The Swarm

by Frank Schätzing

  'God help us,' groaned Vanderbilt.

  'Of course, humans use living organisms for warfare too,' continued Johanson, as if he hadn't heard. 'Scientists are growing strains of Ebola and other viruses, and experimenting with smallpox. For the moment, the conventional method is to cram them into warheads, but it's not the most straightforward way of doing things, and even satellite-guided missiles don't always hit their mark. Dispatching a pack of diseased dogs might be more effective. Or you could use a battalion of birds – or insects, for that matter. Just imagine trying to defend yourself against a swarm of virus-infested flies or an army of infected ants … Or against millions of crabs, transporting killer algae.' He paused. 'The worms on the continental slopes were genetically engineered. It's not surprising that we'd never seen them before. They didn't exist. Their sole purpose is to convey bacteria into the ice. They're annelid cruise missiles, if you like – biological weapons developed by a race of beings whose entire culture is based on manipulating organic life. It gives us an explanation for all the various mutations. In some cases, organisms have been modified only slightly, while others are new creations. Take the jelly-like tissue. It's a highly versatile biological product, but it certainly wasn't arrived at via standard evolution. Like the worms, it's there for a purpose – to control other living creatures by invading their neural networks. It's somehow affecting the behaviour of live whales. The crabs and lobsters are a slightly different story. The jelly steers their movements, but they're not actually alive. They're empty shells with incomplete nervous systems – organic spacesuits for the journey on to land.'

  'This jelly,' said Rubin, 'couldn't a scientist have developed it instead?'

  'Unlikely.' Anawak joined the discussion. 'Dr Johanson's explanation makes more sense. If this were a human project, what would be the point of attacking via the depths? That's a pretty big detour.'

  'Because killer algae are found in the sea.'

  'Why use killer algae in the first place? Anyone capable of creating a strain of algae more toxic than Pfiesteria would surely be able to find some pathogen that doesn't live in water. Why breed crabs if ants, birds or rats would do the job?'

  'Rats can't trigger a tsunami.'

  'That jelly was concocted in a lab,' insisted Vanderbilt. 'It's a synthetic substance, which-'

  'I don't buy it,' interrupted Anawak. 'Not even the navy would be capable of that, and from what I've heard, it's pretty darned good at messing with animals.'

  Vanderbilt's head was shaking so fast that he looked as if he was having a convulsion.

  'What are you trying to say?'

  'I'm referring to a programme of experiments codenamed MKO.'

  'Never heard of it.'

  'Well, for years now the navy has been experimenting with dolphins and other marine mammals, trying to manipulate their behaviour by putting electrodes in their-'

  'Bullshit.'

  'It didn't work, though, or at least not in the way they'd intended, so now they're using Ray Kurzweil's ideas to-'

  'Kurzweil?'

  'A leading authority on artificial intelligence,' Fenwick explained. Suddenly he had become animated. 'He came up with a vision of the future that pushed back the boundaries of current neural research. If you want to establish how much we know about the workings of the brain … in fact, better still, if you want to understand how much another intelligent species might know about the brain, you should study his work.' Fenwick was flushed with excitement. 'That's it! Kurzweil's neural network computer! You could really be on to something.'

  'I'm sorry,' said Vanderbilt, 'but I have no idea what you're talking about.'

  'Really?' Li smirked. 'I thought the CIA took a professional interest in brainwashing.'

  Vanderbilt snorted. 'Can anyone tell me what he's talking about? Because I'll be darned if I know. Is someone going to explain?'

  'The neural network computer is a blueprint for creating a perfect replica of an individual brain,' said Oliviera. 'Our brains are made up of billions of nerve cells, or neurons. Each neuron is connected to countless others. They communicate using electrical pulses, allowing our brains to continually update, reorder and archive what we know, learn and feel. Every single second of our lives, even when we're asleep, our brains are being reconfigured. Modern scanning technology gives us pictures of the brain that are accurate to within one millimetre of detail. We can watch how the brain thinks and feels, and which neurons are activated when, for example, we kiss or experience pain or recall a past event.'

  'The scans show which parts of the brain do what, so the navy knows where to place the electrical signals to achieve a particular response.' Anawak had taken over. 'But they aren't detailed enough. If you think of them as maps, you can only see objects in excess of fifty square metres. Kurzweil predicts that we'll soon have the ability to scan an entire brain, mapping every single synaptic connection and every neurotransmitter, and detailing the concentration of every chemical. We'll have a complete model of every cell.'

  'Gee,' said Vanderbilt.

  'And once you've gathered all that information,' said Oliviera, 'you'll be able to install the entire brain and all its functions in a computer, which would replicate that particular person's thought processes, memories and abilities. You'd have a kind of clone.'

  Li raised her hand. 'I can assure you that MKO hasn't reached that stage,' she said. 'At the present time, Kurzweil's neural network computer remains just a vision.'

  'Jude!' Vanderbilt whispered, aghast. 'What are you thinking? This stuff is classified – it's none of their business.'

  'MKO is based purely on military necessity,' Li said calmly. 'If it didn't exist, we'd have to sacrifice human lives instead. We can't always choose our wars, as I'm sure you've realised. The programme is currently at an impasse, but I'm confident it's merely a temporary hitch. We're well on the way to creating artificial intelligence. In medicine, it won't be long before we can replace organs with microchips. Implants are already allowing blind people to regain some of their sight. Entirely new forms of intelligence will emerge.' She fixed her gaze on Anawak. 'That's what you're getting at, isn't it? All the evidence would seem to support the Middle East theory, if only humanity were as advanced as Kurzweil predicted. But we're not. This jelly does the job of a neural network computer, and no living scientist is capable of inventing it.'

  'In practice, a neural network computer would be in control of every thought process,' said Anawak. 'Assuming that's how the jelly functions, it doesn't simply steer a creature, it becomes that creature. It becomes part of its brain. The cells of the substance assume the function of brain cells. They either add to the capacity of a brain-'

  'Or they replace it,' chimed Oliviera. 'Leon's right. An organism like that can't come from any human lab.'

  Johanson's heart was pounding as he listened. They were engaging with his theory. With every word that was spoken, his hypothesis gained weight. While the debate raged around him, he envisaged a biological computer that could copy every neuron in the brain.

  Roche jumped to his feet. 'Perhaps you could explain one thing, Dr Johanson. How do you account for these underwater life-forms knowing so much about us? I dare say it's an impressive theory, but how could an inhabitant of the ocean depths obtain that kind of knowledge?'

  Johanson saw Vanderbilt and Rubin nodding. 'That's quite straight-forward,' he said. 'Whenever we dissect a fish, we do it in our world, not in the water. Why shouldn't these creatures find out about us in their world? Drownings happen all the time – and these beings are certainly capable of fetching more bodies, should they need them. Having said that, it's a valid point. How much do they really know about us? I first started to come round to the idea of an organised attack just before the shelf collapsed in Europe. Oddly enough, it never occurred to me that humans might have been responsible. The strategy seemed too outlandish. Wiping out large swathes of the infrastructure in northern Europe was a stroke of genius, and had serious consequences for humanity, bu
t using whales to sink small craft strikes me as naive. Poisonous jellies are never going to stop people plundering fish from the ocean. Shipping accidents cause a lot of damage, but I seriously doubt whether swarms of mutated organisms are capable of paralysing international trade. But it does make one thing clear: they know a lot about boats. They're familiar with anything that comes into direct contact with their habitat, but they're not so well informed about dry land. Dispatching killer algae in an army of crabs shows excellent military planning, but the first attempt, involving Brittany lobsters, wasn't as effective. They clearly hadn't reckoned with the pressure difference. The jelly was introduced into the lobsters in the depths – that is, in conditions of high pressure. Once it reached the surface, it expanded, and some of the lobsters exploded before they came into contact with humans.'

  'By the time they deployed the crabs they seemed to have learned from that mistake,' said Oliviera. 'The crabs stayed stable.'

  'What do you mean, stable?' Rubin pursed his lips. 'They died almost as soon as they reached land.'

  'That's irrelevant,' retorted Johanson. 'Their mission had already been accomplished. These creatures are all destined for an early death. They're not trying to colonise our world. It's purely an attack. Whichever way you look at it, humans would never fight a war like this. Why approach from the sea? What possible reason could anyone have for manipulating the genes of organisms that live several kilometres underwater – like vent crabs, for instance? You won't find any humans at work here. All this is designed to discover our weak points. They're experimenting – and, more than that, they're trying to distract us.'

  'Distract us?' echoed Peak.

  'Yes. The enemy is attacking on all fronts at once. Some of the attacks cause nightmare scenarios, others are more of a nuisance, but the main thing is, they succeed in keeping us busy. They're needling us, which means we don't notice what's really going on. In our eagerness to limit the damage, we're blind to the ultimate threat. We're like circus clowns, balancing a series of plates on poles. All the time we're running from one pole to the next to keep the plates spinning and stop them crashing to the ground. As soon as we've spun the last plate, we have to rush back to the first. But the number of plates exceeds our powers of juggling. We won't be able to cope with the volume of attacks. Individually, whale attacks and disappearing fish stocks wouldn't be much of a worry. But taken together, they fulfill their purpose, which is to paralyzed and overwhelm us. If the phenomena continue to spread, governments are going to lose control, other states will take advantage of the situation, and there'll be regional, maybe even international, conflicts. The trouble will get out of hand, and no one will be able to stop it. We'll undermine our own strength. International aid organisations will collapse, and medical supply networks will be overstretched. The barrage of head-on assaults serves to mask what's silently unfolding in the depths, and soon we won't have the technology, energy, know-how or even the time to prevent it.'

  'Prevent what?' asked Vanderbilt, in a bored voice.

  'The annihilation of mankind.'

  'Excuse me?'

  'Isn't it obvious? They've decided to deal with us in the same way that we deal with pests. They want to wipe us out.'

  'I've heard enough of this bull.'

  'Before we wipe out all the life in the sea.'

  The CIA chief lumbered to his feet and pointed a trembling finger at Johanson. 'That's the biggest pile of crap I've ever heard. We summoned you here to deal with a crisis. Are you trying to tell us that those, uh, do-gooding aliens from The Abyss have come back to wag their fingers at us because we've been misbehaving?'

  'The Abyss? Johanson thought for a moment. 'Oh, I see. No, I wasn't thinking of creatures like that. They were extra-terrestrials.'

  'It's the same kind of crap.'

  'Actually, no. In The Abyss the alien creatures come from space. The film makes them out to be a nicer version of humans. They're supposed to have a moral message. The main difference, though, is that those aliens aren't interested in toppling us from our throne at the top of terrestrial evolution, which is what any intelligent species that had developed in parallel to us and that shared our planet would want to do.'

  'Dr Johanson!' Vanderbilt pulled out a handkerchief, and wiped the sweat from his forehead. 'You're not a professional snoop like me. You don't have the benefit of my experience. You've done a great job in keeping us entertained for these past fifteen minutes, but the first thing you've got to do when you're trying to get to the bottom of a mess like this is to ask yourself who gains. Who stands to gain? That's how you get on the scent. Not by poking around like-'

  'No one stands to gain,' said a voice.

  Vanderbilt heaved himself round.

  'That's just it, Vanderbilt.' Bohrmann had risen to his feet. 'Last night Kiel finished modelling the scenarios for what's likely to happen if further continental slopes collapse.'

  'I know,' Vanderbilt said brusquely. 'Tsunamis and methane. We'll have a spot of bother with the climate-'

  'No,' said Bohrmann. 'Not a spot of bother. It's a death sentence. We all know what happened fifty-five million years ago, the last time enormous quantities of methane were released into the atmosphere-'

  'Know? Come on, it was fifty-five million years ago.'

  'We reconstructed what happened – and now we're predicting that the same thing will happen again. Tsunamis are going to hit the coastlines and wipe out coastal populations. Then the surface of the Earth will get warmer, and it will keep getting warmer until we all die out. That's everyone, Mr. Vanderbilt, including the Middle East and all your terrorists. The dissociation of the hydrate reserves in the western Pacific and off the east coast of America would be enough to kill us all.'

  There was a deathly hush.

  'And there'll be nothing,' said Johanson softly, looking at Vanderbilt, 'absolutely nothing you can do. You won't even know where to start. And because you've been dealing with all those whales, sharks, mussels, jellies, crabs, killer algae and invisible cable-munching monsters, you won't have had time to prepare. In fact, you won't even have been able to peek under water, because all your divers, dive robots and other gadgets will have disappeared.'

  'How long will it take for the atmosphere to heat up sufficiently to pose a threat to humanity?' asked Li.

  Bohrmann frowned. 'A few hundred years, I guess.'

  'That's OK, then,' growled Vanderbilt.

  'On the contrary,' said Johanson. 'If these creatures have launched their crusade because we're threatening their habitat, they've got to get rid of us fast. A few hundred years are nothing in the context of the history of the planet, but mankind has inflicted incredible damage in no time at all. So they've quietly decided to go one step further. They've stopped the Gulf Stream.'

  Bohrmann stared at him. 'They've what?'

  'It's stopped already,' Weaver spoke up. 'OK, so maybe there's still a weak current, but it's practically gone. The world had better start bracing itself for another ice age. It's going to get seriously cold within the next century. It may come sooner than that – in forty or fifty years' time, or perhaps even earlier.'

  'Hang on,' Peak called. 'Methane's going to heat up the planet. We know that for a fact. The climate might shift. But how does that fit with the Gulf Stream causing an ice age? What the hell happens then? Do two catastrophes balance each other out?'

  Weaver turned towards him. 'I'd say they make things worse.'

  IF AT FIRST it seemed that Vanderbilt was alone in vehemently rejecting the theory, over the next hour the situation changed. The assembly split into two camps that were locked in bitter combat. Everything that had happened was rolled out and picked over again. The first anomalies. The rampaging whales. The circumstances leading to the discovery of the worms. It was like watching a rugby match, as arguments were tossed back and forth, then knocked out of play by rhetorical elbows, allowing one side to surge forwards, flanked by the opposition, then thwarted by its tricks. But behind all the manoeuv
ring was an impulse that Anawak recognised: some people couldn't countenance the existence of a parallel intelligence that challenged the supremacy of mankind. They didn't voice their outrage, but Anawak – versed in debates about animal intelligence – could hear it. An undercurrent of aggression entered the debate. The split caused by Johanson's theory wasn't merely scientific; it created a schism within a group of experts who were, first and foremost, people. Vanderbilt counted Rubin, Frost, Roche, Shankar and a hesitant Peak on his side, while Johanson was backed by Li, Oliviera, Fenwick, Ford, Bohrmann and Anawak. At first the intelligence agents and diplomats looked on in silence, then one by one they joined the scrum.

  It was astonishing.

  Johanson would never have expected it, but the professional spies, arch-conservative defence advisers and counter-terrorist experts were almost unanimously on his side. One commented, I'm a reasonable kind of guy. If I hear something that seems to make sense, I'm willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. If the alternative explanation has to be pounded into shape before it fits the mould of our experience, it seems to me that it's unlikely to be true.'