Crux

by Ramez Naam

  They brought the inflatable boat ashore on the narrow strip of tumbled rocks at the base of the cliff, in a ripple of the rock that would hide them from the view of the guardhouse.

  Sam shook her left shoulder out. It was stiff, but her posthuman genetics had healed most of the damage left by the bullet a week ago. She stretched, then took point on the climb, with Feng behind her and Nakamura in the rear.

  The cliff was granite, vertical but run through with cracks and irregularities. Her combat goggles painted green contour lines on it, showed her every indentation and protuberance, animated a path forward for her, gently flashed location of every hand and foot hold that would keep her out of view of guards and cameras.

  Sam put a hand on the cliff, and the gecko grips in the palm of her glove adhered her to it. Then she started to climb, strength and skill and technology eating up the three-hundred-foot ascent, chameleonware turning her into little more than a faint distortion against the rock.

  Above, the children waited.

  Feng climbed, his eyes on the rock. His body was sore, still aching from the wounds he’d taken, but better than it had been days ago. Posthuman genes, ample calories, and the medkit Nakamura had given him access to saw to that.

  Feng focused his eyes and hands on the climb, but part of his mind still spun. Nakamura. Would the man truly allow Kade and Feng to go? Would he betray his CIA masters that way?

  No, he thought. Nakamura had told Sam what she wanted to hear. He would double-cross them in the end, do his best to deliver Kade – and likely Feng – to the Americans.

  Feng wasn’t about to let that happen.

  He climbed on, his senses attuned to the man below him, his mind running through scenarios.

  Nakamura paused at the top of the climb, still on the rock, just below the lip that would put them on the walkway atop the cliff. To his left the transparent outlines of Feng and Sam clung to the stone.

  His retinal display tapped into the laser-delivered feed from the circling surveillance drones. They flapped their bird-like wings hundreds of yards away from the island and zoomed in their robotic eyes. Two men in the guardhouse a hundred feet north along the cliff. Another was passing by on his mobile patrol now.

  Nakamura bounced instructions to the sub’s above-water antenna. Status rolled across his eyes. An aerial map of the region came alive in his senses. Out at sea, half-a-dozen green icons blinked in his vision, in a loose ring around the island, a thousand yards out from shore.

  Positions, check.

  Weapons, check.

  Target locations, locked.

  Nakamura turned his head slowly to his compatriots. Feng nodded. Sam nodded.

  It was time.

  Kevin Nakamura pulled a menu down with his eyes, clicked on an item, clicked again to confirm, and phase one of the assault began.

  80

  BRAVE GIRL

  Saturday November 3rd

  Ling cried for hours. She had never been so frightened in her life. Not even when her mommy’s body had died. Not even when they’d shut her off from her mommy and she’d been alone for the first time. She’d been sure it would end soon, that she’d have her mommy back and not be alone any more…

  But now they were going to kill her mommy. Kill her dead, the way that humans died. She tried to reach out her mind for Feng again, for Kade again.

  FENG! FENG, PLEASE! FENG, HELP ME!

  Nothing.

  KADE! KADE, I NEED YOU! KADE, PLEASE!

  Nothing, nothing, nothing.

  Ling was alone. And only she could stop the humans from killing her mommy.

  She cried curled up in a ball, the ampule and injector from the freezer clutched in her hands. She cried as softly as she could, so her father wouldn’t hear, so he wouldn’t know that she knew.

  She watched her father in the house monitors. He was asleep, his breathing slow and regular. In just hours he would rise to murder her mother. Unless she did this. Did it now.

  Ling Shu rose. She wiped her face with her dress, did her best to stop her sniffles. She was a posthuman. Maybe the only posthuman if her mother died. She had to be brave. She had to do the right thing.

  The house opened the door to her mother’s room for her, and Ling crept out, slowly, quietly. Outside the floor to ceiling windows of the penthouse, Shanghai was alive with light, a city pretending that nothing had ever happened to it. The electronic face of Zhi Li stared at her, a thousand times larger than life, ruby lips smiling, green eyes winking. Ling hated her then. Hated her with a fury that she had to struggle to keep in check.

  Ling took a deep breath, then a tiny step, then another, and another, illuminated only by the light of the city and Zhi Li’s porcelain glow, until she stood before her father’s door, the injector in her hand.

  The door was locked, the apartment told her. He locked it every night when he retired to his room. But this apartment was hers, not his. Ling reached out with her thoughts, and the door unlocked itself for her with a quiet snick.

  She held her breath then, waited, watched her father through the cameras in his room. He didn’t stir. He breathed deeply and slowly.

  Ling reached out with her thoughts again. The door opened for her, and Ling stepped into her father’s room.

  81

  ASSAULT ON APYAR KYUN

  Saturday November 3rd

  In a loose ring around the isle of Apyar Kyun, little more than half a mile from shore, six Moray-class amphibious drones received instructions from their Manta-class submersible mother ship.

  Independently, their combat AIs evaluated their instructions. Weapons-safe protocols fired off confirmation and authentication requests, checked the private encryption key used, validated the command authority. Legitimate human instruction had been received. Lethal force had been authorized. Their decision trees dictated that their weapons were now free. Independently they loaded their assault plans, phase alpha, sub-plans one, two, and three. Confirmed. Execute. Execute. Execute.

  For a moment nothing happened. The dark sea gently rolled and swelled under a moonless midnight sky. Ashore, a macaw called to its mate. Frogs croaked. Insects chirped.

  Then chaos filled the night.

  Off the southeastern tip of the island, two Moray drones powered up their drive systems on the surface of the water, detuned their radar-absorbent skins, engaged their active radar and sonar, maximized their profiles to appear far larger and more massive than they were, and propelled themselves at high speed towards the island’s marina, guns firing. The drones’ combat AIs steered them on semi-autonomous paths meant to produce the impression of a significant attacking fleet.

  Micromissiles launched out from other Moray drones on the south, north, and east. Their hydrazine-fueled solid rocket motors ignited, forcing out jets of superheated plasma behind them as they accelerated at eight gees towards targets on the island. The drones that launched them activated their own radar and sonar systems, broadcasting loudly, exaggerating their presence, and initiated reload of their micromissile launchers.

  To the west of the island a lone Moray bobbed silently on the surface, fully stealthed. It watched, evaluated, and took careful aim with its smart pebble launcher, waiting for just the right moment.

  Automated defenses on the island activated. Alarms blared, jolting human operators out of their boredom. Screens scrolled status. Before the humans could react, the machines did. Missile interception systems came alive, targeted defense lasers on the incoming missiles, launched clouds of thousands upon thousands of anti-missile projectiles into the air. Island-based launchers pivoted to target the enemy ships attacking the marina.

  The micromissiles zigged, zagged, their own AIs adapting their courses in real time to the countermeasures they saw heading their way. For some, it wasn’t enough. A micromissile fell from the sky, its warhead ignited by a defense laser. Another collided with a defense projectile at twice the speed of sound. A third was knocked off course by the resulting explosion. More fell from project
iles, from lasers, from the secondary effects of explosions.

  In seconds, eight of the sea-launched micromissiles were knocked from the sky.

  Sixteen got through.

  The first micromissile struck home four seconds after launch, igniting its warhead at the last instant, a kamikaze burst of goal-satisfaction rushing through its primitive mind as it demolished one of the island’s radar installations. The next bore down on its target a fraction of a second later, setting off its own explosive warhead in a blaze of impact-maximization just instants before it collided with one of the island’s missile launchers. The resulting blast set off the warheads of the launcher’s dozen remaining missiles in a chain reaction, booming a thundering staccato explosion across the island, lighting up the night, sending up a bright red mushroom cloud that expanded as it rose into the moonless sky. If the micromissile’s AI had survived, it would have been very satisfied indeed.

  Within seconds the island’s radars, missiles, and uplinks were destroyed. In a buried command center, the klaxons continued to blare. Security personnel blanched at what they’d seen before their radar was destroyed. They were under attack. Multiple ships had fired on them. And two were coming in fast for the marina.

  They were about to be invaded.

  To the west, the only Moray that hadn’t announced its position waited, waited, waited with the infinite vigilant patience that only machines can know. Then the explosions came, and the counter explosions. Now, its AI determined. Now is the time. The Moray fired a salvo of tiny, nearly silent smart pebbles. The pebbles streaked out at the house, compared their positions and trajectories to their targets, morphed their body shapes as they flew to adjust their course, and streaked in to strike the cameras and audio pickups that covered the western wall of the palatial home.

  The Moray’s AI noted the successful barrage, gave the digital neurons of its aiming circuits jolts of positive reinforcement, and took itself back down, below the waves.

  In the chaos, the blinding of the western side of the house was just one detail, one small event hidden among the noise of so many larger ones.

  Kade sat cross-legged on the bed in anapana. He had no control over the outside world. But he could control himself, his own mind, his own thoughts. He wouldn’t crumble. He wouldn’t lose himself. He had to stay centered, to stay alert. No matter how bad it got, he wouldn’t give up.

  So he breathed. In, out. Observe the breath. Let that be your all. Let it grow to fill all consciousness. Allow the thoughts to rise up, then bring the attention back to the breath. Release attachments. Find solace in the absence of thought, in the sensations of the breath filling up attention completely, leaving no room for fear, or anxiety, or self-recrimination.

  Then the sounds of explosions ripped through the night, and Kade’s eyes snapped open.

  The sound of explosions ripped Shiva out of his godhood trance, away from the tens of thousands of minds that were now part of his extended consciousness, and back to the physical world.

  He reached out to the island’s information systems, but all was chaos. An assault. Missiles launched. Defenses down. Ships heading for the marina. They were about to be invaded.

  The data was old by the time he saw it. Radars were down. Cameras were destroyed. Drones were crashing.

  Who? The Americans? The Chinese? His Burmese hosts?

  Shiva reached out to the Nexus projectors and signal boosting antennae built into his home. His thoughts expanded to encompass the whole of the mansion. He felt the minds of the children, of all of his staff in and around the building. He found Ashok among them.

  Secure Lane and the children, he sent to his Director of Operations. Get them underground.

  Then he leapt from his hard narrow bed, out the door of his bare cell, and to the stairs that would take him to the roof. He needed to know what was going on.

  Nakamura watched his feed from the drones. Missile strikes successful. The soldiers at the guard post above them turned and ran, headed to the action at the east side of the house as they’d hoped.

  Excellent.

  Nakamura waited until the three soldiers passed, then gave the signal. As one, he and Feng and Sam slipped over the lip and onto the walkway below the house.

  Then Nakamura turned to Sam, and nodded. Time for phase two.

  Kade leapt to the west-facing window, but he saw nothing out there but dark waters. Another explosion boomed from somewhere behind him. Faint red light reflected onto the sea.

  He ran to the kitchen. From its window he could see the courtyard and parts of the house. Security men moved about frantically. Beyond the house he could see smoke rising, underlit by the red of flames. Gunfire sounded from somewhere.

  Then he heard the door to his suite open, heavy footfalls.

  He turned and they were there. Two of Shiva’s security men. They wore Nexus jammers. Their minds were balls of static.

  “Come with us,” one of them said. The dark-skinned one he’d never placed. The other one had a third Nexus jammer in his hand, meant for Kade.

  Kade shook his head, and a look of impatience flashed across the soldier’s face. He came forward and Kade grabbed a pot from the stove top, swung it at the guard’s head.

  The security man caught it, ripped it out of Kade’s hand, then slapped him across the side of his head hard enough that Kade saw stars.

  Sam nodded in return, acknowledging Nakamura’s signal.

  Then she opened her mind, in receive-mode only. If they were right, the children were on this side of the building, on the west face, on the first or second floor. Once she found them, they could rally them, use the sub and their own skills to misdirect and blind the defenders, clear a path, get them on the vehicles and towards the airfield while Feng and Nakamura retrieved Kade.

  Her mind opened and the night was alive with Nexus. Dozens of minds inside the building. Fear and confusion. Panic.

  And there. Those minds. The children. All together. It took her breath away to feel them, to feel them like this. It brought it all back to her, all the reasons she’d fallen in love with them and the reason she was here.

  Shiva was not going to turn this beauty into horror.

  Sam reached out, projected her own thoughts outward towards Sarai and the rest.

  I’m here, she sent. I’ve come for you.

  And across the link, she felt those young minds rejoice.

  Sarai woke to the sound of explosions. Her heart thudded in her chest. Her brothers and sisters had woken to it too. They were all frightened.

  The connecting door opened and the five boys flooded in to the room she shared with the three other girls. Aroon was crying, wailing, carried on Kit’s shoulder. Everyone looked to her.

  I’m the oldest, she thought. I have to make this right.

  She reached out to them, brought them together, sent calming thoughts. They huddled together on the floor, the youngest on the inside, the oldest around them.

  She opened herself completely to them, breathed as Sam had taught her, breathed in and out and sent her breath to them and felt for theirs. Then they were falling into a rhythm together and even little Aroon was crying less and she could see, she could hear, she could think. The world slowed down and possibilities expanded.

  Someone had come. Someone had come to fight Shiva. And in that fight… they had their best chance of getting away.

  There was a boom at the door and it flung itself open in slow motion. One of the men was there. He wore the ball of static around himself. He had a gun with him. He reached out his hand to them.

  And they knew. They understood. He would take them somewhere, somewhere the new people couldn’t find them. And that was not what they wanted. Fear struck them.

  Then Sam was there, in their minds. And their hearts soared.

  “Found them,” Sam’s whispered voice came across the laser link, played to Nakamura’s ears. And now it was time for phase three.

  Nakamura pulled down the menu, found the item. He he
sitated for just an instant. An image flashed across his mind, three of the missiles veering in mid-flight, as if disrupted by countermeasures. Two of them impacting harmlessly across the island. One smashing into Lane’s room, exploding there, ending the threat.

  Then, afterwards. The lie he would tell Sam. That Shiva’s countermeasures had caused it. That it hadn’t been part of the plan. Her inevitable suspicion…

  He pushed it out of his thoughts. His duty was clear. No one could have this power.

  Kevin Nakamura blinked to activate phase three. And around the island, Moray-class drones fired another salvo of their deadly micromissiles.

  Shiva reached the roof as another boom sounded. A giant fireball erupted into the night sky to the east, turning into a mushroom cloud as it rose. The fuel depot.

  Who were the attackers? Where were they?

  He stretched his mind out again, expanded it through the Nexus repeaters throughout his home, felt the minds of his security team, his scientific staff, pulled at them for understanding. He felt fear and panic from the scientists, grim resolve from his soldiers. Enemy ships were strafing the marina now. Sensors were down. They had no visual on the invaders. His men were rushing into position, unlocking heavy weapons, preparing to meet the invaders with shoulder-mounted anti-ship missiles and high-speed flechette launchers that could mow down hundreds of men at once. Other soldiers were heading for Lane, for the children, to move them to the secure bunker. From there, if necessary, they’d evacuate them via the underground tunnels to the airstrip.

  Then he felt the intruder. A mind he’d never touched before. A woman. Her mind was reaching out to the children’s, passing through a wall studded with Nexus-band repeaters as it did. He felt their mutual recognition.

  The American woman. Here, now. The one who’d been searching for Nexus children, who’d tried to infiltrate her way into his home, who’d killed one of his men already… Who was she? CIA?

  Shiva growled. It didn’t matter. They would not do this. They would not take these children from him, lock them up, dehumanize them, euthanize them.