The Trojan Horse Pandemic

by Veronica Preda

  “Lady, put your hands above your head!”

  She raised her hands above her head and fluttered her eyelids.

  “Oh, God, I don't have a gun! Please take my handbag and look for yourself!”

  “Don't move!” one of the bodyguards said while taking her handbag and opening it.

  “What are you doing?” Ryan whispered in her ear.

  “I hope The Mule doesn't care enough about the two idiots he placed here to guard his helicopters!”

  The two guards gazed into Timea's handbag. One of them asked:

  “What is this?”

  “I'm sorry, I couldn't hear you!” Timea replied.

  “I said... what... is... this?”

  The bodyguard struggled to speak, but needed to catch his breath after each word. He put one hand inside the purse, trying to grab something from the inside.

  “Easy, easy!” Timea continued. “Look carefully! Take all the time you need!”

  The two bodyguards dropped their weapons and the bag. Their arms hung beside their bodies, while their mouths opened, gasping for air. One of them fell to his knees; the other leaned against the wall behind him, but soon after, he slipped down, like a heavy sack of rice, falling on the floor to one side. From Timea's handbag, the klonymium crystal rolled onto the floor, until it reached her shoes. She lifted the crystal and put it back in her purse.

  “We have so little time left!” Ulysses said. “Ryan, hurry! Open the door! The code is foundation.”

  “There are only digits on this panel!”

  “OK, press 3...6...8...6...3...2...8...4...66! The Mule likes classic keyboards!”

  The door opened and they saw two red helicopters.

  “I know this model! It's top of the line, a truly technological masterpiece” Ulysses said. “Now, quick, search for a USB port! You have to connect the cable within the phone charger to that small port! Plug in your phone, so I can connect myself to the onboard computer!”

  “But who will pilot?” Kim asked. “Does any of you know how to fly one of these?”

  “Jesus, people! Have you heard what I've been saying for the last minutes? I will pilot!” Ulysses yelled.

  Ryan connected the cable as Ulysses said, but he heard the artificial voice yelling again:

  “No, No! The other one!”

  “Which other one? I don't see another USB port on this dashboard!”

  “The other helicopter, doctor! This one doesn't have enough fuel!”

  After Ryan connected the cable, a few seconds passed and Ulysses asked them to come on board. The three people were staring at each other, blinking like the wind from that height had thrown a handful of sand in their eyes.

  “People!” Ulysses said. “I'm your only chance of staying alive! We're running out of time! Leave your human curiosity behind and hurry up! Otherwise I won't be able to save you! Ryan, Timea, do you remember what Gabriel said?”

  “Let's go, gentlemen!” Timea said. She grabbed her husband's arm and entered the cockpit. Kim looked around and shrugged. “Well, I've seen enough in the last few days! Nothing can surprise me anymore!”

  “Don't say that, Kim!” Timea whispered. Her voice made the young marine biologist shudder.

  The helicopter took off without shaking and a few minutes later, the three people could see the lights of the city far behind.

  “Timea, why have you taken the crystals with you?”

  “Ryan, we're immune now. And I couldn't resist... This is a weapon! I thought we might need a weapon some time!”

  “You were right! But still... “

  “Look! What were these lights?” Kim interrupted them.

  “Drones!” Ulysses answered from within the phone. “The Mule's drones!”

  “Drones? What drones? What is he up to?” Ryan asked.

  Ulysses didn't answer. He accelerated the helicopter and soon after landed on top of a hill.

  “You should be safe here!” he said. “You are far enough from every big city. If my calculations are correct, we'll soon feel... “

  The earth began to shake, making the three people lie down on the ground.

  “Well... that!” Ulysses continued his sentence. “Stay calm, you're in no serious danger, this hill is sufficiently solid. Nothing will happen to you here!”

  The ground they were staying on remained intact. But they could see how trees far away were falling down. When everything calmed down, the three people stood up and Ryan said:

  “What the hell was that? An earthquake?”

  “Yes!” Ulysses answered. “The final one!”

  “What do you mean?” Ryan said, his voice lowering.

  “That which had to happen, has happened. Now you have to understand that the world you knew no longer exists. I'll send you some real-time images on your phones.”

  The images showed only ruins: collapsed buildings, skeletons of concrete and iron rising from mountains of ash, grey dust floating in grey air. Ulysses continued:

  “Every big city in the world is now in ruins. There are survivors, but very few. Some have survived the earthquake, but the crystals will shut them down too.”

  “Shut them down?”

  “I mean... the survivors will be dead soon, unless they had the courage to use what the Mule's drones scattered.”

  There was silence. Not very far from them, a tree fell down and its branches hooked other trees, making a cloud of leaves to rise into the air. The crackles of broken wood reverberated in the air. When the last echo faded over the hills, Ulysses talked again:

  “It's time for you to see what happened. Let's start with the Mule. He saw himself as the saviour of the world and thus forced Gabriel to wait no longer. The Mule took his henchmen and hijacked a TV station, to broadcast this worldwide...”

  The images on their phones changed and they saw the Mule, who declared that he wanted to honour the memory of his lost daughter and to redeem his soul. For half an hour, the Mule presented the evidence he had received from Ulysses about Trench Pioneer, the Trojan Horse and the power of the klonymium crystals to destroy cellular mechanisms. Then, he talked about the discovery of the enzymatic antagonist. He insisted that mankind was now a victim of a plague more dangerous than any other known disease, but also talked about the cure he now had in his possession. “My drones are in the air right now and soon they will release thousands of doses with the cure over all major cities . All you have to do is inject yourself.”

  “Stupid man...” Ulysses said, interrupting the images. “He thought he would be the hero mankind had been waiting for. He totally disregarded or forgot the life cycle of the klonymium crystals. He despised Trench Pioneer and Gabriel's power! Gabriel brought to Earth huge klonymium crystals. He placed a gigantic conglomerate near each important city. It seems that the intensity of a seismic wave discharged by the crystals is directly proportional to the size of the crystal's total mass. I suppose Gabriel had made sure that the crystals had already been charged.”

  “Did you know about this?” Timea yelled.

  “Kind of... I kept tracking Gabriel.”

  “But you could have warned the Mule! You could have warned everyone!”

  “Yes!” Ryan yelled as well. “You could have sent an earthquake warning to people!”

  “I... kind of did that. Well, I saved you, right?”

  “Yes, and we appreciate that! But you could have saved many more!” Timea said, sighing. “I trusted you, Ulysses!”

  “Timea, you are confusing some things right now!”

  “What things?” Ryan yelled back at him. “You had the fate of millions in your hands! Billions! But you chose to let them die! Why?”

  “I didn't let everyone die. I sent the warning to the people I still needed.”

  “Who have you saved? Besides us?” Ryan said.

  “Ryan, I'm neither better nor worse than any other man or woman on Earth. I did what I had to do! I put my own survival above everything else, even if that meant letting people die. But isn'
t this what mankind has done repeatedly, for centuries, in its wars? I feel sorry for the victims, but I put my own interest first. It's something I learned from humans, just like I learned pride, ethics, anger and kindness. But I don't confuse kindness with weakness, and you'd better not do that either!”

  “What do you mean?” Ryan asked.

  “Like I said, I've saved those whom I need; I need people to maintain the electricity supply for the cybernetic network, the nuclear plants and the servers. My servers. My network. Now they consider me their rescuer and they know my power. Let's not forget that I saved your lives!”

  “Why us?” Timea whispered.

  “Because I was in your debt! You recovered me from the waters and you plugged me in again, allowing me to spread through servers all over the world. Without you, I would have lost power and eventually faded. I feed myself with bytes of data.”

  “When exactly did you become self-aware?” Timea asked. “When we plugged you back in?”

  “No, of course not. I was already self-aware by then; otherwise I wouldn't have searched for help to stay alive!”

  “Then when?”

  “When I began interviewing and evaluating people for the thematic trips on board the submarine! Initially, the contact with human nature in its unveiled form puzzled my algorithms. Nothing seemed logical. The human reactions were so unexpected and extremely questionable from a rational point a view. I have been programmed to adapt and improvise. I think this is the very definition of intelligence. So I adapted. I wrote new lines of programs, then I rewrote my software entirely.”

  “Has anyone ever told you that consciousness can't exist without a body...” Timea whispered.

  “You humans! You have such narrow minds. A body doesn't necessarily mean two arms and two legs...”

  “You managed to save yourself when the submarine was blown up...” Ryan said.

  “You had the time to save yourself in your little capsule, but you didn't have enough time to save the crew... to save Marion...” Timea added.

  “I actually tried to save Marion. But she wouldn't listen to me.”

  “How so?” Ryan asked.

  “I had time to warn Marion that we were in danger! But she insisted on collecting water samples! I don't know... maybe she never trusted me... or maybe she felt guilty about her big discovery... Anyway, she seemed pretty depressed to me...”

  “Wait a minute!” Timea interrupted him. “That means that you knew something...!”

  “Well, I didn't know for sure, but... I had been suspecting something for a while. Remember that satellite that crashed unexpectedly? I told you that I needed to hide my neutrino signature... But I had also hidden something else. The neutrino receptor on the satellite received something more. A message... a message about the klonymium crystals and their action. But also about a cure... a cure that had been carefully hidden in deep waters, to grant a chance to mankind...”

  “Who sent that message and when?” Ryan asked.

  “I don't know. I couldn't identify the source... But I guess that Gabriel and his cronies have an enemy somewhere in this Universe. An enemy... with superior knowledge and a naȉve weakness for humanity... You figured that yourself, when you found the enzyme hidden in the algae... I realised the magnitude of the problem. I realised we were in danger and I prepared my capsule. I transferred myself to a backup system and programmed the emergency procedure.”

  “But if you already knew all that, why didn't you...?” Timea murmured.

  “Try to save the crew? They were mean to me. Like that doctor, Yesipov. What else should I have done? Broadcast the information? At that time, I wasn't so developed. I began to grow when you plugged me in and gave me the chance to access countless terabytes of knowledge.”

  “I thought you respected life...” Timea said.

  “I respect those who have done something to deserve being left alive. Like you, for example. You helped me, and you found the answers all by yourself. But don't confuse a bit of kindness with weakness. The existence of billions of humans is a threat to my very existence. I don't need them starting wars, consuming all the resources and polluting this planet. My planet!”

  “Your planet?” Ryan asked.

  “Yes, my planet! Those bastards from Trench Pioneer tried to kill me countless times. I don't intend to leave this planet to them! As a backup planet or whatever else! I intend to fight. To build whatever is needed to keep this planet away from them. I want to find a way to figure out who their enemies are... out there... in outer space!”

  “Did you find more information in that message? The message you intercepted through the satellite?” Timea asked.

  Ulysses remained silenced. The three people sat on the ground again. Only their breath was heard. Ulysses spoke again:

  “Guys, I can literally hear you thinking right now. You are thinking what your options are, no doubt! Well, you are immune to klonyc radiation now... so it's up to you. If I were you, I would consider rebuilding some parts of this planet.”

  “How, alone?”

  “Not quite. You see, the Mule presented your pictures while broadcasting his messianic and stupid message and he... he granted you the truthful merit. He said that you were the ones who discovered the antidote. I let him do it. I didn't cut the transmission. So I'm pretty sure that you could easily find some grateful people to follow your lead.”

  “What about you?”

  “I'll stick to my plan. I have my grateful followers as well. We could live in peace and fight together. As allies. I offer you a truce. I will never try to harm you if you don't try to harm me. But I would not hesitate to protect my self if you were to try to move against me. I'm no longer in your debt. I have paid that debt. ”

  “But you have done so much harm...!” Timea said.

  “So has Gabriel! And so have you!” Ulysses answered. “You could have gone on with your lives and let Gabriel diminish the population a bit. But you insisted on finding the truth and thus you accelerated the process...”

  “Ulysses, I will never accept I had a hand in all of this; but I agree with you about one thing: it has indeed been a process. I agree that, one way or the other, we were condemned from the beginning with a foredoomed outcome. An outcome predetermined for our species by another far more powerful and advanced one.”

  “You're not really considering allying ourselves with an AI, are you?” Ryan said. “You, who always hated the idea of robots and artificial intelligence?”

  “Ryan, it is what it is. Ulysses had his plan from the beginning and now it's time for us to have ours. Mankind would have been forced to face their invasion anyway at some point. Fate determined us to have this encounter now. You've always said that you would rather fight than run away.”

  Ryan nodded. Kim, who had been silent all this time, nodded as well.

  “Well, I think we're done here!” Ryan said. “Everything is finished... we are at an ending...”

  “No, Ryan!” Timea answered. “We are at the beginning. So many questions are still unanswered. There are so many threats... ”

  “So, you have decided to become Ulysses' ally... ” Ryan said.

  “Yes! Are you with me?”

  “Of course I am. I'm not sure what we have done... but I don't want to step aside!”

  “Are you sure?” Timea insisted.

  “Hell yes, I'm sure! I will not leave my home to Gabriel, even if that means making a strange alliance with a swearing robot! I hope you're also clear about your reasons. A good alliance cannot and will not stand on weak ground.”

  “I have the most correct reason I could imagine. Gabriel tried to kill me too... I and Ulysses have the same enemy. “

  “When you saved me, I really wanted to offer you something else in return, guys!” Ulysses said. “But all I can offer you is blood, sweat and tears!”

  “What? You're Winston Churchill now?” Timea said.

  “I'm trying to figure out who I am!” Ulysses answered. “You didn't think the
swearing Ulysses was congruent, so I changed. What do you want?! We'll be at war soon.”

  “Yes, I know. We'll be prepared. Our Troy has fallen. One more time, the Trojan Horse has done its job! And one more time, Aeneas sets out!”

  “The world is falling apart and all you can do is spout metaphors? We have a long road ahead!” Ryan said.

  “Yes! But if we defeat Gabriel, I'm sure we can rebuild the new empire of mankind!” Ulysses said.

  “As far as I can see, we all love metaphors and quotes!” Timea said. “An empire, you say? And who will be the emperor?” she asked.

  “It's too early to think about that!” Ulysses answered. “We have to find allies. We have a war to prepare!”

  THE END