by D. A. Hill
“It’s my sister—Jenny. She emailed me a few days ago saying she needed my help, but refused to talk to me about it other than face to face. She’s here now. At my apartment.”
Newton wondered why Cyrus was so worked up. This problem was easily fixed. “Cyrus, I know we haven’t discussed the criteria for selecting who we’re going to take, but if you’ve told your sister about the Ark and you want her to come then that’s fine.”
“James, I appreciate that, but that’s not the problem. The problem is my sister is a political reporter...”
“...and she’s on to the government’s cover-up about the asteroid,” Newton interrupted. Now he saw the real problem and understood why Cyrus was so concerned.
“Yes. Unfortunately I know my sister. I tried to deflect her but she’s not going to let this go. She is going to get herself in real trouble. I’ve got to stop her James, but I don’t know how.”
—o—
James Newton watched Cyrus and a woman he assumed to be his sister Jenny walk towards him. He could not help thinking the scene was straight out of a spy novel. As cliched as it was, he understood there was a good reason spies so often met their contacts in parks; neutral territory, away from prying ears, but public enough that there was a certain sense of safety. It had been Jenny’s choice to meet here rather than in his office. It was a choice he would have made in her shoes.
Newton stood to greet her as they approached. “A pleasure to meet you Ms. Jones,” he said as he extended his hand.
“Ryan,” she said as she shook his hand in return. “Ex-husband.” she elaborated. “Turned out to be a real piece of work. Cyrus tried to warn me about him right from the beginning, but I didn’t listen. By the time I understood that my over-protective big brother was right, I’d already established my byline as Jenny Ryan.” She paused and looked away in embarrassment. “I don’t know why I told you that whole story. Must be nerves. Anyway, please call me Jenny.”
“And I’m James,” he said. “Cyrus, would you mind if I talked privately with your sister?” Newton asked. “If that’s alright with you Jenny?” She didn’t object.
“Of course not,” Cyrus said as he took a seat on the bench that Newton had been occupying moments before. He pulled out his pad and started working as he watched Newton and his sister slowly walk away.
—o—
“Cyrus is very worried about you Jenny.”
“Cyrus always worries about me,” she replied. “Our father was a nasty, violent drunk. Cyrus did what he could to protect me until I was old enough to get the hell out of there. Cyrus stuck around for a while, I think for our mother’s sake. He was big enough that our father dared not get physical with him, and he avoided the emotional turmoil by retreating into his computers. He still thinks of me as his little sister who needs protecting.”
“I think Cyrus is right to be worried about you. I can say that because I know what you suspect. I won’t insult your intelligence by telling you that you’re wrong.”
“Thank you.”
“But I know first hand that the government has a very good reason for doing what it’s doing.”
“How do you know?” she asked. A good journalist always looked to trace information back to the source, hopefully a reliable source.
“I’ve spoken personally with the President about it,” Newton replied.
Wow. The President was definitely a reliable source. But if the President was his source that meant... “So you and Cyrus are part of the cover-up,” she said, her anger that her brother had lied to her showing clearly.
“No,” he replied emphatically. “Cyrus did not lie to you if that’s what you were thinking. We know about the cover-up, which is not the same thing as being part of it.”
“But if you choose not to say anything aren’t you complicit in it? How can you justify not exposing it?” she challenged.
“We choose not to disclose what we know for the very same reasons I’m going to ask you not to. Yes I’ll admit that I’m afraid of what they’ll do to us if we do, but more than that, it wouldn’t be in anyone’s interests, not even the public you care about so much. And your brother and the rest of our team have vitally important work to do here, work that can’t be done if we’re locked up somewhere, or worse.”
“What’s so crucial that you would turn a blind eye to the government lying to the people about something so important as the asteroid?” she challenged him.
“The survival of the human race,” he answered. As they continued to walk he began to explain everything he knew about the government’s plans and his ideas for Newton’s Ark.
—o—
Jenny made small talk as she and Cyrus walked slowly back across the park to his apartment. Cyrus knew not to press her, that she would speak about the meeting with Newton when she was ready. Apparently that was the minute they were back in his apartment. “Your boss is a nut job Cyrus,” she blurted out as soon as he closed the door.
Cyrus was disheartened. He had hoped her meeting with James Newton would have gone a little better than your boss is a nut job. He tried not to let his disappointment show. That would only make his sister feel bad and get in the way of finding out what had happened. “What makes you say that?”
“Come on, Cyrus. All this talk about saving the human race? James Newton is clearly a guy with an over-developed sense of drama and just a little bit of a messiah complex.”
Cyrus’s drug of choice was usually caffeine, but the last thing he needed right now was to be hyped up. Calmness was called for. Calm was not how he felt. He opened the refrigerator and reached for one of his few remaining beers. Maybe this will help he thought as he screwed the top off. He was not much of a drinker and it was only light beer, but the effect was as much psychological as physical. He poured a fair proportion of the bottle down his throat before responding. “I happen to agree with him.”
“You can’t be serious,” Jenny replied.
“I am. Tell me where you think his logic is wrong?”
“Cyrus, what proof do you have of anything he says?”
“First, the technology that he’s talking about, I designed it. So I know what he is proposing is technically feasible.”
“Let’s come back to this crazy business of living inside a computer later. But what about the rest of it?”
“Jen, you know there’s a cover-up. I’m sure he told you what it is. He’s a big time political donor. He’s been to see the President for Pete’s sake. Got the story straight from the horse’s mouth so to speak. Doesn’t his whole story hang together? Is anything he said inconsistent with what you know, with what you see going on? Aren’t things falling apart just like he said?”
Jenny Ryan did not respond directly to her brother’s challenge. She could not because she knew he was right. Instead she pushed the buttons that she knew from years of experience would get him to do exactly what she wanted him to do. She felt bad manipulating him, but in the end he had left her no choice. “If you want to prove me wrong, help me access this,” she said waving the piece of paper from her unknown source in his face.
—o—
His sister had backed him into a corner. He thought this was a very bad idea. No, he knew it was a very bad idea. But Cyrus also knew Jenny was going to pursue this with or without him. Better that he help her than let her try to do it on her own when she would be sure to get caught. At least with his help there was a slim chance it would not end in disaster for her.
Cyrus Jones knew exactly what the long string of numbers on the piece of paper was and how to use it. The trick was doing so in a way that appeared to be coming from a legitimate system. He worked through most of the night configuring the software he needed. As he did so he held on to the hope that sleeping on it would change Jenny’s mind. Or that if he said nothing she would quietly let it go.
“I noticed you were up all night,” she said over breakfast. “Does that mean it’s ready?” Of course she was not going to let it go.
&nb
sp; “Are you really sure you want to do this Jen?” Cyrus asked, desperately hoping that his sister would change her mind. He knew she would not, but he had to ask one last time anyway.
“Cyrus, I need to know for sure.”
“OK, here goes nothing then, but don’t say I didn’t warn you,” he replied as he initiated the process of accessing the hyperlinks. He needed to send the authentication request in a form that would not trigger an intrusion alarm. It had been quite a while since he had done this; he just hoped he did not miss any new security protections. “Done,” Cyrus said handing her a pad containing the documents she wanted. He had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach that this was not going to end well. But it was too late now.
“That’s it?” Jenny asked. She was surprised that it had been so quick.
“Yes, that’s it. I designed the access routine so we would be in and out as fast as possible. I also routed the request through several remote servers and an anonymous proxy, so they shouldn’t be able to trace the request back to this location unless they’re really looking. Now let’s just hope that the authentication key your source provided isn’t already flagged as compromised or something.”
—o—
Jenny spent several hours reading the secret documents without saying anything. Finally it was too much for Cyrus. “So what’s the verdict Jen? Isn’t it just as James Newton described?”
“I’m sorry I doubted you Cyrus,” she replied. “It’s exactly what Newton said.”
“Then you’ll let it go?”
“I didn’t say that. I need to think about it.”
Cyrus was not in the habit of being angry with his sister, but he could not help it. For once in her life it was time for his sister to stop being so headstrong and to listen to what other people were telling her. “You know what will happen if you release this,” he said with barely controlled anger. “James explained it to you. Everything else he said has turned out to be correct. He knows what he’s talking about Jen. For once in your life please listen!”
Cyrus’s anger surprised Jenny. It was not like him to get angry at her. Normally she could push him and push him and he would not push back. Unfortunately his anger only served to elicit a similar response from her. “You can’t tell me what to do Cyrus!” she shouted as she slammed the door on her way out.
—o—
Cyrus was satisfied with the way the testing had gone over the past few weeks. They had found problems, but nothing fundamental, nothing that was not readily fixed. He had been a bit distracted by the drama with his sister Jenny but for now there was nothing more he could do about that. Even so they had managed to confirm that they could realistically simulate the full range of interactions between an EM, its virtual body and a significantly larger virtual environment than a drone cockpit. He concluded they were ready to move on to the next step. Newton and Blake agreed. Time for a more expansive, much richer virtual environment. And time to keep an EM running in there for an extended period.
chapter 7
November 2045
Jenny Ryan told herself she would write the story first and then decide whether to release it. Deep down she knew she had decided to publish as soon as she read the secret documents, but she could not bring herself to admit that. It was not that she did not consider the warnings that James Newton and her brother had given her, but the more she thought about it, the more she felt that people needed to know. It was not right for the government to decide in secret who should live and who should die. If they were right, if they truly could save only half a million people, then at least that decision should be made transparently. And for those who were not going to make it, it was wrong not giving them time to prepare, not giving them the opportunity to decide for themselves how to spend whatever time they had left, not giving them a chance to decide the time and manner of their own deaths.
She hoped James and Cyrus were wrong, that this crisis would bring out the best in people. In the end though, she was not responsible for how people dealt with the news; all she could do is make sure they had all the facts. The only concession Jenny Ryan made to her brother’s concerns was to publish under an anonymous byline. It was the biggest story of her career, maybe the biggest story of any journalist’s career, maybe the biggest story ever. For her own safety and the safety of her brother she hoped nobody would ever know she was responsible.
Her editor had insisted on calling the documents the Asteroid Papers. The name was intended as a parallel to the Pentagon Papers—secret Pentagon documents published by the New York Times in the early nineteen-seventies, back in the golden age of investigative journalism. Those Pentagon Papers had proved that the government was lying to the American public on a massive scale about the prospects for the Vietnam War. Just like the Asteroid Papers proved that the government was lying on a massive scale about the asteroid.
—o—
“What the hell do we do now?” President Paul Carlson demanded. The entire plan was predicated on secrecy, and there it was down to every last detail available to anyone with access to the web, which meant everyone.
“We have our best intelligence people tracing the source of the leak,” Harry Branston replied.
“What good does that do us Harry?” the President asked impatiently. “It might make us feel better to string the bastard up, but the horse has bolted. No point worrying about shutting the gate now. What I want to know is how do we move forward with the preparation of the arks?”
“Conscription is the key,” Harry Branston replied. “We’ve introduced food rationing and cut back on some non-essentials, but our mobilization of the American people has been half-hearted. We need to run this like a war economy, like they did in WWII, to make it clear to the people that the simple reality is this: if you don’t work as directed by the government you don’t eat. We’ve been too soft with people. Now that the truth is out there we can get tougher. Stop worrying about constitutional checks and balances and civil liberties. They won’t do much good if we’re all dead.”
Homeland Security Secretary Rajev Sandeep stepped in. “Mr. President I believe the key is to address concerns about the selection process. Yes the public are angry that we kept this from them, but the anger over the cover-up will subside as people realize the reality of the situation we are facing is far more important. As for the religious right and evangelicals who are claiming that this is God’s retribution for our decadence, I doubt there is much we can do to stop them if they want to be martyrs, so it’s better not to waste resources even trying. But for the majority of the people, they simply want to be sure that there is a fair and open process for selecting those who survive. We should have a lottery for the places in the arks.”
The President considered what Branston and Sandeep had said. “I think you’re both right. Harry you’re right that we do need to get a lot tougher. Time is fast running out. And Rajev you’re right that people will only accept tougher measures if they believe the selection process is fair.”
That’s certainly what social media polling is telling us,” Jack Brown added.
“So be it,” the President said with determination to make it work. “Jack, let’s get an announcement ready.”
Harry Branston did not bother arguing. He did not believe a lottery would work—the odds were just too long for it to be effective in keeping people in line—but he knew his friend’s idealism stopped him from seeing that the time for less drastic solutions had passed. Idealism was a luxury for ordinary times, not something a President could afford in a crisis, especially an existential crisis, a crisis that threatened the very survival of the United States. America’s great presidents were the ones who governed in times of great crisis and rose to the occasion, doing what was necessary to meet the challenge. Lincoln had the Civil War, Woodrow Wilson had World War I, FDR had the Great Depression and World War II and the second George Bush had 9/11. None hesitated for a moment to consider the constitutional limitations on Presidential power; they simply did w
hat needed to be done to protect and serve the American people. Despite being presented with the greatest crisis in the country’s history, he was beginning to doubt whether Paul Carlson had it in him to be a great President.
—o—
ASTEROID PAPERS SOURCE ARRESTED the headlines screamed from Cyrus’s pad. Beneath the headline was a video of what cops call the perp walk; a non-descript middle aged man in a suit being herded from a government building in handcuffs, desperately trying to hide his face from the holo-cameras. It was disturbing enough watching it in two dimensions—he did not bother turning on the holo-projector so he could see it in all three.
Cyrus found his mind racing as he considered the implications. Jenny’s story had been published anonymously, but he knew it would not be long before the government followed the trail from the source back to her. If the government had the right man, and there was no reason to believe they had made a mistake, then the authentication key Cyrus and Jenny had used to access the documents belonged to the man now in custody.
He knew the government’s experts would already be checking the security logs to see where and when that key had been used. The measures he had taken to obscure their location would buy them time, but now that they were looking the government’s experts would not take long to figure it out—probably less than a day, two at the most. Cyrus realized they had to move quickly. “Pack your bag right now,” he ordered his sister as soon as she answered his call. “I’ll pick you up at the apartment in twenty minutes. Don’t ask any questions, don’t talk to anyone. I’ll explain in the car.”
—o—
Cyrus and Jenny headed north-east out of Denver on I-76. He had briefly explained to Newton what he was planning when he borrowed his car. He was thankful that Newton had not said I told you so or criticized him for not stopping Jenny. He just gave Cyrus the keys, told him to be careful and wished him luck. Other than that, Cyrus made sure nobody knew where they were going. He instructed Newton’s car to stick very carefully to the speed limit so they would not attract any unwanted attention.
