by Tom Clancy
Arrogance, Charles, arrogance.
He had to remember not to underestimate them. No matter what he believed of the nation as a whole, there had to be at least a few sharp people keeping the bread and circuses running. Were there not, the last remaining superpower would not be such, eh?
The real question — and his real concern — was whether or not the Americans were responsible for what had happened. A faked incident of their own might have been staged to draw CyberNation in, to deceive them into joining as an ally against a foe that did not exist — the purpose to fuse a partnership where CyberNation would remain a weaker ally, or perhaps to link the two nations symbolically in world opinion.
He didn’t believe that, though. If what he had learned was true, such a plot would have cost a great deal, and money was always such a consideration with the Americans that it seemed an unlikely scenario. Still, one had to consider all the possibilities.
America’s allies had a tendency to act as ventriloquist’s dummies for the huge nation, and Seurat would have none of this to taint the purity of CyberNation. Sooner or later the torch of the most powerful nation would be passed to another — and Seurat did not want to delay this inevitability in any way.
He leaned toward the idea that a government was behind the attack. It seemed unreal that a single man with limited resources could manage to do so much damage on his own. A government could support an apparatus large enough and powerful enough. Too, only a government would care enough to want to bring another government down. It was approaching hubris to consider that CyberNation was worth going to war with, but the evidence was there, non?
But could the United States be so worried about CyberNation that they had decided to act?
He didn’t know, but as the shepherd, as the adult, he had to find out.
If the Americans planned treachery, they’d find him a difficult target. Years of fencing had kept his body and mind honed to a razor’s edge. The lamb might lie down with the lion, but in his case, it was more like a wolf in sheep’s clothing lying down with the lion.
He smiled. What was the term they used about the French? Ah, yes, frogs.
Well, this frog has teeth, mon ami.
As they would find out, if they attempted to hurt his nation.
His alarm chimed. It was time to go.
Washington, D.C.
It had been a long time since Chang had been to Washington. The place had a charm to it. It was different than New York or Boston or Los Angeles or Chicago. It felt much more like a Southern U.S. town than a big city. As the taxi took him to his hotel, he looked at the people and buildings, recently washed clean by rain and now basking in bright sunshine. Here was the head of the superpower that was the United States, and it looked so… ordinary…
Looks could be deceiving, of course. Chang knew this as well as any. He recalled an old joke he had heard as a younger man, here in the States.
A man is walking a tailless little yellow dog on a leash when another man walking a snarling bulldog comes up. The bulldog takes a run at the little dog, growling and snapping. The little yellow dog opens enormous jaws and bites the bulldog in half.
The bulldog’s owner stares at the other guy. “Lord, man, what kind of dog is that?”
“Well, before I cut off his tail and painted him yellow, he was an alligator.”
Chang smiled at the memory. No matter how you disguise it, an alligator is still an alligator.
Here in this city, this unique district, lived men who had more power than the greatest rulers in all of history. With a spoken command, their leader could more or less wipe out every human being on the planet. There were enough atomic and hydrogen bombs in America’s arsenal to directly destroy hundreds of millions, with the resulting fall-out killing millions more. And if the scenario of nuclear winter was true — that awful theory that enough smoke and dust in the air would cast a pall over the whole of the world and bring about massive weather changes — it might be that one man could destroy most of the life on Earth. It was a frightening thought. Nobody knew this for certain, and Chang hoped nobody would ever have to find it out the hard way.
Washington might look innocuous to a visitor, but it was, like the yellow dog in the joke, more than it appeared on the surface. Just like the people of this country. Many in the world thought that Americans were overfed and lazy, concerned only with their toys and their easy lives.
That kind of thinking was a mistake. Americans were an affable people, sure enough, but when attacked, they did not shrink from a hard response. Witness what they had done to Afghanistan, to Iraq, and what they were almost certainly going to do to any other nation that was stupid enough to threaten them. To attack such a country was to court a terrible retribution.
Chang smiled. Such was certainly not his intent. The new China was more interested in commerce than war — there were more than a billion mouths to feed, and business was growing better and better.
Before he went to visit Net Force, he had appointments with several software and hardware dealers eager to have Chang’s business. There were some limitations on the technology he could legally acquire, of course, and there probably always would be, but such restrictions had lessened in the last few years. Nothing Chang wanted to get his hands on presented a threat to the U.S.’s national security. At least, he didn’t think so.
The cab arrived at the Constitution, a small but well-appointed hotel on Chang’s approved list. It wouldn’t cost much more than staying in a comparable place back home.
Chang alighted, paid the driver, then followed the bell-boy who collected his luggage into the building.
A sunny day in a sunny city, and he was a man about his business. What could be better?
Well, he thought as he approached the check-in desk, a beautiful and sunny woman with which to share it would be nice. He was between relationships at the moment, no girlfriend back home. He had thought to be married and a father by now, but work had gotten in the way. He would have to spend some time in that arena when he got home. A loving and passionate wife, sons and daughters, these were things he wanted. Life wasn’t all about work, after all. The Prophet had said so, and Chang believed it.
Paradise Cove
Fiji
The sun was warm on Jay’s bare back. He wore a pair of ragged shorts and nothing else. The hot sand made little chee-chee sounds under his feet as he walked. A line of breakers rolled sudsy white surf onto the beach. Gulls crawed overhead. Palm trees wafted in the gentle breeze. The bananas and coconuts were ripe, you could see fish in the tide pools, and the heady scents of flowers and fruits drifted about him. It was as close to a tropical paradise as Jay could imagine. Because, of course, he had imagined it.
In such a place, the set of small footprints on the wet sand at the shoreline was easy to spot and follow. Once Jay caught up with the person who had made those prints, he would have access to a vital bit of information. Which, at this point, would be a lot more than he currently had — which was to say, at this point, he didn’t have anything at all.
Jay was not used to being stymied. Part of the problem with being really good at what you did was the realization that a lot of people weren’t able to run with you. You started to take it for granted that, when given a problem, not only would you be able to solve it, you’d be able to do it fast. Like being an international chess grandmaster, most of the players you ran into simply weren’t in your league. But even the world champion lost now and then — nobody was perfect. Nobody stayed champ forever. Sooner or later, somebody better came along and beat you.
Intellectually, Jay knew this. Emotionally, however, it was hard to accept.
Jay Gridley did not like to lose. Ever.
The track followed the shoreline for maybe a quarter of a mile, then veered into the dry sand, heading away from the beach. The footprints weren’t as distinct here, but still easy to see across the otherwise smooth sand. Two hundred yards away from the water, there was a line of trees and underbrush,
and there the footprints disappeared. But even so, there was a trail, narrow and winding, and no sign of broken branches or disturbed bushes leaving the path. A couple years back, Jay had learned how to track a man on foot, even one trying to hide his trail, and whoever this was, he was sticking to the easy way.
There was a gentle rise, and it was cooler here in the trees, but not enough so that Jay needed a shirt. The dirt and moss underfoot were soft and warm. Birds cheeped, some kind of small creature chittered in the trees, and Jay enjoyed the hike.
After another fifteen minutes or so, the animal track widened into a clearing, ringed by banana and palm trees.
In the middle of this glen stood a woman dressed in a sarong, a bright red patterned wrap that covered her from her breasts to just above her knees. She had a Polynesian look to her, silky black hair that hung to the middle of her back, dark skin made darker by the sun, and a flashing white smile. Altogether gorgeous, Jay decided.
He returned her smile. Well. This was easy enough. About time.
He walked toward her. She waited.
Fifteen feet away, he stepped onto a broad palm leaf and felt his belly lurch as he fell into a pit.
He landed heavily on his feet, collapsed, and stood up again, shaking his head, already angry with himself. Fortunately, the trap had not been lined with stakes; but it could have been. As it was, the edges of the pit were two feet above his outstretched hands. He jumped up, caught the edge, and it gave way under his grip. He fell, cursing.
He shook his head again, disgusted with himself. And here he’d just been thinking about how great he was.
Jay shook his head. He would have to dig climbing notches in the dirt, which, with his bare hands, was going to take a while, even in the soft soil. And he knew that the smiling woman he had been following would be long gone by the time he reached the surface.
Gritting his teeth, and biting back a few more choice curses, he got to work.
WTC Airlines Flight #217
Somewhere over the Atlantic
Locke wished that the Concorde SSTs were still flying the Atlantic route between Paris and New York. Yes, he was in first class, and certainly there were things he could do to pass the time; still, commercial air travel was so much less interesting than almost any other mode of transportation. There was nothing to see, just clouds and distant ocean. The air on board a modern jet was dry, stale, and full of enough germs to infect an entire army.
A train, a riverboat, those gave you sights. Even an old prop plane chugging along at low altitude was better. Riding a bike or walking was the best of all — you could interact with the scenery. You saw things while walking you’d miss in a car or on a train, and certainly would miss on a jet roaring along at six hundred miles an hour.
Still, if you needed to get somewhere quickly, the jet was obviously the way to travel. Crossing an ocean on a ship could take a week; flying over it, a matter of hours. One had to balance the means against the end. Too bad there were no such things as matter transmitters, like in the sci-fi stories on television.
Locke had seen those as a kid — with Captain Kirk and Spock speaking dubbed Mandarin. Step onto a pad, Scotty pushes the sliders, and presto! You were instantly where you wanted to be…
Locke sipped at his club soda. When he had been making his living from women, he had drunk alcoholic beverages at social gatherings; it was necessary. These days, he seldom indulged in liquor. He did not like to have his thoughts fuzzed by anything.
In fact, he had found certain smart drugs and mild psychedelics to be enhancing, and he sometimes took these. In competition, with all things else being equal, the smartest player had the advantage. The kind of work he had come to required a sharpness of mind, a concentration, and anything that altered his consciousness and made him feel less clever? No, thanks.
This venture with Wu was intriguing on many levels. If it succeeded, it would be hard to top. The money aspect of it was enormous, the level of detail needed immense, and offhand, Locke couldn’t think of any way he could better it. Well, toppling a government, perhaps, and becoming a king himself…
Locke smiled, and sipped his tonic water again. He would worry about that once he accomplished the task at hand.
He had come a long way from the streets of Hong Kong. And not just in distance.
9
People’s Military Base Annex
Macao, China
Wu hated computers. But then he pretty much disliked high technology in general. Were it not for such things, the Chinese would rule the world. It was a simple matter of numbers, and the Chinese had more of them — more citizens, more soldiers, more weapons, more everything. At least, everything that wasn’t high-tech.
But with their electronic smart missiles and radar and sonar and IR satellites that could spot a man smoking a cigarette at night in the fog from hundreds of miles up in the sky, the armies of the West had the advantage. And their superiority in technology more than made up for the Chinese superiority in numbers, the Chinese superiority in tradition, and the Chinese superiority in moral standards.
For now, anyway.
Wu recalled the first American Gulf War, wherein the Iraqi troops had dug in, formed lines as had been done for hundreds of years — and had been whipped like a housewife beating a dirty rug. The Iraqis had been outflanked, outmaneuvered, and outgunned. They sat there in their trenches in the desert while the United States flew over them unseen like a sharp-eyed eagle, watching every move they made. If, in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man was king, then a man with two eyes and high-tech telescopes was a god. The Iraqis had not had a prayer of winning — not using the tactics of the past against those of the future. No chance at all.
Wu sighed. The Chinese could put millions of soldiers onto a field, but today, those numbers were not enough. To win a battle, much less a war, against an enemy with a vastly superior technology, you either had to develop weapons of your own to match his — or you had to somehow take his away.
A smart weapon with its brain removed was no danger. The playing field would be leveled considerably if the West could not bring its toys to the game.
Thus the need for Comrade Shing. Water could defeat fire, but with a large enough fire, water was not the best way — fire itself was.
“Report, please,” Wu said, giving Shing his usual enigmatic smile.
“We progress according to plan,” Shing said. He was bored with this; it shone from his face. He felt superior to Wu, felt a contempt for him and his oldness, had no respect for tradition. Shing was one of the new dragons of the air, all looks, bright red wings fluttering, pretty to gaze upon, but no substance, no connection to the ground. You must have roots to withstand the cyclone’s winds. Men like Shing would be blown around the skies in a moderate breeze. Computers were amazing playthings, smart bombs could not be denied, but their reality was ephemeral. Take those away, and it was the man on the ground who decided the battle.
The pen, in the long run, might indeed be mightier than the sword, but on a street facing a man with a sword, a pen was a poor weapon. There would be no long run for the scribe against the warrior in such a situation. Shing did not know this. He had not yet learned that real power always comes down to the sword. All else flowed from that.
Wu knew. Wu also knew that the sword of power must, at times, be taken from those who did not know how to wield it. From those who did not wish to give it up.
Shing was of some value. Locke was worth more.
Men with swords of power were not to be faced directly, however. They might be less than adept with their blades, but even a casual backhanded swipe could behead somebody foolish enough to stand in front of them making annoying noises. One needed to distract them, misdirect their attention, and while they were busy, slip in and steal their weapons for one’s own use.
This was Shing’s worth. He would be a distraction, though he would have no idea this was the use to which he was being put.
Shing was too full of himse
lf, his own skill and talent, to even consider that a man such as Wu could use him thus.
Pride was both terrible and wonderful — terrible for the man who suffered it; wonderful for one who could use another man’s hubris to his own ends…
So, go on, flying dragon, feel superior. Look down from the skies upon lowly Wu, plodding across the ground like a turtle, ancient and slow. Eventually, the cyclone would come, and Wu, safe in his shell, would be here long after the dragons of the air had been dashed against the mountains, their bodies left there to freeze in the chilly heights…
He smiled at the image. Even a poor general could be a poet, if not a great one. But there were other ways to make up for that.
Edward’s Park
Washington, D.C.
Jay Gridley, who had survived countless VR battles, a quantum computer-generated stroke, and a brush with Mr. Death Himself in the form of a bullet to the head, stood at the edge of the sidewalk, worried about crossing the street.
The walk sign had just lit, and bright LEDs gleamed at him, offering the same promise the witch in the fairy tale had offered Hansel and Gretel: inviting, but surely a dark side lay hidden in it somewhere.
He eyed the traffic on both sides of the intersection. All the cars were stopped now, waiting for him to head out into the street. Waiting for the baby.
Come on, Gridley.
He felt a nervous tingle, but stepped forward, pushing the pram. He paused to eye little Mark, who lay quietly, watching the world go by overhead, with seemingly no cares in the world.
If you only knew, son.
Not willing to be distracted from their imminent peril, Jay scanned the street again, looking for signs that the drivers at either side were planning to run him over. Eyes that had been trained to note the slightest change in the hyper-realistic environments of VR scanned every detail. He saw nothing out of the ordinary.