by M.A. Harris
An Ending
The image showed something like hell, what looked like it might be a volcano cauldron, but instead of spewing rocky projectiles the rocks fell inwards. The picture was from some distance but it still caught the mind numbing violence of the bombardment. Caught the moment when a section of rock measuring a significant fraction of a mile across split away and fell into the valley below.
“...I am assured that what you are seeing are rocks being dropped from orbit onto the ex base of the so called Space Raiders on what the locals call Ship Plateau.” The striking blond talking head had huge eyes and breasts enhanced by a jacket that fit like a second skin, she looked to the side, “They sure look like Blaster Bolts to me, don’t they to you Ted?”
The male equivalent of the blond nodded his head fiercely, “Rocks don’t do it for me. The Raiders have been pulling new tricks faster than the Air Force or NASA can get their stories straight. It’s clear the current administration has let us down one more time, in a catastrophic way....”
The image one of several news crews had caught of the destruction of Ship Plateau began to play and the nearly brainless talking heads began to recycle their inane chatter.
Benjamin VanBunt muted the channel with a giggle, though agony was squeezing his heart in more ways than one. The picture showed tiny darts of fire falling across the sky again and again, the terrific flashes as they hit, and the clip that caught the cliff falling. Other pictures showed a roadblock in the dark, another clip showed people running and pointing as the sparks fell.
The Aristide Industries logo flashed up on the screen and a rather tousled young man appeared opposite the big eyed blond. Ben groaned again, he knew that young man; he was an industrial economist who knew AI well. The two of them had met and talked several times over the last few years.
Ben tore his eyes away from the mute screen and looked around, at his desk and computer. Then at the door that lead out of his office, into an office now full of confused men and women he had lied to, whom he had destroyed. Most of them were good workers, had done good work, they’d just done that work on figures Ben had invented, recently from almost whole cloth. But no one was going to believe that, none of those well-paid young men and women would ever be able to get equivalent positions again. There were a couple of them he could imagine committing suicide because of his treachery.
He looked down at the single malt scotch in the glass gripped tightly in his right hand. He lifted it to his lips and took a slug; its smooth fire burnt his tongue and throat as it rolled down. It didn’t do the tearing pain in his belly any good but he didn’t care about that. The buzz of the alcohol did help the mental pain, a little.
He had a cramp in his arm so he set the glass down so he could work it a bit.
He walked over to the computer, tapped a couple of switches. ‘Access denied, judicial lockout.’ The same as before. He snorted to himself, a flicker of amusement lightening his mood. He looked out of the window; the sky outside was an infinite blue, not unusual for Bermuda. Aristide Industries headquarters had been here for years because of the liberal corporate laws here.
AI was actually incorporated in Hong Kong, but having the headquarters in this more central and rather internationally chic location had been a great coup. Howard Conrad’s computer security creeps had always smarmily assured Ben that the island’s networks were well buffered from the EU and the American snooping, on top of which the AI systems were supposedly secure to a level hardly imaginable by the cretinous American bureaucrat spies.
Apparently Howard’s amoral young geeks had been wrong on most counts, though they HAD kept the system secure long enough for Ben to do his worst. He was fairly sure that the key data was probably beyond recovery, he could see the wisp of smoke rising from the small building that held HQ’s local data servers.
He heard the knock on his door, and called out, “Come in.”
The willowy young brunette who came in was less pretty than usual, her face drawn with shock and disbelief. Ben looked at her, schooling his face to a blank, “Yes, Annalisa?”
“Sir there are police officers at the gate, armed police, some of them are Americans, they want to speak to you. There are soldiers out there as well.” She whispered.
Through the door Ben could see that the office outside was empty, apparently his young men and women had already left, looking at the clock he realized he’d been in stasis for the better part of four hours, no wonder they had left, they were all smart enough to know what was coming. Only lovely, loyal Annalisa was still here. The alcohol was making him maudlin he realized, he wanted to cry.
“Open the gates, tell the guards to go home, they’ll come through anyway. Tell everyone to go home Annalisa, you too, it’s all over, no point in hanging around the corpse.” His voice was startlingly level. But that part of him was discrete from his soul; his soul sat and did cry inside. The pain in his arm and his belly were much worse now. The fire was spreading and he could no longer deny what it portended, he no longer cared, welcomed it in fact.
“Yes sir…Sir, what happened?” Tears were pouring down her cheeks.
“We gained the stars Annalisa, gained the stars and lost our souls…just remember that when you go on tourist trips to Mars one day Annalisa. Remember me, remember what pride can do, what it gives with one hand it steals with the other. Now go, go before they start arresting everyone in sight.” He was having a hard time keeping the pain back now. She turned and almost ran; he gasped out a yell, “And close the doors behind you.”
-o-
It took the police almost forty minutes to find the office they wanted in the warren of ultramodern cubicles and desks. Much of that time was taken up battering through two sets of steel reinforced oak doors. In frustration they did start arresting just about everyone in sight, mostly men and women too shocked to think, to leave. But they got no one who knew anything. Benjamin Van Bunt’s body was already cooling by the time they reached him. Dead of a massive heart attack, the only oddity the beatific smile etched into his pain ravaged face.