by D. A. Hill
Jenny Ryan wasn’t surprised but she was certainly disappointed. Dr. Chen Wei was the last name on a long list of scientists she had tried to contact in her attempt to find someone who could shed some light on the asteroid. “Do you know where I can contact Dr. Chen?” she asked. “It’s terribly important I consult with him,” she added, trying hard to make her need to speak to him sound compelling, but knowing it was futile. She expected the same answer she had received a dozen times already.
“I believe Dr. Chen is visiting relatives in China. Unfortunately he did not leave any contact information,” the woman said. “I’m sorry I can’t help further,” she added before abruptly terminating the holo-link.
Jenny pondered her next step. She knew for sure there was a cover-up. That did not mean she was any closer to exposing the real story. She did not know what the cover-up was, nor did she have any real evidence other than some missing scientists. That was an important story in its own right—maybe she should just run that? But if she did who would tell the real story? Under martial law it was likely she would only get one chance. She had only been chasing this for a week. She was not even close to giving up.
—o—
“James, we have just spoken with the President,” Harry Branston began as Newton resumed his seat. “President Carlson appreciates your offer of assistance and he has authorized us to brief you fully on the administration’s plans so you may better assist us.” Branston was nearly choking on the words but had his orders. He had never really understood why Carlson had such a soft spot for James Newton. “The President has also asked me to inform you that should you repeat any of what you are about to hear publicly, the administration will vehemently deny it. Furthermore you will be immediately detained by Presidential order in a secret military facility for the duration of this emergency.” He enjoyed delivering the threat a whole lot more.
“I fully understand Mr. Secretary.” Not only did Newton understand, he knew exactly what they meant by being detained in a military facility for the duration of the emergency—making him the guest of some helpful ally that was even less inhibited about torture than the United States. “As I said earlier, I appreciate the extraordinary circumstances facing the administration.”
With the threats out of the way, Secretary of Defense Harry Branston and Secretary of Homeland Security Rajev Sandeep began describing the administration’s plan to save less than one in every eight hundred Americans.
—o—
James Newton reflected on the meeting with Branston and Sandeep as his limousine took him back to the airport. They had confirmed everything he had suspected. That alone made his trip worthwhile. The detailed briefing on the administration’s plans was more than he had hoped for.
The implications of his discoveries were very disturbing though. Sandeep and Branston had acknowledged that the success of the administration’s plan depended on secrecy—the President himself, an old friend, had threatened to disappear him should he release the details—but if he could figure it out, others certainly would. It was only a matter of time.
He was also disheartened by the lack of urgency the administration was showing. In their shoes he would have mobilized the Newton Group and its competitors within the first few days. Instead he had to come to Washington to insist on offering his assistance. God knows how long it would have taken to mobilize his company if he had not. It seemed far too much like business-as-usual in DC. What Washington needed was a few crazies wandering around with signs saying the end of the world is nigh—just to remind them of what was at stake.
James Newton could see the fundamental problem; the administration’s plan was simply far too optimistic. It must be heart-wrenching for the President to think he could only save half a million people, but James knew he risked saving nobody. A plan on such a large scale simply could not be implemented right under the noses of the American people and kept secret for two years. Yet Sandeep and Branston clearly believed it could, even after Newton had personally proven otherwise and pointed out that fact to them. That had not helped his cause; like typical politicians they blamed the messenger for delivering bad news, as if doing so somehow made an unwelcome truth less true. Their plan was almost certain to fail and when it did they would be surprised. They seemed to him like heroes in a Greek tragedy, heroes whose hubris would be severely punished by the gods in the final act of the play.
As the limousine pulled to a stop at the door to his jet, James Newton reached the inescapable conclusion that only a much less ambitious plan could succeed. Newton bounded up the stairs and announced to the crew that he was ready to get underway immediately. As the attendant closed the door and he settled into his seat he tapped the computer screen embedded in the wall. The display lit up awaiting his command. “Have my direct reports ready to meet in person as soon as I return to my office.”
“Yes Mr. Newton,” the computer answered in the warm female voice he had selected as his preferred interface. As he felt his jet leave the ground James Newton closed his eyes and began formulating his own plan for the survival of the human race…
—o—
“Major Lopez to see Secretary Branston,” the tall dark- haired woman said to the assistant as she entered the Secretary of Defense’s office for the first time. It was only a short walk from the Pentagon office she had occupied for the past year but Regina Lopez did not relish being here. Real soldiers avoided politicians if they could, but sometimes it was necessary. At times like this, she envied her father’s career served almost exclusively in front line units. She could have done the same—she had qualified for Army Ranger training early in her career—but chose Military Intelligence instead. Regina knew it had been the right choice—she had a real skill for getting information out of people—but it did mean more time dealing with stuffed shirts.
“Of course Major. Secretary Branston is expecting you. Please go right in.”
“Major Lopez,” the Secretary of Defense said effusively, rising from behind his very large and elaborate desk to greet her as she entered. He allowed her to salute but then insisted on shaking her hand enthusiastically, as if she were an old friend. “Please,” he said with a broad smile as he indicated she should take a seat.
Regina Lopez could see that like anyone who survived and thrived in the world of politics, Harry Branston was living proof of the old adage, once you can fake sincerity you’ve got it made. Regina knew him to be one of the most insincere and untrustworthy men in a business filled with professional fakers. Yet she was sufficiently self-aware to notice that her instinctive reaction on finally meeting him in person was to like and trust him. As she sat, she made a point of reminding herself not to be taken in by it. Not that she was incapable of using a little fake but completely convincing sincerity herself when it was useful to the mission. All the more reason there was no excuse for her to fall for Branston’s schmooze.
“Major, I apologize for the short notice. Effective Monday you are being reassigned to the Seventh Infantry Division at Fort Carson, Colorado.”
“Yes, sir,” she replied emphatically. Regina Lopez did not baulk at the prospect of moving her life half way across the country on a moment’s notice. As an Air Force brat it had been that way all her life. Another fifteen years in the military, much of it working covertly in the field, had reinforced for her that life was wherever the Army said it was. She had nothing to tie her to DC, or any other place for that matter; no family, no romantic entanglements, not even a dog. Her father was the only person she was close to and like her he was always moving from one military posting to another. As far as Regina was concerned, one Officers’ Mess was as good as another; a place to eat, sleep, drink, work out, and occasionally amuse herself with one of the other officers.
Plus she had known this assignment was coming. You did not get to be widely regarded as one of the Army’s best intelligence operatives without knowing what was going on around you, especially when it affected you directly. With everything that had gone on since
the President’s announcement, and the military up to its ears in most of it, the Pentagon grapevine was working overtime. Even if everything had been locked down tight she had the skills and the sources to uncover all but the best kept secrets.
Lopez therefore knew, even though she had not been briefed, that trillionaire James Newton had met with Secretary Branston along with Secretary of Homeland Security Sandeep the day before. She also knew they had spoken with the President in the middle of that meeting. When she, a mere Major, was summoned to a personal meeting with the Secretary of Defense she knew there must be a connection between these two highly unusual events. Time to find out what that connection was. “And my assignment there sir?”
“Officially you are being assigned to monitor the activities of the Newton Group. They are being mobilized under Executive Order 16291. A briefing on their specific Task Orders has been pushed to your account.”
Regina Lopez knew she would not be here if Secretary Branston was not well aware of her reputation. He would therefore know that watching over the activities of a government contractor—no matter how important the contract—was a waste of her talents. She drew the obvious conclusion; Branston had a more important and delicate task for her. “Unofficially, I expect you want me to monitor the activities of James Newton himself.”
“Exactly Major,” he replied with the enthusiasm of a small child opening a gift on Christmas morning to discover exactly what he had asked for. “I knew you were the right officer for the job when I read your file. I want to know where he goes, what he does, who he talks to and what he is thinking, without him knowing he is being watched.”
“You can count on me Mr. Secretary,” she replied.
“Now let me fill you in on the larger picture Major. Then you will understand how important it is to make sure Mr. Newton does nothing to jeopardize our plans.”
chapter 3
July 2045
Cyrus Jones sat alone in a very typical meeting room on the twenty-sixth floor of what was a very typical office tower in downtown Denver. There were only two things worth remarking on: the quality of the coffee and the sweeping view of the Rocky Mountains which filled the large windows. As he took in the view he could see a few traces of snow still remaining on the highest peaks, even now in the middle of summer.
Cyrus had been overjoyed when the Newton Group asked him to transfer to the Denver office. The past month had been hell. Yes the drones were still active—they were busy now patrolling America’s borders and coastlines rather than fighting proxy wars with China in distant lands—but the program was not the priority it once was. Apart from a minor software update that had taken him all of two hours to code and the same again to test and deploy, there had been very little real work to do since the President’s announcement about the asteroid. Cyrus was bored, and if there was one thing Cyrus Jones hated, it was being bored.
He had not been told what he would be doing in Denver, other than he would be working directly with James Newton and that the work was somehow related to the asteroid. For an inanimate rock it seemed to be doing a good job of controlling his fate, although maybe for the better; working with James Newton on something related to the asteroid meant the odds were good that whatever he would be doing was important. Cyrus just hoped it would also be interesting.
He was sure his experience on the drone program was somehow relevant. Newton would know that you could count on the fingers of one hand the number of people who had been doing what he had been doing with EMs—even if the hand your were counting on was missing four fingers. So it seemed logical that it was him in particular they needed, and that they needed him because they wanted to do something related to EMs and virtual environments. He just could not make the connection between his work and the asteroid. Not that his speculation really mattered now. He was about to meet James Newton; he expected he would soon discover why he was here.
—o—
The man who entered the room was not at all what Cyrus Jones expected. He looked about sixty, or perhaps older but in good shape, about average height and with average looks. Cyrus had often seen pictures and holo-images of him, but somehow he imagined that the real life James Newton would be more impressive, that there would be something obvious about him that explained why he was a trillionaire. He did however have intense eyes, the sort of eyes that see and question everything. Cyrus hoped it was a sign that there was a worthy intellect inside, someone he would enjoy working with.
“Cyrus, welcome to Denver and the Newton Group headquarters. I’m James Newton.” He held out his hand.
Cyrus Jones did not like shaking hands. It was not that he had an irrational germ phobia, or particularly disliked human contact, but if you wanted to design a way to rapidly spread infection through a population, you could not do better than shaking hands. It just seemed unnecessarily risky, and for what—to show your enemy you were not concealing a weapon? That seemed just a little anachronistic in the twenty-first century when death tended to be delivered remotely and impersonally.
On top of that, telling Newton his name was totally redundant. Since James Newton had just called him Cyrus he obviously knew who Cyrus Jones was. But Cyrus had found that making at least a minimal effort to follow social conventions, no matter how irrational, saved him a lot of aggravation. Cyrus was not one of those socially inept geeks who did not know how to behave. He knew what other people expected. He understood the social conventions, he just thought them arbitrary and irrational. Generally though he went along; it was just easier that way. So he shook the offered hand and said his name because that was what you were expected to do in this situation. “Cyrus Jones.”
“I see you were admiring our view. I never get tired of it.”
“It’s a bit more interesting than the view I’ve been used to,” he replied. “There’s not much to see working at an Air Force base out in the middle of the desert.” Not that Cyrus really had that much time to admire the view where he worked. He spent most of his time working inside secure rooms; rooms that had no windows.
“Nevertheless, I hope you don’t mind us plucking you out of your life in California and bringing you here.”
“Absolutely not, Mr. Newton,” Cyrus replied. He did not see the need to mention that he had been going crazy out there in the desert with nothing interesting to do. “Although I am wondering why. I can put together some of the pieces—I’m sure you know about my work and that’s why I’m here—but I seem to be missing some key pieces of the puzzle. I’m afraid I can’t see the overall picture.” Cyrus was accustomed to operating in a world largely of his own creation, where other people came to him to explain what was happening, so he did not like being thrown into an environment where he did not fully understand what was going on.
“Yes, I definitely know all about your work, Cyrus, which is precisely why you’re here. But first do me a favor. Please call me James. We’re going to be working very closely together, you and I, on a very important mission. Assuming you agree to help me.”
“To do what?”
“To ensure the survival of the human race,” Newton replied.
That was not what Cyrus had expected Newton to say. It must have shown on his face.
“You’re wondering how you’re going to help me do that.”
“I sure as hell am Mr. Newton. James. I’m just a programmer. A very good one, but just a programmer nevertheless.”
“You underestimate yourself Cyrus. What you don’t know is that the asteroid is almost certainly going to strike the Earth and when it does it will cause such a climate disaster that nobody will survive.”
“That’s not what the government is saying,” Cyrus replied, surprised and unsure what to make of Newton’s revelation.
“And what would happen if they did, Cyrus?” Newton asked. “Mass panic,” he said answering his own question.
“Doesn’t the government have a plan?” Cyrus could not believe the government would just sit by and do nothing while mankind was
wiped out.
“They do, Cyrus. That’s part of their reason for playing this down—if there’s panic, their plan cannot work. The problem is that even if they can keep this under wraps, which they can’t, their plan is too big, too ambitious.” Newton could see Cyrus’s skepticism. “I can explain why to you later if you like. Look, if the government’s plan does pan out, then well and good—nothing I’m proposing will detract from its chances—but just in case, I’m working on a plan that I believe has a much greater probability of success.”
“Which is what you want me to help you with. I still don’t see how my skills are relevant.”
“May I answer that by asking you a question first?”
“Of course,” Cyrus said opening his hands in a gesture that said please enlighten me. He was growing anxious to find out where this was heading. This talk about saving humanity had him wondering if Newton was for real or whether age and too much money had loosened his grip on reality.
“ Cyrus tell me this. If you had to choose between being an empty mind inside a healthy body or being a healthy mind inside a useless body, which would you choose?”
“Would I rather be a vegetable or Stephen Hawking? Easy. I’d choose to be Stephen Hawking,” Cyrus replied.
“And what if the choice is being inside a useless body as Cyrus Jones, very good programmer, rather than one of the greatest theoretical physicists of all time?”
“I’d still choose that,” Cyrus replied with confidence.
“Why?” James Newton asked.
“Because my mind is what makes me me,” Cyrus replied. He touched his chest. “This? This is just hardware.” Then he tapped his temple. “It’s the software that makes me Cyrus Jones.”
“So if our minds live on, even without our bodies, we live on?”
Cyrus had never really asked himself that question, which now seemed to him like a ridiculous oversight given the work he had been doing. He did not have to think about it very long to conclude that it must be true. Two programs which provide the same output for every given input are for all practical purposes identical. It does not matter what language they are implemented in or what platform they run on. “That logically follows,” he replied, and then inhaled sharply as he realized the essence of what Newton was proposing.