• • •
Relatively more peaceful than other European cities, Berne was selected years ago as one of the five locations in Europe to have a spaceport, which partly influenced Ikaros and Sascha to buy the villa nearby. The small size of Berne and its population — which was capped at 250,000 in 2040 with an additional limit of 25,000 tourists at a time — in combination with the relative stability in Switzerland, made the management and safety of the spaceport more viable, a judgement that has proven to be wise over the years of its operation.
• • •
After lining up for just ten minutes to show his falsified passport and get a fingerprint and iris scan — all of which cause no problems for him only because the Laboratory Network has put so much time and energy into developing a number of identity protection technologies — Samuel walks through into the transfer area, where he files onto a train that takes him to the space ferry resting at the base of flexible and stretchable tubing that rises straight up through the atmosphere and is attached to a non-orbiting spaceport in the thermosphere roughly 320 kilometers above the surface.
Despite the imposing nature and the initial expense of the technology, the space-ferrying system has provided a cost effective means of quickly transporting large numbers of people into space. This is enabled by the expansive solar power farms located around each of the spaceports, from which electricity is transmitted down through the conductive fibres of the tubing to the ferries, where it's stored in launch batteries and is also used on demand by the ferries' maglev and arcjet propulsion systems. Being cylindrical with tapered ends and eight stories in height, the ferries are aerodynamic and have a large carrying capacity of up to one thousand passengers and a considerable amount of cargo, but usually only baggage and certain perishable items and sundries. This is not the only means by which cargo is transported into space, though: fleets of massive, cylindrical balloons take between one and two days to haul the majority of the large and heavy loads required for the infrastructure development projects, and have done so for many years.
From his window seat on the fourth floor, Samuel watches calmly as the ferry rises steadily above Berne, almost immediately showing its city limits and the nearby countryside. As they rise high enough and while he still has time, he tries to spot the mountains around their villa in the distance and thinks that he has a pretty good idea of its approximate location, even though the view from such heights is slightly disorienting. The ferry then moves into the thick layer of winter cloud, blocking the panorama below.
Soon emerging above the cloud, he and many of the other first-time passengers look out at the aerial scenery with anticipation; they don't have to wait long for the blue hues to start noticeably shifting towards the darkness of space while the curvature of Earth and the layer of atmosphere that surrounds it steadily become more pronounced.
After ascending for twenty-five minutes, the ferry docks at the central hub of the spaceport and passengers alight from exits on their respective levels; from this location, they are able to take orbital tours or visit one or more of the publicly acknowledged space stations in the limited network.
Mixed among the passengers are those returning to, or about to join, the space colonies. In a seamless system of divisions, partitions, and entry and exit points, space tourists have remained unaware of this elaborate operation since inception: they simply return to the surface at the end of the their stay of a maximum of two days and nights, at which time they are accompanied by more space colonists who are able to travel as they please to any of the twenty spaceports and visit the safe cities and surrounding recreational areas below that have been secured and are rigorously kept in pristine condition for their leisure. The operation has been able to avoid arousing suspicions partly because it's common knowledge that space tourists have the privilege of travelling to any port around the world they wish but also because, although inflows of travellers have been, at times, less than the outflows, the flux is kept to a minimum and controlled through a complex quota system, the data from which is also hidden from the view of all the employees, businesses, and authorities that aren't in the secretive loop.
Emanating from the hub of the spaceport are seven long spokes, each of which have fifteen well-used docking gates; this allows a constant stream of shuttles to come and go throughout the twenty-four-hour-a-day operation of the facility. Samuel strolls down one of the walkways towards gate twelve, watching the groups of people sitting in the waiting areas and lining up to board their respective shuttles. He joins the end of one queue but doesn't have to wait long before it's his turn to show his boarding pass and be greeted onto the craft by over-polite flight attendants, one of whom directs him to a window seat that has a large and imposing view of Earth just beyond. He makes himself comfortable and waits patiently, knowing that it's only a thirty-minute trip to their destination, which includes a more-than-full orbit of the planet for their pleasure. They are scheduled to stopover for an overnight tour of the International Space Research Centre (ISRC), the largest publicly known space station and a primary research facility that's popular with the tourists.
Chapter 26
Forty minutes later
In the foyer of the Grand Space Hotel aboard the ISRC, Samuel stands looking out at the view of Earth through the enormous windows lined with eight marble pillars while one of the receptionists checks him in. A few minutes later he opens the door to his suite, which, along with the other five hundred and ninety-nine, has a constant view of Earth. Although he has the opportunity to go on a tour of the station and participate in a range of touristy activities, Samuel has chosen not to as his interests evidently lie elsewhere. He walks up to the windows and watches patiently while the sun rises on the Pacific islands and the line that splits night and day moves steadily across the ocean towards its next targets. After several minutes, he glances at his watch, then waits some more.
Seven minutes earlier
Nearly six thousand rocket-assisted pods are launched in quick succession from twelve hundred locations around the world. Once in space and having disposed of their spent launching rockets, the trajectories of the remote-controlled pods are adjusted and fixed upon their respective targets; specified pressure bursts allow them to accelerate and decelerate as required while making the best use of Earth's gravitational pull and their orbital velocities. After five minutes of flight, and entering the coordinated attack window of three to seven minutes, the first group of pods begin to reach their targets — tourist resorts, the space metropolises, military and research facilities, and the twenty spaceports. Over a thousand pods pass the orbital networks and continue on their longer journey to the various research stations and minor colonies on and/or around the Moon and a number of the planets and their satellites in the solar system.
In the control centres on Earth, the distributed crew of technicians overseeing the operation work frantically to ensure that their programs, once within range, take control of their targets' mainframes and, after gaining access to the remote communications networks, disseminate to all peripheral systems, including those of shuttles and minor space stations. Within fifteen seconds of being infiltrated, all systems are stripped of their capabilities to send communications and also to control any important functions, such as life-support and weapons systems.
Scanning the deceptively peaceful scene before him, Samuel just manages to spot a small, black object rapidly approaching within a second before it attaches itself with a dull thud to the window. A circular atmospheric seal is made thirty centimetres in diameter and a laser cutter begins penetrating right through the high-density glazing to the last fraction of a millimetre from the inner surface; once a small circle has been created, an abrupt decompression within the pod pops the loosened glazing out onto the floor. Samuel then reaches in and extracts a shortened Kalashnikov, three spare magazines, a communications headset, and a small camcorder with an attached telescopic tripod.
Having just gained control of the ISRC, the
pod's program proceeds to shut and lock all the main doors throughout the station, including those of the hotel rooms, the laboratories, and many of the other public and private spaces, temporarily confining everyone to their current locations. Meanwhile, Samuel extends the legs of the tripod and attaches the camcorder; he then stands the tripod on the floor with the lens directed towards Earth and stares through the viewfinder for a moment. He presses record.
• • •
Distributed throughout the space tourism network were 3,116 soldiers of the Global Domination Corporation's paramilitary force, which was made up of nearly 50 percent of the Laboratory Network members and known only to themselves at that point as the 'Dissemination Army.' All these soldiers had begun making their way into space over the previous twenty-four hours. Either individually or in pairs, the majority waited at their designated locations for their pods to arrive and provide them with their equipment: seven soldiers were unable to rendezvous successfully due to unavoidable delays and a few hotel rooms being switched unexpectedly, and five pods broke down on the way, leaving ten soldiers weaponless until other arrangements could be made.
The Dissemination Army proceeded to take control as swiftly as possible, initiating an orchestrated event that disarmed security and directed all of the 352,368 space tourists and employees back to Earth within two days. Then, over the next two weeks, using the same method as they did for the security teams, the soldiers gradually disarmed the 230,578 military personnel of the various nations' forces that had their own presence in space. This was achieved by rendering the small, isolated groups unconscious by depleting oxygen levels before going in and removing their weapons. Awakening shortly after this, they remained locked down for the remainder of the early stages of the operation and until an effective plan to deal with them was developed.
Early in this process, a squad of two hundred soldiers boarded the space resort in which the Earth Summit was being held and proceeded to disarm the 1250 unconscious security personnel. Once the oxygen levels were returned to normal and everyone was revived, the security personnel and the 620 resort staff were promptly ushered into six shuttles, which took them to a nearby spaceport, where they were gradually transported back to Earth. Meanwhile, a pod positioned itself at a distance of five hundred meters from the space resort; the on-board camera began recording just before the orbit of the resort started rapidly decaying. Plummeting into the upper atmosphere, the hull of the resort soon began to heat up and, not designed for such an event, the structural integrity was put under severe strain. Before it had a chance to break apart of its own accord, however, a massive bomb detonated magnificently, ripping the doomed projectile into uncountable pieces, many of which burnt up before the detritus that remained sprinkled elegantly into the Indian Ocean several minutes later. This event resulted in the deaths of all 16,246 aboard, including many of the major political, media and business leaders of the top fifty developed nations, and their entourages.
The video from this event was forcibly broadcast live across the world on the Internet and every TV channel, effectively blocking out all other media content. Following this, footage of the broader situation in space, which was gathered by the pods and the Dissemination Army and selected by the network's media team, was then presented to the world with narration in forty-three languages for over twenty-four hours, albeit with the aid of many repeats and intermittent updates. This continuing broadcast, which also dominated radio waves, focused on two main areas of concern: 1) exposing the covert space programmes and those involved in unprecedented and embarrassing detail; and 2) describing the intervention programme of the Global Domination Corporation and its objectives.
• • •
Standing in front of the camcorder with Earth looming large behind, Samuel looks calmly into the lens and begins his short speech, which is transmitted to an editing suite, where it's promptly intercut with other received footage of events before being broadcast: "My name's Samuel. I'm a scientist-technologist and the PR representative of the Global Domination Corporation's Dissemination Army and Laboratory Network. I know you haven't heard from us in some time: we've been busy, and we're all about to see the fruits of that. What we're engaged in now is a change event that we've been planning and working towards for many years. For a growing and already large number of people, it's obvious that there needs to be some significant changes made to the way we do things locally and globally. Too many people are dying and being left behind with little to no genuine effort being directed where it should be. For years, more lifetimes than just our own, we've been cheated, deceived, and actively targeted, controlled, limited, constrained, manipulated, undermined, threatened, tortured, killed, neglected, and more or less thrown to the wolves. There has been, and there will continue to be, an obscenely high death toll if we allow current practices to continue on unimpeded. We can't allow that to happen, period.
"We hold the belief that there are other ways … many viable alternatives that deserve our attention and exploration … and that, therefore, it's not acceptable for us just to sit back and allow the establishment to maintain its stranglehold on hegemony with all the associated constraints and limitations when, now more than ever, it's proven that it's wholly unfit for the task, doesn't deserve its power, and should be punished for what it's done and, sometimes more importantly, what it hasn't done. It needs to be disestablished and ejected from reality because it doesn't work, it hasn't done its job, and is unlikely ever to. I'm here to tell you that the Dissemination Army isn't prepared to wait around for the unlikely prospect that it ever will.
"The atrocities and the corrupt and contemptible governance of this century and the last can't be forgotten, nor forgiven; moreover, when the direction that we were being taken in — up until today — is thoroughly understood, only anger and disdain for it and those responsible will result.
"Although we may fail and things may get worse, a fresh start doesn't have a history of culpability until it's no longer fresh and it too has such an ignominious history.
"At some point you have to make a decision. And we've made ours. We didn't ask for permission. If we had, we obviously wouldn't be here today. It's because we didn't that we can now ask for your help. I'm sure many of you are already or soon will be as keen as we are to make changes … and really just need the opportunity to begin doing so. That opportunity is what we're in the process of providing…"
Samuel's speech continues and lasts just over four minutes; his unscripted but previously outlined delivery is sharp, hard hitting and swiftly fluent if only because he's been living and breathing this reality for so many years now. Once finished, he goes silent and just stares into the camera for a lingering moment as if making direct contact with his viewers. He then turns the camcorder off and prepares to leave the room to join the other soldiers in carrying out the remainder of the operation.
• • •
In addition to their efforts to take control of the technologies and facilities in orbit, they also focused attention on Earth's surface: once in possession of the vast military arsenals in space, they directed the weapons systems towards the buildings of governments and their associated agencies and local councils, military facilities and equipment — including missile launch sites — the headquarters of international institutions, the head and regional offices of certain multinational corporations, and as many police stations and courthouses as they could identify.
Using a range of smart missiles from the immense stockpile lying in wait at various of the international and military locations in space, as well as the less devastating, laser-pulse weapons systems, they systematically located and destroyed their targets in each and every city and many regional hubs throughout the world for a total of eight days and nights with a continuous and determined intensity until all major targets were eliminated, initially paying particular attention to neutralising military targets in order to avert the threat of counter-attacks being mounted. This was also made possible by penetrating a
nd overriding mainframes and peripheral systems, and disrupting communications networks, a procedure that was used for the other targets as well, effectively isolating the former power holders and thus eliminating any effective means of responding to the situation in a coordinated manner.
After the initial twenty-four-hour worldwide broadcast, programming resumed with the media immediately beginning an extended coverage of the dramatic turn of events and the broad-scale anarchy that was ensuing on the ground as a result of the hamstrung capacity of the local and international institutions to contain the population.
Apart from the widespread violence and destruction of shops and other property, groups of various types that were either already existing or spontaneously emergent took the initiative to continue the attack on the organs of the institutions and corporations, hunting down likely targets and subjecting them to brutal beatings, interrogations and torture; in tens of thousands of cases, these victims either died inadvertently in the process or were eventually deliberately killed.
The unfettered brutality that was released after so many years of brewing tension and barely-contained discontent was no surprise to Samuel and the soldiers of the Dissemination Army who observed and facilitated the process not just by crippling the forces that were previously able to prevent such a disturbance but also by refraining from intervening, believing that such a venting of built-up anger and frustration formed a useful part of their punishment and restructuring strategy.
NEW WORLD TRILOGY (Trilogy Title) Page 21
