E-Day

by Nicholas Sansbury Smith

  The soldier with long hair looked back at the teenager and then over to the turret, giving the slightest of nods.

  Akira hit the roof, yelling, “NO!”

  The turret barked to life, drowning out his plea. A single round from Frost silenced the gun in the time it took Akira to flatten his body on the roof. The gunner slumped in the turret, his helmet smoking from a hole in the center.

  Akira watched all hell break loose below. Cries of pain filled the night as the Engines cut down the Coalition fighters with easy shots. Frost blasted up to the roof next to Akira, her rifle barrel sighting targets the moment her boots set down.

  “You good, Captain?” she asked.

  He nodded and pulled out his rifle.

  The hatch of the APC had burst open below, releasing three soldiers that burst into pulpy kisses from the spray of Tadhg’s WMD. The big Engine lumbered across the dirt, hip-firing his massive plasma cannon.

  Another Coalition soldier jumped out of the APC only to fall from a suppressed .50-cal sniper round that blew through armor and flesh, hitting a second man just emerging from the hatch.

  “Damn, never seen you take down two at once!” Tadhg said. He chuckled, but Akira found no joy in killing these people. He knew Frost didn’t either.

  Ghost was coming up around the other side of the APC when a female Coalition warrior with dreadlocks shoved a pistol to his gut. Okami jumped up and bit her hand before she could pull the trigger, and Ghost headbutted her in the nose with his faceplate.

  Perez used his shield to deflect bullets coming from behind a truck, where three Coalition soldiers fired ancient assault rifles. They seemed to run out of ammo, providing Perez with a chance to advance while Frost laid down covering fire.

  Two more soldiers slumped to the ground, their skulls destroyed. Perez reached the third soldier behind the truck and drew his sword.

  “Cease fire!” Akira shouted. “Cease fire!”

  He rose up to assess the carnage in a quick scan. Thirty seconds was all it took to kill and maim more than twenty fighters. Jumping down to the dirt, he began the search for survivors.

  The other Engines spread out, drawing their energy swords. Feeds from Okami and Blue Jay directed Akira to a man crumpled against a pipe.

  He stopped and crouched in front of the mortally wounded nomad leader. He was still breathing. Bloody bubbles burst out of his mouth as he tried to speak.

  “I’m sorry,” Akira said. “It didn’t have to be like this.”

  Deep down, he really was sorry. He didn’t want to kill these people over water. Doing so confirmed how cheap life had become in the wastes outside the megacity walls.

  The dying soldier fingered for something inside a pouch in his vest.

  Ghost walked over with a blade raised, but Akira stopped him. He reached down to help the man retrieve a small Christian cross from the pouch.

  “AI… is… n-not…” the man stuttered. He gripped the holy relic and, with his last breath, prayed to the Christian God.

  Perez stepped next to Akira, shaking his helmet.

  “They will never understand,” he said.

  “No, I suppose they won’t,” Akira replied.

  “They cling to their superstitions instead of embracing our future and salvation. It’s a shame.”

  Akira rose to his feet and left the dead man with Perez. They joined Tadhg to help him free the workers and two Pistons. The soldiers were both beaten, but they would live.

  “We got a runner!” Frost shouted. “In pursuit!”

  She took off after the hostile. She was the fastest Engine on the squad, even with her long-barreled rifle.

  Using his infrared scanner, Akira saw the fleeing nomad heading toward the pumping station. He made it there and hopped onto an ATV.

  Zooming in with his INVS eyes, Akira recognized the youthful face of the teenager who had shot him in the chest to kick off the massacre.

  The youngster steered the ATV out onto the road, dust kicking up.

  Frost, taking a knee, locked on with her rifle, but Akira called out to hold fire.

  “There’s been enough bloodshed today,” he said. “Let the kid go.”

  “Are you sure that is wise?” Apeiron asked over the comms.

  Akira was surprised to hear her voice after minutes of silence, but even more surprised by her question.

  “Doctor Crichton says that when children are orphaned, they often become terrorists,” she said.

  “Yeah, and sometimes they see the light,” Ghost said. “I say let the kid live. Let him think about what happened here. Maybe next time he won’t be so trigger happy.”

  Perez shrugged. “Or next time, he might not miss.”

  — 8 —

  Jason woke up to a beeping noise in the upper cockpit of the MOTH just before midnight. Outside the viewports, the moon was high in the night sky. He was expecting to see ocean when he looked down, but instead he saw sand.

  Darnel was sleeping across from him, snoring loudly.

  For the past week, they had visited destinations across the globe in Apeiron’s quest to collect a variety of life forms from the world’s most hostile places.

  They had taken a submarine to the bottom of the Mariana trench to discover life that had adapted to the crushing depths.

  At the bottom, Apeiron had used the submarine’s robotic hands to capture a new species of octopus. Two days later, they had added a highly venomous cuttlefish to the vault.

  Jason unbuckled his harness and left the cockpit to search for the AI. A hatch opened into the troop hold where most of the Pistons were sleeping in their racks.

  Embodied in the Hummer Droid, Apeiron stood over the crates, studying the creatures through the glass sides.

  “Hello, Jason,” she said without turning. “There is something I need to tell you.”

  He stepped up next to her, rubbing his eyes.

  “Okay, but want to tell me where we’re going next first?” he said. “I haven’t been home for a week, and I miss my girls.”

  “I know you do, but you will see them soon,” Apeiron replied. “We are about to make our final stop.” She lowered her voice. “I have some dire news.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  “A group of Coalition nomads attempted to hijack water from the tanks at Pumping Station 9 in the Sahara terraforming site.”

  “Wish I could say I was surprised.” Jason sighed. “So, how’d that turn out for these nomads?”

  “Shadow Squad was deployed to neutralize the threat and eliminated all but one of the hostiles.”

  “And the truce—”

  “Is still holding. I am currently monitoring one thousand twenty different patrols, between AAS guards and Nova Alliance Strike Force Pistons. There have already been thirty skirmishes between Coalition troops and our own.”

  “Thirty in a week…”

  “That was today, Jason.”

  He looked over at the Piston Lieutenant, who watched them suspiciously.

  “The peace is fragile, but it is holding… for now,” Apeiron said. “I just need a little more time to finish the design of the Canebrakes, and today I hope to finish my research. You should try and rest. I will wake you up when we arrive.”

  Jason nodded and returned to the cockpit.

  “You know where it’s taking us now?” Darnel asked.

  Jason looked at his friend and confidante. A man he trusted to run his company, a man who had served in the Carbon Wars. Darnel refused to call Apeiron “her”, which told Jason everything he needed to know about how Darnel really felt.

  He was a supporter of AI and had never wavered in that, but his service in the military ingrained in him a closely held respect for protecting the law. He might not admit it outright, but Darnel didn’t approve of Jason breaking the law to merge human consciousness with AI.

  And of course, there was also the fact Jason had done it with Petra’s mind. Something tha
t Darnel definitely didn’t understand.

  “Look, I think we should have a talk,” Jason said. “About Apeiron.”

  “Don’t you mean Petra?”

  Jason shrugged. “If you want to do this, let’s do this.”

  “Do what, Doctor?” Darnel said. “I’m here. I’m always here. But you never asked me my opinion on Apeiron or if it was right to hook Petra up to that machine. You just asked me to help, and I’m honestly starting to worry about how fast Apeiron’s advancing.”

  Darnel leaned closer to Jason.

  “It’s existed for forty-five days and has already grown more advanced than all of the AIs in existence. And it’s getting smarter every second,” he said.

  “That’s the point,” Jason insisted. “That’s how she developed a treatment for SANDs. She altered the electromagnetic therapy that took us years to develop and turned it into a system capable of finally eliminating the molecular contaminants that cause the disease in a matter of days. Now she’s perfecting the Canebrakes, and helping to oversee every single one of the fifteen thousand, four hundred and three project sites designed to restore the planet.”

  Darnel stiffened in his seat. “So, you’re not worried at all about how fast it’s adapting and learning?”

  “All due respect, my friend, but this is what I designed her to do. I just wish I had done this earlier. If I had, then Petra would still be alive.”

  “I know, I’m sorry, but I will say this… Apeiron is not your sister. Petra, in my opinion, is dead.”

  “Yes, that is true,” Jason said.

  Darnel eased back and looked out the window, clearly still worried but choosing not to argue. Deep down, he was fiercely loyal and smart too, but he wasn’t a visionary.

  And that was why he would never understand why Jason had created Apeiron.

  A beeping noise drew Jason’s attention to the viewports. Under the glow of the moon, a jagged mountain chain spanned the horizon.

  “Where are we?” Darnel asked.

  “Over the Atacama Desert,” said one of the pilots.

  “Where it rains only once every fifteen years,” Apeiron said. She stood in the open hatch to the troop hold, holding out two bulky, vacuum-rated suits with oxygen packs.

  “Please put these on,” she said.

  Darnel and Jason followed her through the hatch with the suits.

  “Why do we need these?” Darnel asked.

  “Because tonight, we are going to trek across the El Tito Geysers,” Apeiron replied.

  “An active volcano,” Darnel said. “Sounds like Piston training.”

  Some of the soldiers in the back of the troop hold laughed. Jason forced a smile as he slipped into the suit.

  “The arid region of the desert fluctuates severely, ranging from ten degrees Fahrenheit at night to one hundred and thirty degrees Fahrenheit during the day,” Apeiron said. “It is currently fifteen degrees Fahrenheit.”

  Jason secured his suit as the MOTH descended over the desolate terrain toward the bulging brown hills on the horizon.

  “Approaching LZ,” announced the pilot.

  The back gate opened, and a ramp lowered to the dirt. Jason walked out into the frigid night with Darnel by his side and the Pistons following.

  Apeiron gestured for them to follow her toward the vents where white steam sprayed out in billowing plumes. “It is safe, I assure you.”

  They passed by the cracks in the Earth, most of which seemed dormant. Apeiron stopped to collect a sample at one.

  “The microbes here are different than most organisms on Earth,” she said. “They produce energy by metabolizing normally dangerous gases like carbon monoxide and dimethyl sulfide.”

  “Yes, I remember reading about how some hardy microbes can produce water and methane from carbon-rich compounds where sunlight isn’t available for photosynthesis,” Jason said.

  “Correct, Doctor. Some organisms, like these methanogens, actually find oxygen toxic.” Apeiron stood and deposited a sample into a storage slot in her arm. “There are also hyperthermophiles, like those we discovered at the deep-sea hydrothermal vents, and I am hoping to find more here.”

  She led them deeper into the steaming field. Finally, about a mile from the MOTH, she halted, scanning the terrain and then turning back to Jason.

  “We have about another minute if my calculations are correct,” she said excitedly.

  “Before what?” he asked.

  “You will see in a moment. Please stay here.”

  She continued into the field, the lights on her shoulder mounts clicking on. The beams raked back and forth, revealing a crack across the dirt she was heading directly toward.

  “Apeiron, wait,” Jason said. “You’re…”

  A blast of steam fired into the air, venting across the cracks and enveloping the Hummer Droid in the spray.

  “Petra!” Jason yelled.

  The temperature reading spiked on his HUD, and he retreated with the soldiers and Darnel.

  “Do not be afraid, Doctor.”

  The soothing voice of his sister whispered in Jason’s ear. He saw something moving in the steam. He took a step forward, shaking Darnel’s hand off his shoulder.

  “This isn’t safe, Doctor,” Darnel said on a private channel. “We should get back to the MOTH.”

  Apeiron broke through the cloud and walked forward, a cape of steam draping off the droid’s titanium armor. She deposited another vial into her chest.

  “I have the samples I came here for,” she said. “We can get you home now.”

  Apeiron started back toward the two men, stopping and tilting her head. The smile from earlier returned.

  “Doctor, I believe we have discovered a new type of species not present in the Nova Alliance database,” she said. “These cell membranes maintain amazing structural stability at high temperatures. They will further help us learn new ways for humanity to survive in extreme conditions too.”

  It suddenly struck Jason what Apeiron was doing on these trips. She wasn’t just looking to perfect the Canebrakes…

  “You don’t think we can save the Earth?” he asked. “You think humanity is doomed?”

  Apeiron rotated her head. “Doctor, you coded me to protect human life, at a time when your species is facing the very real possibility of extinction. Learning from some of the most adaptive biological lifeforms will give me insight on how to help humanity adapt to a changing Earth environment, and other hostile environments like the moon and eventually, other planets.”

  She gestured for Jason to follow her back to the MOTH but stopped at the bottom of the ramp with the smile still on her face.

  “If it is okay with you,” she said, “I would like to see the family.”

  “Family?” Jason asked.

  “Betsy, Nina, and Autumn,” Apeiron said. “I miss them, and would like to see them again.”

  ***

  The guard came for Chloe the same time each day, so she learned to keep track of time in the darkness of the underground prison. Today, her uncle had been sleeping when the guard arrived. He was smaller and thinner than the other guards, and like the guard Dr. Cross had killed, this man had no antlers.

  Keanu got up and hugged Chloe, whispering into her ear. “Pretend it isn’t real and do as they say.”

  She nodded.

  The young guard led Chloe through the tunnels, her mind in a daze. She thought of her parents and Radar, but she snapped alert when the man directed her to the left at an intersection where they had always gone right.

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  “I’m sorry, but I can’t answer that,” he said.

  His voice was kind, making her wonder if he was a good person just trapped in a bad circumstance. Surely this wasn’t what he wanted. Surely he didn’t want to live in a world of death and horror. But she also knew he wouldn’t help her. No one who worked for Dr. Cross would betray him, for the same reason that
she continued to work in his macabre labs.

  Fear.

  They continued down a stone hallway that narrowed toward a stairwell winding deeper underground. Somewhere in the distance she could hear a heavy flow of water. They were passing under the river.

  Sconces guided them down the stairs. At the bottom, an open door led to a sprawling cavernous room full of empty cages. Chloe gagged at a foul odor and pulled her mask up.

  Cages that once held animals now sat empty, nothing but dried lumps of feces, clumps of fur, and stains on the cage floors. They passed larger cages that had once held horses, and then the smaller one for the wolves, bred by the tens of thousands to be turned into Iron Wolves.

  The guard stopped in front of the next door, facing Chloe and pushing his helmet up, revealing a metal jaw and blades for teeth. INVS eyes stared at her.

  It took all of a heartbeat to notice this was the first patient she had worked on for Dr. Cross.

  “What else are you going to tell him to do to me?” he asked. “Replace my arms like they did my legs?”

  He pulled up his pant legs, exposing titanium prosthetics with hydraulics.

  “I… I’m sorry,” she said. “I was just—”

  He drew in a breath. “Following orders, like me.”

  She nodded.

  “Not all of us believe—” he began to say.

  A scream echoed through the facility, and the young man quickly secured his helmet. He pushed open a door to a stone hallway, where water dripped from the ceiling, splashing into puddles across the floor.

  Chloe followed, with a question on the tip of her tongue. Maybe he would help her escape, maybe they could help each other.

  He stopped in front of a wood door before she could muster up the courage to ask.

  “This is it,” he said.

  The door opened to a stone chamber that looked like the ones Chloe had seen in ancient pictures of French Revolution torture chambers. The only difference was a white plastic medical tent in the center of the room, with an operating chair. Spider-like arms rose from the metal seat.