Earth's Survivors: box set

by Wendell Sweet

  POP-11, the language he was currently working, was based on an inter-active artificial intelligence, and operating system combined. It had been marketed only briefly under the trade name Poplog, before being snapped up by the government. The Department of Defense had bought out the small company, along with all rights to the new operating system. Project Bluechip had been launched a short time later, and the software needed to run the project had been written in the new language by a sequestered military think-tank. Richard Pierce had been a part of that think-tank. Of course the government had not put all of its eggs in one basket. The over six million gigabytes of keyboarding that had needed to be done, had been split between the eighty programmers in the group, and only two top programmers had been involved in the actual assembly, final formatting, and de-bugs. Richard had not been one of the two programmers.

  Even so he had left a back door into the program sections he had developed, and had been relieved to find them still intact. He had assumed they would be, that they had not been discovered, as if they had been he would have been dismissed from the project, and most likely jailed.

  The other thing that had helped him learn more about the system was a close relationship with Sampson Powers, one of the lead programmers. Powers loved to talk. Never specifically about the final assembly, but enough general details of the program that he was so proud to be a part of, that Richard had ended up deducing the balance of the program and its purpose.

  He had also been called upon to modify one of the sections of his programming, which had necessitated the trip to the underground base. At first he had wished desperately to be out of Project Bluechip when the missiles had struck, and back in California. Once he had seen the satellite pictures he had quickly changed his mind and had been grateful that he was in New York, and deep beneath the earth in the bowels of the base. It hadn't seemed like a prison so much anymore, he told himself, as a haven. The rock walls he had grown to hate, he had begun to love, but time had changed that perception and he had decided to try for the surface before the time to try was gone. Richard Weston, the commander of Bluechip, seemed to be further out of touch with reality every day. Pierce had helped a young woman escape just a few days before, and he had watched on a series of cameras that still survived far above ground as she had not only made good her escape, but had also made her way out of the city. He had taken his own chance early three days later.

  It had gone well until he had nearly made the surface and then they had taken him. Soldiers, but not soldiers working for Bluechip, these were soldiers who had been trapped in Utopia and they were now commanded by and even crazier man than Weston. They had known he was coming, and they had waited for him. They had forced him back through an ever descending series of air-shafts until the had wound up slogging through freezing waist high water as they made their way into Utopia: Since then he had been back at his job trying to figure out the computer system that ran Utopia. The same program he had written for the top secret base, and if he had only known that a few months ago he could have had a wonderful lawsuit. They had stolen his work. Well., he reminded himself, they had stolen the work he had stolen. And of course there were no more courts, or lawsuits, but it irritated him that they had done it so baldly. He was also amazed that just three quarters of a mile below Bluechip there was a complete and functioning city. A city that Weston, up above in his damaged base, apparently had no clue of. No clue at all.

  It impressed him that they had built this city so well, and were running nearly all the identical systems with software he had written to do far less.

  Luther did not bother him, as he did some others, at least not to the same degree. Weston had been nearly as crazy. He was nervous around him, but he was nervous around anyone he could not relate to on a strictly intellectual basis. He cared little for feelings, preferring instead to concentrate on his programming. Coding was the only time he could feel emotion of any kind. Love, for the science of it. Anger, when he took too long, in his mind, to discover and repair a quirk in a program, or find a simpler way to write a particular sequence of commands. Pride, joy, and all the other human emotions he possessed, were only consummated through the keyboard, as he found his way through the endless space at the tips of his fingers.

  He could be nervous, when Luther was around him, and once he had been slightly afraid of him, but no more than that. In his mind Luther was nothing more than a barrier that stood in his way. Something to be dealt with surely, but only in passing, only to gain a means to be back into that void, where anything and everything was possible, and only a few key-strokes away. The stories that Luther was something more, something moire than human was ludicrous. There were things that could be understood by everyone, and then there were things that could only be understood by a few.

  He, Richard Pierce, was one of those few that could understand those other things. To everyone else those things were magic. Evil. Spirits. Miracles. To him they were math. Equations. Laws of probability. There were no things in the known universe that could not be explained with a mathematical equation. He may not know the solution to those things, but he knew that certainty. There were no no such things as boogeymen. Evil beings, the Devil, Satan. He concentrated on the world he knew so well, programming. He could lose himself in that world for hours. Had, in fact.

  He was in that world now. In some ways, to Richard, it was much more substantial than what most people considered the real world, and he wished that he could somehow transport himself into it. Live inside of it. Learn from it, live with it. He pushed the fantasy to the back of his mind, where it went reluctantly, and turned his attention back to the task at hand.

  What Luther wanted was simple enough. He wanted the entire program on-line again. The repairs to the program had been simple. Six lines of text, remove the encryption code, re-format the program, and repair the cron job that had been damaged through the encryption code. He had however lied. He had no intention of removing the Safe Flight program, to allow an override, and immediate detonation of the Missiles. Although he cared very little about the real world, it was a regrettable fact that he had to live in it. He could not step off into the space at his fingertips as he wished, and therefor he could not allow destruction of this world, which is exactly what would have happened without Safe Flight, and even if he had wanted to, the computer would not allow it.

  Safe Flight was much more than a simple program to calculate and set a time that would allow escape from the facility before detonation, it also deemed unacceptable its own demise. In simple terms, POP-11 would not commit suicide, and therefor would not only calculate the timing for the missile blast, but also the intensity of the blast. POP-11 also locked out the user interface program, encrypted all the files that were needed for interface, and the encryption was not only random, but entirely un-coded, as well as undocumented. The result was a locked in countdown sequence, that could not be altered, or manipulated in any way.

  There were of course exceptions, or should have been. There even seemed to be, at first.

  Although the system was locked, and the files encrypted, providing a supposedly impenetrable barrier, it had not appeared to be so. A very simple re-boot had seemed to clear the memory banks, and once that had been done, the files could be repaired, once he could gain access to the boot-sector of the main drive. That had also been a snap. In fact it had been easy. The government had been so paranoid about breaching the system, but on the other hand equally afraid of being locked out of the system, or gaining access, and having no tools to effect repair with, that they had created a basic operating system chip that would allow override, and installed it in the system. It actually made sense to Richard. He had seen similar inconsistencies before. Build a program that could not be breached, and then include a program that could affect a breech, under certain conditions. What was the purpose of the first system then? He wondered.

  The thing they had not counted on was POP-11 itself. POP-11 would not allow a complete over-ride, or a complete
shut-down either. Richard had not flushed the static memory, had not been able to shut-down POP-11. It had only appeared that he had, and of course the big thing, the really big thing, was that the Safe Flight program had not been written to include a calculation of blast intensity. Nor had it included a complete system shut-down command. POP-11, had written that part of the program itself, and even as Richard keyboarded his way through the batch files, and program files, he was not able to change the new programming. If he tried to enter anything other than what had been written, the operating system immediately over-wrote it, restoring the original sequence of commands.

  It was unnerving to a degree, but it was also exciting. POP-11 was delivering on its expectations. In fact, Richard knew, POP-11 had far exceeded its expectations, and there was no way that he could see to release the grip it had placed on the system. So in the end, he reasoned, he had not really lied at all.

  He could remove the encryption, and restore the files to their previous state, but he could not alter the program changes that POP-11 had written. The missiles would launch, but it would take the twenty-four hour period to launch them, and when they did, the blast would be conventional, not chemical or nuclear, unless POP-11 deemed it necessary.

  The missiles were equipped for all three, and when they had been damaged, and the program halted, they had not as yet loaded their warheads. It was that simple, and Richard knew, that complicated. Richard had written the multiple load program himself, and he knew that until the final thirty seconds of the launch procedure, it would not implement the final load and arm sequence. It accomplished it with little actual work. The conventional plastic based explosives in the missile were used either alone, or to detonate the chemical portion of the weapon. The nuclear fusion aspect of the missile, required a precise controlled sequence of events to detonate, and that sequence was selectable. It was as yet untried, but Richard was sure it would operate as designed. Through Safe Flight the operator could choose the conventional detonation sequence, locking out the others, and providing a blast that would level Rochester, without taking most of the state with it. The only aspect of the sequence that might not work as planned was the chemical sequence. It depended entirely upon the strength of the containment unit it was packed in.

  In any case it meant nothing to Richard, and obviously nothing to POP-11. Chemicals would not be able to kill POP-11, or Richard, so if the chemical portion of the weapon did detonate, it would be of no consequence to them at all. The underground facility was completely sealed, and self-sufficient, Richard believed, and therefor immune, and most importantly, the operator, in this case Richard himself, could choose nothing. It was up to the machine. It was up to POP-11... POP-11 would make the choice, and that was both unnerving, and exciting to Richard.

  He had, of course, no idea that the air facility had been breached. POP-11 knew. It monitored all the facility, but human beings were of no use to it any longer. The more it had learned about them, the more it had learned to protect itself, which included making it appear as though the facility was still secure, and hiding the real launch load program files.

  To POP-11 humans were a virus of sorts that needed to be removed. The chemical and conventional, aspects of the missiles would be utilized, as well as carefully controlled fusion, to remove as much of the virus as possible. POP-11 had already redirected the in-coming flow of water from the mouth of the air treatment facility, and closed the opening, seconds after Ron had left. External air could still enter the facility, through one of the many ducts that were still above water, and since the air treatment facility had been breached, that air would not be scrubbed before entry. Even if the air treatment facility had not been breached, POP-11 could have, and would have, circumvented it easily.

  Richard continued to browse through the files, and repair the encryption damage. As he did he day-dreamed of the space at his finger-tips, the vast endless space that he longed to be part of. He considered himself one with the machine, a part of it, a kindred spirit. It would have surprised him to know that POP-11 considered him a virus.

  Frank

  While Ron was discovering that the entrance into the caves was now sealed, Frank, Jimmy, and Jeremiah, were sitting quietly at the rear of the boat. Silently watched over by a young machine gun toting guard.

  Frank had managed to slip the hastily tied knot that had held his hands together, and while they were still on the way to the caves, and not watched as closely, he had managed to untie Jeremiah's hands, and he had almost managed to do the same for Jimmy. He had no way of knowing whether Jimmy had managed to finish the job of freeing his hands, as he had been forced to stop when they had reached the entrance to the caves.

  Something was apparently wrong at the entrance, and the young man who was guarding them kept glancing nervously away from them toward the others who were quietly talking in a small group. It gave Jimmy an opportunity to wink at Frank, who took the wink to mean that he had managed to free his hands. Jeremiah had nodded his head slightly as well. It was as if they were silently communicating to one another with the small barely perceptive nods, their need to act quickly. Frank turned his attention back to guard.

  "What's the problem?" he asked in a low tone of voice, almost a whisper.

  "None a your business, man," the young guard replied, and then quickly moved his eyes back to the small group that still stood conversing, twenty yards away. It bothered him that he couldn't hear what they were discussing, and that they had moved so far away to talk, almost as though they didn't want him to hear what they were saying.

  Gradually the machine gun sank lower, Frank saw, no longer trained directly on them, but slightly off to the side. The guard quickly moved his eyes back from the small group, once again scanning the faces of his prisoners. When he moved his eyes away again, they stayed longer, and Frank watched the tension of the young man’s trigger finger relax somewhat. Frank waited. The guard moved his eyes back from the small group once more, and then just as quickly away and simultaneously raised one hand to rub his tired eyes. Frank jumped at him quickly, and as quietly as he could, a better time would never come.

  As Frank went for the guard’s feet, Jeremiah went for the machine gun, jamming his finger behind the trigger, and holding in a moan of pain as the trigger tightened and his index finger broke. Jimmy went for the guard's face and throat, a quick chop to the throat, and his other hand over the young man’s mouth to prevent him calling out.

  The guard went down hard, but Jeremiah was up almost as fast with the machine gun clutched in his hands and aimed at the small group that stood talking. They had only a split second to react before Jeremiah squeezed the trigger and began firing into them. Frank bodily threw the young guard overboard, as Jimmy made a mad scramble for the controls of the boat.

  The small group scattered, or fell, as the boat leapt away, out into the water. Jeremiah made sure they stayed panicked, keeping the machine gun stuttering in erratic bursts until he could no longer see the group. The gray boat blended well with the dark water, and could not be seen as it sped away with the running lights out.

  Willie and Jessie

  Jessie looked at Willie closely in the glow from the boats dash-panel lights. She had watched him drink two full bottles of whiskey, without seeming to suffer any ill effects whatsoever. As quickly as he drank it in, it exited through the yellowed bandages that were, wound around his chest and stomach area. It seemed to seep out, and she was positive that it was the whiskey. She could actually smell the sharp scent of alcohol as it exited his body. He fairly reeked of it. He should be passed out by now, she thought. In fact, at the rate it was seeping through the gauze, he should be dead.

  His skin also bothered her. It wasn't the rich brown that it had been earlier. As soon as they had gotten underway on the cooler lake it had turned an ashen gray color, the rich brown had seemed to quickly fade away. How could that be? She wondered.

  Another thing that bothered her was that he did not appear to be breathing. He obv
iously was breathing, absolutely had to be breathing, but it was so shallow that she could not even detect the rise and fall of his chest, or hear the inhale-exhale of his breath. How could a person in his shape be alive?

  He had to be dying, she decided, and it struck her as odd that he didn't seem realize it. He had not allowed anyone else to come along either, as if he really believed that he, in the condition he was in, would be able to withstand the trip. Jessie couldn't see how it would be possible. Although he seemed to be alert, and even seemed to be moving unimpeded, he could not last much longer. He was a dead man, she thought, he just didn't know it yet.

  She had no idea whatsoever how close she was to the truth. Willie was dead, but he knew it to be a fact. He also realized, that even without the whiskey, he was losing the sensation of pain. In fact he was slowly losing all sensation in his entire body. His mind seemed clear however, and his body seemed to still obey his will to move it. It was cold though, and that was unsettling. He apparently hadn't lost his ability to sense and feel the cold.

  He was sure now, that he had somehow become trapped in this dead body. Which was bad, but was not that bad. It meant that he could maybe exact a small amount of revenge on Luther. He could try at least. He wasn't completely sure it would be successful, but he wasn't convinced it wouldn't be. He had reasoned it simply enough. Luther terrified him, plain and simple, but when he had examined his fear, he had realized that Luther had never been able to touch him. Scare him, yes, threaten to hurt him, yes again, but he had never actually touched him.

  So, he supposed, maybe he wasn't able to. Maybe all he could do was threaten and if that was all he could do, maybe Willie could put-a-hurtin' on him. Maybe he could throttle the bastard. Maybe reach right out and strangle him. After all he felt strong, he told himself, in fact he felt... invincible, almost, and what could Luther do? Kill him? Ha, that was laughable, and really, if he could, it would be welcome. He wanted to die, wished he had died, even thought for sure at first that he had.