400 Minutes of Danger

by Jack Heath

  ‘More than two thousand unmanned aerial vehicles are already deployed in Syria,’ she continued. ‘Bomb disposal is almost always done by robots. Forty per cent of the boats in our navy have neither pilots, nor passengers. But this machine will change everything.’

  She adjusted the blinds, revealing the room behind the window. Tak had pictured white walls, white-coated workers and beakers atop Bunsen burners, but there was no-one around. The lab actually looked more like a bowling alley. There were a bunch of monitors and racks at one end and paper targets all the way up at the other, with a long space in between. The targets were shaped like people.

  Not a bowling alley, Tak realised. A shooting range.

  ‘Meet the ZX90,’ Major Griff said, ‘or as we like to call him, Zeus.’

  38:45 The robot sat motionless amongst the racks of drills and angle grinders. It looked like a tank, but smaller—about the size of a bathtub. The shell was painted yellow and grey, like a dusty bee. A long gun was mounted on the front, and a bubble camera was stuck to the top.

  The class oohed and aahed. Kids at the back of the antechamber stood on their tiptoes to get a better view.

  ‘Zeus can withstand a direct hit from any projectile short of a Hellfire missile,’ Griff said. ‘Thanks to the fine hairs on his treads he can climb almost vertically, and if he falls or tips over, he can right himself.’

  ‘Can he swim?’ someone asked.

  38:15 ‘No, but he’s waterproof, so he can cross rivers by crawling along the riverbed. This is the current model—the next version will contain a helium canister and a weather balloon. If Zeus needs to surface, he’ll be able to inflate the balloon and float upwards.’

  ‘Does it run on petrol?’ someone else asked.

  ‘Batteries,’ Griff said. ‘He can recharge by finding and consuming biomass—dead animals, rotting plants and so forth. Infra-red cameras help him identify enemy combatants, even in the dark, and he can shoot a met re-wide target from up to three kilometres away, which is better than the best human sniper.’

  37:55 ‘Cooooool,’ one kid said.

  Tak stared. He’d never seen a gun in real life, and it made him nervous. He wished the tour would move on to the planes.

  Tak hoped to be a pilot some day. His dad lived in Adelaide and his mum lived in Brisbane. Whenever he flew from one city to the other he made sure to get a window seat, ideally near the wing so he could watch the jets spin and the air brakes move. On weekends he used a flight simulator on his computer to take virtual flights all over Europe.

  37:20 Mr McNulty shushed the class. He was a long-legged man with swept-back hair and a striped necktie. ‘How can the ZX90 save human lives, Major?’ he prompted.

  ‘Every robot we send into the field is one more soldier who can stay home,’ Griff said. She didn’t elaborate.

  ‘Can Zeus also be used for search and rescue?’ McNulty asked after a pause.

  ‘That’s not his primary function,’ Griff said.

  No, Tak thought. It’s literally a killing machine.

  36:50 He stuck up his hand. McNulty looked nervous. Tak was not one of his star pupils.

  ‘Yes.’ Griff pointed at Tak.

  ‘Does the other side have robots, too?’ Tak asked.

  ‘Well, Mr …’

  ‘Zobel,’ Tak said. ‘Tak Zobel.’

  ‘Well, that’s an excellent question, Mr Zobel. We are fighting several wars on several fronts, and some of our enemies have started using primitive robots—remote control cars, for example—to deliver explosives. Fortunately, our technology is much more advanced than theirs. With continued research and development, we hope to keep it that way.’ Griff pointed to a girl up the back. ‘Yes.’

  36:25 ‘Surely the enemy doesn’t need to build more advanced robots,’ the girl said. ‘They can just steal yours.’

  Tak could tell that McNulty was starting to regret taking this particular group of students on this field trip. But Major Griff merely chuckled.

  ‘What’s your name, sweetheart?’ she asked.

  ‘Peggy,’ said the girl, who didn’t look like she appreciated being called sweetheart. Tak didn’t know her well, but she was the reason he had passed computer class—she had spent her lunchtime teaching him to use HTML tags. He still owed her a favour.

  35:45 ‘Well, Peggy,’ Griff said, ‘Zeus won’t just let himself get captured. He can aim and shoot so quickly that the chance of an enemy combatant getting close enough to take control of him is minuscule.’

  ‘But surely—’

  ‘Next question.’

  ‘But surely they wouldn’t need to get close,’ Peggy insisted. ‘If you guys are transmitting instructions to the robot, couldn’t they just hack in and send some instructions of their own?’

  35:20 Zeus swivelled slightly. Lenses glittered inside the bubble camera.

  Everyone turned to look at the robot. Tak hadn’t realised it was switched on.

  ‘He does that sometimes,’ Griff said, after a pause. ‘Adjusting so he can see or hear better.’

  ‘It can hear us?’ McNulty whispered.

  ‘Oh, absolutely. He can even understand simple instructions. For example—’

  Griff tapped on the window. The robot’s treads whirred as it turned to face her.

  34:45 ‘Zeus,’ she said. ‘Retreat.’

  Zeus zoomed back to the paper targets in a matter of seconds and stopped.

  ‘Hmm,’ Griff said. ‘I expected him to move away from the targets, but never mind. He’s still in the experimental stage, so he’s full of surprises.’

  34:15 Nervous laughter from the class.

  ‘How does he know the good guys from the bad guys?’ one boy asked.

  ‘Good question. All our soldiers wear ID bracelets which broadcast a radio signal to unmanned vehicles and aircraft. Basically it’s a way of saying “don’t shoot” without making any sound. And Zeus can scan for weapons in a split second. He’s programmed to never target people with tags or without weapons.’

  ‘Until someone messes with his programming,’ Peggy murmured.

  ‘Shh,’ McNulty said.

  Zeus slowly rolled back up the range towards them.

  ‘Any more questions before we move on to look at the fighter jets?’ Griff asked.

  33:30 Peggy raised her hand again.

  Several people in the class sighed audibly.

  ‘Yes, sweetheart,’ Griff said.

  ‘When you said “retreat”,’ Peggy said, ‘the robot moved away from us. Doesn’t that make us the targets?’

  At that point Zeus opened fire at the class.

  Tak didn’t even have time to duck. The gunshots were deafening as they slammed into the glass.

  Everyone screamed—

  But the shots didn’t break the window. The glass chipped, but the bullets didn’t come through. Zeus moved to the window and examined the chips with its camera. Tak backed away, his heart racing.

  32:45 ‘It’s been hacked!’ Peggy shrieked.

  ‘Stay calm,’ Griff bellowed. ‘That’s not glass—it’s aluminium oxynitride. Zeus can’t break it. I’ll ask everyone to quickly and quietly go back the way we came to leave the building.’

  Kids were already running for the exit.

  Turning away from the window, Zeus rolled towards the laboratory door. The robot had no hands, and the door had both a handle and a keypad. Could the machine get through?

  32:00 The hinges at the top of the door exploded outwards in pieces. Sparks rained down on Tak’s head. The robot was shooting its way to them.

  ‘Move, move, move!’ Griff yelled.

  Tak raced after the rest of the class, out of the antechamber and into a long corridor. Griff slammed a heavy steel door behind them and locked it. She reached over to a handle on the wall, which looked a bit like a fire alarm, and pulled. A warning siren blared through the facility.

  This building was devoted to research and development, but the rest of the army base was populated with soldier
s. If the class could get out of the building, surely they would be safe.

  Tak was a good runner. He was ahead of most of the class. He looked back as he ran, checking that they hadn’t left anyone behind.

  30:25 They hadn’t—but half the hinges on the steel door were missing. Zeus was coming after them. And if that gun really had a range of three kilometres, there was no time to get to a safe distance. They had to hide, fast.

  30:05 The class ran through a set of double doors onto the airfield—a wide grassy field crisscrossed with tarmac. The doors swung shut behind them and the lock engaged automatically. The base had several buildings, but most were too far to run to in time. The closest cover was a huge aircraft hangar with a domed roof about two hundred metres away.

  The front gates—the only way out, as far as Tak knew—were much further away, and in the opposite direction. Which way should he go?

  Griff made the decision for him. ‘That way,’ she bellowed, pointing to the aircraft hangar. Everyone else ran, while she stayed behind to shut the door.

  28:55 Peggy was running alongside Tak.

  ‘I can’t believe this is happening,’ Tak puffed.

  Peggy was red with exertion. ‘Just run!’ she said.

  28:30 The closer Tak got to the aircraft hangar, the bigger it seemed. When they reached the main door he saw fighter jets lined up inside like bowling pins at the start of a game, and equipment crates stacked up against the walls. But there were no pilots or soldiers around.

  ‘Where is everybody?’ McNulty demanded. ‘Who’s going to stop the robot?’

  Griff had just arrived. She didn’t look puffed, despite the heavy uniform.

  ‘We’re prepared for scenarios like this,’ she said.

  She produced a mobile phone, punched in a number and started talking.

  27:10 ‘This is Major Griff, authorisation code Charlie, Charlie, Juliet, Echo. Activate the Atlantis protocol.’

  She hung up the phone. ‘I suggest you take cover,’ she said, jogging towards a row of crates. The group raced after her.

  The doors they’d just exited were visible through a narrow window near the crates. Tak watched another set of hinges burst in the distance. Would Zeus see them through the glass if it escaped? Was this window bulletproof?

  Tak asked, ‘What is the Atlantis—’

  26:15 Kaboom!

  A shockwave rippled out from the research and development building. The windows blew out on the bottom floor, then the first floor, then the second. Crash! Crash! Crash! A wreath of smoke swirled around the distant building.

  Then it fell in upon itself as though the concrete had turned to water. The walls crumbled away and hit the ground. In just a few seconds the building had completely disappeared. It was like a magic trick.

  24:40 The echoes died away.

  ‘The Atlantis protocol,’ Griff began gloomily, ‘is an extreme but effective way of preventing dangerous tech from leaving the base. Zeus is now buried under a thousand tonnes of concrete.’

  ‘Is anyone injured?’ Mr McNulty asked.

  Everyone in the class shook their heads. Some of the kids still looked terrified—others were merely dazed.

  ‘I’ll have to escort you all off the base now,’ Griff said. ‘The clean-up will be a huge operation. And expensive.’

  Tak wasn’t sure Griff had intended for them to hear that part. He turned to look at the rubble-filled pit which had once been a building. How many amazing inventions had been destroyed?

  23:55 A piece of concrete shifted.

  At first Tak thought the debris was still settling. Or perhaps another charge had gone off.

  But no, the piece of concrete had moved upwards.

  ‘Major,’ Tak said. ‘Something’s moving under the rubble.’

  Griff stared at the wreckage, eyes narrowed. ‘That’s impossible,’ she said finally.

  ‘I saw it,’ Tak insisted.

  23:15 Another block rolled over, unleashing a cloud of brick dust—

  And Zeus emerged from the gap.

  ‘Everybody down!’ Griff roared.

  22:45 Tak threw himself to the floor just in time. A row of holes punched through the window. The bullets pinged off the parked planes and left dents in the cargo crates. If Tak had been standing up he would have been shot in the head.

  When the echoes of the gunshots died away, Tak could hear the whirring of tank treads. Zeus was coming.

  Griff was still by the window—lying on her back in a growing pool of blood. She had been shot.

  ‘Major!’ Tak cried.

  A groan echoed through the hangar. She was alive. But maybe not for much longer.

  21:30 The equipment crates had labels stamped on them. One said: MEDICAL.

  Tak popped open the clasps. The crate was filled with med-kits. He could see bandages and disinfectant through the plastic lids, as well as syringes marked ANAESTHETIC and ADRENALINE. Tak grabbed one of the kits and sprinted to wards Griff.

  21:00 Dashing into the line of fire was a bad idea, but he did it anyway. He couldn’t just watch Griff die.

  He reached the major and dropped to his knees. The bullet had gone through her thigh. There was a lot of blood. The smell made him feel sick. Could a person survive after losing that much blood?

  ‘Major Griff,’ he said. ‘Can you hear me?’

  Griff’s eyes were shut, but her voice was clear. ‘I’ve been shot,’ she said.

  ‘Yes.’ Tak fumbled with the med-kit and dug out the bottle of disinfectant.

  20:40 ‘My leg hurts,’ Griff said. ‘That’s a good sign. It means my spine is intact, and I haven’t yet gone into shock.’ Tak could almost believe she was a robot.

  Tak upended the bottle of disinfectant onto the bullet wound. Griff hissed through clenched teeth as the fluid stung her skin.

  20:15 ‘You have some first-aid training, Mr Zobel?’ she grunted.

  He’d had one brief lesson at school, two years ago. Tak doubted that Griff would find that comforting. ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘Lots.’ He wound a bandage tightly around her leg. It bloomed red immediately.

  ‘You have to put more pressure on it.’ Peggy was right behind him. She had run over to help.

  19:50 Tak pressed down on the bandage, trying to hold the blood in. ‘She needs a hospital,’ he said.

  ‘Can’t get to the one on base,’ Griff mumbled. Her voice was getting faint. ‘Not with that thing out there.’

  ‘Why is it trying to kill us?’ Tak demanded.

  ‘It might be an accident,’ Peggy said.

  ‘An accident?’

  ‘Think about it. If I hacked that robot, I wouldn’t want it to go crazy while it was still on the base. I’d wait until it was on the battlefield.’

  19:25 ‘So?’ Tak didn’t understand.

  ‘So someone probably tried to take control of the robot in secret. But that’s the trouble with artificial intelligence. The more complex it is, the more unpredictable. The robot realised it was under attack, and reacted badly.’

  Reacted badly. Tak looked down. His hands were sticky with blood.

  18:45 ‘Infantry can’t hurt it,’ Griff grunted. ‘They’ll stay back. Need air support.’

  ‘I have an idea.’ Peggy pointed at a computer terminal in another corner of the hangar. It was mounted on wheels so it could move around and had some kind of cannon on it.

  ‘That looks like a laser-targeting system,’ she said. ‘If I can get it going, I can paint Zeus with a laser so a Hellfire missile can zero in on it.’

  Tak’s eyes widened. ‘Can it shoot Hellfire missiles?’

  18:15 ‘No,’ Peggy said. ‘You need a plane for that.’

  ‘But all the planes are in here with us and there’s no pilots,’ Tak said.

  Peggy pointed at the row of planes. ‘I know you’re into flight sims,’ she said. ‘You think you can fly one of those jets?’

  Clang! Another bullet came in through the hangar window. Zeus was getting closer.

  Tak
stared at Peggy. ‘Are you crazy?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Am I?’

  ‘F-38 United Strike Fighters,’ Griff said. ‘Complicated machines. Not like playing video games.’

  17:55 Tak considered the idea. It seemed insane, but it might be their only chance.

  ‘Does it have an air speed indicator?’ he asked Griff. ‘Ground speed, altitude, throttle? All the usual stuff?’

  Griff didn’t reply. She had gone very pale.

  ‘She doesn’t have much time,’ Peggy said.

  ‘This is insane,’ Tak said. ‘Zeus will start shooting as soon as I drive the plane out of the hangar.’

  17:20 ‘Then you’d better go pretty fast.’

  Tak looked down at Griff. The veins were visible in her neck. Then he looked back at the other students, who were building a flimsy barricade out of equipment crates under McNulty’s direction.

  17:00 ‘OK,’ he said. ‘Let’s do this.’

  The bleeding seemed to be slowing down. Hopefully that was because the wound was healing, rather than because Griff’s heart was giving out. He and Peggy dragged her across the floor to McNulty.

  ‘Put pressure on the wound,’ Tak said to his teacher.

  McNulty did. Tak wrenched open an equipment crate marked FLIGHT SUITS.

  16:25 ‘What are you doing?’ McNulty asked.

  ‘Getting myself killed, probably,’ Tak muttered under his breath. He grabbed a helmet with a built-in mask. There was no time to put on a full flight suit.

  Peggy ran over to the laser-targeting system and started fiddling. Tak felt himself become invisible. When Peggy was working on anything with a screen, the rest of the world seemed to disappear for her.

  ‘Wait,’ Griff gasped. ‘Keys.’

  Tak looked back at her. She was pointing at a keyring on her belt.

  ‘Blue,’ she said.

  Tak grabbed the keyring and found the blue key.

  15:20 ‘Thanks,’ he said, and sprinted to a plane.

  The fighter jet was way bigger up close. He grabbed a nearby stepladder so he could climb up to the top.

  When he crashed in the simulator—as he had done many, many times—he could just restart the flight. But if he made a mistake in this plane, he was dead and so were his friends. The robot would hunt them down and shoot them to pieces.