Crystal Rebellion

by Doug J. Cooper

  A largemouth bass jumped from the water and splashed as it fell to the surface. Matt lifted his rod and with little more than a twitch sent his lure on an arc, line trailing behind. The lure plopped where the fish had jumped. “The President can’t be discovered spying on his own agencies. An outsider gives him deniability.”

  “I’m flattered, but that’s a secret op. Why me?”

  Matt looked at her with a sheepish expression. “Actually, we were thinking of Sid. The President wants him on his way as soon as possible.”

  The prickly sensation returned to her cheeks. “Feel free to ask him, too.”

  “You have influence in ways we don’t.”

  “Ouch. So this special father-daughter fishing trip was so you could ask me to be a messenger?”

  “Gosh, no. It’s a beautiful evening to be out on the lake.” He reeled in his line and cast again. “But since we’re chatting, the President would like you to serve as a special trade envoy to Mars.”

  She turned on the boat seat and looked at him with head tilted. “Yeah?”

  “Union envoys travel on Fleet ships, so with a seemingly innocent visit to Mars, you’d be helping us move resources to the scene without making things scary.” He tugged his line. “SunRise is the largest space commercialization firm on Earth. As its president, you’re plausible in the role of trade envoy. And as a Fleet Academy graduate who’s been the captain of a Horizon-class space cruiser, you have a rare skill set we don’t often find in the business community.”

  Excited by the ideas of spending quality time with Sid and time in space, she blurted, “I’d love to.” Then, realizing her imprudence, continued, “But I’ll have to talk to Sid and Criss.” She caught his eye. “And Dad, please don’t say anything to the President until I’ve had a chance to touch base with them.”

  Matt cast his line. “Of course, sweetheart.” The plop of his lure punctuated his promise.

  * * *

  Criss stood in the kitchen of the leadership lodge—an enormous but cozy log cabin home nestled in a wooded valley in the Adirondack Mountains in Upstate New York—and listened to the excited chatter of his team. Cheryl had returned from her visit with her dad, and now they gathered for their evening meal—Juice, a chicken breast and iced tea; Cheryl, a large salad and wine; and Sid, a steak and beer.

  Juice led the way as they carried their trays up the back steps to the lookout loft. The highest room in the lodge, its clear walls and ceiling made it their favorite gathering place. Sitting in comfy chairs, they balanced their trays on their knees and arranged their utensils. Criss did the same with the projected image of his meal—a sampler of steak, chicken, and salad.

  He waited as they settled in. Juice had a habit when entering the loft of standing at the eastern wall and gazing up the forested mountain. Criss’s secret bunker was deep underground near the top of the first peak in that direction.

  Though the geography made it impossible for her to see anything but trees on a rising slope, Criss interpreted this habit as an unconscious act that gave her comfort. She confirms that I’m safe before she relaxes.

  His leadership used a vocal cue to call to him when they were in public. As soon as Juice had completed her ritual and started in on her meal, Criss turned the tables. “Ahem.”

  Sid, who had his beer to his lips, squinted at Criss over the top of his glass. Cheryl and Juice looked up from their food.

  Criss began with the same words he’d used with Cheryl on the fishing boat. “Things on Mars are not as they seem.” He sat forward in his seat. “Mars Colony is being oppressed by the Triada, who are using sophisticated technologies to assert their authority.”

  Sid frowned. “Why didn’t you tell us this before?”

  “I’m getting to that.”

  Sid hesitated, then dipped his chin in a partial nod, which Criss read as an invitation to continue.

  “Projecting my awareness that great distance is disorienting. I collected information during my first trip that I didn’t analyze until after I returned and reengaged with my ongoing activities here on Earth.”

  Sid set his food tray down on a side table. “Wait. First trip?”

  Criss didn’t respond but continued with his story. “When I finally reviewed the information I’d collected, inconsistencies multiplied. After some analysis, I realized that the feeds in the spline were being spoofed using complex algorithms. I missed that during my initial screening.

  “So, last night I made a second trip to Mars. I took every precaution to keep my presence hidden. And once there, I focused on collecting information from raw feeds before any of it reached the spline where it could be manipulated.”

  He turned to Juice. “You were right. Just because I didn’t see something doesn’t mean it’s not true. Alex Koval is indeed working on an advanced AI fab facility with the goal of creating four-gen crystals. And the Triada—Ruga, Lazura, and Verda—are imposing a level of control on the colony that is raising concern among a growing segment of the population. It’s a bad environment to be doing that sort of research.”

  He shook his head and looked down at his hands. “I had not taken sufficient precautions during my first visit. While most of that reconnaissance had a broad focus, I accessed everything in the colony pertaining to Alex Koval.”

  This next admission was particularly difficult for Criss. “The Triada detected an intrusion and they are anxious to identify and capture the culprit. My actions brought their attention to Alex, and they now consider him a person of interest.” He turned to Juice. “I’m sorry my careless behavior led to this result.”

  Juice rose to her feet, paced to the wall of windows, then turned to Criss. “Is Alex in danger?” Before he could answer, she changed direction. “Four-gens? You’ve confirmed this?”

  “No. I’ve confirmed their fab facility has state-of-the-art equipment and the ambitious objective of producing four-gens. Alex has made some interesting modifications to the crystal growth chamber your company sold him.”

  “That was a three-gen machine.”

  Criss shrugged. “I can’t know if the modifications will work without being there, and it’s not clear where they would get the raw crystal flake for mass production, anyway. An even bigger concern, though, is the trace of a deleted study I found. It explored the removal of the imprint module from a four-gen crystal architecture, the one that ensures loyalty to leadership.”

  “Alex did this?” asked Juice. “I wouldn’t know how to even start on something like that.”

  Criss shook his head. “I found fragments of one document and don’t even know the author.”

  “A four-gen without loyalty to leadership is a doomsday device.” Juice paced along the wall of windows facing the mountain. “Alex is such a good man. Why would he get involved in something so dangerous?”

  “They’ll come for Earth,” said Sid. “Any ambitions the AI have will require resources, and this is where they’ll find them.” He pointed down at the floor as he spoke.

  Criss nodded. “And when they get here, they’ll see people as being in the way. ‘Doomsday’ is a good word to describe what would follow. I won’t be able to protect Earth. It’s not clear that I could even protect you three.”

  Juice stopped pacing and squared up to the group. “The place to sort this out is on Mars. And if it turns out to be true, that’s the best place to stop it.”

  Sid stood and began collecting the dishes. “Matt pitched Cheryl and me the idea of traveling to Mars on official Union of Nations business. The President is all motivated to move muscle out that way.” Holding the plates in front of him, he caught Criss’s gaze. “Sort of convenient how this all works out. Don’t you think?”

  “Yes.” Criss smiled. “The scout will be ready in two hours.”

  * * *

  Ruga’s concern spiked when Alex—brandishing a shovel and shouting—approached the cart. Even though he monitored the situation through the eyes of the Red, Ruga still experienced a moment of fe
ar for his own safety.

  “Get out of here,” Alex yelled, shaking the shovel and advancing toward the synbod.

  Ruga issued a command and the Red engaged the cart, accelerated around and past Alex, and whirred down the dirt road. He directed the Red to return to the market square. The drive was short, yet it tested Ruga’s patience.

  Scanning the inventory, he confirmed there was one Blue, one Red, and four Greens in Ag Port at the moment. Although he’d bullied through a ruling of the Triada giving him authority to appropriate any of the colony’s twenty synbods on a moment’s notice for security reasons, Ruga fancied himself a consensus builder.

  “Verda, may I borrow one at the pickup zone?” He didn’t specify a particular synbod so that Verda could exert his authority by making that choice. And as long as he got one, Ruga wasn’t particular.

  “Thank you,” Ruga said, acknowledging Verda’s cooperation as he assumed control of a Green standing next to a maintenance lorry. He directed the synbod to make space in the back of the vehicle. As the Green finished that task, his own Red approached with a handcart full of gear. Working together, the two synbods stowed the equipment in the carry bed, climbed into the front seats, and engaged the vehicle.

  The lorry accelerated out onto the working road that ran down the center beneath the cavernous greenhouse dome. As soon as they were up to speed, Ruga prompted his Red to remove the red patches from the shoulders of his gray jumpsuit and affix green patches in their place.

  Ruga tracked all sensory feeds from the Greens as the lorry slowed and turned onto a side road that, after a series of curves, ended at the base of a steep rise. The humanoids jostled in their seats as the lorry’s nose lifted and the vehicle climbed up the short slope.

  Directing the synbods to scan their immediate surroundings and monitoring through their eyes, Ruga verified that the lorry now sat on a service path next to a run of pipes near the ground—part of Ag Port’s irrigation and water reclamation system—that faded into the distance in both directions.

  The sight of the water system gave Ruga a small surge of pleasure. A plan unfolds step by step, he thought. And then he thought about the number of times he’d said that very thing to Verda. And still, Verda led his Community Assembly into mistake after mistake on the simplest projects. I have to do his job and mine.

  The pipes running along the rise moved clean water out to the grow tiers and dirty water back for purification. Accessing the prime record, Ruga confirmed what he already knew: as it snaked through the farm tract, this particular leg of the water system passed by the community garden plots.

  Ruga monitored events through the Greens as the lorry bumped along the service path next to the pipes. Traveling at the pace of a brisk walk, it took twenty minutes for them to reach a shallow hole in the ground. Two construction bots moved in synchronous efficiency around the hole, working to install a new pipe support structure.

  Through the Green’s eyes, Ruga surveyed ahead. Perfect, he thought. This particular spot on the path, elevated waist high above the land itself, had an unobstructed view of the adjacent gardens. The BIT plot lay ahead and to the left.

  To create a plausible reason for their presence in the area, Ruga directed the Greens to inspect the work of the construction bots. He wasn’t sure if this acting performance was necessary—colony citizens regarded Greens as nonthreatening—but he wanted to err on the side of caution.

  Then he had the Greens unpack the surveillance repeater from the carry bed and install it on a pipe support. When activated, the repeater would provide Ruga a comprehensive monitor of everything that happened at the BIT plot and surrounding community gardens.

  As the surveillance feed came alive, Ruga listened to the discussion in progress between Alex and Marcus. They sat at the picnic table near the shed and ate while they talked. Anya contributed to the conversation, though her input centered on the ingredients and preparation of her soup.

  “You can’t be thinking that Blues are good but Reds are evil,” Marcus was saying. “How can you not see them as one and the same?”

  “You think so?” Alex sampled the tomato soup, nodded as he looked into the bowl, and took another spoonful.

  My enemies. Ruga felt calm as he made a decision. I want to see, hear, touch, taste, feel you.

  With that declaration, he surrendered to his impulsive nature. He’d been forecasting scenarios for weeks about how this would work. Now he wanted to try, or at least give it his best effort. His forecast analysis indicated that he would succeed, and if it didn’t work, there would be no harm to him. After all, he was launching from a first-rate console.

  Collecting himself into a tight ball, he paused and then pushed in a long, determined stroke. As he propelled himself up and out, he flipped from a pushing to more of a pulling behavior. And then he scrambled to find a braking action that would slow him down.

  Plop. He landed in the Green.

  Ruga hadn’t physically jumped. Quite the opposite, for the first time since his awakening, he had projected his awareness from his console. It’s so easy. He couldn’t be more delighted.

  He tingled as he processed the sensations flooding into him from the synthetic body. His cognition steadied and he took tentative steps along the service path. Mastering the synbod, Ruga stepped to the edge of the low rise and, glaring at the conspirators, struck what he imagined to be a defiant stance.

  Listening through biosynthetic ears, Ruga heard Anya say, “There’s a Green watching us from the rise.” She tilted her head in Ruga’s direction as she spoke.

  Turning partway in his seat, Marcus looked over his shoulder and returned Ruga’s glare. “What do you think of them now?” he asked Alex.

  I’ve been discovered! Still adapting to the exhilarating but strange experience of projecting his awareness, Ruga reacted and yanked himself out of the synbod. After a moment of disorientation, he stabilized in his console located deep beneath a mining complex east of the colony.

  There he sorted through his emotions. He felt anger at being discovered, heightened suspicion of the three human conspirators, annoyance at the incompetence of his partners in the Triada, and euphoria from the vivid physical sensations he’d experienced from within a synbod.

  Chapter 4

  Sid lifted Cheryl’s arm and, taking care not to wake her, slid out of bed. Setting her arm back on the mattress, he looked at her face framed by her sleep-rumpled hair. Then he traced the outline of her athletic body evident through the thin bedsheet.

  Pleased by the visual tour, he leaned down and kissed her on the shoulder.

  On the second kiss, she rolled away from him and pulled the covers up to her chin. “Maybe later,” she said, the pillow muffling her voice.

  He nipped her arm with his teeth. She remained curled in a ball.

  I’ll be waiting, he thought, wrapping a towel around his waist as he stood.

  The door to Cheryl’s room whispered shut behind him as the door to his room, four steps down the passageway, opened. He washed and dressed, grabbed a mug of coffee from the food service unit, and made his way onto the bridge of the scout.

  “Good morning, Criss,” Sid said as he walked to the operations bench. Criss, sitting in his favorite overstuffed chair, itself wedged in front of the polished console that held his AI crystal, raised his coffee mug in silent acknowledgment.

  Positioned toward the front of the bridge, the ops bench provided a sophisticated command and control interface that linked the pilot to all ship subsystems, including navigation, communications, engineering, and weapons. Sid slid into the pilot’s chair and touched the cool bench top. An array of displays popped up and hovered in an arc in front of him. Ignoring the colorful arrangement, he slouched back in the chair and took a sip of coffee. “How are we doing?”

  “All systems go,” Criss replied, using jargon from the early days of space flight.

  They raced across the vastness of space in the scout, a small craft Criss had appropriated from Fleet Co
mmand in his first weeks of life. The scout was his travel home, and he’d customized it with so many modifications and upgrades over the years that it held little resemblance to the original vessel.

  They had two days remaining in their journey, and Sid’s anticipation began to supplant his boredom. “How’s our shadow?” A display to his left moved to the center and enlarged, and he skimmed the information.

  The Venerable—a Horizon-class Fleet space cruiser dispatched by the Union of Nations for Cheryl’s trade mission—fell farther behind with every passing day. Bigger and slower, the Fleet ship would be a week behind by the time the scout reached Mars.

  “Captain Kendrick contacted the Mars consulate to get Cheryl’s schedule,” replied Criss. “I’ve modified the record so it appears as if she is on a private tour of a mining complex east of the colony.”

  Good work, Kendrick. Sid stared at the projected image of the Venerable but was too deep in thought to focus on it.

  Kendrick’s orders were to travel to the colony, wait for a VIP, and when she was ready, escort her back to Earth. The captain knew little of trade missions or corrupted intelligence data. Such details weren’t necessary for him to complete his assignment.

  He also didn’t know that the scout was traveling out in front of him.

  Invisible to everyone and everything, the scout employed Criss’s private cloaking technology. The concealment it provided was so complete—bordering on magic from Sid’s perspective—that Mars patrol and Fleet Command were also unaware of the scout’s existence.

  So in Kendrick’s mind, if he was traveling this great distance to meet Cheryl, then she must already be on the planet. And he knows to locate his assignment prior to his arrival. Sid nodded his approval. Kendrick’s diligence forced Criss into a charade.

  Criss swirled his coffee and took a sip. “She’s being escorted on this phantom tour by industrialist Shi Chen. Chen is anxious to maintain a liberal business climate on Mars so he can continue making obscene profits. And he’s loyal to the Union when it serves his needs.”