by Stephen Moss
“If we do, then at some time in the not-too-distant future the real me will stand in orbit over this planet and upload the memories that now make me who I am. Maybe they will overpower me, maybe I will come to the same conclusions that this copy of me has. But if I don’t, then the less I know about the identities of you and your fellow conspirators the better.”
They both contemplated that, and then Quavoce finished, “It would be a cruel fate indeed if your trust in me ended in me being your executioner.”
Quiet descended as this enigma hung over them. John had prepared himself for the fact that either this copy of himself or the real him may die in the coming war. He had even known that it may be both, or worse, that this more hardy copy may outlive the real him. But that he may form friendships with his enemy had been beyond him. The real Quavoce Mantil may kill the real him in battle. He and the other members of the resistance may kill Quavoce, they may have already, back aboard the Armada, if the opportunity has presented itself.
After a moment, John nodded and said, “Thank you, Quavoce. You are right, of course. And your desire to protect me, even from yourself, is yet another sign of what an honorable man you truly are. I would like to believe that the real you will come to the same conclusions that this version of you has. But you are right, unfortunately, when you say that we cannot know that for certain. He won’t have seen what you have, won’t have lived through what you have, and will have had ten more years among our Mobiliei brethren than you and I have.”
There was silence for a long time. They were trying to reconcile the concept that at this moment they were both the closest of allies, and the very worst of enemies, sworn to both save each other, and kill each other.
They drove on into the night.
After a long while, John said, “When I was a child my mother called me Batim. It is not my real name, of course, but in many ways it is just as much my name as the one my parents gave me before they actually knew what a troublemaker I was. You could call me that, if you wish.”
Quavoce appeared relieved at this gesture of friendship, his infrequent but genuine smile spreading across his face once more. “Batim? The swamp rat?” A chuckle escaped Quavoce’s lips, “What a wonderful child you must have been to earn such a name.”
John … Batim, laughed, “One would like to think she was being ironic …” Quavoce shot a doubting glance at John who smirked in reply, “Yes … well … like I said, one would like to think that.”
They were approaching the center of Gaza City, and John slowed as the muddiness of the evening traffic clogged the roads around them. But they would not drive all the way to their destination anyway.
Abandoning the car that they had been given by a contact in Tel Aviv, they walked the final quarter of a mile in silence. Side by side, they were a walking army. Their legs moving in unison as they passed, unnoticed, through the scarred streets of Gaza at night. John had tainted his skin to give himself a darkness that went some way toward disguising his systemically British look. He could not do much more. They were not designed to be shape shifters, but he used his malleable facial muscles to tighten his jawline, giving it an angularity, and to sharpen his nose a little to give his face something of the strength of the local Arabic complexion.
Their feet moved in unison, not in a march, but in the quiet agreement of two old friends walking in step. Each of those feet that could propel them farther and faster than any of the passing locals could have imagined.
Their hands were tucked into their jacket pockets against the forgiving and imperceptibly cool Mediterranean evening. Hands that could so easily wrench apart any of the fragile bodies of the innocent and ignorant that they encountered in the night.
And as they walked, their eyes stayed always on the path ahead, but they missed nothing. Eyes hiding their most lethal secrets. Eyes that had locked on each other in battle only months beforehand. Eyes that now faced an uncertain future, but did so together, as they went to confront one of the Agents they had betrayed.
They both noted one of Ayala’s team in his spot down the road from Raz’s building. They would not have seen him there but for the fact that his reports had told them indirectly of his position relative to Raz. He was well hidden and appropriately subtle, they each thought in unison. A fact that had no doubt saved his life. They did not feel the need to point these things out to each other, knowing like identical twins exactly what each could and could not see. They just walked on, another block and then a turn into a faceless, rundown apartment building. They did not glance at the building they knew was Raz’s. They would be visiting her soon enough. It would not be a pleasant reunion.
- - -
Across the globe, America was still writhing from the pain of the radioactive wound it had suffered. Twisting and turning in discomfort as it got used to the deep gash that was driving up through eastern Georgia. People moved away in massive waves like concentric circles, either bouncing off or washing into the swelling cities inland from the radioactive coast. Millions were uprooted, and the economy bled in response. The emergency funds of the wealthiest nation on earth pumped through its veins to dull the pain of the unprecedented upheaval.
The monies acted like adrenalin, numbing the nation to the extent of its wound, but its energizing effects would eventually fade, and the reality would come through, surging into focus as the full, stunning aftermath of what had happened sank in. Even a day as tragic as September 11th would be but a headache compared to the long-lasting effects of the invisible radiation poisoning that had bathed so many.
Jason and Theresa Stevens of Slocomb, Alabama, continued to argue over which victim deserved what, and how affected they were by the disaster. They bickered, as politically and ethically ignorant of the world around them as they were unaware of the sleeping presence beneath them. It had been a week. As America’s wounds still throbbed with bloody newness, Lana’s body busily repaired itself. Millions of tiny tendrils and nano machines diagnosed and repaired subsystem upon subsystem in her almost biologically complex body. The fusion reactor at her core pumped energy throughout her systems, reaching more and more components as they came back online.
She would remain as black as midnight for good now, none of her systems could fix that. Outwardly she would be absorbent of all light, a pariah. But as she lay beneath the home of the two imbeciles above her, Lana was coming to appreciate a certain poetic beauty in her new form. She would use it to strike fear into the world. She would become a nightmare, a cautionary tale told to children. And her midnight black silhouette would be the last sight of any who dared to stand with Neal Danielson and his cohorts.
Lana inwardly flinched at a particularly vulgar flatulent burst from the moronic pair above her and thought offhandedly about how she was going to kill them. Responding to her wish with virtual immediacy, her machine subconsciousness began to list out tactical options, arraying a stream of wildly diverse methods of ending the lives of the two people she had been forced to cower under.
She smiled as the list grew, laughing to herself when the artificial intelligence that supported her every whim was forced to begin breaking the list into categories to make it more manageable. She realized she could search the list based on the amount of pain she wanted to inflict, the length of time she wanted the death to take, the amount of scarring and external damage that would be visible afterward. Deliberate disease infection, specific blows that would cause degenerative heart arrhythmia or terminal brain hemorrhages, and onward down the list. The options got ever more vulgar until she reached one that piqued the level of pain and misery she wished to inflict, and combined it with an immediacy and poetic cruelty that somewhat satiated her psychopathic urges.
She thought about, it, and began modeling the ways in which she could use it, analyzing in minute detail every aspect of it as the concept developed like a science in her mind. Yes. This would be her calling card. Using direct manipulation of the spinal cord via electric pulse, she would be able to induce a
n acute and all-encompassing agony so great it would cause convulsions that would turn her victims inside out.
She smiled inwardly at the vision and saved it, savoring the pleasure of what it was going to feel like. Then, with nothing else to do, she started to think of each of her intended victims as they suffered this death, creating detailed, vivid virtual images of each gruesome end, and drinking them in like a dark, red wine.
Chapter 10: Blowing Minds
Professor Ignacio de Prado walked along a long, ancient corridor in Coimbra University’s Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia. Yellowed flagstones polished with age met his black, creased shoes, which were softened with seemingly equal age as he scuffed toward the office he had called home for the bulk of his professional career. As he rounded a final corner and started down one side of a cloistered, manicured courtyard, he saw two unfamiliar figures standing outside his office. He was used to many people waiting for him, students of his various classes awaiting him with a pressing question or a spurious excuse, typically the latter. But these two stood with a purpose few students would learn before they were deposited out into the real world, and Ignacio surveyed them with more than his usual cursory glance as he approached.
“Professor Ignacio do Prado, se faz favor?” said the woman in the grey jacket and black skirt. Her white shirt was starchly pressed, as was the one of the man standing next to her. But he wore his with less practice. This was a man not used to wearing a suit.
The professor nodded his slightly chubby, well-worn face at them both with expected hesitance, frowning as he searched for something he recognized in both of them. But he would not find it. This was outside his experience.
In a polite, well-formed Portuguese accent from Lisbon, or maybe Cascais, the woman went on, “My name is Maria Eça, I am with the Ministerio da Defesa Nacional.” she handed the professor her card as she went on, “This man is an American who represents an international body that is interested in speaking with you about an important matter. May we have a moment of your time, Professor?”
- - -
“I don’t know what it is about, Amadeu,” said a frustrated assistant at the door of the university dean’s office, “They told me to find you and bring you here, immediately. They did not say why.”
Amadeu looked at her skeptically, without any attempt at disguising his fear and concern. There was a long list of reasons he could be being summoned here, ranging from expellable to jailable, and to top it off he was more than a little stoned. He had been smoking alone, in his room, as usual. Fantasizing about a fellow student he had just seen entering the communal showers. That and the woman that had driven the bus on his way to the store last night, and the lady who had bent over in front of him in a hallway two days before, and his high school gym coach. The knock on his door had sent him reeling, only to be followed by the stern voice of the dean’s secretary to add to his panic.
He had nagged the woman all the way to the office where he was apparently awaited, but she clearly knew nothing. It was becoming plain that he was going to have to face the music, and then think on his feet about what his tune.
- - -
“I am sorry for this delay, ladies, gentlemen.” said the dean once more, his frustration starting show behind his obsequious smile. Maria Eça shook her head once more with a pleasant smile, having already said not to worry countless times. While the man she was with sat mute, unclear what was happening as the people around him communicated in a foreign tongue. But sensing from Maria’s lack of translation that the dean was apologizing once more, the man aped Maria’s ingratiating nod and the room fell back into awkward silence.
Professor de Prado decided to fill the void with conversation, “Like I said, Senhora, the paper you referred to was not written by me, but by a team of students with my … limited supervision. But the part of the paper that clearly interests you, and our American friend,” he nodded a smile at the stiff-looking man who he knew could not understand his lilting, flowing Portuguese, “was written mostly by one particularly bright boy. Only a master’s student, and not the best of my students by far.” the professor’s smile flinched a little as a memory fluttered through him but he went on, “but his ideas about direct spinal interfaces are, indeed, quite striking, if a little far-fetched.”
The stiff looking man clearly understood the words ‘spinal interfaces’ and nodded appreciatively. Maria was beginning to translate the professor’s words to him when there was a knock on the door and an apologetic but triumphant assistant poked her head into the room.
“Professore, desculpe. Amadeu Esposinho …” she said almost breathlessly, and at the dean’s nod she opened the door fully and herded a nervous-looking boy in his early twenties into the room.
The room rose to greet him and Amadeu looked even more concerned. But he was greeted warmly by the dean, and by a new face, an attractive face belonging to someone called Maria Eça, and he blushed mute as the smart-looking lady extended her hand to him.
“Amadeu, fala-se um pouco Inglese?” she said. The boy stared at her. What the foda was going on, he thought.
“Sim … yes, of course.” he replied, and noticed that the stiff-looking man that stood by her side perked up a little.
“Amadeu,” the woman went on in English, “I would like to introduce you to General Milton of the United States Air Force.”
Amadeu went wide-eyed, and mentally checked and rechecked that he understood her correctly. But suddenly the rugged-looking man was stepping past the woman and extending his hand, his eyes surveying and clearly assessing Amadeu with cold efficiency.
The general’s voice was slow, speaking with forethought for the boy’s lack of experience with English, and for the shock that he must be under from being summoned here, “Amadeu, please, call me Barrett. I am here because we would like to ask you to help us with something.”
Everyone in the room looked surprised, their limited English making them struggle to make sure they had heard correctly. But Amadeu was actually far from a slouch in English, it was the language of the internet, the language of coders, and the internet was his life, even if it played a backseat to the medical studies his father had forced him to pursue.
His reply came out hesitantly, “My help? Can I ask with what?” He had visions of some college think tank. Maybe it could be interesting, but typically they were sad attempts by blowhards to get extracurricular credit. He was profoundly unprepared for the general’s next statement.
“Well, Amadeu, I won’t beat around the bush here. We are forming a team. A team that is planning to build the direct spinal interface that you recently wrote about so astutely, and finish it within the year…” the boy stared at Barrett with undisguised astonishment and not a little glee, “…any chance that might interest you?”
- - -
As General Milton bounced around Europe and Asia on a prolonged recruitment tour, Madeline was in the middle of a lengthy meeting with several members of NASA’s Institute for Advanced Concepts, in an office on the campus of Berkley.
There were numerous fields that the cutting edge agency was working in that were of interest to Madeline and her colleagues, but one in particular was the focus of today’s conversation. After years of conceptualizing and scientific dreaming about one of the most fantastic and yet feasible hopes of the twenty-first century, this team had labored through many a mocking remark and disparaging magazine article. But Madeline had in her toolbox of fabulous machines the key to unlocking the bonds that, until now, had kept this particular dream earthbound.
In a conversation that became ever more heated and impassioned, the horizon was beginning to come into focus for these brilliant thinkers. A horizon that had on it a structure so large and so magnificent as to defy imagination. Thousands of miles long, reaching from the earth’s surface out past the ranges of geosynchronous orbit to an anchor in space, the tether they were envisioning would link humanity to the stars.
No more rockets and boosters, no more hea
vy-lifting ourselves into space piece by piece. Instead, a smooth ride up a tether of carbon nanotubing extending into the blackness, a trillion tiny fibers interwoven into a band of material so enduring it could support thousands of tons with its unimaginable tensile strength.
It had been first conceived by Arthur C. Clarke in the 1970s and refined by countless scientists since. Humanity had even managed to invent the first carbon nanotubes. But they had yet to develop the technology to anything close to the levels they would need. Now, on the table in front of them, were the equations and methods necessary to close that gap. And there was a sample of this magical material. The perfect carbon nanotube, the bootstrap by which humanity would truly lift itself into space at last.
- - -
She sat, shivering in the middle seat. It was too wide for her. A small window to their side showed the ground twenty feet below, but she dared not look. The plane was larger than any building she had ever seen in her life, and when it had moved it had been like the earth shifting. No amount of explanation and comforting could reconcile six-year-old Banu to the concept of this building being able to fly. Having seen planes flying far overhead and hearing her brothers explain them to her, she had thought she might be able to accept this.
Maybe if her savior had been here with her she might have felt safe; the man who she had learned was named Quavoce Mantil. But he had vanished with the same mystery as he had arrived, taking his strange name and bottomless eyes with him. After a long and tender goodbye, he had promised that he would see her again soon, that for now she should go with the other two strangers that had been with him that night, and they would make sure she was safe until he came back from whatever mission had taken him away from her.
But the two Americans did not speak a word of her language. Not even the translator they had hired was able to grasp in full the local dialect she had spoken all her life. Quavoce had been able to speak with the gravel of a local. He could speak to anyone, she had discovered, no matter what language they spoke.