Johnny Winger and the Great Rift Zone

by Philip Bosshardt

CHAPTER 18

  Nairobi, Kenya

  Kibera Fields

  December 24, 2110 (U.T.)

  1930 Hours

  “Superfly’s up and operating, sir.” Sergeant Lars Lundgren worked the controls of the entomopter and steered the tiny flyer toward the growing crowd spilling out of Uhuru Park, pushing and surging along Kenyatta Avenue toward a stage up on the edge of Kibera Fields. “Got good imagery now…looks like the crowd’s getting restless. Jeez, what a mob.”

  The rally was set to begin promptly at 7 pm and the fanfare had already started. On the main stage, Masai dancers jittered and juked to a hard-driving drum beat, while off to one side, the Assimilator booths were already working overtime, sucking up a long queue of volunteers, disassembling the poor souls into atom fluff.

  Lieutenant Jake Argo studied the console he had set up on the bed in their rented room at the Milamani Hotel. PINCH ONE was showing clean and green, ready to launch. MAGIC ONE too, for the diversionary effort that hopefully would make the grab easier to pull off. Getting close to Symborg was going to be dicey. It would take the combined efforts of the whole Detachment, including the angels Table Top had developed. That and a little luck wouldn’t hurt either.

  “Let’s do it,” Argo decided. He checked the time. Quarter to seven…if practice held true to form, Symborg would finally show up about 8 pm, after some warm-up acts, some speeches and testimonials, and whole lot of very loud music. That would give them time to get PINCH ONE and MAGIC ONE deployed, on station and ready to assemble. The angels had come from Table Top in separate containment capsules and their CQE, Sergeant Mark Zammit, now set the capsules to launch the bot masters and deploy the swarms.

  The bots would make their way on internal propulsors across open ground—smoking, trash-strewn, rat-infested ground—for that’s what Kibera was, toward the stage. The plan was to assemble the angels from loose bots in the chaos of Symborg’s first appearance, when all eyes and all attention were on the great robotic messiah. Argo had trained his Detachment hard for just this moment. When Symborg showed up and the shrieking and the fainting and the breast-beating began, PINCH ONE would quietly replicate and materialize in human form out of some smoldering trash heap nearby, like a genie from a bottle, and along with his comrade angels, would squirm and wriggle his way forward and approach the stage.

  And if all went well, an angel named Kgani, closely resembling a bullet-headed seven-year old boy, would leap onto the stage with hundreds of others and surround Symborg in a massive love embrace.

  Only this embrace would come away with pieces of Symborg that the eggheads at Table Top could examine. And Config Zero would be none the wiser.

  That, at least, was the plan.

  “PINCH ONE away,” said Lieutenant Cynthia Tamaguchi. “PINCH TWO through FOUR spooling up.”

  From the outside patio of the hotel suite, a faint mist drifted off into the smoky twilight over Nairobi. The first swarm was quickly lost to view and Tamaguchi studied her control board, reading off system status, speed and heading. “PINCH ONE reports ready in all respects. On course for Kibera…heading two five five, one-quarter propulsor. PINCH TWO, THREE and FOUR ready to launch, sir.”

  Argo gave the order. “Launch now, Lieutenant.”

  The remaining PINCH bots were quickly ejected into the air and drifted away from the hotel.

  Argo turned to Corporal Zammit. “MAGIC ONE ready, Zam?”

  “Straining at his leash, sir. Program laid in, course downloaded. All systems green.”

  “Launch MAGIC,” Argo told him.

  In seconds, the final bot and swarm were away. Now it was up to Superfly to follow the plotted courses of the five swarms.

  “Q2’s studied the protocols and practices of every Symborg and Assimilationist rally that’s happened over the last few months,” Argo muttered to no one in particular. They were all back inside the hotel, following the feed from Superfly. Overlaid on a map of Nairobi and Kibera Fields, Superfly projected the position and course of each swarm as it maneuvered toward its target. It wasn’t uncommon for hordes of followers to try to rush the stage and touch Symborg as their ecstasy overcame them. Argo was counting on that happening again.

  Argo planned to use this as ‘cover’ to insinuate his little angels into the people flow and get as close as possible to Symborg. One possible obstacle: Symborg always had a strong-arm security detail around the stage and Q2 was certain that some of them were angels themselves. They were there to protect Symborg from too much contact with the public. But PINCH ONE, a.k.a. Kgani, was a capable little angel and could morph into all kinds of objects, shapes and structures. In the end, some in Q2 thought the grab might only be possible with Kgani morphing into a fly or mosquito.

  Even from the Superfly vid feed, the scale of the crowd stunned the troopers.

  “Jesus H. Christ, that’s a horde,” said Corporal Renata Ngara. “Will you look at that?”

  “Some estimates put these rallies at nearly two million people,” Argo reminded them. Indeed, the crowd surged and sloshed along alleyways and side streets as it swelled and strained against barriers and police cordons, pushing ever closer toward the main stage at the western end of the district, not far from a rail station astride the Uganda Railway. The crowd seethed and pulsed like a thing alive. Even from the Superfly feed, it was apparent that Kenya Police and the local constables were just barely in control of things.

  “MAGIC ONE four minutes out from Assimilator booths,” reported Zammit. His fingers flew over the control board, bringing up telemetry on bot status. “I’m going to slow-rate rep now…a little bang to get things started.”

  “Very well,” Argo said. “Proceed with the diversion. And keep your fingers crossed.”

  Zammit steered MAGIC ONE toward the line of Assimilator booths surrounding the main stage. Overhead, the Superfly entomopter gave a view of the massive crowd, boiling and surging forward, pressing against the police cordon like waves against a beach. Smoke from small fires had been set at key intersections, and the winds twisted the smoke columns into braided ropes reaching into the sky.

  Already long queues of volunteers had lined up in front of the booths. Superfly dropped down to get a closer look at the Assimilator setup. There were dozens of booths, each manned by a technician and an intake specialist, who took down the name and vitals of each volunteer as they approached the booth. Once the preliminaries had been done, the tech assisted the volunteer into the booth and whoosh, nothing but atom fluff.

  A steady stream of faint mist issued out of each booth, as the deconstruct bot swarms worked overtime, disassembling each volunteer and sending them right into oblivion…or as Symborg termed it: “unity with the Mother Swarm.”

  “Three dozen miniature Auschwitzes…that’s what it is,” said Argo. “I’m glad we’re starting the diversion here. Zam, what’s our distance?”

  Zammit examined his board, triangulated with Superfly’s sensors. “I make it less than fifty meters to the first booth, Lieutenant.”

  “Execute phase two now.”

  Zammit sent the signal and the MAGIC ONE swarm went into big bang overdrive, swelling into a larger swarm, which would soon be lost in the crush of the crowd and the smoky fires nearby. “Max rate rep…now ninety percent. Maneuvering for first assault—“

  The plan was to drop MAGIC ONE into several booths located a few dozen meters away from the main stage. The swarm of nanobotic mechs would insinuate themselves into the booths and work to bollix up the disassembler swarms, engaging the interior bots in a free-for-all that would slow down and scramble the assimilators, and bring a halt to the mass suicides that were so much a part of every Assimilationist rally.

  “…now closing on target, less than ten meters…get me a Superfly close-up, Cynthia…I want to see what the first engagement looks like…picking up EM spikes now—“

  The botswarms of MAGIC ONE swooped down on the booths, invisible
to everyone, and penetrated inside. Moments later, Superfly caught an image of one booth bursting into flame, dense white smoke billowing out the top.

  The crowd recoiled from the fire, like an ocean wave reflecting off a seawall, and soon chaos had enveloped the whole area. As MAGIC ONE descended and penetrated other booths, more fires started and soon an entire line of booths was affected. Spectators, technicians and volunteers scrambled away in panic.

  Argo watched it all on the Superfly vid with a growing sense of satisfaction. “I’d say this diversion’s working like a charm. PINCH status?”

  Sergeant Lars Lundgren studied his own board. “All PINCH elements on course, altitude eighty meters, heading two six five…we’re closing on those matatus parked by the rail line…there’s a tree stand right in the middle…perfect cover. Those drivers are all half strung out on khat anyway…we’ll look like a horde of flies just flew in. Permission to set down?”

  “Permission granted…execute Phase Two.”

  Indeed, as Lundgren predicted, the approach of the PINCH swarms did resemble a horde of flies or mosquitos. Superfly captured the scene: the taxi drivers waved and swatted at something invisible descending on their small opening from the sky. They scattered and left the opening unattended for a few moments. In those moments, PINCH One alighted and, on command from Lundgren, began assembly ops.

  Moments later, Kgani, as a para-human angel resembling a lanky, 7-yr old boy with a buzzcut and unusually long arms and legs…intentionally designed that way by UNQC engineers to make the ‘swipe’ of Symborg bots…slowly materialized. Kgani would be the first of four angels Quantum Corps had devised for this snatch and grab mission.

  “PINCH One at full config,” Lundgren. “Ops underway on PINCH Two through Four.”

  Lieutenant Tamaguchi steered Superfly closer to the taxi stand. For all intents and purposes, the view showed a few kids kicking cans around. The taxi drivers slowly worked their way back to the opening, gesturing and shouting at the kids. By the time the drivers had returned and begun passing around bottles of changaa to drink, the kids had moved off…four of them, lanky, teenagers and younger. They headed into the crowd and worked their way against massive throngs of people, navigating toward the main stage alongside the railway tracks.

  Tamaguchi steered Superfly to follow. “All elements in position, Skipper. Moving on the target now.”

  Argo wanted to know about the angels themselves. “Zammit, Lars….what about configs?”

  “All clean and green,” the two troopers replied in unison. “PINCH elements at full config. Grabbers operating normally. Now…they just have to get to the site.”

  Argo studied the vid from Superfly. “Easier said than done….” The Detachment had hacked into the comm feed from Kenya Police and Argo studied that for a moment. “They’re estimating nearly two million coming to this rally. I didn’t know two million could cram into this hellhole.”

  Zammit kept a close eye on PINCH One, leading the approach. “It would be easier to slog through solid rock, Lieutenant. At least, the structure’s regular.”

  Bit by bit, Kgani and the others squirmed and squeezed and ducked and crawled their way forward, homing on the main stage. The crowd thickened as they closed on the pavilion that covered the stage.

  “Something’s happening,” Tamaguchi reported. She steered Superfly to a higher altitude, letting the entomopter orbit a few hundred meters overhead. Something had roiled the crowd, stirred the pot, and thousands began surging forward, straining, pushing, screaming.

  “It’s him,” Argo realized. “Take a look…the Messiah comes.”

  Indeed, Symborg had appeared on the stage, as if by magic. Argo realized it was likely that Symborg had initially deconstructed himself into a swarm and made his way to the stage that way, only to materialize into human form in some kind of dramatic fashion, like a genie. The slender man-swarm had now taken center stage and spotlights shone down in stark cylinders of light, while the music had fallen off to a steady rhythmic drumbeat.

  “PEOPLE OF KIBERA…I HAVE COME TO BE WITH YOU….” The loudspeakers reverberated and squealed with his voice and his words were like applying heat to a vast pot of water. The crowd boiled and steamed, stirred and frothed, moving always forward, pressing and crashing against the barriers and the police cordon like waves.

  “….WE MUST LOVE ONE ANOTHER…WE ARE ALL ONE WITH THE MOTHER SWARM….”

  With that, Symborg spread his arms wide and held out his hands to the ring of children arrayed before the stage. It was the signal they had been waiting for. The children screamed and began climbing up, some tossed onto the stage by adoring parents, through openings held by Security forces, streaming onto the stage to embrace the One Who Calls. In moments, Symborg was surrounded by several hundred children, all of whom pressed in on the robotic messiah and stretched out to touch him.

  Embedded in the middle of the love fest was Kgani and the snatch and grab force of PINCH units.

  “Moving into position,” Zammit reported.

  Now, Superfly flew lower and lower, feeding vid of the chaos that had enveloped the stage. Pinpointed on the vid, Kgani’s position was marked, as well as the other PINCH units.

  “Seven meters and closing,” Zammit went on. “We’re working our way through the crowd…ducking, bobbing, weaving…like walking through an ocean.”

  Argo’s lips tightened. The moment of truth was fast approaching. “Zam, make sure containment’s ready.”

  “Grabbers are primed, position one,” Zammit reported. “Less than two meters—“

  The snatch, when it occurred, was almost invisible, even on Superfly’s vid. Kgani was shoved by the force of the crowd right up against the robotic messiah and his grabbers fired, snagging a handful of Symborg in the process. From the vid, Symborg showed no reaction. He was already being grabbed and groped and pushed and pinched by dozens of other kids.

  “Got it!” Zammit exulted. “Got it! Securing the sample. PINCH Three is close too…I’m going for it. Extra samples can’t hurt.”

  Stage Security had been distracted by the fires and chaos around the Assimilator booths nearby. None of the security agents saw anything. None reacted. Zammit steered PINCH Three into contact and secured more samples of Symborg bots.

  “Pull ‘em out, Zam,” Argo ordered. “We got what we came for. Let’s get the hell out of there…before the whole place blows up.”

  “Moving out,” Zammit reported. Superfly confirmed the maneuver. Kgani and the others now began working their way offstage, climbing down on the shoulders of some beaming parents trying to retrieve their own children. In moments, the four angels were on the ground, slithering and crawling and sliding through the crowd, working their way back toward the taxi stand.

  Among them, Kgani and the angel known as PINCH Three carried a sample of Symborg tightly contained in their grabbers. Zammit studied their status on his board, made sure the samples were in proper containment.

  Back at the taxi stand, Kgani ran headlong into a pair of grungy-looking matatu drivers, leaning against a tree, both chewing khat and sharing a flask of something.

  “Get lost, kutu…this is our tree…move along….”

  Superfly hovered a few meters over the taxi stand and provided vid of the whole scene.

  Zammit swore. “I don’t want to go small with them watching everything. Lieutenant, permission to engage…get rid of these dirtbags?”

  Argo studied the scene. Kgani needed to get back to base with his prize. Quantum Corps needed those bots pinched from Symborg.

  “Permission granted. Make these slugs disappear but do it quick.”

  “With pleasure, sir.” Zammit’s fingers flew over the keyboard on his console. He dialed up a config for speed-disassembly and sent it. The Kgani-angel received the command immediately, the Superfly vid showing the result.

  Where once had stood a lanky seven-year old Keny
an boy, there now materialized a small faint glowing fog, swelling outward and upward from the boy’s feet into the air. The matatu drivers backed off immediately and one of them ran for his taxi, leaping into the open cab in one motion, trying desperately to get the thing started.

  The other driver wasn’t so lucky. The Kgani-angel had fully morphed into a tight pulsating swarm, like an angry horde of bees and it fell upon the driver with full fury. The fog thickened and the light strobed and flickered as nanomech hell swept the taxi stand clean.

  When it was all over, there wasn’t even any ash. The driver was gone, now so much atom fluff.

  “Obstruction removed, sir,” Zammit reported with satisfaction.

  “Okay,” Argo checked the time. “Recall the bots…get ‘em back into containment so we can get out of here. I don’t like the looks of that crowd.”

  Zammit sent the command and ten minutes later, the balcony outside their hotel room was enveloped in a faint mist as the swarms returned to base. Tamaguchi and Ngara gathered the swarms into containment and made sure the bots were secure and stable.

  Now it was time for the Detachment to vanish.

  Extracted by lifter from the hotel roof, the Detachment made its way to a desolate airstrip deep in the Somalian desert, where a hyperjet was waiting. They boarded and once again, checked containment of the Symborg pinch.

  “A lot of people are waiting on these pods,” Argo told the hyperjet crew.

  Table Top was a 2-hour suborbital hop, rocketing across the top of the atmosphere, some eight thousand miles. Most of the trip, Argo and his troopers dozed in the cargo hold…Tamaguchi and Ngara both curled up against the containment pods secured by webbing along one wall. It was only when the snow-covered mesa that was Table Top came into view that Argo finally began to relax. The mission was almost over.

  The hyperjet set down on the north lift pad and the pods were conveyed under heavy guard to the domed containment center south of the barracks and the Ops building. Argo followed Tamaguchi, Zammit and Ngara to the vault, checked through security and, in short order, found himself staring at an imager screen filled with scaffolding hung with what looked like a bunch of grapes.

  “That’s it?” he asked a nearby tech. The tech was a big-boned bald guy. His name plate ready Stefans.

  “Symborg…in the flesh,” Stefans told him. “We’re doing initial scans, measuring bond energies, basic geometry, just trying to tickle the little guys and see what makes them tick.”

  “Doesn’t look like much. My Detachment went through hell to grab those samples.”

  Stefans sniffed. “It’s not the appearance that counts, Lieutenant. It’s what’s under the hood. These buggers have all kinds of capabilities we haven’t figured out.”

  Argo was unconvinced. “I say zap the bejeezus out of him. HERF the bastard and be done with it.”

  “That’s the trouble with you atomgrabbers,” Stefans came back. “That’s your answer to every problem…fry the bastards. Has it occurred to you that what you’re seeing here, what we’re dealing with here is a direct offshoot of Config Zero itself? We can zap it all day long but if we don’t get the master, it just regenerates.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Argo said. “It’s still a cloud of bugs.”

  “Our mission,” Stefans informed him, “isn’t just to zap the bastard. We can do that anytime we want. What we have to do here is find some weakness that we can use to discredit Symborg. That’s the only way we’ll defeat this Assimilationist crap. Somehow, some way, we’ve got to find a way to bollix up the master, so the angel’s not so stable, so he starts doing and saying things that don’t make any sense…gum up the comms with Config Zero and make Symborg into a puppet without strings. That’s our mission.”

  Argo was already heading out the door. He had a debriefing with General Winger on vid in ten minutes. “Sounds like politics and psych-war to me. Leave me out.”

  Stefans figured soldiers and atomgrabbers were all alike…too many guns and not enough brains. He went back to his imager controls, probing the bots now in containment with electromagnetic fingers, studying what reactions each little pulse provoked. He knew General Winger and UNSAC expected results and reports.

  If Symborg were to be defeated, they had to find some weakness they could exploit and they had to find it soon.