The Singularity Trap

by Dennis E. Taylor

  “Yes sir,” Admiral Moore answered. “If I may ask, sir, what has happened since I left Lagrange Four?”

  Again the chairman smiled, this one showing no more humor than the first. “We have some information based on a third-party conversation with Pritchard. It turns out your instincts were correct. We are in the shit, and deep.”

  * * *

  Admiral Moore watched the video excerpt of the interview of Dr. Narang. The woman had an excellent memory, really a basic requirement for a doctor, and a fine level of attention to detail. And an eloquent manner of speaking. Her description of what they’d been told by Pritchard had Moore’s stomach dropping every third sentence. In the shit, indeed.

  Interviewer: So you believe this entity is a significant threat.

  Narang: Ivan has the power to be a significant threat. The nanites, as I mentioned before, are capable of manipulating matter at the molecular level. They completely replaced a flesh and blood human being with a metal version. And maintained his personality, memories, and thought processes.

  Interviewer: What do you know of his plans?

  Narang: At the moment, he’s trying to contact the beings who created the nanites. Probably to report in, and possibly to receive further orders.

  Interviewer: So he’ll wait until he gets a response.

  Narang: No, not necessarily. The entity has a certain amount of discretion, based on what it might find in a system.

  Interviewer: The entity being Ivan.

  Narang: No, this is what I keep trying to tell you. Ivan and the entity are separate beings. Ivan is a computer programmer who crewed on the Mad Astra. The entity is a computer program that was placed in our solar system to wait for the emergence of intelligence.

  Beside him, Commodore Mandelbaum stood at parade rest, showing neither impatience nor boredom. She was in charge of the strike force assigned to take out the threat, and it had been made abundantly clear to Moore that he was answerable to her.

  When the excerpt finished, Mandelbaum turned to him, her impeccable eyebrows arching. “Is she credible?”

  Moore shrugged. “I can’t think of a reason for her to be making this up. For most of the time she’s been, if not on the other side, at least not sympathetic to our concerns. It would take something on the order of what she claims to make her come to us like this.”

  Mandelbaum nodded, deep in thought. “Communications with the Makers, then, aren’t our biggest concern. If only Ursa Minor stars are involved, then we have an absolute minimum of 142 years before even a radio response would get back here, let alone any kind of physical arrival.”

  “Discounting the brown dwarf,” Moore added.

  “That’s a safe assumption, I think. These Makers would tend to be found in the systems they originated. Or similar systems. No species is going to evolve in a brown dwarf system.”

  Moore thought she was being a little naïve by just writing off the brown dwarf system, but he had every intention of having resolved this situation before a twenty-two-year round-trip completion anyway.

  “Ideally,” she continued, “we will be able to take him down before he is ready to transmit at all, thereby solving all our problems at once. A less ideal outcome would be to destroy him before completion of his task, meaning we’d be uncertain if the message had been sent to the correct stars. But at least we’d have some breathing room to prepare.”

  “We need to know what we’re up against, and how far along Pritchard is.”

  “We’ll have to reconnoiter,” Mandelbaum said. “Ideas?”

  “Remotes, coated in industrial glass. Early research showed that the nanites didn’t have the ability to take apart or penetrate the substance.”

  Mandelbaum nodded. “Followed, if necessary, by coated nukes?”

  “That would do the trick. The self-guided variety, I think. Otherwise he might try to lob something big enough to knock them out.”

  “They’ll be harder to coat and still be operable.”

  “Harder isn’t the same as impossible,” Moore said. “Also, last time we came at him in a nice convenient clump. Next time, if we come from all directions, he will have to spread his nanites over the entire sphere.”

  Mandelbaum glared at him, her head cocked. “Your role in this exercise has been made clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am. And it’s also clear that the best outcome for me is a good outcome for this exercise. If you’re worried about me grandstanding or attempting some subtle sabotage, you needn’t.” Moore tried to project an image of candor and trustworthiness.

  The Commodore nodded. “Good. Keep that attitude, Admiral, and we’ll get along fine.”

  Visiting

  Dr. Kemp opened the front door and motioned Dr. Narang in.

  She looked around the home as he took her coat and put it in the closet.

  “Nice place,” she said. “I caught a bit of the view as I pulled in. I’m guessing that factored into the purchase?”

  “Price-wise, oh hell, yes. A small bungalow on less than a quarter-acre needs something special to command a price in the fifty million range.”

  “Hmm, I looked up Horseshoe Bay real estate on the way in. I’ll never get here on a doctor’s salary.”

  “Well, not as long as you insist on working for the government, no.” Kemp smiled at her as they walked into the living room, then gestured to the right.

  Narang turned to the picture window and got her first taste of the full panorama. “Oh. Oh. My. God.”

  “And that is why I bought this place.”

  The land dropped steeply from Kemp’s house. There was barely a yard. The slope ended in the salt water of Horseshoe Bay, the calm, blue cove below sheltered by the rugged shoreline and numerous islands. In the distance, Vancouver Island could be faintly seen as a ghostly image. It was farther away than it would have been a hundred years ago, as the rising ocean waters steadily moved coastlines up the mountain slopes and farther apart.

  Sailboats moved lazily in the near distance, or lay at anchor in the afternoon sun. Closer to home, draconian conservation policies kept the local slopes mostly forested. It was too little, too late, of course. Global warming would continue to erode the percentage of the planet that was still human-habitable. And within a century, if Ivan was to be believed, the entire planet would choke in heat death.

  Narang sat and waited as he fetched a couple of bottled waters. Health nuts both, they’d determined early on that this was their favorite drink. Well, this and caffeine.

  “I did the interview, Charlie. I went straight to Navy HQ on Olympus Station and gave them everything we’d talked about.”

  “I’m sure it was hard. But you’re not betraying Ivan. It’s what he wanted us to do. I’m positive of that.”

  Narang took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I know, but once you start getting into this double-agent-y reverse-double-cross stuff, I find myself wondering exactly who is getting played—them, or us?”

  “We can only do what we can do, Maddie.”

  “And Ivan doesn’t have the full picture, yet, either. The computer might be playing him.”

  “Also a possibility. Same answer, though. At some point, you have to commit.”

  Narang closed her eyes and rubbed her temples. “We’re playing a dangerous game, Charlie. We’re taking implied advice from Ivan on how to convince the computer not to destroy us or Upload us. No matter how I parse it, it sounds ridiculous.”

  “I know, I know,” Kemp replied. “But, as Ivan explains it, it’s the computer we have to convince. Ivan is acting like our lawyer, arguing our case and giving us advice. But once the computer makes a decision, Ivan is helpless. He might, in fact, be worse than helpless; he might be switched off once he’s no longer needed.”

  “Well, we’re going to play it the way Ivan hinted at, Charlie. And the military will do their part, whether they realize it or not. Best case, they’ll take our advice about offering the cooperator move
. Worst case, they’ll blow him up before the computer can do anything. I think Ivan would consider either outcome acceptable.”

  Preparations

  The communication station grew steadily. With the addition of the two cruisers, Ivan had enough material to build a radio dish that would be heard all the way to the farthest homes of the Uploads.

  He wasn’t sure whether it was more amusing or discouraging that a civilization millions of years old was still depending on radio communications. Or maybe Ralph didn’t feel the need to build the advanced stuff. It was one of those questions the computer was either unwilling or unable to answer.

  They would have to wait a minimum of 142 years for a response. Ivan didn’t have nearly enough study courses for that. Maybe he could get Ralph to open up more about galactic civilizations. Otherwise he would discover untold new levels of boredom.

  The cruisers were sorry-looking balls of metal, half melty-looking, with most of their hulls already stripped. Nacelles had been removed to act as transport thrusters. To one side, two chrome balls were just beginning to grow. They had no specific programming, as yet. They could be set to any of a number of different tasks, although that decision hadn’t been made. Ivan had to hope he could delay it until after the Navy’s move.

  Three more sat to one side, ready for launch. Their programming was straightforward, and he had been pushing their manufacture. No doubt Ralph was wondering why he was so energetically pushing the manufacture and early launch of these items. Ivan kept his face neutral and carefully steered his thoughts in another direction. He could no longer hope that Ralph’s plans would be good for the human race. He was faced with his worst-case scenario.

  Ivan sat in the Captain’s Chair of the Mad Astra. He patted the arm with a fond smile. In the short time that he’d been aboard, he’d managed to start thinking of it as a home of sorts. The Astra had fared a little better than the cruisers. She looked like a much-reduced version of herself, but she was still recognizably a spaceship. At least the skeleton of one. No environmental requirements made a lot of the mass of a spaceship redundant. The fusion nacelles, though, were unchanged.

  As he stared into infinity, he wondered how the doctors had done with the Navy. There was a small chance that the Navy might believe them and offer a cooperator move. No, not really. The Navy would be out in force, and soon. He had to hope that the Getting Ahead crew would figure out the real message in time. Otherwise, his fallback plan was to have the Navy nuke the hell out of him and Ralph, before the computer realized it had been set up.

  So far, Ralph didn’t seem to have copped on. So he did continue to enjoy some mental privacy. Or maybe it was just too much work to monitor him.

  Ralph broke into his musings.

  Nanite balls are ready. Confirm your intention to place these on planets one, two, and four and initiate conversion.

  That’s right.

  Why?

  Trying to get their attention. I’m hoping that an external threat will bring humanity together.

  Your plan is optimistic. The word ‘naïve’ seems appropriate as well. Is it?

  You’re an expert on human psychology now?

  Is anyone? Your species is fractious, disorganized both mentally and politically, unpredictable, immature—

  But not beyond hope. You’ve said yourself that an Uploaded species would be valuable. We’re—

  —not ready. And possibly won’t ever be. A decision must be made soon.

  Fine. But let’s try this first.

  Very well. Launching nanite payloads. Regardless of the ultimate decision, this reconfiguration will be useful.

  Ivan carefully kept his features neutral. The important thing was to launch the nanites before the Navy launched another attack.

  Very soon, humanity would have its collective face shoved in the fact that it was not alone in the universe.

  Second Assault

  Twenty Navy ships stood at station keeping outside the Lagrange Four base. Frigates, cruisers, and warships, each had its part to play.

  In another area, five supply ships were being offloaded. Crews moved cylinder after gleaming cylinder from transport vessels to fighting ships, using what for some reason were still called forklifts.

  Admiral Moore scanned the paperwork, making annotations and initialing sections as required. Despite the Board of Inquiry’s statement about his status, Commodore Mandelbaum had recognized that his decades of experience in certain areas should be taken advantage of. She would review his decisions, but it would be a formality. Moore could do this stuff in his sleep. And for a while, at least, he could feel useful.

  Finally, the preparations were complete. Surveillance drones and cruise missiles had been distributed to the ships. Courses had been calculated and communicated. Before the ships departed, there would be a strategy meeting.

  Twenty Ship’s Captains crowded into the large hab-ring conference room. The various seating angles caused by the floor’s curvature wouldn’t even be noticed by these Navy old-timers. Mandelbaum stood at the center of one of the longs sides of the conference table, her eyes scanning the room. Moore, standing to one side, found himself impressed by her outward calm.

  Barely raising her voice, she said, “Your attention, please.” Conversations in the room stopped as cleanly as if a switch had been thrown, and all eyes turned to her.

  “You all have briefing packages, which you will have studied exhaustively. I remind you that the enemy we are facing is more indifferent than antagonistic. Strategies will be set accordingly. We will maintain a radio communications blackout from the time we depart from Lagrange Four. Any necessary comms will be effected by intership maser. We have determined that our comms masers are sufficiently powerful to fry the nanites, so even if one manages to insert itself by fluke, it won’t survive the encounter.”

  She paused and swept her eyes around the room. “Your individual orders are not to be discussed or shared with other ships. Inevitably, Pritchard will manage to take over some of your ships using his nanites. We will limit the information that he can extract from that tactic.”

  Heads nodded around the table. No one had any illusions that this was an exercise, or police action, or some similar euphemism. This would be a naval engagement, with the very real possibility of destruction and death.

  “All right,” Mandelbaum continued. “You have your orders. Let’s do this.”

  Mandelbaum and Moore stood at parade rest at the center of the room as the officers filed out. There was no buzz of conversation. Each person was alone with their thoughts, reconciling themselves to their fate, whatever it might be.

  * * *

  Commodore Mandelbaum and Admiral Moore stood on the on-axis bridge of the Resolute, Velcro slippers helping maintain the illusion of a martial stance. All preliminaries being accomplished, Captain Norman Harding awaited their orders.

  Mandelbaum turned to him and nodded, a minimal movement with a large meaning.

  Turning to his crew, Harding ordered, “Signal all ships. Let’s move.”

  On the status board, icons began to shift. The floor became down. As the minutes stretched, the graphic representing Lagrange Four fell farther to the bottom of the monitor. Finally, with a flicker, the gaps decreased as the scale changed. They were underway.

  * * *

  The Signals officer turned to face Captain Harding. “Message from base, sir. Tagged CEO.”

  “Transfer to my Ready Room.” Captain Harding glanced at the commodore and the admiral, and they followed him. A Command Eyes Only communication at this early stage would not be routine.

  The three made themselves comfortable, and Captain Harding pulled up the message, repeated onto each officer’s tablet.

  TO: Harding, Capt. (Resolute)

  FROM: SSC/UENN

  COMMAND EYES ONLY

  RE: Bogeys

  LRS confirms 6 bogeys trailing your position. Silhouette and drive flame spectrum indicate SSE C
lass-3 Destroyers.

  Captain Harding, these were launched without the usual chest-thumping and paranoid threats. Strategic Space Command analysts suggest the SSE wants as little visibility on this as possible. That can’t be good.

  Maj. Christina Furlong

  Cmdr, Monitoring & Analysis

  The three officers looked up at the same time. There was a moment of silence before Captain Harding ventured, “The Sino-Soviets are so mad they’re speechless?”

  Mandelbaum stared into the air for a moment longer before responding. “Might as well look at it that way, Captain. I bet their orders include the very real possibility of weapons exchange. And without phoning home first.”

  “Destroyers.” Harding grimaced.

  Moore nodded. “Yep. What the SSE lacks in technology they more than make up for by just building bigger and badder. Six destroyers aren’t quite enough to take on our task force, but they can certainly make a mess.”

  Captain Harding glanced at his tablet before placing it carefully on the table. “Well, it doesn’t really change our immediate strategy, does it? We’ll just have to figure it out when we get there.”

  The intercom gave a short beep, followed by the Signals Officer’s voice. “Another CEO, sir. Forwarding.”

  “Busy day,” Mandelbaum commented.

  Captain Harding reached for the control to share the missive, but stopped with his hand in the air. “Wow.”

  “Really, Captain? Care to share?”

  “It’s for you, Commodore. Seems you’re getting a field promotion, of sorts.” He handed his tablet to her.

  Mandelbaum’s eyes tracked back and forth for a few moments, then she lowered the tablet with a bemused expression. She handed it to Moore. “I’ve been granted Level 3 Conflict Decision authority. I guess SSC doesn’t want us phoning home either, if things lose their shine.”

  Captain Harding stood. “I think I’m going to have the crew run a few drills. Just in case.” Without waiting for a response, he headed for the bridge.