Rising Storm t2-2

by S. M. Stirling

  "I think you might be making a mistake here," she said slowly, still obviously thinking hard. "You blow this thing up and they just rebuild it somewhere else."

  John looked over at her, but said nothing. Wendy turned to him eagerly.

  "What you need to do is get something into the programming that will also become a part of their stored data. Something that will prevent the thing from becoming sentient!"

  John blinked. "Can that be done?" he asked, sitting up to face her.

  "Yes. And it will probably be a lot easier than trying to make a machine sentient in the first place. And you know what?" She leaned close as though to kiss him.

  "I've already done a lot of the work. So you do need me to come with you." Then she did kiss him.

  John pulled his head back after a moment to give her a speculative look. "I'm not all that easily distracted myself, sweetheart. If you can write a program that will

  do this, why can't we install it? Dieter and I are both computer literate."

  Wendy gave an exaggerated sigh. "Well, I have most of the ideas down," she admitted. "But I was coming at the problem of AI from a different direction—

  namely, creating self-awareness, not stifling it. So I'd have to rewrite the program." She shrugged. "And that will take a little time."

  "We don't have years," he said, disappointed.

  "It won't take years. I've already identified a number of factors that indicate sentience. Well," she admitted with a deprecatory shrug, "I've gotten a huge boost from Kurt Viemeister's articles. But those were just a springboard. I've gone much further. I can do this!" she insisted. "By the time we get there I could have it ready to go." Wendy tried to keep her expression neutral and to hide any trace of the mantra take me!, take me!, take me! that yammered in the back of her head.

  John looked at her in astonishment. "What you're saying is we wouldn't have to blow it up."

  "Not at all," she agreed, nodding enthusiastically. "It will be better if you don't because this way you'll corrupt all of their updated information. Just make it look like blowing it up was your goal, but you were prevented from following through and the program should pass unnoticed." She bit her lip. Don't say too much, she cautioned herself. Let him work it through.

  John looked up from his reverie. "Let's go talk to Dieter."

  " Should pass unnoticed?" Dieter said. He folded his arms before him on his desk.

  "My dear Wendy, we can't afford should. We need to kill this monster."

  "Which John tells me you've already done twice!" Wendy challenged from her chair in front of him. "So killing it isn't working. You need to prevent this thing from becoming a monster. Maybe something less obvious and less destructive is the answer. Let them have their Skynet!" She waved her hands in an expansive gesture. "Just don't let that Skynet reach its full potential. All they're looking for is a tool, not something that's going to try and take over the world. Let them have what they want while making sure you get what you want. They'll never even suspect anything's wrong—because from their point of view, nothing will be wrong!"

  She stopped talking, looking at him as though willing him to give her a go-ahead. Von Rossbach pushed out his lower lip as he thought and John stood behind Wendy's chair, tapping his foot nervously.

  "How likely are they to find this program you're proposing?" Dieter asked.

  "Not very," Wendy assured him. "A program like the one that makes up Skynet is extremely complex; there are millions of lines of text involved. I could never have done it without that data that John gave us, from the thing's… head. What I'm intending isn't going to interrupt Skynet's function, so it won't cause problems for the designers. All I want to do is prevent unintended consequences, and I can do that by spreading my program out quite a bit so that it won't stand out as something alien." When von Rossbach still looked dubious she hastened to explain further. "They'll certainly check the program after your visit," she admitted. "I know I would. But they'll be looking for key words that will involve self-destruction. While our goal isn't to destroy but to get the computer to ignore

  certain data. Something like that won't stand out. And unless someone is so anal that they insist on going over every single line of text, it will not be noticed."

  "Where's your mother?" Dieter asked John, who shrugged. "Let's go find her."

  Sarah was in John's room working on his computer. She glanced up with a distracted frown as they came in, then looked a question at them.

  "Wendy has a new idea that we'd like to run by you," Dieter said.

  Sarah turned to the girl and gave her all her attention. After Wendy had finished explaining she sat quietly rocking the desk chair as she thought. "It could work,"

  she said at last. "Maybe destroying Skynet is impossible; it certainly feels that way. But sabotaging it…" Sarah chewed her lower lip, then nodded once, firmly.

  "Yes. Let's try it. It isn't like bombing the place isn't taking a risk, too. And this way they won't feel the need to start all over again. And"—she glanced at her son

  —"John can stay here."

  John simply stared at her in shock and Wendy caught her breath in a gasp.

  "You've got to be kidding," he said.

  Sarah shook her head. "Completely serious. The mission doesn't need you and I don't think that with this new plan there's any excuse for putting you at risk like that."

  "Mom, you're asking me to send my girlfriend in my place! Do you think I'm going to just stand by and let you do that?"

  "I expect you to weigh the risks against the benefits and to come up with the

  same results that I have." Sarah met his eyes with a hard look.

  "I can't believe this," John said, turning his back on her. Then he swung around again. "Wendy hasn't had the training to take on something like this."

  "You haven't been around snow since you were four, kiddo," Sarah reminded him. "And Dieter can take very good care of her. I was trusting him to take care of you, so now he can do the same thing for her." Slowly she realized that he was more angry than she'd ever seen him; the skin around his nostrils was actually white. "Besides, you don't have enough supplies for three people."

  "Those could be acquired." Dieter shrugged in the face of her glare, his face unreadable.

  "I'm going, Mom." John was breathing hard, but his voice was calm and his eyes were cool. "That's the end of it." Then he turned and started to walk out of the room.

  Sarah sprang to her feet, hiding a wince. "John! It's an unacceptable risk!"

  "Mom, I ask you, what good will I ever be if I stay here safe and warm while sending someone I love out to maybe get killed. How would I ever be able to call myself a man?" He glared at her from the doorway.

  Wendy had been watching them wide-eyed; now she spoke up, her voice shaking. "I won't go without him."

  Sarah's eyes widened and her head snapped around to face the girl. She could feel the blood draining from her face. Then she looked at Dieter. The big

  Austrian stood like an oak, his arms folded, his eyes downcast.

  "Sarah, you have not healed completely. You would be a liability. You know it, we all know it. Why not admit it?"

  "If you'd all already decided this was what you were going to do, then why in hell did you interrupt my work?" she demanded fiercely. "Get lost, I've got things to do." She sat down and began typing.

  John looked at von Rossbach, who tossed his head in the direction of the door.

  Wendy scuttled out first, followed by John. Dieter gave Sarah's back a long, last look.

  "You're right," she said, in an almost whisper.

  "What was that?" he replied politely.

  "I said, you're right. I'm not fit to go into the field right now. I'll be more useful here." A pause. "Harder to wait than to do."

  Dieter smiled and pulled the door gently to.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  LOVE'S THRUST, VERA PHILMORE'S

  YACHT, THE RAGING FIFTIES

  "John stood
alone on the deck, so deep in his own thoughts he barely noticed the driving rain that competed with the seawater blasting under his oilskins. The sky above was steel gray, the same color as the rough-sided mountains of moving

  water before and behind, topped with frothing white where the keening wind slashed their tops into foam. It was a storm fifty million years old, here where wind and water circled eternally from east to west about the Antarctic coasts.

  The young man ignored it, save for the tight grip on the railing and eyes slitted against the spray.

  He had been brooding ever since the stiff leave-taking with his mother. He'd been busy breaking down the moments before good-bye into smaller and smaller pieces.

  From the time when she'd first sent him to the academy, his mother had insisted on carrying his bag out to the car for him, no matter how heavy it got. As he grew and realized that despite his mental image of her, Sarah Connor was not a towering Amazon, he'd tried to take over that task; but she wouldn't allow it. It became a kind of good-natured contest between them. A contest he'd never won until that morning.

  He'd dragged his duffel downstairs to find her already on the portal, looking out into the yard, unsmiling, arms crossed, her back military straight, the fingers of her hands digging into her arms. The bag was a little thing—really an unimportant thing—but it signaled her displeasure to him vividly and he regretted the rift between them.

  "Did you forget anything?" she'd asked, obviously unable to break old habits completely.

  "Nope," he'd said, just as he always did. "Got my toothbrush, my comb, and an extra pair of shoelaces."

  That had earned him only a slight, distant smile.

  Wendy, in her eagerness to avoid contact with his mother, was already in the car, in the backseat—crowding the far door in an effort to escape Sarah's gimlet eye.

  Knowing Wendy might be watching them made him feel even more awkward.

  John was disappointed that the women in his life hadn't taken to each other, but under the circumstances he had decided to just let it ride.

  Sometimes you could put off trouble.

  ***

  Through the windows of the lounge Dieter watched the young man automatically adjust his stance to the rolling of the big yacht, ignoring the V-plumes of spray that erupted skyward every time it dug its bows into the cold gray water.

  "It's freezing out there," Vera observed. She shivered dramatically, causing the ice cubes in her Scotch to clink. "But it is fantastic." Her eyes glowed as she watched the steel-colored sea heave itself into mountains of water. "I love the sheer power of it! I'm so glad you convinced me to come down here, darling."

  She wrapped her arms around one of his and grinned up at him mischievously.

  Dieter knew she was well aware that he got nervous when she did that and he smiled down at her in a carefully pleasant but not encouraging way.

  She indicated the direction of Wendy's cabin with a tip of her well-coiffed head.

  "That nice little girl has been pretty broody, too."

  "No"—Dieter patted Vera's hand—"not brooding. She's working on something.

  It has to be done by the time we reach our landing point, so she's just concentrating."

  With a very unladylike snort, Vera said, "Yeah, right. And Johnny?"

  Dieter shook his head. "He's eighteen."

  "Ah," Vera said wisely. "That explains a lot."

  John blinked and studied the waves as they roared toward the yacht, broke at the bows, and cataracted down the sides, doing his best to empty his mind and simply feel. He was out here to acclimate himself to the cold, and the mealy scent of the everlasting ice was strong. He kept telling himself that this was a useful exercise that would test his endurance. I'll build confidence knowing I can keep going through the discomfort. Jungles I'm used to, and mountains, but not ice.

  Unfortunately he suspected that in reality he was enduring the discomfort because he felt guilty about leaving his mom behind and didn't want to discuss his feelings with Dieter and Wendy.

  Not that Wendy seemed to be on the same planet with the rest of them at the moment. Sometimes she looked right through him, her head moving in little jerks as her eyes roved the room and her fingers tapped in a keyboard rhythm on the tablecloth. What she was like the rest of the time he didn't know since he only saw her at meals.

  My girlfriend, the zombie, he thought bitterly, knowing he was being unfair. He paused in his thinking. I'm whining! I'm actually whining— and to myself! Did

  other people do that? It seems I do. So what was he supposed to make of that?

  His feet and fingers hurt from the cold and the hairs in his nose felt like they were snapping off with every breath. Maybe his body was whining, quite justifiably, and this was the way his mind was interpreting its complaints. He sighed and could have sworn that he saw ice crystals fall from the plume of his breath. Impossible, with the air this saturated with moisture, but they should have…

  The whining might not be justified, but the guilt was. Or at least it was understandable. By insisting on coming, he'd broken with a near-lifelong habit of assuming that his mother understood the situation better than he did. At least as far as Skynet went.

  But he'd been right. I'm supposed to be a great leader. Nobody is going to follow someone who makes preserving his own precious pink personal buttocks the maximum priority.

  His mother's still face came before his mind's eye. He had sensed her deep unhappiness and ignored it, choosing instead to crack jokes and to lift her off her feet with his good-bye hug. It was as if he was saying, See, Mom. I'm all grown up. I'm bigger than you are! Suddenly he felt very gauche.

  He wondered if he shouldn't have confronted the situation, let her tell him what was on her mind. Like I didn't know, he thought grimly. Wendy was coming with them and Sarah couldn't. Wendy was an unknown quantity, an untested weapon, and Sarah wasn't going to be on hand if that weapon failed.

  He had to give it to her; his mother knew how to cover his back, even if some

  part of him resented her presence there more and more as he grew older. At the same time he appreciated her devotion, even if he didn't want to examine it too closely. How hinky is that? he wondered, and decided not to examine that question too closely either.

  Maybe he was just tired. The cold really burned energy and the heavy clothing he was wearing was… heavy. Still, he didn't move to go into the warmth of the lounge. Maybe he was punishing himself in some daft effort to make it up to his mother because he felt guilty. Guilt again. Though considering his insensitive behavior at their parting, he had good reason for feeling it.

  Aside from that, whatever his mother felt, to him Wendy wasn't a weapon of any kind. What she was, quite simply, was the most important person in his life. Uh-oh. Did I really think that?

  He'd been aware that he had very strong feelings for her, but he hadn't realized until this moment the depth of those feelings.

  But Mom knew. She was as sensitive as a cat when it came to gauging people's feelings. Which might explain her distrust and resentment of the younger woman. Replaced and abandoned. The thought made him want to squirm.

  But, hey, wait a minute. Look at it from another angle and this just clears the way for her to get together with Dieter. If everything goes according to plan this could all work out as neatly as a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta.

  It unnerved him that he honestly didn't know if he was being sarcastic or not.

  A wave heaved itself over the railing and drenched him from head to foot. And

  on that note… Grasping the safety line, he made his way to a door, grateful that he could choose to go in. One or two of the crew had to stay outside at all times, and every one of them came from the tropics. At least he'd seen snow.

  Wendy saw John move past her porthole and flew to the door; throwing it open, she rushed down the corridor, opened the hatch to the deck, and flung her arms around his neck.

  "I'm done! I'm done! I'm done!" she sang, hopp
ing up and down. Her eyes grew round. "I'm cold! I'm cold! I'm cold!" She turned and fled back through the hatch.

  He followed her in, grinning at the sight of her shivering, her teeth chattering as she hugged herself. As soon as the door was closed she rushed him again, then pulled back.

  "You're wet!" she said in dismay. Then she looked down at her shirt. "I'm wet!"

  He could see that. He could also see through the thin wet fabric that she wasn't wearing a bra. Now that's a sight for sore eyes!

  "Never mind," Wendy said. Suddenly all business, she took his hand and towed him toward her cabin. She opened the door and turned to him, her eyes glowing.

  "Come in," she invited, tugging him forward.

  "I'll come back," he promised. "I'm drenched."

  Wendy laughed. "Use my shower," she suggested. Her voice dropped and went slightly husky. "I'll scrub your back." Then, taking him by surprise, in one smooth movement she pulled him in, closed the door, and leaned against it.

  John blinked. Scrub your back was pretty unequivocal. He could feel himself blushing, but he was pretty sure that it was more about desire than embarrassment. He glanced at the porthole and Wendy moved to the wall and drew the short curtain over it. Turning, she raised a brow at him, then without a word went to the door and locked it.

  "That should ensure privacy," she said. Wendy moved closer and looked up at him. "And your mother isn't here now, so there's no need to be shy."

  He backed up a step and said uncertainly, "I just don't want to take advantage of you."

  "Pleeease!" she begged him, crossing her eyes and shaking her folded hands in the classic pleading posture. "Take advantage of me! I've just done the impossible and I want to celebrate, and I want you! Moments like this only come along once in a while, John," she said as she began untying the ribbons on his life jacket. "You have to grab them while you can."

  Beer commercial, he thought irreverently. Then, somehow, the life jacket was on the floor and she was reaching for something else. John grabbed her hands.