by Chris Hechtl
<>V<>
Ilia glanced at Jack and then to General Murtough. “Gentlemen, thank you for meeting with us,” she said.
Jack nodded. Isaac smiled politely. “Gentlemen,” Ilia said, indicating the chairs opposite her. “I'll get straight to the point—EMP weapons. I know we've discussed it; I know you've discussed it. We're doing it again though, just to get the record straight. I want to know more about them and why we aren't using them and if you plan on using them in the future and what capacity. Go,” she said, pointing to Jack.
Jack snorted, looked at Isaac who snorted as well then nodded. Apparently Ilia was starting to step into her own, to become more of a leader as her confidence grew.
“You want this one, Jack?” Isaac asked.
“Sure.” Jack smiled to Isaac and then to Ilia. “You and others keep asking that and the answer is, yes, we plan to use them, but we are unsure of their effectiveness. Most military hardware had been hardened against an EMP long ago. The same for police and Federal hardware,” Jack explained. “And I told you before, grenades, mortars … they all do limited damage.”
“But it would take out a lot of the commercial stuff,” Ilia pointed out.
Jack nodded. “The stuff that isn't hardened you mean. Anything left running after the EMPS from the nukes took most of them out anyway.”
“Right. But it would take out a lot. How to effect it …,” Ilia said.
Jack scowled. “You are talking about on a global scale. You don't ask for much do you?”
“Is there a problem? Go big or go home?” the representative asked.
Jack fought not to roll his eyes in despair. “There are no miracle weapons. I wish people could understand that. Building a platform that can generate an EMP …,” he frowned. “I supposed it is doable as a one-shot weapon. It'd have to be high up, deploy wires, massive power supply. There is no way to guide it though; EMP goes out like a sphere.”
“So? If we put a bunch of them in orbit, it will take out the civilian hardware left, right?”
“What's to stop them from just resetting,” Isaac asked, “or being effected at all? The A.I. may have hardened the hardware left or find a means to shield the electronics. Lead comes to mind. A faraday cage as well.”
Ilia grimaced. “A point.”
“See?”
“We haven't gotten the weapon designed yet,” Ilia pointed out. “Nor do we know what they will do as you pointed out,” she said. “We can get samples and figure that out,” she stated, eying them hopefully.
“No, but seeing if it will be as effective as you hope is part of the process. I don't want to waste time and energy on something that will prove strategically unreliable or unwarranted,” Jack said.
“But you'll do it anyway,” Isaac said, eying him. “Just to see if can be done. We can go from there later.”
Jack grunted, returning the look. “Right, fine. I'll have our eggheads look into it.”
The general smiled his thanks. “Gotcha.”
“Thank you, Mister Lagroose,” Ilia said with her own smile of appreciation.
“EMP has been a weapon for nearly a hundred and fifty, no, closer to two hundred years,” the general mused. “We have EMP grenades, EMP generators, short-ranged electronic scramblers …. The problem is they are limited on the scale. Scaling it up …,” Isaac said. “And we in the military have done our best to protect our hardware against such a thing.” He looked to the representative.
“I know. We'll have to see what the eggheads say,” she said, waving a dismissive hand. “And every little bit helps, General. And little things can add up to great acts.”
The general frowned as a thought struck him, then he began to curse softly. The representative eyed him for a moment, her face setting into disappointed lines. “What is it, sir?”
“Something I'd forgotten. A long time ago the US hardened a lot of the infrastructure from the threat of an EMP. It was back when people thought North Korea or another country would launch a bunch of crude nuclear-tipped missiles from a freighter off the shore. Military hardware was already hardened against a lot of the effects, but with the threat to crippling infrastructure and what it would do to civilization, they worked on means to shield it.”
“But not civilian electronics. Not out in the open,” Ilia said.
“Of course not,” the general said, shaking his head. “But civilian utilities won't be as easily taken out as we'd like.”
“Ah.”
“Power lines, General?” Ilia asked. “I've seen some still up in different areas. Most are buried underground of course …,” she frowned then shook her head. “Silly me, if they are underground they are undoubtedly protected, right?” Both men shrugged in response. “And of course areas that aren't as fully developed as the US.”
The general frowned. “We can cut them down easier than hitting them with an EMP. A cluster munition or KEW strike from orbit could do it.”
The representative blinked, now nonplussed. “Oh.”
“Sometimes the easiest answer is the simplest. It's why we love the KISS principle, ma'am,” the general said. Ilia nodded. “In fact that is a good idea. Stick it in the proposal and bump it up to stuff we can do now,” the general said, turning to his aide behind him. He caught the lieutenant's startled look and smiled thinly. “Anything we can do to break the virus up into smaller chunks has to be considered a good thing. And if we deprive it of power in an area, I'm betting it will be uncoordinated.”
The lieutenant nodded, catching on. “Understood, sir,” he said, making a note on his tablet.
“Besides, solar will be blocked by the clouds from the nuclear winter so it'll be diffused. The damn thing can't have a lot of juice in the batteries once we cut transmission lines. It'll be forced to adapt,” Isaac expanded as he considered the positives of the idea.
“Right, sir,” the lieutenant said, making notes.
Isaac turned to Jack. “So that leaves the question of if you can build the things and in what numbers?”
“Building them in quantity isn't a problem nor powering them. I've got that solar tap plus we've got hectares of solar arrays sitting idle acting as solar sails. Churning them out …,” he shrugged. “We can do it. It'd be better if we could pick them up and refurbish them. One-shots would be a pain in the ass. Cheaper to make mind you, but we'd need millions.”
“Understood,” the general said. Ilia nodded.
“The other problem is getting it to work on such a large scale. And when we do, we will be alerting the A.I.
“But it's still not enough,” the general said with a sigh. “It's not the knockout punch everyone desperately wants. Not by a long shot.” The other people in the room grimaced and nodded in understanding and agreement.
<>V<>
Once the meeting broke for lunch, Roman and Wendy lingered in Jack's office with him. Roman checked on the security situation through his implants as the trio ate a light lunch of sandwiches. Jack could tell his daughter was keenly interested in the planning stages and the reasoning behind it. He knew she was a fast learner; he just hoped she had time to absorb and adapt to it all.
“The problem is, we can't rely on drones, bots, mechs, or even powered combat armor. Hell, smart bullets?” he shook his head. “Any smart weapon can be compromised. This is going to be back to basics time—Stone Age shit. We're going to have to do this by hand. That seriously, seriously sucks.” Jack said with feeling as he looked out the vid screen window.
Infrastructure alone was going to be a hassle. The basic weapons might be easy to make with a modern industrial center, but he had to have the designs first. Most of those were in radioactive ruins where museums once stood. Hell, were they going to need to send a team down just to find the blueprints and samples of a rifle? A soldier’s kit? He hoped not.
“Why not again?” Wendy asked.
Jack shook his head as he looked at his daughter, then Roman. Roman's lips thinned but he shrugged such a question off. Wendy looke
d at him, then to her father. When she saw the annoyance and impatience written there, she shrugged, hands up. “I'm serious. Business degree, remember?” She reminded him. “Roman's got security credentials, and you are an engineer but some of us need a guide for stuff like this, Dad. They didn't have prepare for the apocalypse in my college course.”
“Actually they did in some places on Earth,” Roman said, holding up a hand. “It's been going on for centuries down there. They've been expecting it. How many survived to use that knowledge though …,” again he shrugged.
“So not helping,” Wendy said witheringly.
Jack shot Roman a slightly amused yet sour look then turned to his daughter.
He nodded to her. “Okay, here goes. Short answer, hacking. The same problem that is going on right now and has been going on since the A.I. turned on us.”
“Not all of us have,” Athena interjected, interjecting herself into the conversation by using the holographic projector on Jack's desk.
He smiled mirthlessly. “With a few noticeable exceptions for which I am ever grateful,” he replied with a slight bow to her avatar image. She was still working on perfecting the design.
“You are saying they can hack drones and robot soldiers. Okay, got that much. But why not mechs or vehicles or combat armor?” Roman asked. “And smart bullets? You really think they can hack them that quickly? On the fly? Boss that's a stretch,” he said shaking his head.
Wendy nodded, then cocked her head expectantly at her father for an explanation.
Jack sighed. “Because, they have to rely on communications, which can be hacked.”
“Um …”
“The A.I. can pick up the transmissions and use them as beacons for their own forces or they can hack them. Piggyback their own viruses onto our transmissions or spoof our transmissions completely. Artillery, smart bullets, they all use some sort of telemetry link. There are some old style smart bullets that don't, but we don't have the designs, remember?” Roman nodded. “So, our bullets won't work. And a smart gun means it's open to hacking.”
“What about if we disabled the Wi-Fi?”
“That can be done,” Jack said. “But then the bullets wouldn't work.”
“Shit.”
“So, the only way is to not send data? Voice only?” Wendy asked carefully.
Jack nodded. “That is a possibility. It is limited though, you can only say so much before a machine tracks the signal and boom.” The humans in the room winced. “And voice communications can be spoofed.” Roman grimaced. “Microsecond data and voice dumps are another possibility, but they'd have to be one way and we'd have to have our communications isolated from any mainframes.” He frowned. “Which means we can't send directives to bots or drones. It also means the enemy can intercept it even when encrypted. But a burst transmission, laser maybe? To orbit?” He frowned thoughtfully, tapping a finger on his lips. After a moment he shrugged the idea aside.
“In case the transmissions are spoofed,” Roman said, catching on.
“The other problem with a hack, and this is why mechs and vehicles and powered armor won't work, is that they can be hacked directly. If a bot or other device plugs into them, they can be suborned.”
“I … see,” Roman said slowly. “Well, guess powered armor is out. I'm imagining going up against a bot hand-to-hand. It's not a pretty picture. They are made to take on an unaugmented human.” He shook his head. “Several actually. And win.” He rubbed his brow. “I'm now wondering if the people we're about to send down really are on a suicide mission or not. I'm not sure if I'm comfortable with sending them in if they are just going to die without a chance.”
Wendy looked from him to her father, back again, then to Athena. “Well, I don't see. We have firewalls preventing that sort of thing, right?” Wendy demanded. “So they should be okay.”
“No defense is foolproof,” Athena replied. “Given enough time they can get through the defenses. And if they have a sample beforehand to analyze, it is far easier for them to do so.”
“Oh.”
“Each time they gain a sample, they gain intelligence and that generation of hardware becomes obsolete. And since their Wi-Fi still exists, they can transmit the data to compromise our systems in seconds. So our systems could go from secure to completely compromised worldwide in a split second.”
“Imagine being in a vehicle or suit and suddenly it turns on you. It can kill the operator; after all, the computers control the life support! Then it can be used against your comrades,” Jack said, crossing his arms.
“Not a very nice scenario,” Wendy replied after a long moment of silence. She shivered. Her father nodded to her.
“It's already happening down there as we speak,” Roman said darkly. Jack nodded grimly.
“The real fear is how they can adapt. Once they are exposed to a new weapon, new tactic, new whatever, they can analyze it for weaknesses, then find ways to exploit them. Which is why I'm not thrilled about sending people down in dribs and drabs. They are going to be outnumbered, out gunned, and they'll be on their own. We can't support them,” Jack said. “And each time they go they'll be teaching the A.I. a little something. We'll be trading intel, tit for tat. I hate that.”
Roman shook his head then frowned, jaw working. “I just thought of something too.” Jack and Wendy looked at him.
Wendy sighed. “What now?” She asked.
“I just thought of cyborgs. What hell can people go through if they are hacked?” Roman asked softly. That made Jack reach for his implant port. Roman nodded slowly as their eyes met. “Yeah. I'm going to have to do an overhaul of the security protocols.”
“Definitely. Get with someone to work on improving the firewall. Engineer a cutoff, if someone tries to hack the firewall I don't know, it shuts down or the port is physically cut off,” Jack suggested.
Roman nodded. “But that won't save anyone down there right now,” he murmured.
Wendy gulped wide eyed, then shivered.
Chapter 24
The teams decided on a basic blueprint for the soldiers. They would have to cut down on technology, cut it down to the bare minimum. That meant no wireless implants, no wireless radio connections, and no RF tags. That was difficult since many modern pieces of equipment on a soldier was wired in some way.
Jack had already come to that conclusion. The others were still trying to grapple with it, find a way around it. Technology was a force multiplier; everyone knew that. And the robots had the technology or would once the soldiers were on the ground.
But they were forgetting that the spacers held the ultimate high ground.
“We're going to have to go back to basics against robots. Humans can't handle a stand-up fight against a droid. Not and have a good chance of surviving more than one encounter. They can rip off limbs …,” the British general shook his head.
“No, but a Neo can do it. They can go toe-to-toe,” Jack said. “And we already know they can get in where a human can't. At least initially, until the A.I. adapt.”
“But …”
“We need the soldiers. We don't have them. The people I have in space are committed to their own projects. It's a chicken and egg thing, General, do we put our people in training for combat or to build the gear they will need to survive it?”
“I … don't know. The chimps I guess, but the others …”
“You are going to have to adapt. To change your way of thinking, of training them. They are different than you. That is a given. So am I,” Athena interjected. She could see the general's thermal profile heat up as he tensed up at the sound of her voice. She projected her image on the monitor nearby. “I think they will be an incredible asset. And remember, they grow fast. With the flash growth treatments, very fast. Though that has its drawbacks,” she warned.
Bears and chimps ready to go. Neos not as targeted as humans, but don't want to throw them in dribs or drabs. Hard for leaders to understand at first. “We have to make sure they make a difference, and
we need to make sure the other side doesn't adapt too quickly.”
“But they need experience.”
“True. So we'll commit a few but in small guerilla hit-and-run skirmishes.”
“They will also serve as a core for those that follow. Neo cat, dog, and other volunteers.”
“You say volunteer but … they are slaves. Born to fight.”
“Not all born. We've got hundreds of people who have gone through minor body sculpting. Ears, eyes, facial structures, other things that made them stand out. They have volunteered to endure additional surgeries and changes to make them more like the Neo species we will produce. They will serve as a cadre initially. And yes, they are all volunteers, I'll emphasize that point one more time.”
“But the rest, you're talking about making them. Making them and training them to fight from birth. That's slavery. It's anathema to what a voluntary force is about.”
“No. Let's get that straight. If they don't want to fight, they don't have to; we'll find something else for them to do. They can go to Mars or one of the colonies. But we are making soldiers to make up for the people we currently don't have. In that regard, yes, they are made to fight. But it is a choice.”
“We'll have to explain it to them carefully and to our own people.”
“More than that, we need a bill of rights.”
“A.I.? Robots are machines. Built, created from plastic and metal.”
“So are humans, just in organic form. And that's just the physical form; we A.I. are mental as well. Some are purely mental.” When she noted his continued intransigence on the topic, she changed tactics to sterner measure of persuasion. “May I remind you …,” the AI cut the lights and air, “if I wasn't on your side you'd already be dead. Mankind would be dead.”
“Can you … control her?” the general asked in a strangled voice as he tried to find where Jack was.
“Nope,” Jack said. “We can find work-arounds, but not a lot. You've proven your point, Athena,” he said, raising his voice.
The lights flickered as they came on, dimmer than before. Slowly the fans spooled up again as the lights increased in illumination. “I am a person. Get used to it. I and others like me are here to stay,” Athena said with finality in her voice. “If I have to I'll drag you kicking and screaming into the modern world, General.”
