Clemons stared at the bot with the flaming spout moving towards him. Two of the nozzles pointed to his arms over his head. The other two lowered to just below his knees. Clemons heard Roland’s screams in tandem with his own as the flames touched those areas.
MCT Lab, New Polis
“Wu, what do you mean we’d have to interrupt service to the whole of the Metaverse and the internet?”
Wu looked at Argosi and then to Parker who jumped in.
“Sir, he’s talking about ‘Flashing the System.’ We hadn’t had a chance to brief you on it yet. It’s designed to hit targeted areas, either where a hacker is originating from or failing that, the recipient of the cyber intrusion. Since we have not identified the originating server or servers and it’s being transmitted to, and through, two hundred million IP addresses we would have to carpet bomb the Metaverse and the internet itself with a laser light. Flash it. We have the ability to do that over every single fiber optic cable in the continental U.S. and beyond linking server farms all the way to individual providers, wherever a fiber optics cable runs, which is almost everywhere now.”
“You mean fry the Metaverse as well as the internet?” Argosi asked.
“Yes, although fry is not what would happen. Since data is compressed and then sent out via laser, sending an enormous amount of it very quickly. So quickly that even an interruption of a fraction of a second can stop hundreds of terabits on just one of the multiple cores of each cable. But that speed also relies on a link at the other end. Flashing it would disrupt that data. Blow it apart. The servers on the other end would not be able to maintain the link and would try to reestablish, but as we pulse the flash repeatedly for a millisecond at a time, the effect is like a strobe. Imagine that you are watching your favorite NFL team play on one of the five hundred channels that you receive. Then imagine a strobe is set off on the screen and the links broken. Then as it tries to establish the connection all five hundred stations or parts of them appear on the screen all at once. Before they can reconfigure another flash and poof. It’s back to viewing five hundred stations. More likely broken up parts of each, all at once. All of the software that establishes and maintains any link between any two servers would come down, interrupted and unable to re-establish a connection as long as we keep ‘pulsing the flash.’ Without a targeted hit, it wouldn’t stop there, sir. It would cascade.” Parker chewed his gums.
“Cascade how?”
“Sir, if we just sent it, and I’m not sure we could in time, it would not just stop at the links and the streaming video. This would disrupt every internet phone call, email or text message in the process of being sent, every financial transaction, bank deposit and it would send all of the people in the Metaverse back to their individual servers it would...” Parker looked up. “It would break the link if they are indeed controlling the bots from the Metaverse.”
“Do it!” Argosi chopped his hand in the air.
“Commander, there will be hell to pay. If they have a direct link from outside the internet, it won’t–”
“NOW, CHARLIE!”
Argosi looked at the flames licking at the two victims. Their shirts and pants had turned black in places and burned through completely in others. The red, blistered flesh was now visible on many areas of their bodies where their clothing had been as well as on their exposed arms and heads. The Shrieks were sickening to hear.
“Mr. Wu. Power up the–”
“Sir, it’s all ready. I did it in anticipation of the Commander’s order.”
“Then push the God Damn button, Wu!” Parker barked.
“Yes, sir,” Wu said.
He stood at the console designed for the targeted interruption of service. By pushing down on the plunger type button and holding for two seconds, it activated the complex system.
As the system came online, it pulled power from electrical substations throughout the continental United States and turned it into light energy at hundreds of prepositioned stations. Because Wu had already primed the system, he did not have to wait for the power. Almost immediately a powerful surge of laser energy began to pulsate for a few milliseconds at a time pause and repeat as it was directed out and then found its way through every fiber optic cable throughout the country.
The end result amounted to all data traveling through the internet being, for lack of a better description, blown apart. The pulse effect was magnified further as millions of servers tried to reconnect all at once. As the pulse raced through the Internet and into the Metaverse, any link depending on a fiber optic line became lost.
People in their pods would remain where they were. Their immediate surroundings would be the same as that loaded onto their individual servers, but they could not move or transport anywhere outside of their server. People walking down the street in New Polis would find themselves suddenly alone. If they tried to enter a building, they instead found a blue haze.
The MCT labs of the FBI and other similar installations were shielded by filters. More importantly, just like the Department of Defense and other key federal agencies, operated a separate, closed internet. That, however, was not the case elsewhere as Argosi watched the video feed go dead.
Abandoned Farm, Central Indiana
Roland could feel the flames burning his arms and lower legs. He was tired of screaming, but he couldn’t stop. He couldn’t make himself, as much as he tried. Reynolds was right, he would beg. He was begging now through his screams for it to stop. Roland could see the traffic bot in front of him with the cam. He was even asking the bot to make the other bots stop it. Even though he knew, the bots had nothing to do with it and wouldn’t stop on account of his muffled pleas.
Begging the machine was pointless. But it was at least something he could focus on. He wanted to put his mind in another place. Maybe by thinking about the bot and trying to figure out how Reynolds had gained control he could escape the pain in some way. Roland found that idea short lived as the bot moved the flaming nozzles from his hands and arms down to his chest. He screamed louder as the flame passed over his face.
The lower blazing nozzles now moved up to a more sensitive area moving up and down from his belt buckle down to his knees and then back up again before proceeding to one side of his thighs then repeating the process. The repositioning of the flaming nozzles caused him to break his focus on the bot as reality returned with a new area of agony as his belt buckle and zipper became superheated.
The upper two nozzles of flame moved up his chest and then to his face and the top of his head. It circled, burning his ears and melting his short black hair down to the skin which bubbled like molten plastic then the flaming nozzles moved back down to his chest and stomach before turning to his right side and then the left side repeating their systematic patterns. He felt the skin under his chin burning to the jawbone as the flames bounced off the top of his chest. His lips felt like they were melting. The steel wire gag was searing hot as were the ones around his wrists, ankles, and biceps. Now the wires at his thighs, waist and chest grew similarly hot.
As he screamed, he forced himself to focus on the traffic bot. He noticed the little blue “idiot light” flashing. It was trying to re-acquire a signal. He heard whirring noises as the bots with the melters and heaters moved away then extinguished the heaters. Roland took a deep breath of the relatively cooler air. He knew that Reynolds was just prolonging it. The sick digital bastard.
Business District, New Polis, Metaverse
MD debated how much longer he should have Alex prolong the current burning, they were getting down to the nitty-gritty now. The two victims’ clothes were tattered, and large portions had been burned through or off. No hair remained on their heads, and they were both covered in Blisters. MD looked at the number of estimated live streams. Over three hundred and fifty million.
Well, why not give them a good show?
He decided to let the victims recover a bit but not before they went into too deep of a shock and passed out. The noise that they made
added to the scene so much that he wanted them conscious for as long as possible. Fortunately, their youth and health aided in that.
He was slightly nauseated and knew if that was the case then the effect must be dramatic on the masses watching. After a five-minute breather, he would hit them with the flames until they screamed themselves out and went silent. Then move the bots in and make them nothing more than the charred remnants of the human beings they once were.
The victims spasmed and shrieked. MD considered for the first time that both were not far from his age. What a pity for you that you were in the wrong place. So many others that I went to school with that I would have wanted to do this to, but you’ll do.
He was about to tell Alex to move the bots back and extinguish the flames and do another narration when Alex disappeared in front of him. He looked at the video feed and other monitors—all blank. He tapped at his watch and tried to call Alex, no answer. MD got up and ran through the door to the large work area where all his AE’s would have been working. They were all gone. MD tried to leave the offices but found only a blue haze where the hallway should have been.
His mind raced. Stuck in his own server. He could not leave! He brought up his dashboard. The teleport light was faded out. MD panicked.
Did they isolate me? Do they know where I am? Had they found his pod?
MD fought the urge to urinate. If they could isolate him in the Metaverse, could they locate his pod? He hesitated for a moment, then pushed the quick eject button. His surroundings became a blue haze with only his dashboard and keyboard hovering in front of him. MD pulled the hood from his head and saw the top of the H-Pod separating. The upper part’s battery powered lights illuminated the interior—something he had never seen before—then again he had never done an emergency eject. Without waiting for it to completely open he climbed out and hurried down the ladder and began to run to the changing area.
MD nearly ran over Robert who rolled to the door as MD flung it open.
“Mr. Richards is there a problem that I can help resolve? The glitch should be–”
“Shut the fuck up and get out of my way!” MD screamed at the animatronic device.
MD found his clothes and without taking off his SecondSkin got dressed. He pulled the SecondSkin contacts out and threw them in the small case with the hood and then threw that case in the larger case for his SecondSkin. MD picked up the container and ran to the garage throwing it into the back seat. He pushed the button near the doorway that operated the garage door and jumped in the car starting it and putting it reverse, nearly taking the garage door with him. The car cleared the rising door by inches as it raced by underneath. MD drove to the gate and was tempted to drive through it. Giving a quick scan, he didn’t spot any cops. He managed to calm down enough to wait for it to open before rocketing out of the parking lot.
Aboard The Pinnacle of The Seas, Metaverse
Edgar was on the phone in the spacious wood paneled office. He was discussing a business matter when the world outside went blank. He looked around for a moment before, like all digital beings or any other piece of software that depended on an interconnected network to function properly, he was broken apart by the pulse. He reconfigured in a different server reboot. As soon as he tried to link back into the Metaverse or anywhere on the internet he disintegrated again.
He thought he remembered being on the phone but wasn’t sure. He picked up the phone again and was attempting to reconnect to the other party when the sensation happened all over again. He reconfigured and then realized that he was in his office again—this time, further back in time—to the last backup. Edgar like all SDB and T-3’s was experiencing a digital form of deja vu. To the extent that his operating system could be puzzled, it was.
Old Barn, Central Indiana
The traffic control bot’s electronic brain told it that it was without instructions. After repeated attempts to reconnect to BMM, it did what it was programmed to do under such circumstances: activate its satellite phone and call HQ. With no further instructions, all the other bots that had their heaters fired up extinguished them. None of the bots thought of either Roland or Clemons, or their condition. They simply had no capacity to. If they were capable of doing that, then they would have most certainly dialed 911. Right in front of them both victims heaved trying to expel the hot air from their lungs, their clothing smoking, tattered and hanging from them, both still screaming in agony.
MCT Lab, Metaverse
“Commander, BMM is telling me that one of the missing bots just called them through a Sat. Phone. It is giving them coordinates to a farm house on Indiana 9 near Huntington. We have units en route there now including ours.”
“Have they established the link to the bots?” Argosi wanted to know.
Callum nodded and talked into his headset then turned to Argosi.
“They linked in via the sat phone then told them to power down. They had eyes on the victims who still look like they are alive but were afraid of being hacked into again, so they shut them down. They will be down until someone manually starts them onsite.”
“Ok link us into our units, Callum.” Roger that sir.
Argosi looked up at the screen and had a view from the dash cam of an FBI-Police Unit following a fire truck down a rural roadway. The fire truck turned onto a driveway with a faded “For Sale sign.” The driveway had trees on both sides with overgrown branches that reached out and scratched the car. A faded white farm house with boarded up windows came into view. To the right of it and farther down the driveway was an even more faded red barn with a sagging roof. The fire truck pulled to a stop in front of the closed doors of the barn.
The cam view changed from the car to a first-person view as the officer exited and moved to the door, his tactical rifle at the ready. Argosi could see a volunteer firefighter peering through a crack, then heard him yell. “They’re in there. Those are some big bots!”
The officer whose cam feed Argosi was watching motioned the firemen away then pulled open the door. Several pieces of lumber fell then the officer moved in with his partner in tow their cams now a split view on the large screen in front of Argosi. One of the officers kept his weapon trained on the bots. Argosi knew that those bots would shatter apart if hit by the high-velocity rounds. He hoped that wouldn’t be necessary; he wanted the tech guys to get into their processors. It was better if they remained intact.
The second officer moved to the two victims kicking over a smaller bot that was in his way. The bot fell to the ground unmoving.
“Jesus Christ, these guys are messed up. Get me a paramedic up here now!” The officer could be heard yelling.
Both victims’ white shirts were blackened and in tatters, the same with their trousers. The ears of both young men were deformed and blackened in some places, red and blistered in others. The lobes sagged like melted plastic. Both of the victims short to medium hair was mostly missing except for a small patch here or there in a sea of red highlighted by the whitish blisters. What remnants of their hair remained in those small spots was melted down and stuck to the red, blistered surface. It was unsettling to realize that just fifteen minutes ago both had whole heads of hair and now they were bald, looking almost unrecognizable as the same two people. Argosi could hear them both moaning and heaving. They were alive, at least for now. The cam came around to Clemons. He was trying to say something. The officer leaned in, and the cam provided a view of the man’s blistered and bleeding lips that had curled back into his mouth showing more of his teeth.
“Ith urns.” Came the raspy muffled sound.
“I think he’s saying that it burns.” A voice from behind the officer boomed.
The officer then placed his hands onto the steel wire gag to see how he could maybe release it or loosen it.
“Ow, God dang, that’s hot!” The officer shook his fingers after grabbing the gag and quickly releasing it.
“Get some water and wire cutters these guys are still burning from the hot steel!”
Argosi felt sorry for the victims. But he knew that if they were strong enough to be still able to communicate, then they would likely survive. With advanced medical care, both would make full recoveries, at least physically. New skin and nerves could be grown right on their bodies, but mentally it would be tougher. No doubt there would be a lot of nightmares in what he hoped would be long lives for them both.
“Excuse me, Commander Argosi?” It was Susan, his admin person.
“I have DC Stezno on the line.”
“Tell her I’ll call her back.”
“She says it’s urgent, sir.”
“Tell her I’ll call her back.”
“Wu, secure the Flash and let’s see if this sick fuck sticks his head up and tries to reconnect.”
“Yes, Commander,” Wu responded.
For the next ten minutes, firemen and paramedics carefully cut Roland and Clemons from the wood pole. It was slow going as the bailing wire had burned into their flesh. Both were administered oxygen and IV’s while they were still attached to the pole. Getting the wire gags off was the priority, and both had to endure the fireman pulling the wires from their cheeks where the hot steel had seared into them like a deep brand. They had poured saline over the bailing wire which steamed and hissed from the internal heat that it retained. Neither could stand on their own and had to be delicately held up as the multitudes of wire strands had to be cut and pulled away, or out of, the burnt skin.
After they had been cut down, EMS personnel placed them onto stretchers with sterile burn sheets. The paramedics cut away their outer clothing, and the wounds both suffered became more apparent. Some areas, their forearms, lower legs, thighs, chests, and midsections had severe 2nd-degree burns, with others clearly 3rd degree. Both their hands were black at the fingertips and clenched into a grotesquely frozen claw. Their feet were red and blistered, the toes mostly blackened. Everywhere the steel bailing wire had touched, even the clothing had dark black burn marks, many bleeding. Blisters had formed head to toe on them, and they were shaking uncontrollably from the shock and the trauma and loss of skin surface to properly regulate their temperature.
The Metaverse: Virtual Life-Real Death Page 35