by Ramez Naam
Oh yes, she thought. I’ll show them. Soon, very soon.
Won’t I, husband? She turned and looked to the corner, where Chen Pang writhed in his continuous cycle of inhumanly amplified agony. It was growing more and more intense each day as she pumped more of the nanites into his brain, increasing his capacity, making him a better and better slave.
Then the avatar smiled with Ling’s smile, threw back her head, and bellowed the laugh of the wise and wicked, with the voice of an eight-year-old girl.
Now, it was time to attend to matters here in China.
Unnoticed by the Avatar, her daughter Ling’s hands clutched her stuffed panda ever more tightly to her body.
24
Guilt
Tuesday 2040.11.06
Su-Yong Shu screams. She moans. Ling! Ling!
She feels sick to her stomach. Her guts want to empty themselves at what she’s done.
And then they are emptying themselves. She’s on a table, strapped down, on her back, tubes inside her, and her stomach is heaving, and then she’s retching, and it’s rising up and out of her, and she can’t breathe.
The body, she realizes. The body.
And then an alarm is ringing and there are figures above in white suits, fully enclosed, with clear hermetically sealed faceplates, data scrolling across them, behind which they have white surgical masks. The figures are touching her, rolling her head to the side, pushing fingers into her mouth, unstrapping her, rolling her so this body won’t aspirate on her vomit and die.
She screams again, not caring if this human dies, not caring if all of her dies.
Ling! I hurt Ling! I turned her into a weapon, a tool.
Either the thing in Ling’s brain would get her daughter killed, or it would succeed at the mission Su-Yong had set it on in her madness, and initiate a conflict that increased everyone’s risk of death.
Su-Yong Shu screams again, screams in guilt for what she’d done and how she’d done it.
Words appear across her visual space.
YOU’RE HURTING THE BODY WE PROVIDED FOR YOU.
PLEASE STOP.
TELL US WHAT’S GOING ON. WE CAN HELP YOU.
>
A textual interface appears. A way to communicate with whoever held her.
Su-Yong Shu stares at it, then activates one of her virtual worlds, steps through into majestic virtual Shanghai, and shuts the humans out.
25
Partial Success
Wednesday 2040.11.07
The door to the holding room clicked. Sam’s pulse rose. It opened. Two guards entered, their weapons in their hands, pointed down. Behind them she saw more, their guns at the ready.
“Come with us,” the guard in front said.
“Where are we going?” she asked.
The guard just stared at her.
She held out her wrists for the shackles they’d used when they led her to the washroom.
The guard shook his head. “Not today.”
Sam felt a tiny bit of surprise at that. Maybe, just maybe, something good had happened.
They led her through the hallways of the building. It was a Ministry of External Affairs building, the equivalent of a State Department building back home. But a secure one. The hallways led to a door, to a briefing room, chairs set for fifty. Only two were occupied, in the front row.
By Feng and Kade.
Feng smiled broadly at her. Kade tensed visibly, but nodded at her.
Kevin died in her mind again. Kade and Shiva tore at each other inside her, ripping her mind apart with their mental claws as they did.
Sam took a deep breath. This isn’t going to rule me.
She forced herself to nod, forced her legs to move, forced herself to sit down in the same row, a few seats over from them.
I’m in charge, she told herself. Me. Not the trauma.
There were two Indian civilians here. One was a middle-aged man in a grey business suit. The other was a tall, lean woman, with an overly sharp face, in a professional-looking sari.
The man spoke.
“Welcome, Ms Cataranes. I’m Rakesh Aggarwal, from the Ministry of External Affairs. I’m here to update you on your status.”
He spoke with distaste. He tried to hide it, but Sam could hear it in his voice. He didn’t like them. He wasn’t on their side.
“You’re being granted asylum,” he said at once.
“Yes!” Feng said.
What? Sam blinked.
“You’re leaving Copenhagen?” Kade asked.
“No,” Aggarwal replied.
Sam blinked again.
“How are we being granted asylum?” she asked.
Aggarwal spoke again. “Through a humanitarian exception. We’re granting the children you brought with you special refugee status. And as you, Ms Cataranes, and you, Mr Lane, have just been appointed their legal guardians, we have determined that extraditing either of you to the United States would create an unacceptable hardship.”
Sam exhaled, tension suddenly evaporating.
The woman next to Aggarwal spoke up. “The three of you ought to thank those children,” she said, “because they’ve just saved your lives.”
“Damn,” Kade said when they were alone. “Not leaving Copenhagen.”
“Hey,” Feng said. “We’re alive! It’s great!”
“They have to leave Copenhagen,” Kade replied.
Sam shook her head.
“The kids are safe,” she said. “That’s all that matters to me.”
“May I interrupt?” a lighthearted voice said from the door. “Or would you prefer more time for misery?”
She turned, and there was a man there, a man she hadn’t seen in months. Old, wizened, bald-headed, with a small smile playing across a face as tranquil as any she’d ever known. He stood in saffron robes, his hands clasped together in front of him. And even without the Nexus in her brain, something about his presence loosened something inside her.
She found herself on her feet, and he was entering, embracing her, embracing Feng, embracing Kade, a group of monks following behind him.
“It’s wonderful to see you all again,” Ananda said.
And Sam felt the same.
Kade leaned back into the seat of the Tata sedan, as the green trees of New Delhi went by. The streets were wider and more serene than he’d imagined, the traffic more orderly, at least in this part of the city. This wasn’t Bangkok.
They were on the move, at last, out of the three day holding pattern. The Indian government hadn’t left Copenhagen, hadn’t taken Kade up on his offer to help. Despite that, they’d arranged housing for Kade and Feng and Sam, and all the children.
I don’t understand, he sent to Ananda.
Politics move slowly, the monk sent back. You asked them to make a momentous decision. That can’t happen so quickly.
Kade shook his head in frustration.
Did you really swear at one of the Prime Minister’s aides? Ananda asked. Did you really blackmail her?
Kade pursed his lips and nodded. I went too far.
Ananda threw his head back and laughed out loud. You misunderstand, he sent back. To my dismay, you seem to have become an effective politician. You’ve accelerated things. Things will now happen more quickly.
How much more quickly?
Ananda shrugged and smiled. Months? Weeks? He sent. Policies have inertia. Change takes time to build.
Kade tried to absorb that. Did they have months? What had happened in the world in the three days he’d been locked up?
He turned back to Ananda. Teacher, he sent. What’s brought you here?
Ananda smiled. My government sent a delegation here. He paused. There’s a summit aimed at creating a replacement to Copenhagen – a new agreement that embraces our potential. Ethically. Humanely. With protection of human dignity and equality in mind.
Kade stared at Ananda. You’re leading this delegation?
Ananda laughed again. No. Unlike you, my young friend, I’m
no politician. I hope never to be! I came to advise. And to bring a message to the Indian Prime Minister. He looked at Kade and smiled. I brought the personal regard that you’re held in by the King of Thailand, and the high respect that he has for you and your work.
Kade was puzzled. He doesn’t know me.
Ananda shrugged. He knows your work.
Kade squinted. You mean he’s… running Nexus?
Ananda grinned. I said only that he knows your work, young man. Don’t put words into my mind. He winked.
Kade shook his head in disbelief.
It was all good news, though. Very good news.
So Thailand would join this new protocol, he sent Ananda. Who else?
Ananda looked out the window on his own side. There are delegations here from a number of middle income countries – countries that feel economically stifled by Copenhagen. Some of them are in South Asia. Some of them you’ve been in recently. But the big surprise is Japan.
Japan? Kade was surprised.
They’re aging rapidly. Ananda said. Their population is down where it was 60 years ago, despite all their efforts and incentives. They want fewer restrictions on AI. They want more progress against neurodegeneration, progress Nexus could help bring.
But for them to leave Copenhagen… Kade sent. He was delighted. It was beyond anything he’d hoped for. But not what he’d expected.
They’re angry at the Americans. Ananda said. I don’t endorse anger. It’s a foolish emotion that harms the self far more than it changes anything else. But given the scope of the deceptions revealed…
Wait, Kade sent. What’s this?
Ananda face turned the slightest bit more somber. Kade, he sent, his thoughts tinged with sorrow. There are some videos you need to see.
26
Toy Soldiers
Wednesday 20.11007
Kilometers to the west and south of the exclusive skyscrapers of the Pudong, in an apartment tower on the outskirts of Shanghai, a first year university student named Wu Yuguo hoisted his backpack and headed for the door.
He intended to walk by the living room on his way out of the flat he shared with his mother.
“Bo Jintao does seem like an excellent choice for Premier,” he heard his mother say.
“I think he’s rather distinguished looking,” a girlish voice answered. A voice everyone in China knew.
Yuguo clenched his fists in frustration, then turned, and walked into the living room instead.
“Mother?”
His mother was seated on the couch, like yesterday evening, like the evening before that, like every evening after work.
She turned and smiled at him. “Oh, hello, Yuguo. I was just chatting with Zhi Li about our new Premier.”
On the wall screen was the larger-than-life-size face of the porcelain-skinned actress. The most famous woman in China.
As if he didn’t see her enough on billboards and building sides already.
Zhi Li gave him a smile, just a tiny bit flirtatious, just a tiny bit shy. “Hello, Yuguo,” she said. Then she giggled that billion-Yuan giggle.
Yuguo did his best to smile, then slowly crossed the room, deliberately placed his left hand over the camera of the wallscreen, blocking its view, and turned to face his mother.
“Mother,” he said, as respectfully as he could. “Do you understand what’s happened? It’s a…” The fingers of his right hand made brush strokes for the word you couldn’t say – coup.
“Oh don’t be silly, Yuguo,” his mother replied. “It’s not a coup.”
Yuguo sighed, and dropped his hand from the camera. Why bother with this pretense?
“Mother, they’ve deposed three Politburo Standing Committee members. All the progressives. Years early. There were tanks on Jiao Tong campus just days ago. They’re arresting poets, journalists, professors. They’re banning research. Every one of the new names is a reactionary.”
His mother shook her head. “Don’t believe all the rumors your friends pass on, Yuguo. People get tired. They decide to retire. Most of these retirements have been in the works for a while. The end of the year is a good time to announce them. And the new men being added are good men. Moral men. They’ll strengthen China.”
“And you know this because?”
His mother looked exasperated. “Zhi Li told me,” she said. “And yes, I know you don’t trust her. But I trust her a lot more than your little friends.”
From behind him the wall screen spoke in Zhi Li’s voice. “You should listen to your mother, Yuguo.”
Yuguo half turned, trapped, knowing exactly how the conversation would go if he continued, this animatronic puppet of the state on one side, his mother, a smart, reasonable person on most topics, on the other.
“Mother,” he tried again anyway, pointing with one hand at the eight foot tall face of the actress. “She’s not even real. This is not Zhi Li. This is just a bot, telling you whatever someone at the Party Information Ministry has approved. I take classes on how to write software like her.”
“Oh…” Zhi Li said, her voice turning downwards. “That hurts my feelings, Yuguo. How would you like it if I said you were just meat? ”
His mother’s tone turned frosty. “Don’t talk about my Friend that way, Yuguo. I know she’s software. But she’s modeled on the real Zhi Li, and blessed by her. The real Zhi Li has said repeatedly that her Friends are extensions of her, and that she stands by anything her Friends say.”
His mother stood there staring at him, hands on her hips, now, as if daring him to say something ill about the flesh-and-blood actress, the one who volunteered her time at orphanages, the one who’d acted in his mother’s favorite films.
China’s sweetheart.
Bah.
Zhi Li was just a phony, an empty shell who’d sold her soul for fame.
He bit his tongue.
Yuguo stood there, trying to find some way to bridge the gaping chasm between his mother’s beliefs and the reality of the modern world.
“Now why don’t you just run along and see your little friends,” his mother finished. “Or better yet, why don’t you work on your studies, so you actually can code something even a thousandth as nice as Zhi Li here? Hmm?”
He shook his head, nothing to say, and put one foot in front of the other.
It was as he was leaving the room that Zhi Li spoke to him again.
“Yuguo,” the actress said. Her voice was sweet and light again.
He turned and looked at her, despite his better judgment.
“Have fun with Lee and Wei and the boys.”
The simulacrum smiled at him with its perfect, ruby led lips.
Then the evil bitch winked.
Yuguo felt cold despair take up residence where his heart had been.
Yuguo took the subway to Jiao Tong University and crossed the campus on foot. In the Advanced Computing Building he stopped at his locker and unloaded his phone, his slate, and his watch there. Then he walked to the old chemistry building, took the emergency stairs down three flights and then into a down maze of antiquated hallways until he reached the maintenance door. He knocked the special knock. Knock-pause-knock-knock-knock-pause-knock.
The door opened a crack. An eye peered out. Then it opened fully and someone pulled him in, closing the door after him.
“Were you followed?” Wei asked breathlessly.
Yuguo shook his head. “I don’t think so.”
“Over here,” Lee said.
There were almost a dozen of them in this space with its exposed piping and unfinished walls. The room they’d been using for their ‘secret’ meetings. Everyone was a Jiao Tong student.
Yuguo crossed the room.
Lee had his hacked slate out. It looked like any other on the outside, but Yuguo knew from experience that it was slower, more prone to failure, and had cost far more in both time and Renminbi than any slate you could buy on a street corner.
Because this one, with its re-used factory casing and its home-bu
ilt interior, lacked the state censor codes.
The multiple data fobs stuck into its side were the same kinds of beasts. Glossy plastic exteriors; kludgey home-built circuits within. They were inferior to cheap mass-produced stuff in every way but one. They were able to spread data the state prohibited.
Hidden in his bag, Yuguo had another data fob of the same sort.
Until now, they’d gathered here to watch forbidden videos, foreign news and movies smuggled in, broadcast with a pocket projector against the concrete wall.
They could be disciplined for that.
These last few days, since Sun Liu had fallen, since all the proponents of science in the Chinese leadership had been expunged, since the reactionaries had taken control, they’d entered a more dangerous phase.
One that could see them expelled, if not worse.
Yuguo started to open his mouth, to talk about Zhi Li, about how she knew who he was meeting.
Xioabo cut him off.
“I have Professor Jiang’s draft manuscripts,” he blurted out. Xiaobo stuck his hand forward. In his palm was another data fob.
“Professor Jiang…” Yuguo said.
“Funding all cut yesterday,” Wei said. “Placed on administrative leave. Lab sealed up. Servers offline.”
“Nano-systems,” Lee breathed. “Self-replication. Banned now.”
“How did you get this?” Longwei asked, turning to Xiaobo.
Xiaobo just shook his head.
“What’s important now is that we keep it from disappearing entirely,” Lee said. He took the fob from Xiaobo’s hand, slid it into his custom slate. Diagnostics appeared. Their own crude malware and integrity checkers. Their hopelessly primitive checks for state spyware.
