The Transhumanist Wager

by Zoltan Istvan

  Clueless, the guards looked at each other. They were surprised the reverend was even asking them.

  “I don’t know, Reverend,” answered the senior guard. “But what should we do?”

  “Protect me, you idiot. Guard the door. Close it behind me and shoot anyone who comes down here. We’ll wait for army reinforcements. I’m sure the emergency signal was tripped and they’ll arrive shortly.”

  Belinas turned to go, but spun around abruptly, and said, “Wait—give me your pistol first.”

  The bodyguard obeyed and shut the heavy steel door behind him. Belinas walked towards Jethro Knights and cocked the .45 caliber handgun. The preacher raised the gun and pointed it at him, a half meter away from his face.

  “Whatever happens here today, Mr. Knights, I swear on the power of almighty God, you are not leaving here alive.”

  The next moments defied all of Belinas’ expectations. Jethro laughed out loud, unhurried. It was a booming, contemptuous sound from the depths of his stomach.

  “Now who's being naïve, preacher? You’re still like an ape on the savannah. And your God is just an imaginary manifestation in your primitive cortex. Don't you know you don’t have enough bullets in that gun to kill me? A surgery center ten times more advanced than anything on this continent is on that aircraft up there. My rescue team will be here in less than sixty seconds. No matter what you do here now, you’re the loser. And I swear upon my nation, your life and the space you take up in our world are just about over.”

  Fear shot out of Belinas’ eyes. The reverend didn't want to believe it. He wouldn't believe it. He glowered at Jethro, and wrathfully pulled his gun’s trigger. But at the same instant that the bullet ignited, the underground compound rocked hard all around him. A massive explosion somewhere in the cave had erupted, shifting the structure of the complex. Belinas toppled over onto his knees as the gun fired. The bullet whizzed forward and penetrated Jethro’s shoulder right below the collar bone. The transhumanist yelled out in pain and clenched his fists. Belinas tried to get up and shoot again, but Jethro was quicker. He jumped out of the chair with his handcuffed hands, sprinted four steps, and punted the preacher in the torso with the full force of his right foot. Belinas lifted six inches into the air, gasping as bones cracked in his rib cage.

  Jethro was about to kick him in the head, but just then a second explosion, vastly more violent than the first one, rattled the underground structure. A giant fireball careened from the cave’s entrance inward and spanned the entire length of the compound, scorching everything in its path. Belinas’ two bodyguards watched in disbelief as the inferno raced towards them. When the blast reached the guards, it threw them into each other and lit them on fire. Falling rock from the shaking cave ceiling pummeled the screaming men as they burned to death.

  Inside Jethro’s room, the jolt from the second explosion sent him flying into the air. He threw his bound hands over his head to protect himself as he collided with the cement wall. Around him, he could feel the temperature soaring, but the heavy metal door, now partly buried in rock, protected him and Belinas from the worst of the inferno. Jethro raised his sweaty, chained hands to his mouth, trying to filter the dust and smoke he was breathing.

  When everything was still and the heat had dissipated, Jethro staggered up. Debris was everywhere. All the tables and chairs were overturned. Instruments and tools littered the cracked, uneven floor. He found Belinas near the room’s entrance. The preacher was disoriented and trying to dig himself out of rubble—a concrete wall had partly collapsed on him. Jethro roughly pulled Belinas from the wreckage and jumped behind him, wrapping his handcuffs around the preacher’s throat. He squeezed the chains tight.

  Littered air and smoke were ubiquitous, but they began filtering out through some of the broken walls and holes in the ceiling. Tiny, faraway rays of sunlight from the cave’s entrance beamed sporadically above them. Belinas heaved hard, gasping for breaths, begging Jethro not to choke him to death.

  “Don’t worry, preacher. Not yet. Not until you see what I want you to see.”

  It was surprisingly quiet now. The aircraft had quickly landed and shut off its engines. Soon, just outside the damaged entryway of the torture room, someone began moving rubble. Huge chunks of concrete were heard being lifted away. Rebar was twisted and ripped out with intense strength. Belinas still couldn't see much because of the filthy air and smoke. His ears, however, heard the use of hydraulic parts and metal scraping against cement. The preacher tried calling out to his guards, but no one answered. He thought it was strange that the person digging only a few feet away from him didn’t shout or ask anything, either of himself or of Jethro.

  After another thirty seconds, a handlike object pushed through a crumbling hole in the wall near Belinas. It possessed seven fingers: three of them smaller and more intricate than those of humans; four were much larger and more powerful. The hand was made of a metal-based compound, trending slightly to an orange hue, but it wasn't a metal known to more than a few thousand people. Jethro immediately recognized which robot it was from its finger configuration.

  The metal hand reached deeper into the room and touched Belinas' left thigh, slowly dragging its sharp fingers against it until it reached his ankle.

  “Get that thing off me,” Belinas cried, trying to jump back.

  The robot tightened its grip on the preacher’s ankle and crushed it like an overripe strawberry.

  “Soldierbot—stop.”

  Immediately the metal hand released the crippled foot, responding to its commander's voice.

  Belinas sobbed, and stared in disbelief at his destroyed ankle, its cracked bones shooting through his skin. Blood oozed everywhere. Soon his sobs quieted though, as he registered shock at what emerged from the smoke. Belinas watched an eight-foot robot rip out a chunk of wall near him, then agilely fit through the small opening to enter the room. Inside, the robot stood up straight, appearing in its full form. Thin streams of light radiated around its haunting figure. Its head was just inches below the fractured ceiling. It peered into Belinas’ eyes.

  “Oh no. It can't be,” Belinas whimpered.

  “Yes, preacher, it can—and it is. Welcome to the future of the Transhuman Revolution.”

  Belinas' mind frantically ran through various scenarios. He unconsciously grabbed the miniature wooden cross on his neck and began reciting a prayer.

  “Where is God now, Belinas?” whispered Jethro into his ear. “This is your God. And it's here for me to command. Part of its main microprocessor chip is already in my head. That's how it found me. You could say we're almost one already.”

  The reverend stared, horrified. He rubbed his cross fanatically, trying not to understand, yearning for a miracle.

  “Soldierbot, clear the way out of this room. We are leaving now.”

  Belinas watched, aghast, as the machine immediately obeyed. It began working and moving pieces of concrete ten times the weight of its metallic body.

  Jethro tightened his handcuffs around the preacher's neck, so that his air pipes were completely closed off. The preacher couldn’t breathe, but he was too stunned and weak to resist. He was dying.

  When the way was clear, the robot turned around and looked at Jethro, ready for orders.

  “Soldierbot, come here. Look into this human's eyes. Ten centimeters from his face.”

  Belinas’ last moments of life were spent looking into the machine’s single orange eye, and feeling Jethro’s handcuffs clenching his throat tighter and tighter.

  ***********

  Jethro Knights was nearly halfway back to Transhumania, rocketing across the sky in Trano, as Medibot completed the last stitches of his shoulder’s bullet removal surgery. For a man who had just undergone a serious medical operation and was drugged with painkillers and antibiotics, Jethro seemed vivacious and unfazed. Adrenalin pumped through him. He savored his thoughts: The archenemy of transhumanism is dead. The killer of my wife is dead.

  Soon after Jethro landed
on Transhumania, U.S. Army reinforcements arrived at the attacked military compound in western Virginia. The carnage and damage they found shocked them. Quickly, the news was reported up the military’s chain of command, eventually reaching the U.S. President. After discussions with his Cabinet, the President chose to give the media full access to the scene at the secret military compound. Dead soldiers were gathered together and laid in a row with an American flag flying behind them. Their opaque faces were filmed so the public could see what Transhumania had done. Grieving families were allowed to visit the compound, and footage was shown of them weeping over their fallen kin. A surveillance video of the fighting was aired; it revealed Transhumania’s robots as haunting, alienlike creatures without feeling, without human morality.

  Reverend Belinas’ body was included in the show. That night in a live speech, the President emotionally praised him as a dear friend, a dedicated minister of God, and an American patriot. He also announced, along with his A10 counterparts, that war was officially declared on Transhumania and that battle plans were being devised.

  Ironically, the candid media coverage in the United States didn't have the government’s desired effect on the public. Sympathy was cast aside in favor of sheer wonder. People were shocked at how far Transhumania's technology had advanced; how one man, an advanced airship, and a few robots could destroy a whole army squad with no losses of their own—literally on the army's home turf.

  Then the bombshell came, upending everything. Transhumania dispatched its own broadcast and story of Jethro Knights’ abduction only thirty seconds after the President's live speech ended. Jethro's chip had recorded all the conversations between Belinas and himself, many of which the Transhumania News Network replayed live on its website and also shared with media organizations around the world. People felt baffled and betrayed by their governments, asking: Did the world's A10 leaders know about this? Is it legal? Is it morally right? Since the kidnapping and torture compound are clearly criminal and dishonorable, did we ever really know Reverend Belinas? People felt embarrassed for their government and country.

  The following morning, in another impromptu televised speech, the U.S. President awkwardly reversed the praise he had poured over Reverend Belinas. He apologized to his country for the kidnapping, insisting that he knew nothing of the preacher's plan nor of the government’s secret torture compound in Virginia. He promised a thorough investigation into the matter and into the NFSA, and asked Americans to continue supporting and trusting their government.

  It was too late. Many people were now angry and permanently skeptical. The President was caught in a web of lies, and his play of innocence only fueled their lack of faith. Opposing parties in Congress demanded his immediate resignation, citing his inability to run the country properly. Anti-government demonstrations in America’s major cities popped up everywhere. Senator Michaelson was also trapped by the public’s fury. His leadership of the NFSA was hotly questioned and criticized by the media. Gregory tried to distance himself from the hounding press, holing himself up in his Washington, D.C. house with the blinds shut. He felt lost without Belinas, and his presidential chances were rapidly dwindling.

  A10 countries and their politicians also tried to distance themselves from the kidnapping of Jethro Knights—what they publicly called: injudicious American actions. They especially didn’t want to be associated in any way with the famous preacher. He was, after all, an obvious Christian fanatic, the foreign leaders insisted. Their countries and religious populace, they promised, were far more moderate. Regardless, all A10 members and their leaders still agreed on the dangers of Transhumania, more so after seeing what their advanced military technology was capable of doing.

  The generals, admirals, and military commanders of the A10 countries were even more vexed than politicians, fearing with certainty that Transhumania possessed evolved nuclear weaponry and other mass destructive capabilities. They fretted that the Transhumanians would not hesitate to use such power against the A10. The commanders insisted on beginning their war campaign immediately. It was not prudent, they felt, to give Transhumania any more time to mobilize and develop a strategy.

  Chapter 31

  Twenty-four hours after Transhumania rescued Jethro Knights on American soil, the most powerful A10 military leaders were transported by helicopter to the aircraft carrier USS Freeport, thirty-five miles off Oahu, Hawaii. The ten haughty figures, all older men bearing myriad medals, emblems, and stars on their uniforms, gathered in the ship’s main conference room. After hours of deliberation, the commanders decided their combined navies should surround Transhumania and selectively bombard it with the most sophisticated and accurate surface-to-surface missiles in their arsenals.

  The commanders did not want to destroy the entire city nor kill its scientists. Their intent was only to demolish the parts of Transhumania unnecessary to them, such as the wind farm, the stadium, or even the tallest skyscraper, which contained all housing and administrative offices. Once the bombing was done, the A10 would seize the city, along with all valuable research and inventions in the Science and Technology Towers. Captured scientists would be forced to return to their homelands and be jailed or released on strict probation.

  “Nuclear weapons will not be used unless A10 countries are attacked with mass-destruction weaponry,” the American Secretary of Defense promised the press and the public. “We plan to spare as many lives as possible. This is a group of very intelligent people—scientists the world needs—who have been led astray by a devilishly philosophical tyrant.”

  Secretly, though, A10 military leaders agreed that if Transhumania put up too formidable a fight, or threatened their navies directly, they would collectively destroy and sink the platform in one massive onslaught. They weren’t going to take any chances with a city full of technological wonders and horrors. Besides, there was always the possibility of a revolutionary new Transhumanian weapon falling exclusively into the hands of one of the A10 countries. Such an incident could have vast ramifications in the geopolitical pecking order; relative global peace and the A10 union could be quickly destabilized. Nobody wanted to take that risk.

  Forty-eight hours later, in the heart of the Pacific Ocean along the equator near Fiji, an international armada of warships convened and moved on Transhumania. They encircled the seasteading city, keeping twenty miles off it. F-22 fighter jets were ready to depart from nearby aircraft carriers. American, Chinese, and Russian submarines patrolled close by, underneath the sea. Fully loaded B-2A bomber planes awaited orders to quickly take off from Guam, New Zealand, and the Philippines.

  Preston Langmore, Mayor Burton, Josh Genear, Janice Mantikas, Francisco Dante, Oliver Mbaye, and three top Transhumanian military division heads met Jethro Knights in his quarters at the Immortality Bridge. In front of them, on the dining room's huge glass table, were tons of strategic plans, laptops, and half-drunk coffees. They were deep into a late-night strategy session. In the background, IMN was playing on a television, the volume barely audible. Jethro listened occasionally, chuckling as he watched IMN’s live coverage of the ships gathering outside Transhumania. Oliver and Burton smiled too. Langmore did not find it so amusing.

  “They’re so misled. So blind,” Jethro said. “They have about twenty-four hours in a world they call their own. Then it's ours. Just think of the possibilities.”

  “As long as the shield system works,” Langmore pointed out nervously. “It’s not been fully tested.”

  “It’s been simulated dozens of times. That's what engineers call fully tested,” Jethro answered.

  “It’s not the same thing.”

  “Preston, when I built my sailboat, I simulated the whole thing in my head. A is A. Our engineers have done the same thing here, except not only in their heads, but also on a hundred supercomputers that approximate a trillion calculations a second. We’re fine. Besides, we have backups of backups. A very sensible philosophy.”

  “Our lives and everything we’ve been working
and fighting for will be over quickly if you’re wrong.”

  ************

  At exactly 8:15 A.M., two hours before the first A10 missiles were launched at the transhuman nation, an American admiral on the battleship USS Talbot telephoned Oliver Mbaye at the Transhumania Defense Command Center. He warned him to tell the city’s citizens not to be near the solar farms, wind farms, or the power station, because incoming missiles would soon be destroying those areas. In a straitlaced tone of voice, the admiral also told Oliver other parts of the city would be spared until further notice. The A10 commanders were counting on a quick surrender once Transhumania’s leaders saw its city on fire and its energy sources destroyed.

  Oliver politely thanked the admiral for the call, telling him he would inform the people. The recorded phone conversation was forwarded to Jethro Knights, who listened to it from the observation hall on the top floor of the Transhumania Tower. In front of imposing, twenty-foot-high, 360-degree viewing windows, Jethro stood coolly, wearing a wire-thin headset connected to every person in the command center and control rooms of the city. Twelve flat screen monitors, showing radar, video feeds, and other data points, were built into the floor in front of him. Preston Langmore stood next to him on his right. Jethro shook his head in jest when he listened to the formality of the admiral's tone. He emailed the audio message to leaders and staff of Transhumania with a smiley face icon in the subject line. It calmed the air.

  An hour later, no one was calm anymore. History and their futures weighed upon them. Jethro began pacing in front of the huge glass windows, like a tiger in a cage. If their defense systems failed, there was little chance for success, and surrender remained the only option. Many military specialists, technology experts, computer technicians, and cyber-warriors at Transhumania had spent years preparing for this moment, and now everyone was jittery while waiting to see the results.