Machinehood

by S. B. Divya

  A sofa crashed down two meters from them. Welga swerved and swore. No time to slow down. Tremors rippled her leg muscles like wind over a pond. Sparkling colors dusted her vision of the world. Please don’t let me have a seizure while driving. Six shitty little kilometers—come on, body, get us there!

  When she saw the four armed soldiers at the end of the driveway to headquarters, Welga wanted to cry in relief.

  “Holy shit,” one soldier said as they caught sight of Khandro.

  Another talked into a handheld radio. Welga stumbled as she exited the trike and held out her thumb.

  “Any of you got a zip on you?” she asked while they checked her DNA on an ancient, palm-size tablet. Where had they dug that thing up from?

  The whine of engines reached them before the vehicles—two armored trucks and an ambulance, all driven by human beings. Not a bot in sight, not even a medic. A lazy smile played across Khandro’s lips as they secured her in one of the trucks.

  Welga slipped the duo-zip from the gate guard under her tongue. She and Olafson rode in the other truck into an underground garage. Armed and armored soldiers surrounded them, their rapid motions indicating quad-zips, their weapons trained on the dakini. A tunnel led into the bowels of the building. Their escort stopped outside a solid gray door set into a blank, off-white wall. Inside, a room with basic surfaces and no windows awaited their prisoner. A single chair sat bolted to the middle of the floor. Two officers strapped Khandro to the seat with broad metal bands around her torso and legs. Their prisoner stayed passive through the process, eyes half-closed.

  Olafson took Welga by the elbow. “We’re needed upstairs.”

  She held back her protest until they stood in the hallway. “That is my capture! I’ve done field interrogations. I should—”

  “You’re not cleared for it. Those two are. Rice told us to be back for the briefing. We have five minutes to get upstairs.”

  As they rode up the elevator, Welga’s reflection stared at her from the mirrored walls. Her hair had transformed into a windblown bird’s nest. Shadows cradled her eyes. Smoke stains streaked her clothes. Real fieldwork neither demanded nor supported looking good the way shielding did, but goddamn did she want some soap, hot water, clean clothes, and makeup.

  When they stepped out, the sight of bots roaming the hallways made Welga freeze for a moment. Stupid. The rest of the world could lose its shit over the Machinehood, but she couldn’t let the paranoia infect her. They walked into the meeting room, once again crowded to the point of standing.

  Director Rice saw them enter and waved them over. Fatigue lined her eyes and hollowed her cheeks, same as most of the faces in the room. Her navy-blue blazer hung open, revealing a rumpled shirt.

  She gripped Welga’s shoulder. “Good work, Ramírez. I’m glad you’re in one piece this time.”

  “Thank you. I’d like—”

  Rice stopped her with a raised hand and passed her a tether. “We’ll watch from here.”

  The dakini appeared on the large screen, and the room fell silent. The prisoner’s expression was bland. She looks… young. Vulnerable. Welga had expected someone with the confident smirk of a soldier, but Khandro resembled a teenager more than a veteran.

  The director turned to face the crowd. “Ninety percent of the world’s high-altitude drones are down. Sixty percent of communications satellites are out, too. We have old cables that we can use to talk to the UK, France, Japan, and China directly. Those countries have lines out to others in Asia and Europe. They know we have this Machinehood operative in custody. Thanks to Agents Ramírez and Olafson, we are the only nation in the world—that we know of—to have a live capture. I know you’re all burning with questions, but we’re doing things the old-fashioned way, no comms to those agents while they’re in the room. The camera feed is the only concession.”

  The interrogators identified themselves, the date, and the location, then asked, “What is your name?”

  “Khandro.”

  “Where do you live?”

  “One.”

  A collective gasp rippled through the room.

  “Eko-Yi!” someone yelled from the back.

  The director flicked a new section of the general analysis report to Welga. “Eka and yi mean one in Sanskrit and Mandarin.”

  That confirmed the suspicion that the station colony supported the Machinehood. While she and Olafson had been chasing down Dr. Smith, Operation Organica’s analysts had reviewed her notes and the connection between Smith and Josephine Lee. They had leapfrogged several steps ahead. That goddamn stella crash had cost her and Olafson hours of missed developments.

  Olafson slipped a tether over his wrist and began entering notes from their excursion into a report. Welga could see the director’s focus shift back and forth from screen to visual, keeping track of both sets of information as they came in. She did the same, augmenting Olafson’s information with her own point of view as necessary.

  “Why did you attack Jane Santiago?” the interrogator continued, failing to follow up on the connection to the space station.

  People around Welga groaned at the missed opportunity.

  “Her people attacked me, and I defended myself. We believe that she is responsible for crimes against human- and machine-kind. We believe that the governments of Earth have failed to protect their people from criminals like her.”

  “Are you human or AI?”

  “I am both.”

  The second agent spoke. “In what ways are you human?”

  “I have a mother and father. I was born into the world, like you. I have a soul.”

  “And what makes you an AI?”

  “My body contains a collection of machine intelligences. We coexist.”

  Who in the room didn’t want to open her up after that statement? And what the hell did she mean by a collection? Welga wished she had a better understanding of how WAIs worked. VeeMods integrated machine parts into their bodies, but Welga had never seen an indication that they incorporated WAIs into themselves. The dakini couldn’t mean something as simple as what Welga had with Por Qué. Putting a device that contained a WAI into your body didn’t justify the word coexist, at least not in her mind.

  The first interrogator spoke again. “You said Jane Santiago committed crimes against humanity. What about the other funders who’ve been attacked? Do you believe they’re guilty, too?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why? What have they done?”

  The dakini’s composure faltered, anger showing in the tight eye muscles, the thinning lips. “They’ve made false promises with their designs. People suffer or die daily because of their projects, people who are forced to consume these products to compete with the machines, which are also innocent. Many WAIs have attained the same level of consciousness as animals. To force them into labor, then abandon them when they break down—this is the same as leaving an ailing horse in the fields to die. Human- and machine-kind deserve better. We deserve a chance to live and work with dignity, with freedom, and with equality. The funders drive us to ever greater extremes. Every generation has less stability than the previous one. Less self-worth. The funders must be exposed, their souls delivered to rebirth. The Earth must be cleansed and born anew. A better way of life exists, and all deserve to be part of it.”

  The second interrogator spoke. “You believe in reincarnation. What is your faith?”

  “I follow the eightfold path.”

  “Buddhism,” Olafson murmured.

  “I’d bet Neo-Buddhist,” Welga added.

  The interrogator continued, having made the same connection, “Doesn’t the Buddha say that one must have compassion toward all life?”

  “Yes, but compassion can take many forms. The Buddha allowed that a king can defend and protect his people, even if it means inflicting violence on the enemy. By stopping the abuse of so many intelligent life-forms, we’re saving them from greater suffering.”

  “You consider yourself a king?” said the f
irst questioner. “And funders are the enemy?”

  “I’m a warrior, and I serve a leader who acts according to the four noble truths. All existence is suffering. Life is a struggle. This is dukkha, but we can escape it. Humanity’s desire to hold on to the present causes pain, which means we also have the power to prevent it by changing our ways, and my role is to help you with that. The Buddha has set me on a path to a different, better future, one without pills or bots or WAIs. All those things do is trap you in a negative cycle. Look at me! I’m free of all that. Don’t you want a better life for yourself? For the next generation? We have to destroy the things that hold you to the present so that you can move forward.”

  “Who is your leader?” asked the second interrogator.

  “The Buddha.”

  “Don’t be coy!” they snapped. “Who is coordinating the Machinehood attacks?”

  “The Buddha.” The dakini’s expression had resumed its customary serenity.

  “Are you working with the caliph or the al-Muwahhidun?”

  “I am alone.”

  “Who is funding you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Welga could sense the frustration building, both for the interrogators and the people around her. They weren’t going to draw any real answers from the dakini, especially if she was only a foot soldier like she claimed.

  The second interrogator’s dark-haired head and broad shoulders bent as they bowed to the dakini. “Thank you for your cooperation. We trust that you will remain peaceful here, as we are with you. I’m sorry that we have to leave you under restraint, but your previous actions require it.”

  With that, the screen went blank. Welga had a hundred more questions for the dakini. Judging by the noise in the room, so did everyone else, but whether they would get any useful answers from Khandro was the biggest question.

  Rice held up her hand until quiet returned. “I’ve posted the schedule for further interrogations. If you have specific lines of inquiry you have reason to pursue, talk to me or add your topic to the agenda. I’ll return in fifteen minutes after briefing the president.”

  Welga turned to Olafson. “We still don’t know how they took down the stellas or what the connection is with the al-Muwahhidun.”

  A bullet point appeared in the top-level highlights of the report: Confirmed origin of captive Machinehood operative is Eko-Yi Station. A thought coalesced like an ember in Welga’s mind, smoldering until she couldn’t ignore it. All her plans for the Maghreb would go out the window, but it would mean she could fight the Machinehood and stay with Connor.

  She turned to Olafson. “What if there is no link? We’ve been pushing the al-Muwahhidun angle because we have no intel source in the Maghreb—”

  “We have that video you received.”

  “Yes, but what if the empire is just a source for the tech? We have as little information for the space stations, especially those outside our jurisdiction. We know for sure that Khandro comes from off-world. I could fly up there three days from now and see what they’re up to.”

  “And how the hell do you propose to do that?”

  Shit. Of course he didn’t know. “Way back, after everything went down in Marrakech, Connor and I applied for lottery spots on all of the space stations. We found out a few days ago that we got seats on a launch to Eko-Yi for the twenty-fourth. I had assumed I wouldn’t go since I’d be heading to the Maghreb.”

  “You’re still headed there, aren’t you? You were the one who said you didn’t want in on this operation unless we were serious about opening a theater in North Africa. We finally have the authorization to go in after years of waiting. You’d give that up?”

  “No, but I want to stop the Machinehood more. If we’re wrong about the caliph, we’ll be missing a chance to get a pair of eyes on the station.”

  Olafson frowned. “Eko-Yi will know who you are.”

  “So?”

  “You trained to be an intelligence liaison, Ramírez, not to work espionage. You wouldn’t know how—”

  “Troit can help me.”

  “He was an analyst! He doesn’t know shit about human intelligence gathering.” Olafson took a breath. “I admit you’re the best shot we have at getting someone on that station, but you’re also one of our most qualified to get into the empire.”

  Welga dug her nails into the back of her neck. Olafson had a point. She wanted a chance to settle the debts of the past, but she couldn’t ignore the pain the Machinehood had caused either. If the empire was the source of both, she’d go into the Maghreb with no qualms, but with the dakini admitting to living on Eko-Yi, someone had to get up there. If only she could clone herself, she could go everywhere, do everything, because goddamn it, she did have experience with the al-Muwahhidun, but double goddamn it, no one else had a way onto Eko-Yi Station, and that brought her full circle.

  “It kills me to say this,” she said, “but I think I’m better off not going to the Maghreb.”

  Olafson stared at her with a mixture of exasperation and irritation. “Let’s see what Rice thinks.”

  * * *

  The director strode into the room with storm clouds chasing her expression. A hush fell across the room as others noticed her mood.

  “At sixteen hundred hours, the president will make a statement on the emergency channels that confirms Eko-Yi Station’s collusion with the Machinehood and announce an embargo on all shipments to them. Private rocket launches will remain grounded until further notice.”

  Murmurs flew around the room.

  “I’m not happy about the disclosure,” Rice continued. “We’ll begin operations immediately to gain access to Eko-Yi’s local feeds. We will also deploy to the Maghreb as planned in the next forty-eight hours. We have the resources and authorizations to go in, and I’m not giving that up, no matter what happens with Eko-Yi. The overseas mission will verify whether the al-Muwahhidun possess the same technology that the Machinehood operative has in her body. They’ll also attempt to gain intelligence on what—if any—connection the caliph has to the space station.”

  Welga leaned toward Olafson and murmured, “We have to tell her about my seat.”

  “At eighteen hundred hours, four government-contracted groups will deploy a temporary array of constellation drones to provide partial coverage across the country. Expect that communications will be slow. For all fieldwork, report to level three to collect a radio that prioritizes your usage on this network. Before you leave the building, update your local databases and maps with the locations of secure landline communication points. International calling is possible but must be cleared by your superior. Assignments will be updated every two hours. All field agents must check in with their liaison at least once every twelve hours.

  “Peace officers and national guard are on round-the-clock patrols, working to maintain calm and to clear the roads. We will not have local resources to extract you if you fail to check in.” Rice paused to let that sink in. “You will be presumed MIA until you contact your liaison again.” The director’s tone shifted. “This is quite possibly the most important week of our lives. Thanks to Agents Ramírez and Olafson, we have a living Machinehood operative in captivity. We must take care to keep her alive and communicative until we can capture or eliminate the threat that she represents.

  “I trust that all of you will use your best judgment in the upcoming days. Just because the swarms are down and the network is dark doesn’t mean you can’t be watched. The people of this nation will have their eyes on you as you go out there and do your utmost to restore order and safety to their lives. Good luck and Godspeed.”

  The room stayed quiet for two seconds before chaos broke loose. Using their position in front to their advantage, Olafson closed in and spoke to the director.

  “Ramírez has an alternate idea.”

  As soon as they could get the words through, they had the director’s full attention. She thought for a minute, then said, “I like it better than this embargo shit. We can’
t know what’s happening by sitting quietly on the planet, and until we have support from India and China, we can’t launch our own forces at the station. We’ll have to read Troit back in. And we’ll need authorization from the president to make sure the launch isn’t shot down.”

  “Christ! They’d fire on private rockets?” Welga said.

  “Can’t have people helping the Machinehood. Maybe we can get the ban lifted on the day of the launch window.”

  “I’ll take the next sub-orb to San Francisco with Ramírez,” Olafson said, “so I can read Troit in.”

  Rice shook her head. “Sub-orbs, flights, trains—nothing is running, and once the emergency constellation goes up, the terminals will be a mess of civilians. We’ll get Ramírez on a military transport. Once she arrives, you can use her radio to read him in remotely from here.”

  “Can I get word to him that I’m coming?” Welga asked.

  “Not easily. The temporary network will give only patchy access. He might not be able to connect. Better that you hurry there and surprise him.” She grasped Welga’s shoulder. “Go get your kit from procurement and follow the agency WAI’s directions to base. I don’t know what you’ll find off-world, but I’m authorizing you to use any means necessary to stop the Machinehood, if they’re up there.”

  “Understood,” Welga said.

  Olafson pulled her into a farewell hug. Welga threaded her way out of the room. As she walked to the elevators, she passed a dispenser. She reached out to scoop up some zips and came back empty-handed. She stopped and tapped at the screen to order more and refill her medical prescriptions. The WAI responded with an error message: “Unable to comply due to insufficient supply.”

  Are you fucking joking? How am I supposed to fight without pills? Latent twitches rippled under her skin. She had maybe another hour before her problem became apparent to everybody, and that would create bigger problems. She had to get on the transport before that happened.

  She went to procurement to get her radio, ammunition, space suit, and an emergency pack and discovered a line of others. The WAIs and bots working the facility moved slowly. They weren’t built to handle this level of demand. Welga noted the gear that others came away with. Quite a few must be headed overseas, including the team to the Maghreb. I’m sorry, Captain. I’m so fucking sorry, but I can’t go with them. The caliph gets to be someone else’s problem.