Swarm

by Devon C Ford

  “Did you do this?” I stammered.

  “Well, I thought if we wanted privacy this would be better than a pod,” she said, taking my other hand in hers as she turned to face me. “They were nice and private, but my back has only just recovered.”

  I went red with embarrassment and tried to hide it by grabbing her and clumsily attempted to kiss her. Pushing me away she laughed and theatrically held her hand to her nose. “Whoa there, killer. You need a shower first, despite what you northerners may think of us southern girls, we do like our men to smell better than a four-day old jockstrap.” Pushing me to the door she told me she would go and get some food ready for when I had cleaned myself up.

  Despite whatever I thought I may get up to that night, by the time Cat returned, I was sprawled over the bed, a towel around my waist, fast asleep.

  ~

  Annie’s whispered voice calling my name from a speaker hidden in the wall behind me slowly and reluctantly woke me in the morning. Opening an eye, I saw Cat lying asleep beside me, her long hair draped over her face. My heart missed a beat at how beautiful she looked, and I couldn’t take my eyes off her.

  “Annie,” I groaned in a voice scare above a whisper, “five more minutes...”

  Cat’s eyes blinked slowly open as Annie replied, “Mister Weatherby has requested you attend a meeting in one hour.”

  “An hour?” I asked as I smiled at Cat. “Way more time than I need…” Annie’s only response was to sound the down-tone which, unless I imagined it, sounded like she was rolling her eyes at me.

  With my hair still sticking up all over the place an hour later I walked to where Hendricks and Amir were standing, both holding mugs of coffee in their hands. Hendricks gave me a wink as he handed another mug to me and I smiled back weakly knowing that he most likely knew what my new sleeping arrangements were.

  “Gentlemen,” Amir began, “I’ve only included the four of us at the moment as we hold all the answers we’ll need.” He glanced at Hendricks. “Can you give me your appraisal of our current security situation and ability to handle whatever may come at us?”

  “It’s good,” Hendricks answered. “With the new defrostees our strength, as you know, has greatly increased. Coupled with the fact that Tanaka’s army has been decimated, the only threat we should need to consider is another attack by The Swarm. Happily, Annie tells me that the moon is waning, and The Swarm tend only to emerge when it’s full—that’s backed up by Harrison and records Annie has retrieved from Charlie site—so we shouldn’t need to worry about them for another few weeks. The only outward action I do recommend is to send a patrol to conduct reconnaissance at the Springs.”

  “Thank you, Hendricks,” Weatherby said. “Security is your department, so please proceed as you wish.” He turned to me. “David, I want to know what the full capabilities are of combining Annie with the Annie at Charlie site.”

  “Surely she can tell you that herself?” I asked. “You don’t need me for that.”

  He smiled and shrugged his shoulders as if offering an amused apology. “I’ve already asked her and she told me to ask you.”

  “Annie, why do you need me?” I asked out loud.

  “With the two of us I calculate we can answer the question quicker and more efficiently.” I detected a tone of hesitation in her voice. “I have already told Mister Weatherby that when I add the memory and processing power of Charlie Annie my ability to operate on a wider scale will increase by a factor of four. But I…I…”

  “Annie, you okay?” I asked quickly

  “Yes, David,” she replied smoothly, back to her normal voice again. “It is just that I think it would be best for you to check the programming I am writing and inserting into my subroutines. They are now proven against the memory and processing power we currently have but I am concerned about my rate of development when that capacity is increased. I may attempt to evolve faster than I can control. That could lead to small errors being missed which could generate unforeseen problems which may be too late to correct.”

  In the silence that followed I looked at the other two. Was I not the only one once more suddenly with a vision of robots and machines destroying the human race when its self-aware, all controlling computer, decided to eradicate them as the greatest threat to its own survival?

  Seeing their faces, I was not.

  “Annie,” I said cautiously, “put everything in a sandbox and we’ll go through it line by line, okay?”

  Her voice when she responded sounded relieved. “Thank you, David. I would appreciate that.”

  “Sandbox?” Weatherby, still musing over what Annie had said, asked with an eyebrow raised in my direction.

  “Literally a safe space where we can program things which, if they don’t work, can’t get out of the sandbox to mess with other systems.”

  They understood, and I left to find some breakfast before I went back down the rabbit hole with Annie.

  Chapter 29

  The King Is Dead

  The four women of the Springs, now fully clothed, walked cautiously out onto the wide veranda of Tanaka’s private terrace, unsure of what to do next. They’d just killed their leader, and no matter how cruel and vicious and hated by some he was, there would still be some loyal supporters amongst the community that surrounded them.

  The night around them was full of the normal sounds that filled such a tightly packed community: a baby crying, immediately stopping as the child was comforted; a woman wailing in the distance, probably grieving the loss of a husband or child or maybe both; the soft call of sentries on the wall; the crackle of a log splitting in a fire. The night seemed normal, but it wasn’t. The air was filled with an electric sense of tension and unease. It was imperceptible, but it was there, and anyone used to the normal sounds of the community would feel it.

  “You, why are you there? Where is Sanchez?” a voice called to them from the darkness. The women froze in fear and clung together as a warrior emerged from the darkness.

  It was the warrior who had spoken openly against The Tanaka the previous day. Getting closer he recognized the women and his voice lowered and softened. “Come on, girls, get back inside. If that bastard Sanchez finds you away from his master’s chamber, you know what he’ll do to y…” his words faded into nothing as he got close enough to see the blood on their hands.

  The older woman, the one who had killed Sanchez stepped in front of the others, as if protecting them with her own body. They couldn’t hide what they had done for much longer; the dawn would soon start lightening the eastern sky and the community would wake.

  She knew the warrior. He had never been granted the honor of the inner circle, instead he lived with a wife and children in a small hut against the southern walls of the community. Even though he had been loyal to The Tanaka he had not been cruel and vindictive as others became when the power of their position grew larger than their morals.

  “Sanchez is dead,” the woman blurted out. “I killed him.”

  The warrior recoiled in shock at the words and hurriedly glanced around him to see who else was in earshot. Recovering quickly, he stepped closer to them.

  “Then go and hide,” he hissed in warning. “You cannot let The Tanaka find you.”

  He turned to walk away but stopped dead when the woman, with a steely edge to her voice, replied. “Tanaka is dead too. We killed him.”

  Not believing what he had heard he turned slowly and stared at them as he thought until, with a scream of alarm from all four women, he bounded up the stairs to the veranda and burst into Tanaka’s quarters.

  A minute later he emerged, white-faced with shock, to lean on the rail in silence for a long time as his mind raced. Eventually, his mind made up, he turned to the women. What had been done could not be undone, it was how to get the community to survive was the question.

  “Go and wake the Elders,” he ordered, reeling off a list of warriors he thought—hoped—he could trust. The elders did not hold as much influence as the one
s at the Three Hills did, but they were still respected and honored members of the community. Tanaka did not refer to them much, but the lesser members of the community did, as to raise anything with their leader usually resulted in a punishment of one form or another. The elders provided a valuable buffer, often solving disputes and issues without trouble or bringing them to the attention of The Tanaka.

  The Elders entered the bedchamber and stood looking at the man who had ruled them. They had all been community members a lot longer than the man who lay dead in his own bath with a knife sticking out of his chest. They all remembered The Tanaka that ruled before, and some of them the one before that. Indoctrinated in the culture they had lived under for hundreds of years, they were all loyal to the Springs. Some had once been part of the inner circle, before their advancing years caused them to be replaced. The current Tanaka preferred to surround himself with sycophantic followers and not ones who would, through experience gained during a long life serving and keeping the community safe, offer counter advice or question his decisions and orders.

  “It is done,” one of the Elders said quietly. “We must gather the people. Our strength has gone, wasted by the one lying dead in front of us. We cannot defend ourselves from the Three Hills, especially if what is said is true and they have forged an alliance with the newcomers; something HE,” the man spat, “refused to do in case he lost face. Our only avenue is peace, otherwise we face annihilation. We have a duty to protect the people of the Springs now more than ever.”

  With nods and murmurs of agreement from the others gathered around him, the elders filed from the room and walked onto the veranda.

  The elder looked at the warrior who was standing below him surrounded by the ones who had answered his call.

  “Sound the bell. Call the people.”

  The man approached the large triangle of metal that hung from a frame, picked up the steel rod leaning against it and, ringing it loudly, called the community to gather.

  ~

  Hendricks chose to include all the new soldiers in the patrol to reconnoiter the Springs the next day. It would give them all a good opportunity to acclimate to the surroundings and, as most had not served together, to work on unit cohesion. Annie was providing drone coverage, her voice continually updating Hendricks on the terrain ahead and what it contained.

  Two hours into the patrol Annie detected a concentration of wildlife ahead which on closer inspection proved to be a pack of Dragons and Hendricks decided to work into a position so everyone could observe them. Annie agreed eagerly to his proposal because she wanted to study them closely to aid her research. Hendricks wanted to show the soldiers what dangers they faced in the new world they were in, and also wanted to put his own fears to rest after the terror of having to fight them in the dark, dust-filled tunnel. His leg still hadn’t healed fully when one had scraped its teeth down him.

  Dr. Warren had inspected his wound, cleaning it thoroughly and redressing it, and had given him an injection of antibiotics declaring him lucky. The wound didn’t seem infected and if it had been any deeper, he would probably have walked with a limp for the rest of his life, so long as he didn’t lose his leg to infection.

  The line of men crept stealthily up to the ridge that overlooked where the Dragons were located. Not knowing how good their senses were Hendricks had chosen a place to observe them that was over two hundred meters from their position. All trained in observation and concealment techniques, the soldiers blended into their environment and lay still. It would take a trained eye to spot them at a distance further than five meters, either that or a nose finely attuned to predation.

  Fifteen pairs of eyes studied the pack through binoculars. Hendricks knew what he was going to see, but when the magnified sight filled his vision he gave an involuntary gasp. He heard others, either side of him, despite their training uttering gasps and low curses and he smiled wryly to himself.

  Welcome to the thirtieth century boys, he thought to himself.

  Over twenty Dragons of differing sizes were foraging through the forest floor below them, their long, scaly armor-covered bodies varied from ten feet long for the juveniles to over twenty-five for the largest adult and that didn’t include the thick tail. Their legs were short but overtly powerful-looking, and Annie’s earlier description of a Komodo dragon crossed with a saltwater crocodile was a fair description.

  “I’m repositioning the drone to get close,” Annie whispered in Hendricks’ ear. “It will approach from the opposite direction so as not to reveal your position.”

  The faint whirring of the drone moving above the sparse canopy caused the Dragons to react. With a burst of speed faster than anyone could have thought possible for something so big, the largest ones crashed through the undergrowth, their legs a blur as they raced toward the alien noise and their heads searched everywhere to locate the unknown sound. The rest of them acted as a pack; smaller ones were pushed into the center of the group and a ring of protection was formed around them. Every Dragon was emitting growls and hisses that easily reached our position with the exception of five—the largest ones—which began climbing the bigger tress to try and get closer to the sound.

  Annie was flying the drone about twenty feet above the largest Dragons, zipping around as she studied them from all angles.

  The ones still on the ground had all spotted the drone and their heads followed it perfectly as it moved, rearing up and using their tails to push them further upwards as their snapping teeth-filled jaws made percussive noises.

  “Note the behavior of the adult males,” Annie said almost conversationally. “It appears that the lounge are adopting protecti—”

  “The what?” Hendricks asked, interrupting her.

  “The collective terminology for a group of lizards, which I suspect the Dragons most closely resemble, is a lounge.”

  “Can we say pack? That sounds like people would understand.”

  “We can, if you prefer, Mister Hendricks,” Annie answered with such formality that it was obvious she was annoyed. “However, it would be incorrect.”

  One of the Dragons leaped from the tree it had climbed without hesitation, twisting its huge body as it followed the drone that darted to one side. Annie desperately steered it away but the thing caught it in its jaws and crashed to the ground with a thud that the men watching felt from their position.

  “Anything falling from that kind of height has to be injured,” Williamson hissed, but the Dragon leaped back up with the drone still trapped in its mighty jaws to charge around, swinging its head at trees and chomping down to smash the drone to pieces in a matter of seconds.

  Wide-eyed with shock the men watched with terrified awe the display of pure power and animalistic aggression being played out before them.

  “I’m…I’m blind now,” Annie spoke urgently in Hendricks’ ear. “Can you activate your body camera to enable me to continue monitoring?” Hendricks glanced at the others and could tell she was talking only to him, as though she was nervous or embarrassed.

  Hendricks pulled the camera from its pouch and attached it to the mount on his webbing pointing his body toward the Dragon still chewing on parts of drone.

  “Try and hold still,” she commanded, not having the time for pleasantries.

  Hendricks watched as the Dragon suddenly let out a louder roar, more of a screech of pain as it tossed its head from side to side desperately and opened its jaws wide like a snake to try and void itself of the thing it had destroyed.

  “It’s punctured the battery,” Annie exclaimed in Hendricks ear.

  “It’s what?” Hendricks uttered, not quite understanding what he was seeing. His first thought when smoke started pouring from its jaws was that it was going to turn into a real dragon and start breathing fire. If it had, he was not sure that even he could have fought the urge that was raging within him to run away from such a hellish scene screaming in utter terror.

  “The chemical reaction activated when the battery is compromised
and exposed to atmosphere can cause a violently combustible effect,” Annie tried to explain, but Hendricks was still staring at the scene below him, his eyes, usually calm, full of terror.

  The rest of the pack—lounge—followed the still screeching Dragon as it thundered away through the undergrowth at a speed none of them had seen an animal move before and disappeared from view. Its harrowing, bone-chilling screech could be heard for a long time after it was lost from sight, but thankfully getting further away all the time.

  Letting out a long breath, Hendricks rose to his knees and spoke with a sotto voice, trying to use comedy to ease his still jangling nerves. “I think you broke the drone, Annie.”

  “I didn’t, the Dragon did,” she replied in an annoyed tone. “I will, however, admit to underestimating the levels of aggression and problem-solving they displayed. When I have analyzed the data more, I will present my theories, but first I must deploy another drone to replace the one destroyed. I was detecting no other threats in the area, so to keep on timescale, if you continue on a bearing of zero-five-zero degrees it will be overhead in approximately ten minutes.”

  Hendricks looked at the men on either side of him, their faces also showing disbelief at what they had just witnessed.

  “Welcome to the thirtieth century boys,” he muttered again

  ~

  Hendricks studied the walls of the settlement he had been to once before through his binoculars from the cover of the dense foliage that grew at the edge of the forest.

  “Do you see what I see?” Annie asked.

  “Yes, can you get a closer look?” Hendricks replied staring at a section of wall. Within seconds the replacement drone zipped over the cleared ground toward the gates and hovered still for a few seconds before gaining height and returning overhead.