by Jim Keen
The ships no longer docked at the port but drove themselves up and onto a mile-wide concrete plinth where waiting autonomous trucks would chew off exterior containers. Security came from an MI supervision chain that ran from the departure ports, to the vessel, then the arrivals’ MI. Except, as Alice was learning, an impervious, error-free MI was fiction; they were as vulnerable to influence as any sentient being.
“What would madam like to know?” Conner asked.
“How you get a container into the country without it being tracked,” Alice said.
Conner removed his phone and sent a message. Two minutes later the discharge whine of large Dyson engines grew above them, and a weather-beaten aerial transport dropped from the gray sky. It appeared a low-resolution version of the police Hopper—crude and unaerodynamic, built for load carrying and reliability. Its four engines kicked up a cloud of stinging grit as it settled. The battered body was empty apart from two rows of black plastic seats. Conner climbed into the front, while Alice sat behind him next to Xavi.
“Ready?” Conner asked as he slid his phone into the control slot, and the craft bucked into the air with a jolt. “This might be rough for such gentle folks as yourself. These guys are old, and the last software update was buggy.”
The crackling hum of the engines rattled the cabin as they rose.
“Take us over the whole port. I want to get an idea of the layout,” Alice shouted over the engine noise, and Conner saluted a reply.
The ascent pressed them into their seats, and she gazed down, fascinated by the complexity. The old industrial docks had been wiped clean, replaced by a long gray slab that disappeared into the pollution. Ships pushed up and onto this new waterfront like beached whales, any pretense at streamlining gone. Thousands of autonomous trucks nuzzled their cellular forms in no discernible order, algorithmically dictated movements appearing as random as leaves floating on a river. It was only when the trucks poured through the exit gates and joined the roadway that they converged into recognizable lines. That Julia had hacked such a huge and complex system astonished Alice. She caught Xavi’s eye; he was thinking the same thing.
“Talk me through it, Conner,” she said.
“Easier if I show you.” Conner pulled his phone from the flight console and took control of the craft, the engines bucking at the changeover. He dialed a number then spoke over the roar. “Meet me at vessel four. We need to show some tourists the works. Ten minutes on top.”
He tilted the controls left, and the craft dropped like dead weight. Warning alarms beeped then raised in volume as they descended. Conner turned back to them and shouted, “There are huge fines for landing on a docked ship, but we take that from the MIs memory during the hack.”
Alice clung on and looked through the armor glass to see they were headed toward the largest ship visible—fully a mile in length, half of its body pushed up and onto the dock with a swarm of trucks clustered around it. As they descended, a hissing noise penetrated the cabin, louder even than its humming engines. The roar grew to envelope the craft, and she realized it was the howling of a thousand electrical motors rising from the autonomous trucks as they ate into the ship’s hull.
Conner tapped her knee and shouted.
“What?” she asked, the roar drowning out any conversation.
He pointed down, and Alice leaned over to press her face against the cold glass. Ten feet below, the upper deck of the ship blurred past, multicolored containers blended together by their speed. The number was incredible, more than Alice could take in, hundreds then thousands as the craft flew on. She looked forward and saw they were approaching the midpoint of the ship; the MIs chrome blister twinkled in the far distance.
The roar of the trucks fell away, and Conner brought them to land on a battered red metal container at the north side of the hull. The engines spun down, and a tense silence descended. Alice forced herself to take a long, calming intake of air, then popped the door and stepped out.
They were high up, three hundred feet, and a cold wind blew across from the Hudson; it whistled to itself as it found every gap between the containers. She zipped her jacket and clicked on its heating elements as she looked about.
“Watch your footing; it’s greasy up here. Too much sea spray and protective lubricants,” Conner said.
Manhattan stood to the north, Blade Towers shrouded in the morning haze like giant trees. Red and white streaks crossed the sky; the aerial transit routes stacked with cars. To the left, the Hudson glittered and rolled, wave tops foaming above the black water as the Statue of Liberty lurked behind the unemployment center. The center’s disk was an oily smear on the water’s surface, a rod of black smoke rising from it as dozens of small boats buzzed between the large Coast Guard ships.
“Okay Conner, show me how you do this.”
Conner lifted his phone and called again. “Where are you?”
“Right here,” a deep voice said behind them.
Alice turned to see a man as wide as he was tall struggle forward, carrying a two-foot-square black box. His huge arm and neck muscles were taut with the load, bulk pronounced under a thin denim jacket. He clumped over, breath ragged, and lowered the box to the container with a clang.
“Careful with that,” Conner said.
“You carry it next time.” The man stood and saw Alice, eyes widening. “Conner, what is she doing here? Why aren’t you killing her?”
“Calm down, Link. That’s all behind us. We’re here to help our beloved police with an ongoing investigation.”
“She sold us out. What’s wrong with you?” He stamped toward Alice, feet ringing on the metal floor, and pulled a long knife from his jacket.
Alice stepped back, drew her Walther, and took aim, its drum spinning up with a faint but audible whine. “Stop right there, Link.”
He did, red eyes burning.
“Yes, I grifted you. So what?” Alice said. “If I wanted to put you away, I could have, but I didn’t. So back down, or do you and I have a longer-term problem?”
“I’ll see you on the streets, late at night, when you don’t have your boyfriend to hide behind,” Link said.
“I look forward to it.” Alice leaned past Link’s wide chest and looked at Conner. “Tick tock.”
“Link, be a good boy, put the knife away, and answer the officer’s questions.”
Link looked back at Conner, growled, then sheathed his knife.
“Conner tells me you’ve kept a register of all cargo destinations,” Alice said.
Link studied her for a moment longer, then spoke. “I, or rather it, has.” He kicked the box on the floor. It didn’t budge an inch, and he winced. “Though all we have are the initial destinations. If they’re moved after that, it’s nothing to do with us.”
“That works. I’m looking for a pattern with repeat orders.”
“Why?”
“I want to know who had the motive and power to kill your boss.” She flashed him the sweetest smile she had.
“Link, just give her the list and get this done,” Conner said.
Link turned to the box. Again, his huge muscles tensed as he lifted it, back arched, face to the skies, and walked to the container’s edge. He placed it on the deck with a sigh and opened the lid to display a cube of brassy metal. Alice now realized why the box was so heavy; it held the first mobile Mechanical Intelligence she’d ever seen. This was what Julia had brought back from DC, what had helped Five Points take over the ports and New York.
Xavi whistled in the quiet, and they looked at each other. An MI of this type was exceptionally difficult to find. Link took a long handle and a circular spool of green plastic cable from his pocket. He plugged the cable into a hole atop the MI, the handle into its side, then walked across to kneel at the joint between two adjacent containers. There he opened a hatch and retrieved a small white dongle from a nest of cables. He plugged his green cable into the dongle, returned to the MI, and wound the handle. Slow at first, muscles tight, breath labored
, but after a minute it eased, and he leaned back.
“Okay,” he said between gasps. “I’ve wound it up. This is a specialist infiltration MI, designed to crack encryption and replace codes, nothing else. It can’t talk and doesn’t have a remote power supply; I have to wind its analytical engines every time we want to use it. Powered down, it’s inert and untraceable.” He collapsed the handle, then plugged a small display into the vacant socket. Green text ran across it surface. “This’ll take a few minutes.”
Alice lit her cigarette, the blue smoke whipped away by the wind, and tried to imagine the trillions of atomic-sized wheels, cogs, and chains thrashing away inside the metal brick. The air warmed, and she realized the metal carry box was in fact a heat sink shedding the intense energy generated by the Babbage circuits.
“Check your phone,” Link said to Alice.
She did and found a data package waiting acceptance. She put away her half-smoked cigarette and clicked Yes; thousands of names and addresses scrolled in a blur. There were so many, it would take weeks to comb this list. She sighed. Why was time always so short? “Got it, thanks.”
Link’s display changed from green to orange. “Okay, we’re in.” He tapped the screen. “I’ve altered its destination. In a few minutes, it’ll shift down to the trucks and out of here. We hack the port MI next and clean its manifest.” He waited, and the display changed again, from orange to white. “Done.”
He stood, folded the long green cable, and placed it back in the box careful to avoid the boiling surface. “Now all we need to do is—”
Alice caught a flicker of movement, then the MI exploded in a glittering orange fireball that showered them with molten componentry. The shockwave threw her ten feet away to land hard on the metal container, ears ringing. She rolled and stood in a single movement, gun in hand. Xavi was up and scanning the horizon, Conner just behind drawing his hand cannon. Link was last; he had been closest to the blast and was covered with blood, clothes smoldering.
“What?” Link’s voice cracked as another flash streaked through the air and shredded his head into a red cloud.
Alice tasted copper in the cold air as the twitching corpse collapsed to the deck with a hollow thunk. Conner ran to the body, but it was futile.
“Anyone see anything?” Xavi shouted.
Alice looked around—deck, sky, there was nothing. The three of them formed a circle, guns facing outward.
“What the fuck, Conner? I thought Five Points had jurisdiction here?” she asked.
“We do. Not even Barlow and the Dead Rabbits would try to hit us here.”
Alice squinted into the flat, gray sky. Was that something? She opened her mouth to shout when an orange dot flashed across to impact her chest. The blow hit like a wrecking ball, and she was thrown to the deck, the pain a fire that spread across her body. She tried to shout but could only gasp in agony.
Alice tried to stand but found she was sliding backward, her hard jacket frictionless against the oily surface. The pain in her chest spread with agonizing intensity; the stench of burning plastic smothered her. Alice flung her hands outward, but there was nothing to hold onto, just grease that slid under her fingers. She twisted her head and saw the hull’s edge racing toward her. She tried to shout, tried to plant her boots, but it was no good.
Xavi was screaming, the edge was under her, moving past, then there was a moment of sickening inertia before gravity took hold and she fell.
15
The world spun, the battered red hull switching with the gray sky. Far below, huge autonomous trucks were the size of ants. She flung her arms wide, clutching for anything, and her right hand smacked against a cold metal railing. She grabbed it as she flashed past, her right wrist shrieking, and swung underneath. Her boots smacked into the hull, recoil shaking her grip loose. She clung on and twisted in the air.
Her right arm was on fire, shoulder shrieking with pain, as more gunfire came from above. The deep boom of Conner’s hand cannon was instantly recognizable; the buzz of a high-velocity projectile whined in return. Another explosion mushroomed into the sky shrouded by black smoke. She clawed upward with her left hand, desperate for grip, and failed. Her right wouldn’t hold much longer. She swung up again, and her left grabbed a hook projecting from the handrail. She jerked her right hand to the next rung, then the next, to haul herself up inch by inch. Her boots slid for purchase, tips skittering across the wet metal, until she toppled over the handrail to crash onto the platform. The reek of burning flesh was sickening as she forced herself upright and tore at the jacket’s zipper; it moved a few inches and stuck, a wide disk of melted composites blocking its progress. Heat came from the damage in waves: in her face, her eyes. She grabbed the jacket’s collar and pulled it over her head and away before collapsing to the platform, spent.
It was silent apart from her ragged breathing, then screams came from above. Alice rolled to her front and pushed herself to a kneeling position; through the perforated metal floor she saw the ground far below, huge trucks sprinkled like salt grains. She looked down at her chest. The jacket had done its job, stopped the projectile, but the missile’s kinetic energy had been too much for it to absorb. A hideous pink burn covered her lower chest and welded her T-shirt to her skin. Pain throbbed from it in sickening pulses, and her consciousness wavered, vision graying as a deafening roar filled her ears.
They will die without your help.
Alice forced herself to stand on legs filled with iced water, muscles shaking, and grabbed her smoldering jacket. She flipped it over and searched for her gun. It was intact, the drum charged, though she didn’t know how much use it would be. The Walther was designed for close contact, and this sounded like a long-range match. Her ceramic knife still sat in its spring-loaded sheath. She tugged it free and slid it down the back of her jeans, hissing at the pain in her chest. Next was her phone. That hadn’t been so lucky, its body shattered by the rocket impact. There was no way to call for help, they’d have to make it out of this by themselves.
She summoned her wavering energy and looked around. The platform was five feet long, three wide, and ran along a rail set a foot from the container. Its mesh floor supported a low railing, a series of small wheels propelling it forward inch by inch; at the far end, two robotic maintenance arms were tucked away. There was no ladder or way back up.
The platform was approaching the next break between containers, a thick black cable coiling from the gap. Alice moved to the front and wrapped the cable around her fist as more gunfire broke from above. She leaned back; the cable stretched then held, and she lifted her feet onto the side of the hull. It would take her weight. The gantry clanked onward as she hauled herself up, arm over arm. Her chest shrieked, her shoulders throbbed, but inch by inch, the deck crept closer. A small ledge ran below the top; she jammed her boot tips into it and looked down. The platform had almost passed her; only seconds remained. With a breath, she lifted her head.
Conner looked panicked and waved his gun at the sky while Xavi stood motionless, feet apart, hips pushed back as if he were riding a horse. He held what looked like a sawed-off shotgun at groin height, its stubby barrel jutting like a metal phallus, the tip tracking back and forth. Alice opened her mouth to call to them when another missile streaked through the sky to take Conner high on his left shoulder. He spun to the deck, gun clattering away, and lay silent.
“There you are,” Xavi said and fired.
The blast shook Alice’s feet from the ledge, and the drop beckoned below as she slithered down the container. She clung to the cable, rested her face against the cold metal hull, and dragged herself up. She understood now why Xavi had taken such an odd stance; his pelvis and legs had absorbed the gun’s recoil to push him across the greasy surface. His aim was true; twenty feet in the air, a tiny drone was spitting fire and blue smoke. A buzz rose in pitch as a glittering white flash seared her retina and smoking fragments pinged across the metal deck.
More gunshots broke the sudden silence;
these ones sounded different, quiet, a soft pfffft in the stillness. Alice knew silenced sniper fire from Mars and how deadly it was for anyone struck in the open. She watched as Xavi tossed his shotgun and rolled to the deck, flicking out his right hand as if he were trying to shake oil from it. As he moved, a long black rod dropped to his hand, two black handles unfolding from either end to form an inverted U. He grabbed these, extended the rod twelve inches, and sighted down the barrel. With a mechanical whine, an arm’s-length of flame burst from its end. Screams echoed in the distance.
Alice turned to look, but a large rusted crane to her right blocked her view. Xavi’s gun sliced the air once more as he rolled, aimed, and fired again. She’d seen enough soldiers in her time to recognize someone special, but he was too exposed to survive for long. Alice dragged herself up and onto the deck, the metal sucking warmth from her chest, and ran behind the crane. It was heavy, solid. She grabbed the knife from her jeans and rapped its handle on the metal, the dull clanging loud between gaps in the gunfire.
Xavi looked across, then sprinted over to dive next to her. His shirt was soaked red, and his left arm hung limp; he slumped to the deck, and blood pooled beneath him.
“You look like shit,” he said and coughed blood.
“Takes more than a horribly accurate assassin drone to keep me down.”
He laughed then grimaced in pain.
“How many are there?” she asked.
“Two, maybe more. North of here, containers are being cycled down so they have cover in the spaces left behind. They followed us, saw what we were doing, then launched the drone. They’re professional, no doubt.” Xavi stopped, breath hissing between his clenched teeth, and snapped his head beyond the crane.
Thuds ran up her spine as bullets cracked against the thick metal. They were using heavy caliber, armor-piercing.
“How bad are you hurt?” she asked.