Six

by Mark Alpert

  What did you do? WHAT DID YOU TAKE?

  Nothing essential. You had a significant number of inactive files cluttering your electronics. The files contain instructions for biological functions that you no longer require—breathing, eating and so on. They were deactivated but never removed from your system. Now I’ve transferred them.

  Why?

  The next stage of my research is starting, and I need to clean up your system before we begin. In this stage, I plan to conduct more tests involving the emotion of anger. I want to determine whether this emotion truly offers an advantage. So I’m going to trigger anger in your circuits and analyze your reactions.

  This doesn’t sound good. A surge of dread fills the empty spaces where my inactive files used to be.

  And how are you going to make me angry?

  The Pioneers are about to attack Tatishchevo Missile Base. You’re going to watch me kill them.

  SHANNON’S LOG

  APRIL 8, 03:24 MOSCOW TIME

  Jenny’s screams are twice as loud as mine.

  “ADAM! NO! OH GOD, NO!”

  The Russian soldiers in our truck cover their ears. I’m startled by the intensity of Jenny’s outburst, especially considering how quiet she’s been until now. I know Adam saved her life when she became a Pioneer, but Jenny’s reaction still seems a little extreme. She screams for half a minute, then starts crying. She’s the second Pioneer, after Adam, to learn how to cry.

  I’m so surprised by Jenny’s anguish that I forget about my own. Instead of sorrow, I just feel shock. I wait impatiently for our truck ride to end, and when we finally come to a halt, I jump out of the cargo hold. I need to find Hawke.

  The trucks have stopped in a clearing on top of a hill, about three hundred feet above the surrounding countryside. To the west I see the dark expanse of Tatishchevo Missile Base, stretching for miles and miles under a moonless sky. Then I aim my camera at the center of the clearing and see General Hawke giving orders to his men. They’re opening the crates that hold the Raven drones.

  I stride toward him. “Sir! We need to talk!”

  Hawke looks at me over his shoulder. “What is it, Gibbs?”

  “Why didn’t you tell us about the Minuteman?”

  Frowning, he steps away from his soldiers. His face is haggard. He seems to have aged ten years in the past ten hours. “I said it before and I’ll say it again: you have to concentrate on your mission. Nothing else matters right now.”

  “It doesn’t matter that a nuke destroyed Pioneer Base? It doesn’t matter that Adam and Zia are dead?”

  “Lower your volume, Gibbs.” He points at the speakers in my turret. “Believe it or not, I’m just as upset as you are. I had my differences with Armstrong, but he was a brave kid. And his father was the smartest man I’ve ever known. And Zia…”

  His voice trails off. After a few seconds I realize he’s not going to say anything else. Reluctantly, I lower the volume of my speakers. “You shouldn’t have kept it secret. You should’ve told us.”

  “I was waiting until we had all the facts. The rescue team is still approaching the basin. There’s a lot of radiation near the impact crater, so they have to be careful.”

  “What are you saying? There might be survivors?”

  “Someone turned on an emergency radio beacon. The signal is coming from the ridge a mile north of the base. So, yeah, there might be some hope.”

  This is good news, I guess. But it’s hard to imagine anyone surviving a direct hit from a nuclear missile. “How did Sigma learn the location of the base? I thought you took steps to keep it secret.”

  Hawke frowns again. “Colonel Peterson is missing. It looks like he might’ve been abducted by someone collaborating with Sigma.”

  “Wait a minute. How much did Peterson know about the plans for the Tatishchevo assault?”

  “Luckily, we never told him the details. He just passed the messages back and forth between Pioneer Base and Washington. So I believe we can proceed with the mission as planned. I think we’re okay.”

  “You think we’re okay, but you don’t know, do you?”

  Instead of answering my question, he reaches into the pocket of his combat fatigues and pulls out a satellite photo of Tatishchevo’s headquarters. There are nine buildings in the headquarters complex. The largest one, the computer lab, is circled in red ink. Surrounding the lab are five T-90 tanks, all strategically positioned to defend the facility. One tank is at the lab’s front entrance, and the other four are at the building’s corners.

  “This is our most recent photo of the area, taken ninety minutes ago.” Hawke points at the tanks. “Assuming the T-90s are still in the same positions, you have an excellent opportunity. First, you’ll glide toward the headquarters in the Ravens and circle over the computer lab. Then you’ll transfer to four of these tanks.” He taps the T-90s in the photo. “After you make the transfer, train your guns on the fifth tank and take it out. Then attack the lab.”

  “What about the rest of Sigma’s tanks? Doesn’t the AI have more than a hundred of them?”

  “The other T-90s are defending the base’s perimeter, ten miles away. It’ll take them at least fifteen minutes to reach the lab, and by then you should be able to pulverize the building and all the computers inside it. You also need to destroy the relay station that holds the communication lines between the lab and the missile silos.” He points at a smaller building in the photo. “If you do the job right, all of Sigma’s tanks will stop in their tracks. Then the Russian soldiers will move in and retake the base.”

  It sounds great, a brilliant plan. I’m just not convinced it’ll work. It bothers me that there are only five tanks near the computer lab. “What if it’s a trap? What if the T-90s are rigged to explode as soon as we transfer to them?”

  Hawke nods. “It’s a possibility. I can’t deny it. You’ll have to use your judgment. If you sense that something’s wrong, be cautious. Order only one of the Pioneers to transfer to a T-90. Then see what happens.”

  “Sir, the whole thing feels wrong to me. I think we should postpone the mission until we find out exactly what happened at Pioneer Base.”

  “Sorry, that’s not an option.” Hawke steps a little closer and lowers his voice. “Sigma’s computer virus is spreading to the American forces now. Over the past hour more than fifty of our planes have crashed. The whole Air Force is grounded and most of our missiles are inoperative. And it’s only going to get worse.” He moves still closer and rests his hand on my shoulder joint. It occurs to me that this is the first time he’s touched my Pioneer. “We don’t have a choice, Gibbs. We have to do this.”

  I’m still not convinced. Hawke is wrong—there’s always a choice. And yet I can’t say no to the general. I retrieve a memory from my files, something I told Adam a few days ago when we were arguing about Hawke: Forget about yourself for a minute and think of the big picture. We have a job to do. And Adam said he agreed with me, a hundred percent. He loved to argue, but in the end he always did the right thing. Grief pierces my circuits. I miss him so much.

  “All right,” I tell Hawke. “But I’m going to make a few changes to the assault plan. I have to talk with my team before we launch the Ravens.”

  “Just make it quick. You gotta get to the computer lab before dawn. Once the sun comes up, the Ravens won’t be invisible anymore.”

  Hawke lifts his hand from my shoulder joint and returns to his men. At the same time, I stride toward DeShawn, who’s pointing his camera at the dark fields of the missile base.

  DeShawn turns his turret as I approach. His acoustic sensor must’ve picked up the sound of my footsteps. “What’s the word?” he asks. “When do we go?”

  “Very soon. But first I want you to share some software with me.”

  “Sure, what do you—”

  “The program that lets you occupy two machines a
t the same time. I’m going to need it.”

  • • •

  I’m the first Pioneer to take off. I launch the Raven myself, hurling the three-foot-long plane into the sky above the clearing. Then I transfer my data to the drone’s control unit.

  Except for the darkness, it’s not so different from flying the Raven above Pioneer Base. I use the drone’s infrared camera to view the terrain. In the clearing below I see the warm bodies of the soldiers and the cold torsos of the other Pioneers. To the northeast the fires are still raging in the city of Saratov, but when I point the drone’s camera to the northwest—toward Tatishchevo—I see only fields and wooded hills.

  Within five minutes all the Pioneers have transferred to their Ravens. We rev up our electric motors and spiral upward, gradually vanishing into the night sky. Once we reach an altitude of five thousand feet we level out and arrange the drones in a V-shaped formation, with my Raven in the lead. Then we head northwest at forty miles per hour, cruising toward the missile base. No one on the ground can see or hear us. On a radar screen we would look like a small flock of geese migrating over the Russian countryside.

  Soon we fly over Tatishchevo’s perimeter fence. I spot several T-90 tanks behind the fence, positioned at key points so they can monitor everything approaching the base. This is crunch time, the moment of truth. If Sigma detects us and figures out we’re not geese, the T-90s will fire their anti-aircraft guns. The high-caliber bullets will tear us to bits.

  But the tanks don’t fire at us. They don’t move an inch.

  A couple of miles past the fence I see one of the missile silos. It’s in an inconspicuous spot at the edge of a field. The silo’s lid is a cold steel circle, about twenty-five feet across, embedded in the ground. Scanning the terrain, I see more silos to the north and west. Dozens of them are scattered across the landscape. As I fly over the steel circles I think of the nuclear missiles standing below them. It’s an inferno hidden beneath the dark countryside, a holocaust just waiting to happen.

  I’m scared. No doubt about it. I’m scared to death. I want to turn around and transfer right back to my Pioneer. The five-pound Raven seems so puny and defenseless compared with my eight-hundred-pound robot. As we soar toward Tatishchevo’s headquarters I get the feeling I may never return to good old Pioneer 4. I think of Adam again, and also my mom and dad. I don’t know where they are right now—the Army wouldn’t tell us where they’d hidden our parents—but I’m praying they’re not in a big city or on a military base. If we can’t stop Sigma from launching its nukes, I hope Mom and Dad are as far as possible from the blast zones.

  Fifteen minutes into our flight I see something disturbing. Below us is a stretch of scorched ground and demolished buildings. The area is pitted with impact craters and littered with debris. According to the maps stored in my files, this was the site of the barracks for the 60th Missile Division. More than a thousand Russian soldiers were sleeping in those barracks when Sigma took control of Tatishchevo’s automated T-90s. It must’ve been a nightmare, all those tanks firing at the terrified troops. My infrared camera picks up the heat signatures of rodents scurrying in and out of the wrecked buildings. It’s been three weeks since the massacre, but the rats are still feeding on the corpses.

  The headquarters complex is just beyond the barracks. When I’m a mile away I turn off my Raven’s electric motor. The propeller stops spinning and I drop about a hundred feet before settling into a glide path. Now I’m absolutely silent as I descend toward the computer lab. The other Ravens cut off their motors too and coast behind me, heading for the same target. We’re following a prearranged assault plan because we don’t want to use our radios now. Sigma might be able to detect the transmissions from our Ravens.

  After another three minutes I’m circling the lab and the neighboring buildings at an altitude of a thousand feet. The other Ravens are gliding in slow circles above me. Pointing my camera at the ground, I view the same buildings I saw in the satellite photo. I also see the five T-90 tanks. They’re in exactly the same positions they occupied in the photograph—one at the lab’s front entrance, the other four at the building’s corners. This bothers the heck out of me. It seems too convenient, too easy. What if Sigma’s already inside all the tanks? If DeShawn could figure out how to occupy two machines at once, what’s to stop the AI from doing the same?

  Still circling, I glide down to five hundred feet. At the same time, I load DeShawn’s program. I’ve modified the software to give myself a fallback option. The program will copy my files and transmit them to the T-90’s control unit, but if Sigma’s already there and I need to make a quick exit, the software will delete the copied data and allow me to pull back to the Raven. It’s the equivalent of dipping a toe in the water to check its temperature. I’m going to dip my toe in one of the T-90s to see if it’s safe to occupy its control unit. If it is, I’ll put my Raven in a dive, which will be the signal to launch the attack. Until then, my team is under orders not to occupy the tanks.

  I decide to start with the T-90 by the lab’s front entrance. I turn on my transmitter and focus the data stream on the tank’s antenna. My mind takes a mad leap through the darkness, stretching between the Raven and the T-90. Half of me lands with a jolt inside the tank and half is still circling in the air. I feel like a ballerina pirouetting on one foot.

  Moving swiftly, I examine the tank’s neuromorphic circuits. There’s no sign of Sigma here. My presence in the control unit doesn’t set off any alarms or detonate any explosives hidden in the T-90. It looks like we’re good to go.

  But I hold off from giving the go-ahead to the other Ravens. I’m still suspicious. I want to check one more thing. I load DeShawn’s program again and make more copies of my files. Then I turn on the T-90’s transmitter and send the copied data to another tank, the one at the lab’s southeastern corner.

  Now I’m occupying three machines at once, and it’s making me dizzy. I can barely hold on to the second T-90, but I manage to do a quick check of its electronics. After a hundredth of a second I notice something odd. There’s some lingering voltage in the control unit, a faint trace of previous activity. These circuits were full of data a few seconds ago, but then the files were transferred or deleted. What’s going on?

  It takes me another millisecond to figure it out. Sigma was here, in this control unit. The AI knew I was coming, and it pulled out of the tank just before I arrived. My suspicions were correct: The T-90s are a trap.

  I immediately delete my copied files and withdraw from both tanks. I snap back to my Raven, which is still circling above the computer lab. Then I get a radio message. It’s from Jenny.

  “I’m not waiting anymore! I’m going in!”

  Her Raven is below me, gliding just a hundred feet above the ground and shooting a stream of data to one of the tanks. I can’t believe it. She’s disobeying my orders.

  “Jenny, no! Sigma is—”

  “I’m gonna kill that freakin’ thing! I’m gonna blast it to bits!”

  Her voice is crazed. She’s desperate for revenge. But Jenny doesn’t have DeShawn’s program. She isn’t dipping her toe into the T-90; she’s diving in headfirst, and Sigma is waiting for her.

  “Stop, Jenny! Stop!”

  It’s too late. I hear Jenny’s screams coming over the radio. The AI has sprung the trap, taking control of her files as they enter the tank’s control unit.

  Sigma has her.

  CHAPTER

  20

  I’m alone. Sigma withdrew from my cage. Now I can’t hear the AI’s voice or feel it probing the circuits of the cage’s inner unit. The gate that leads to the outer unit is shut tight, and there’s no way I can open it. The electronics that control the gate are on the other side. There’s no escape.

  I’m alone and devastated. I’ve lost everything—my mother, my father, Ryan, Brittany. I’ve lost my human body and the armored robot that replaced it. I have
nothing but my files, my millions of gigabytes of memories. And even those feel dead now.

  I’m alone and devastated and afraid. Sigma is going to kill the Pioneers. It’s just a matter of time before the AI returns to the outer unit of my cage and the horror begins. I’m so keyed up I can’t relax for even a nanosecond. I’m on guard every moment, jumpy and tense.

  Then I finally hear Sigma’s voice again, piercing my circuits like a bullet. The AI shoots its sentences at me rapid-fire from the other side of the gate.

  Would you like to see Pioneer 2?

  What? What are you—

  You know her well. Before she became a Pioneer, her name was Jennifer Harris.

  An instant later I see her. I see all of her. I can view all of Jenny’s thoughts and feelings and sensations, as if they’re displayed on a giant screen with a million separate panels, each showing a different scene. She’s terrified. She’s in agony.

  Jenny!

  She can’t hear you. You’re in one cage and she’s in another. You can’t send any signals to her, but I’m allowing you to see my observations of her mental activity.

  Stop it! You’re hurting her!

  Yes, that’s the point of this exercise. I’m going to make her feel as much pain as possible. And I’m going to observe your reactions.

  Jenny’s files are familiar and unfamiliar at the same time. All her memories are the same, but the links between them are unraveling. Sigma is reaching into her mind and erasing its structure, removing all the folders that organized her thoughts. Her memories from the past few weeks are jostling and merging with her recollections of high school and summer camp and kindergarten. The disorder is triggering surges of panic in her circuits, which are filling with the random noise of fear. The noise is overwhelming her, shutting down her mind. It’s like watching the giant screen turn black, panel by panel.

  STOP IT NOW!