Sawtooth: A Post-Apocalyptic Adventure (Assessor's Archive #2)

By Harry O'Connor

Sawtooth is an exciting, thought provoking adventure based in a post-apocalyptic world where sentient computers rule. One of their laws is that of The Bell Curve Law - everyone outside of acceptable norms is exterminated....well, almost everyone.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Harry O'Connor
• Release date: Apr 8, 2013

Harry O'Connor

Harry is a massive sci-fi fan, both of books and of anything that can be viewed on a screen. Without a book he is totally lost and one day it occurred to him to start writing his own stories instead of just thinking them and forgetting forever. Harry has released two books on Amazon so far, "The Bell Curve" and "Sawtooth", both loosely themed on intelligence and eugenics in a dystopian world. One of Harry's favourite pastime is writing biographies of himself, like this one, in the third person. It makes him feel like a proper author to see a brief summary of his achievements written by himself on a web page. He must feel so proud right now. If you would like to connect with Harry, follow him on twitter @Voodoochilli, I am sure he would like that.

Book preview

Sawtooth

By Harry O'Connor

Published by Harry O'Connor at Smashwords

© Copyright 2013 Harry O'Connor

All rights are reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or places, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

www.harryoconnor.co.uk

To the first sentient computers, whom we will surely meet soon.

I hope that we can be friends.

Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Acknowledgements

ONE

High up in the ten-storey derelict building, Agent Miller peered down the slender scope of his hydrogen-powered sniper rifle. This wasn't right. His job was to enforce the law, not to fight against it. As he contemplated this, one of the two men in pursuit dashed forward, taking cover behind a small wall in the vast open courtyard below. Miller caught sight of his face and recognised the man as a former colleague.

He focused the rifle's reticule on the other agent's approximate, but obscured, position and whispered heat trace, organic like a lover over soft pillows. The gun dutifully obliged and indicated an affirmative by offering a small haptic vibration as the viewfinder switched to an orange and green infra-red display. Mere seconds passed as the gun's computer highlighted several potential kill points – brain, heart, stomach, kidneys and spleen, all indicated with mortality and hit probabilities and estimated times of death. A shot to the head would be instant and fairly easy, but a bullet in the stomach could take hours and be a most painful way to die.

Non lethal he hushed. Another buzz as the display changed again. Several squares indicated other areas on the outline of the man. Using a glance and double blink, Miller selected his enemy's right thigh. He didn't have to think about wind speed, air resistance, ballistic coefficients or the Coriolis effect – these things and others were calculated for him in an instant. An arrow at the top of the viewfinder told him to elevate the gun's trajectory further and a small red flashing cross was superimposed at the exact location he was to fire, several metres above his target. It moved about slowly, compensating for the almost immeasurable movements in Miller's arm as his own heart beat and the small but constant changes of the air pressure were estimated. Given a satellite link and a tap into the net, the gun was completely accurate; even without, its precision was astounding.

After carefully aiming, he took a deep breath, paused and then firmly squeezed the trigger, which sent a tiny electrical signal up the butt of the gun. In turn, this electrical spark provoked a small but powerful atomic explosion in the shielded chamber, forcing out the minuscule round. It hurtled down the barrel with a barely audible pap, one of the benefits of non-lethal rounds. The bullet span as it was spat out into the world and quickly zeroed in on its target at three times the speed of sound. A single second passed before the round passed through the wall, then impacted with the man's muscular thigh, exploding as it did so and releasing its payload. Chemicals flowed, rapidly beginning their job of interfering with its host's nerves and neurotransmitters, causing a disturbing but relatively harmless fit before complete unconsciousness.

One down, one to go.

Watching through glass eyes on the ground and high above the