The Spire

by Peter F Smith

  He couldn’t make out where the Marine’s eyes were directed, hidden behind the polarized ballistic resistant glasses that he wore, but the slight shift of his head led him to believe that he was looking through the open windows to verify his statement. He kept his rifle pointed directly at Miller’s chest, his hand going to a pouch on his vest. He doubted the Marine needed the rifle. The heavy weapons on those armored vehicles were likely controlled by a limited AI program. The moment Miller made a sudden move toward his rifle he and the entire SUV would be ripped to shreds, but he still appreciated the caution of the man.

  The Marine fished a device out of the pouch. Miller was able to watch it all since the man was a front line warrior and not a member of Marine Special Operations. Unlike the group they just left, this soldier didn’t get the fanciest equipment. He activated the device and presented it to Miller. The display asked for his fingerprints. Aaron had dealt with devices like this a lot, not only would it verify fingerprints, but it would also analyze DNA. He watched as it scanned his fingers and then asked him to remove them. The Marine took the pad, pressed a button, and reviewed the results. That sequence of events wasn’t an accident. The designers wanted to make sure that those who were lying about their identities didn’t know that their cover was blown until the soldier decided to reveal that information at a time and situation of their choosing.

  He nodded and slipped the device back into the pouch. Miller noticed several of the nearby Marines relax ever so slightly, and the man before him motioned toward the SUV with his head. “Show me where my Marine is."

  Miller activated the lift gate with his virtual vision and walked slowly to the rear. The Marine cautiously went around the corner of the vehicle keeping his rifle trained forward as he did. Walter waved at him and the medical drone kneeling over the wounded Marine didn’t even bother to acknowledge the new soldier’s presence as it continued to work. He took out the device again, grabbed the crippled man’s hand, and placed it on the screen. A second later he was looking over the results and, apparently satisfied, he placed the device back in his vest. He must have been communicating via text because after a moment the armored vehicle in front began to roll aside giving them access to the bridge.

  “Our AI will guide you to the field hospital across the bridge. Captain Bass will be waiting to approve you to move deeper into the safe zone. If you do anything to take back control of your vehicle or leave it or you just in general give us any reason to doubt your peaceful intention, then the mighty mouse beneath your car will put a stop to you real fast.”

  “Thanks for letting us through.”

  The man nodded and walked back toward the line of vehicles. Miller got back in the SUV and they began to roll forward under the control of the Marine’s artificial intelligence system. They entered the bridge and after a few dozen yards began driving past a line of armor and transport vehicles that were making their way across it heading toward the White House and Capitol Building.

  “Maria, look out the window,” Miller said to the young girl.

  She raised her head and looked out the shattered glass at the convoy of vehicles and soldiers. “You see them sweetheart? Those are the good guys, and they’re going to make everything right again.”

  “Are they soldiers like you, Walter, and Natalia?”

  Tommy sat up a little bit, a quizzical look on his face. Miller chuckled, “Yes, they are darlin’ and they’re going to punish the bad men that did all this."

  “Are they going to get hurt like the man?” She looked over her shoulder as she asked.

  Eva stroked her hair, “Don’t worry about that mija.”

  Miller didn’t know exactly how to answer that. She was smart and he knew she could understand, but he didn’t want to put too much on her at such a young age. “Some will get hurt,” he hesitated unsure how to continue. “But guys like us know that might happen.”

  “Could some of them die?”

  He glanced at Eva, her eyes squeezed shut in grief. He understood why. What parent would want their daughter to be so intimately familiar with such concepts? “Yes.”

  “Then why are they doing it?”

  “Smart kid,” Tommy murmured.

  “They want to make sure that little ones like you are safe from the bad guys, and they know that no one else will.”

  “My daddy will, and you and your friends won’t have to be hurt by the bad guys.”

  Miller’s face stretched into a smile. “I’m sure he’s already working on ways to stop them.”

  The rest of the trip was uneventful compared to what they had gone through to get to the bridge. Their passenger was collected at a small temporary operating base on the other side of the Potomac. The gratitude of returning one of their own made the time Miller’s group was held for questioning shorter, but didn’t prevent it. As they approached Ronald Reagan International Airport, still under the control of the Marine artificial intelligence system and the watchful eye of the drone that was keeping pace beneath the vehicle, Miller activated a call to Mr. Patterson.

  After a moment the Chief Operating Officer of Multi National Robotics appeared in his vision. “Are they okay?” he blurted out.

  Miller nodded, the program simulating that movement in Patterson’s view. “Yes, not even a scratch.”

  Patterson’s head and shoulders dropped, the stress visibly leaving him. “Thank you.”

  Miller nodded awkwardly, accepting the appreciation. “We’re almost to the airport. They’ll be with you soon."

  Jacob wiped his cheek quickly and then looked up saying, “The FAA has grounded all air travel except for military or government. I’ve managed to secure permission for you to fly.”

  “Good to be King, right?” Miller said with a slight smirk. “You can speak to the girls now if you want.”

  He shook his head. “I’ll leave them be until you get home. I don’t want to risk shaking their focus and make your job harder."

  “See you in about an hour.”

  ___

  The SUV pulled up to the private hangar that MNR operated out of Ronald Reagan International Airport as the large doors rolled open to expose two separate vertical takeoff jets with Multi National Robotics written in a forward leaning font along their bodies. Miller always thought that the style was meant to symbolize MNRs constant rush into the future. The jet on the right was the one that Miller had used to bring Eva and Maria into Washington D.C. for their time at the Mall.

  The other belonged to the CEO of the company Robert Stewart who had been at the Capitol Building when the insurgents had struck. Miller knew his personal security team. They were former soldiers that had gone mercenary before becoming corporate security. He had never been impressed with their professionalism or commitment to their client’s safety. He worried that the second jet would remain in the hangar for some time until it was reluctantly recalled back to the corporate office.

  They all made their way up the stairs into the aircraft. Miller and Natalia helped to move Walter into the cabin, placing him onto one of the several beds that was located inside. The drone continued to tend to him transmitting all necessary data to the medical bay located at the Spire. Natalia pulled a chair up in the small sleeping area. She would never leave his side. It was standard procedure for both of them. Tommy sat in a chair, his rifle still in his grip. It would stay that way until the plane left the ground and they were safely at traveling altitude.

  Miller watched as both Eva and Maria found their favorite large couch across from the wall-spanning view screen. He accessed the flight controls and ordered the autopilot to initiate. It took care of everything from filing flight plans to communicating with air traffic control, all the way, to getting them from point A to point B efficiently and safely. When he made the mistake of thinking about it, the fact that the jet didn’t have a cockpit made his skin crawl.

  The plane began moving itself from the hanger slotting into line behind the litany of government jets taxiing for takeoff. He l
ooked out the windows quickly verifying that the jet engines on the front and rear wings were functioning properly. He would never admit it to his team, but after they had been shot down inserting into China, he had never felt comfortable flying, and this little ritual was the only bit of neurosis that he permitted himself.

  After completing his unnecessary visual check, he grabbed a blanket from one of the in cabin closets and handed it over to Eva. She mouthed her thanks, draping it over her daughter, and motioned for him to sit next to Maria who was sleeping with her head in her mother’s lap. “I can’t thank you and your people enough.”

  Miller waved her off, whispering, “I’m sorry I exposed you both to more risk at the Washington Monument. I just couldn’t leave those men out there to die.”

  She began to blink rapidly and pulled a tissue from the box she had on the couch dabbing beneath her eyes. “Of course you’d apologize.”

  His brow furrowed slightly in confusion. She looked him directly in the eyes. “We shouldn’t… you and your team shouldn’t have even been here. We only came because I wanted to make sure Maria had the chance to experience the Mall."

  “With all the insanity that was happening with the protests even before this… whatever it is that we just went through. It makes sense that you’d want her to get a chance to see it." He smiled, “Plus it’s not like you could have known this was going to go down.”

  She stroked her daughter’s hair. “We don’t deserve you Aaron."

  He suppressed a laugh. “We could have worked for anyone Eva. We chose you and your husband because, even though you’re richer than God, you spent more money on charitable work and ethical startups than the next hundred wealthiest people combined."

  She looked away from him and toward the wall, which was displaying the view of the horizon that they would see from their cruising altitude, the sun perpetually setting in the video. “Eva, you and your husband are the reason why all of us have the gift of near immortality. You risked tanking MNR so that you could purchase the biotech company that owned the patent to the Longevity Vaccine. How much did that cost by the way?”

  “Over a billion from our personal assets.”

  He smiled from ear to ear. “And how much money did you make off of it?”

  “We sold the drug almost at cost.”

  “Which is why it only took two hundred dollars for me to get my dose and why so many others who couldn’t even afford that were able to get it for free. You both are saints.” He looked at the same vista she was. “I stopped being truly proud of who I worked for in 2017. I didn’t know if I would ever be proud of my boss again until I started working for you five years ago. Your family is more than worthy of me. I won’t speak for my team, but I doubt they would say different."

  “Thank you Aaron.”

  The plane angled toward the sky and the engines throttled upward as its landing gear left the ground. Their stomachs feeling slightly light. “We’ll be in New York in an hour. You should get some rest.”

  She chuckled, “Says the man who was shot.”

  He smiled coyly at her. “You get used to it." That wasn’t the truth. You never acclimated to almost dying. Each event just piled on top of the next until you either succumbed to the stress and destroyed your life or figured out a way to constructively deal with it.

  He got up and walked over to the closet and retrieved another blanket. He walked up to Tommy who was asleep, his rifle set to safe and across his lap. Miller draped the blanket over him and checked on Natalia and Walter before finally heading into the restroom to examine his wounds and reflect on whether he could best protect Eva and Maria by waiting for this new enemy to come to them or by taking the fight to those that would harm them.

  Jacob Patterson

  He gripped the back of the chair, his head hanging low between his outstretched arms. He focused on deep and controlled breaths so that he could bring his heart rate under control. The pounding in his ears began to fade, but the guilt remained and rage still burned in his heart. He never should have let them go to D.C. so close to the implementation date. He never should have allowed Chen to maneuver into a position that made it possible for him to manipulate Stewart into meeting with Congress before it was time. He never should have told the others about the initiation event that would be used to activate the AI programs embedded in social media and global communication networks. His mistakes had nearly resulted in both Eva and Maria dying. If she had been killed, he wouldn’t have been able to go on. Maria was such a large part of his plans that without her it was all for nothing.

  But she hadn’t died, hadn’t even been hurt. She had been saved by the team he had enlisted to protect her in the event such unforeseen events took place. By a man that he suspected, after watching through his eyes, might harbor some feelings for his wife and child. Patterson doubted that Miller was even aware of them. Miller had been hired to protect his family partly because of his skill but also because of his strained family past. If he grew a deeper connection to his family, then Miller would fight that much harder to protect them. However, his honor would keep him from ever acting on those desires.

  Patterson shook his head in disgust at his actions, but his pulse was beginning to subside. The fact that he had created the situation that led to the need for such a man and his team was upsetting, but he knew it was all necessary. After all he couldn’t have openly supported the 70/30 movement without losing his job on the board of MNR. Making himself into the poster child of automation and artificial intelligence would keep his colleagues from suspecting him of trying to prevent it.

  He needed to refocus. He had spent far too much time following every move Miller made in removing his family from that situation that he had neglected any number of other tasks. He bent over and picked up the bottle of water he had thrown against the ground when Aaron had stopped to save the pinned Marines. He took a sip of what hadn’t poured out.

  He pulled up the various status reports from his Artificial Intelligence programs as they processed through the volumes of social media and communications data. It appeared as if they had identified the most advanced of the assailants as members of a group known as the Guardians of Christianity. They were connected to several mega churches. They had been spending considerable sums of money in Africa and had caught his attention early, if only peripherally. It would appear that they had been plotting for some time to initiate a global revolution and he hadn’t anticipated it.

  He added this lapse to his growing list of failures. He reviewed some of the personal text messages that his AI programs had unearthed between their leadership and cells. He raised an eyebrow at the number of communications that had been labeled as sexual in nature by the programs. They were well-organized, funded, and trained, but their digital game was, while existent, in no way inspired.

  His AI programs had already identified and accessed all of their relevant digital files and tools. He could delete all of their materials, cripple their organizational system, or manipulate their communications to deliver them to the military. Instead he decided to utilize them as an additional resource during the next phase, turning them from a challenge to an asset. He ordered the AI systems to continue to mine data from all of their devices while expanding throughout their network and beginning to generate digital renderings of all of their leadership to be used in future disinformation videos.

  He had to be careful though since he had already detected several signs that his programs may not be the only ones lurking within some of the GC’s networks. He had gone to considerable effort and expense to make sure that his systems were incredibly difficult to trace but, given enough time and computational power, even he could be found. Which was why he was cautious as he snooped through this Network. The other intrusion was likely from the National Security Agency. They had learned of the GC after they had taken out the aerial combat drone over D.C. It made sense because only the NSA would have had the computational power at its disposal to rip apart the firewalls that
had been erected to protect the Guardians control of the drone in the short period of time that had passed from when the military realized it had been compromised to when the NSA overrode its flight systems and crashed it into the ground.

  While MNRs entire revenue and expenditures were in excess of what he figured their budget was, he also knew that his organization had to financially support a vast array of projects and that the NSA focused on just one. He was under no illusions as to what would happen if they found his programs and how long it would take for them to trace them back to the shell companies he had established to house their servers. From there it wouldn’t take much more for the NSA AIs to put the pieces together and trace it back to him. Which, if it occurred before he was prepared, would place the entire plan into jeopardy. The steps he had taken to neutralize their main campus in Fort Meade had been risky enough, so for right now he avoided any significant digital actions that might take their attention from poorly trained insurrectionists and the Guardians.

  He minimized the windows with that data, informing his personal digital assistant to alert him if anything of significant importance popped up. He only had a few minutes before he had to join the conference call with all the other members of the board, and he needed to verify that the other elements were progressing as needed. He pulled up the data from each of the twenty Spires that were located in major cities across six continents. He also made sure to pull the information from the hundreds of research, production, and distribution facilities that existed globally. Shipping of raw materials was proceeding as expected, as was production of drones. There were dips at facilities that were already feeling the disruptive effects of rioting and rebellion, but many of the vehicles were rerouting to avoid traffic issues caused by those events and shifting to alternate production facilities. Since the drones were being stored on site, there was no worry about that. The water distribution systems were priming and nearly ready to present the contagion into the urban water supplies. Other facilities in more remote locales had been equipped with aerosol dispersion systems.