by Morgan Bell
“The last hub is still functioning,” Fenwick reported.
“How many terminals are there in a three block radius?” Blaise asked.
“Forty seven,” Fenwick reported.
“Okay. We need to get that number down to eleven,” Blaise announced.
“Why?” Rosen asked.
“Fenwick worked it out and the summation wave is formed when you have over twelve terminals near a hub experience a synchronized disruption. If we get it to eleven or lower, the hub can’t be blown out by the near terminals. The wave dissipates if it’s any further out. We blow out the terminals on our own and we do it in an asynchronous pattern then the hub should remain stable,” Blaise said. “We’ve got 36 targets to hit and we have to do it before Cronus knows what’s going on.”
“What are we looking at?” Drake asked.
“Thirteen on Cass Avenue, between West Palmer and West Kirby. Twelve on Woodward from West Ferry to East Kirby. Then we have eleven around the intersection of Gullen Mall and Williams Mall,” Fenwick replied, putting up a mission map in the transport.
“We are going into high population areas and blowing up terminals?” Rosen asked.
“Yes, I believe we are dressed for it.”
“Drake and Rosen, you will take Cass Avenue,” Fenwick informed them. “Baxter and Blaise, you will take Woodward. Then when Drake and Rosen have cleared Cass, they will clear the mall intersection and we will rendezvous back at the library.”
Baxter and Blaise were dropped out on Woodward, and Fenwick drove on to Cass where Drake and Baxter deployed. The area, which had been part of the pre-reorganization Michigan college campuses, had continued to operate as a university system, after a fashion. Despite the missile attacks on the downtown and the general chaos of the grid lock of the security system, classes were still in session.
Drake signaled to Baxter that their first target was twenty meters ahead on the right. On the sidewalk Jamie saw a small steel cage, with a padlock and a platform. It was one of the original “free speech” zones established by the university prior to Michigan’s collapse. It was not unique to this campus system. The solution had started in California, and like all bad academic ideas had spread coast to coast after a number of academic conferences. The old steel cage, with lock and key, had been meant to proscribe an area of free speech, and the lock – the students were told – was meant to avoid the speaker being physically interfered with by listeners. Over time the “free speech” zones became alternative forms of incarceration, as was seen in the 2020 presidential conventions where police arrested protesters outside the Democratic and Republican conventions and locked them in “free speech” compounds several miles away from the actual events. No charges were brought against the interned protesters. When lawsuits were brought to challenge this, the Supreme Court ruled that the police had not actually arrested the protesters but were simply engaging in the same activities that traffic officers and wildlife services served, which was the safe containment, management of and prudent relocation of people (wildlife) to areas where they could more safely express their views.
What was surprising about this free speech zone was it was in use and a student had people actually listening to him. “We are slaves of a violent state! Our government hides the violence behind words, in budgets and in organizations that we are told exist to help us. But they don’t help us. They oppress us!” a young man yelled from inside the cage.
Around him, a group of students were snapping their fingers and dancing. “This what it was like when you were in school?” Drake asked.
Jamie shook his head. “No. We had our share of idiots, but most of them became orthopedic surgeons or flesh enhancement specialists.”
“When I was a kid,” Drake began, “there were campus riots.”
“The 2040s?”
“Yes, the tech rebels, anarchists and crypto communists. We had them all. I was in the service at the time, reserves, and doing my masters,” Drake said as they approached the cage.
“What happened to them?”
“The Tech Rebels that weren’t arrested or killed became crony capitalist barons in the 2050s. The anarchists all went into the civil service, and the crypto communists became politicians and formed a conservative party,” Drake informed him, passing the cage.
“Technology is the tool of the oppressor of the masses!” the young man yelled at Drake and Baxter.
“You mean like this here?” Drake asked the young man, and pointed at a street terminal.
“Exactly like that!” the young man snarled.
Drake shrugged and placed his gun against the terminal’s base and fired. The explosion was a short burst followed by smoke, the snapping of arcing electricity, and then a flash of light.
“One oppressor down, millions to go,” Drake said to the young man, and then ambled off down the street to the next terminal location.
∞
On Woodward, Blaise and Rosen were finding it hard going, as many of the terminals were behind locked and secured doors. Blaise, on one occasion, waved his warrant before a monitor only to be informed that he had no jurisdiction, as this was a federal research facility. Blaise waved another document that the system reviewed and was not able to process. Rosen was beginning to think they would have to punch a hole in the side of the building when an officer came to the door and opened it to ask, “Who exactly are you with? Your documents aren’t HDMP issue.”
Blaise struck the officer on the side of the head and muttered “officious little twerp,” then stepped over him, pumped a round into the terminal and stepped back out.
“Nine more to go,” Rosen said.
∞
By the time that Drake and Baxter had cleared Cass, they had a following of students, including the young man from the “free speech” zone cage following them. The young man was yelling, “It’s finally happened, the revolution has come!”
“Don’t you think you are overdoing this a bit?” Jamie asked Drake.
“Power to the people!” Drake yelled, and fired up a large terminal at a corner information kiosk.
“The oppressed workers are joining with the intelligentsia to overthrow the entrenched ruling class!” someone else yelled.
“Death to anyone that can count!” Drake yelled, and shot the next terminal.
“He is taking us to…” another student said and stopped. “What does that mean?”
Drake, in his full HDMP black body armor, with matching helmet and black rifle, stopped in front of the assembled students. “This is basic. The ruling class uses its superior knowledge of math and economics to make profitable transactions that would otherwise be unprofitable and disadvantageous, were an educated proletariat to identify it as such. Marx posited that the additive nature of labor was directly proportional to the final value of the end product. So in essence, if those with the tools of production can achieve a profit through the sale of the product that is improved by the application of labor and superior systems, there is essentially a net theft. So, since we can’t seem to get an educated proletariat, the only solution is a world without intelligent people, starting with everyone that can count over three.”
Drake raised one of his shoulder. “Five minus one! What’s it equal?”
Several people stammered. One seemed to know the answer but was fighting to not blurt it out. The slightly smarter students fled from the scene.
“After them!” Drake yelled. “They are lap dogs of the ruling class and can count to ten!”
Some of the group took the signal as their opportunity to affect their own escape. Some, in youthful ideological rage, gave chase in a way that they would fondly remember years later as members of congress.
“That was pretty cynical,” Jamie said.
Drake shrugged and walked on down to the next terminal.
“Was that stuff you said about Marx true?” Jamie asked.
“More or less.”
“How do you know it?” Jamie asked.
&n
bsp; “I wrote my graduate thesis on economics and game theory. I had two professors sponsoring my thesis because of the subject matter. One professor was a devout communist and the other was a committed Randian,” Drake said, and kicked open the door of a building.
“How did you end up in the FBI?”
“Simple. Someone read my thesis, realized I’d managed to write it in a way that satisfied two department advisors and defended it in two different arenas.” Drake set a percussion grenade in place and retreated.
There was a deafening explosion and the terminal seemed to implode.
“That’s how they recruited you?”
“Military background and the ability to shovel bullshit double time, all pre-requisites for advancement in the bureau.”
“Looks like you have some new followers,” Jamie said as they stepped out of the building to see a group of what appeared to be students less than a block away.
“Check thermal signatures,” Drake told him, engaging his scope.
“Damn,” Jamie swore, seeing the fading red. “KVs.”
“Check again. They’re armed. KVBs.” Drake fired.
The KVBs that had guns were now returning fire.
∞
“Cleared Woodward,” Blaise reported, climbing into the van.
“Baxter and Drake cleared all but two of the terminals from Cass and the mall intersection,” Fenwick reported.
“Well, all of ours were behind locked doors,” Rosen said.
“Their last two are behind KVBs at this point. We need to give them support,” Fenwick said, turning the transport around.
∞
Bullets were cracking overhead near Jamie as the KVBs fired on their position in the doorway they had retreated to. “Which way do we do this?” he asked. “Above, around or under?”
Drake looked at the roof line and the other side of the street. He pulled a grenade from his vest. “Through,” he said, and flung the grenade into the approaching KVBs.
∞
Blaise jumped from the transport and ran into a store front. A man stood with an ice cream cone in his hand, looking blank. Blaise saw the dead food service employee behind the counter. The man brought up his other hand with a gun, but before he could take a bead on Blaise he was shot square through the head. The KVB fell, but the hand still held the gun and now it was twitching and squeezing; bullets were burying themselves into the ceiling. The gun was one of the old eighteen shot clip pistols. Blaise kicked it away and went back to the freezer with his rifle in front of him. A hand grabbed at the barrel of Blaise’s rifle. He opened fire, letting it rip through the assailant who made no noise, but instead continued to try and wrestle the rifle away from him until Blaise brought it to eye level and the KVB’s head burst. Blaise found the terminal and destroyed it with a single shot into a junction point.
∞
Several torn KVBs were on the street, still trying to find a way to kill Jamie and Agent Drake as they made their way up the walk.
“He has got to be near here,” Drake said, retreating into a doorway.
“He?” Jamie asked, stepping out to fire at running KVBs while Drake reloaded.
“Marshall. He’ll be up ahead. Somewhere on the rooftops,” Drake predicted.
Jamie looked through his scope at the roof line and saw a figure running along the roof on the opposite side of the street. “I don’t know if it was him, I saw somebody. They were heading up the street away from us.”
Drake edged out and looked up at the roof line and saw a figure moving further away down the street. “Damn. He’s either setting up to ambush us or…”
“Or what?” Jamie asked.
“Or he’s got a target he wants to take out further up the street,” Drake finished. “I’m going to cross over and get topside while you get on to the next terminal.”
“Got it,” Jamie said, taking a grenade from his vest.
He flung it down the street ahead of crowd of KVBs who were charging toward their position.
“See you down the block,” Drake called, and ran across the street.
The grenade went off and KVBs were torn open and thrown by the force of the explosion.
∞
Blaise worked his way toward where Drake and Jamie would be coming from. He saw someone come out of a building. They took a call as they stepped on the street, seeming unaware of what was going on around them. Then they dropped their tech and started running at Blaise.
Blaise took the man down with a single head shot and scanned the area. There were, of course, cameras that he was being monitored by. But he suspected that Cronus was nearby. He looked to the rooftop and saw a figure dropping into position. Blaise sighted in, let out his breath and pulled the trigger.
∞
Drake ran up the ancient flights of stairs and found the access to the roof open. He swept the entrance for possible ambush, maneuvering his rifle side to side. Once he was convinced that it was clear, he made his way out on the roof top and saw the distance ahead. “Screw me,” he muttered, and then started the long run that would take him over firewalls and further up into the rooftops.
∞
Jamie strapped the grenade to the access scanner and stepped around the corner. Four seconds later the scanner and the entrance were both smoking holes in the side of the building. Jamie checked the entrance and then ran into the building. Like several of the buildings along Gullen Mall, this one appeared to be an old residence hall from the pre-reorganization era when Michigan was in its ignominious decline into a bankrupt, lawless and ungovernable state whose own representatives and senators were unwilling to return to it once elected to office. Running up a flight of steps, Jamie could see that there were signs that the building was presently in use. The stairwell lights were working. There was the sound of people, above and below him. When he opened the second floor fire door, he saw that the lights were operating on this floor, as were the basic systems, and he noted that several doors were open along the hallway. As he ran it became clear to him that this building was being used as offices. A head poked out into the hallway and looked at him. The head was holding a phone. The individual said. “Uh huh. Yes, I see him. HDMP uniform, running with rifle and looking very threatening. What was that? I don’t understand. You…”
The phone fell from the person’s hand and they charged at Jamie. Jamie didn’t hesitate. He hit the newly launched KVB in the face with the butt of his rifle and then shot a single round into its supine head. He kept running. If Jamie knew nothing else, he knew that things were only going to get worse.
∞
Marshall ducked and heard the sound of bullet. Then felt the pulverized cement and detritus sail over his head. “Nice,” he said, resuming his position looking through his scope.
He had Blaise in his crosshairs and was squeezing the trigger when his world became very loud.
∞
Jamie had shot at least seven KVBs on his way to the terminal that turned out to be situated in the office break room. When he arrived in the break room, he could see that the cluster of people in there were not KVs or KVBs. He also knew if he didn’t do something quick they soon would be.
“There’s a birthday cake and pizza in room 222,” he announced.
Of the ones who had noticed Jamie shooting people on his way up the hall, all of them took this as an excuse to run away. Amongst those who were less attentive, occupied with getting their food warmed, or generally the sort that viewed life as something that happened to other people, there was a pronounced indifference to this information. One, for whom life had not become an appalling grind from which they secretly prayed to be released by a violent death, raised his hand.
“Yes?” Jamie asked.
“What type of pizza?”
“There were at least two types; one was pepperoni and one was cheese.”
This one decided he would try his luck with the pizza in room 222. The remaining five decided to ignore Jamie and answer their phones. Jamie sighed and w
aited.
∞
Carl Marshall rolled to his back with his ears ringing. His rifle had exploded. “Damn!” he shouted, but couldn’t hear his own voice except as a muffled vibration in his skull.
“Throw me the gun,” Drake said, his rifle trained on Marshall.
He’d wanted to kill Marshall as soon as he saw him. But he’d made himself wait and he was glad. Shooting Marshall’s rifle had been very satisfying. His only regret was that none of the shrapnel appeared to have hit Marshall in the head or face. “Throw me the gun,” Drake repeated.
Marshall, who was now hearing a high pitched whine in his head, took a gun from his belt and slid it across the rooftop at Drake. “The other one,” Drake said, and motioned with his rifle as to where it was.
Marshall pulled the gun from his ankle holster and slid it across the roof. The rifle continued to move and Marshall gave out an exasperated sigh and pulled the gun from the small of his back and slid it across the roof.
Drake kicked the guns away and took a bead on Marshall, lining it up so that it would be a head shot. That was the moment when Marshall was thankful that the gun’s explosion had rendered him temporarily deaf.
∞
Blaise was shooting his way across to the next building when he saw Baxter come out of it. Baxter was shaking his head. “What is it?” Blaise asked.
“People,” Jamie said. “I always try to keep this bright line in my mind between the brain dead KVs and KVBs and the living. It’s not killing if they’re already dead.”
“I know,” Blaise agreed, putting a hand on Jamie’s shoulder.
“No, you don’t,” Jamie countered, turning away from him. “I tried to clear a break room to get to the terminal. Five people wouldn’t leave. I sighed, yelled at them, ‘Don’t touch your tech!’ and they all ignored me and took the call.”
“Became KVBs?” Blaise asked.
“One did. After that I didn’t bother to wait to find out,” Jamie said.