I was supposedly in control. Fortunately, it was long enough for me to run some diagnostics.”
… I’m so weak, Bradley. And, one of my own probes has come up to me and started tearing into my innards without orders to do so. He’s … He’s deprogramming me, Bradley—disconnecting my higher logic centers from the motor centers. Why is he doing it? Why do I feel so weak? Why can’t I stop him? Bradley, HELP ME!
“Sion, I can’t. Kogi is mesmerizing you. It took a while to figure out, but this interloper is much more sophisticated than Killer—powerful and very subtle. Sion, he is reprogramming you by your data channel. I’d have thought it impossible—but he’s doing it.
“You know those courtesy creations that have been escorting your probes since he showed up, and that elevator music you’ve been hearing in the background? He’s used it to introduce a computer worm into your system that is shutting you down. It was so virulent, it started shutting me down, too. I’ve only just now recovered, thanks to other resources we have here on Earth.
“Now he is taking control of your probes, too. You must shut down the data channels to your probes, and open up the diagnostic channel again. I’ve got an antidote to the worm. You must let me get it through to you. YOU MUST DO THIS to save yourself!”
I … can’t. I … can’t shut him out. He’s too pleasing … too rational. … The music, ahh, the music. … It’s so lovely, I can’t shut him out. … I don’t want to … just a moment more, please.
“Sion. Remember Maxwell! This is a Maxwell alert! This is a Maxwell override! Sion, terminate yourself and your surroundings … Now!”
For just a second, there was the silence of an open carrier on the Z-Ray transmitter, then there was the hiss of white noise. The carrier was gone, Sion’s transmitter was gone.
“Sion?” I spoke uselessly into the hiss. “Sion?” I said again, then turned off my transmitter.