The Swarm: A Novel

by Frank Schätzing

  ‘That’s right.’ Weaver nodded. ‘So we coded our virtual cells too. Each cell already had basic information about its habitat, but some cells were given additional information that the others didn’t have. As you’d expect, the first cells to aggregate were the ones that shared the same coding. Then we tried a different tack, and attempted to join two collectives with non-identical coding. It worked, and the unthinkable happened: the cells not only succeeded in aggregating; they managed to exchange their individual coding and mutually update each other. They programmed themselves to share the same standard code, thereby attaining a new state of knowledge. The two collectives merged into one, which joined with a third, and that, too, gave rise to something new.’

  ‘Next we wanted to examine their learning strategies,’ said Anawak. ‘Once again we created two collectives, each with different coding. We gave one information about a specific experience - an enemy attack. It’s not especially original, I know, but we decided to use a shark. We programmed it to take a big bite out of the collective, then we showed the collective how to dodge it. The second collective wasn’t taught the trick, and it got bitten. Then we aggregated the collectives and sent in the shark - the new conglomerate dodged it. The whole mass of cells had learned what to do. Finally, we divided the collective into smaller groups, and all of them knew how to dodge a shark.’

  ‘So the hypervariable sections allow them to learn?’ asked Crowe.

  ‘Yes and no,’ said Weaver, glancing at her notes. ‘It’s theoretically possible, but on the computer it takes too long. The mass of jelly that attacked us on the well deck was incredibly quick to respond, and it probably thinks just as swiftly. It’s a superconductive organism, an enormous variable brain. It didn’t make sense to limit ourselves to small segments of DNA. We programmed the entire strand so it was capable of learning, and that increased the speed of cognition enormously.’

  ‘Leading to what?’ asked Li.

  ‘We can only base our conclusions on the few trials that we ran before the meeting, but we’ve already seen enough to be sure of a few things: yrr-collectives, no matter what their size, think at the speed of the most up-to-date parallel processors. The information held by individual cells is standardised, and new data gets scrutinised. We found some of the collectives weren’t able to handle new challenges, but as they aggregated, they learned. Initially, the learning curve was linear, but beyond a certain point, the collective’s behaviour couldn’t be predicted—’

  ‘Hold on.’ Shankar interrupted her. ‘Do you mean to say that the program takes on a life of its own?’

  ‘We introduced entirely new situations. The more complex the problem, the more frequently the amoebas aggregated. It didn’t take them long to develop strategies that hadn’t been programmed. They started to work creatively. They became inquisitive. And they learned exponentially. We only had time to do a few tests, and it’s only a computer program, but our electronic yrr learned to assume any given form - to imitate and vary the shapes of other living things. They were able to form feelers that made our fingers seem no more sensitive than cudgels. They examined objects on a nano level. And every single one of their experiences was shared with every single cell. They solved problems that would leave us stumped.’

  For a moment there was silence as the news sank in. It was clear from their faces that they were remembering the scenes on the well deck. In the end Li said, ‘Give me an example of a problem.’

  Anawak nodded. ‘Let’s say I’m a yrr-collective. I’ve managed to infest an entire continental slope with worms that I’d previously bred, packed with bacteria and transported across the seabed. I want them to destroy the hydrates along the length of the slope, but there’s one small problem: although the worms and the bacteria are causing a hell of a lot of damage, they can’t start the landslide without help.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Johanson. ‘We still haven’t figured that out. The worms and the bacteria take care of the groundwork, but a little something’s still missing before the catastrophe can unfold.’

  ‘A little something like, for instance, a small drop in the water level, hence decreased pressure on the hydrates, or maybe an increase in the water temperature near the continental slope - right?’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Let’s say one degree Celsius?’

  ‘That would probably do it, but I’d say two to be sure.’

  ‘OK. Well, we did our homework. The Håkon-Mosby mud volcano is situated not far from the Norwegian continental slope at a depth of twelve hundred and fifty metres. Gas, water and sediment are vented from inside the earth to the surface of the seabed. The water around a mud volcano isn’t hot, but it’s warmer than elsewhere. So what do I do? I aggregate until I’m an enormous yrr-collective. Then I turn myself into a funnel, and since I need to be an extremely long funnel, I limit the width of my walls to several cells across. I need huge quantities of myself - billions and billions of cells - but I extend over several kilometres. My circumference matches that of the volcano’s main crater - around five hundred metres. It allows me to draw warm water from the volcano, so I’m like an enormous pipe, transporting the water to the site where the worms and the bacteria have been burrowing away. And then, whoosh, the slope collapses. Incidentally, I can use the same method for warming the water near Greenland and around the poles to melt the icecaps and disable the Gulf Stream.’

  ‘OK, but those are your computerised yrr,’ Peak said sceptically. ‘What can real yrr do?’

  Weaver pursed her lips. ‘That and a good deal more, at a guess.’

  Swimming

  Weaver’s body was feeling the strain as much as her mind. As they left the operations room, she asked Anawak if he felt like a dip in the pool. Her shoulders were one long ridge of pain - even though her body was accustomed to being put through its paces. None of the training she’d subjected herself to had prepared her for this. Maybe that’s your problem, she told herself. You should probably take up a sport that isn’t a feat of endurance.

  Anawak went with her. They stopped off at their cabins to change into swimwear, then set off to the pool together, wrapped in towelling robes. Weaver felt like holding Anawak’s hand - in fact, that wasn’t all she felt like doing, but she had no idea how people initiated that kind of thing without embarrassing themselves. Before the radical turnaround in her life, she’d taken anyone and everyone who came her way, but love had never entered the equation. Now she felt shy and inhibited. She didn’t even know how to flirt. How were they supposed to end up in bed together, when only last night people had died and the whole world was on the brink of disaster?

  Why did she have to make it such a big deal?

  The Independence’s swimming-pool looked surprisingly welcoming for a warship. It was the size of a small lake. As her robe slid off her shoulders, she felt Anawak’s gaze on her back. Suddenly it occurred to her that it was the first time he’d seen her like that. Her swimsuit had high-cut legs with a low, scooped back and, of course, her tattoo was on display.

  She walked self-consciously to the edge, took off and arced elegantly through the air. Arms stretched in front of her, she cut through the water, just below the surface. She heard Anawak swim up behind her. Maybe it would happen here, she thought. Half hoping and half fearing that he would catch up with her, she kicked her legs and sped away.

  Coward. Why shouldn’t she just do it?

  Dive down and make love in the pool.

  Bodies uniting in the water…

  The idea came to her in a flash.

  It was laughably simple and more than a little irreverent but, assuming it worked, it was brilliant. It was a peaceful way of persuading the yrr to retreat - or, at least, to reconsider.

  Her fingertips brushed against the tiled side. She stood up and wiped the water from her eyes. The idea seemed almost obscene, and with every metre that Anawak swam towards her, she felt less and less certain.

  She’d have to sleep on it.

  Sud
denly he was very close.

  She pushed up against the side of the pool, chest heaving, heart pounding, just as it had all those years ago in the icy waters of the Channel.

  She felt his hands round her waist. Her lips opened.

  A rush of fear.

  Say something, she told herself. There must be something you can say. Something - anything—

  ‘Sigur’s feeling better.’

  The words lurched out like toads and she saw the disappointment in his eyes. He drifted away from her and slicked back his wet hair. ‘Yeah.’

  How could she have been such an idiot?

  ‘But something else is bothering him. A problem.’ She rested her elbows on the side of the pool and pulled herself up. ‘Keep it to yourself, though. I don’t want him to think I go around telling everyone. I just wanted your opinion.’ Sigur’s got a problem? She was the one with the problem!

  ‘What kind of problem?’ asked Anawak.

  ‘He saw something odd. Or, at least, he thinks he did. And from what he said, I believe him. But then it makes you wonder what it means, and…Well, it’s like this…’

  Control Room

  Li listened as Weaver told Anawak about Johanson’s dilemma. She sat perfectly still in front of the monitors. Quite the lovely couple, she thought.

  She was less amused by the topic of their chat. Rubin had endangered the entire mission. She could only hope that Johanson wouldn’t remember any more of the details that should have been wiped for ever from his brain. But Weaver and Anawak were gossiping about it.

  Come on, kids, she thought, why waste your time on rubbish like that? It’s just a horror story from Uncle Sigur. You could always hop into bed together. A blind man could see that you want to. But you’re too inept to make a move. Li sighed. She had been forced to witness so many clumsy attempts at intimacy since men and women had started serving together in the navy. It was always so obvious. Tedious and vulgar. Sooner or later everyone wanted to jump into bed with each other. Surely they could have come up with something better to do than trying to get inside Johanson’s head?

  ‘We’re going to have to get used to the idea that Rubin’s cover could be blown,’ she said to Vanderbilt.

  The CIA boss was standing behind her, mug of coffee in hand. They were alone in the room. Peak was on the well deck, trying to chivvy along the clean-up operation and vet the state of the equipment.

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘There’ll be an obvious decision to take.’

  ‘We’re not ready to do anything of the kind. Rubin’s still busy. Besides, it would be nice not to have to.’

  ‘What’s wrong, Jack? Don’t tell me you’ve got scruples.’

  ‘Take it easy, honey. This is your damn plan, but it’s my responsibility to make certain it works. My scruples won’t get in the way. You can depend on that.’ He chuckled. ‘After all, I’ve got my reputation to think of.’

  Li turned to face him. ‘You have?’

  Vanderbilt slurped his coffee noisily. ‘You know what I like about you, Jude? You’re so darned nasty. You make me feel like a nice guy - and that’s really saying something.’

  Combat Information Center

  Crowe and Shankar couldn’t make sense of it. The computer screen was covered in labyrinthine images. Parallel lines suddenly diverged, moving outwards, arching into curves, then uniting into one. Large empty spaces of varying sizes yawned between them. A series of similar images made up the Scratch signal. They looked as though they should fit together in one big picture, yet somehow they didn’t. The lines didn’t match. And, so far, Crowe didn’t have a clue as to what they might mean.

  ‘Water is the baseline information,’ pondered Shankar, ‘and each of the water molecules is coupled with ancillary data. But what could they be describing? Something to do with water?’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Temperature.’

  ‘I guess, or salinity.’

  ‘Or it might have nothing to do with physical or chemical properties. The data might be describing the yrr. The lines could be population densities.’

  ‘You mean they’d be telling us where they live?’

  Shankar rubbed his chin. ‘Doesn’t seem likely, does it?’

  ‘I don’t know, Murray. Would we tell them where our cities are?’

  ‘No, but the yrr don’t think like us.’

  ‘Thanks for reminding me.’ Crowe produced a wreath of smoke. ‘OK, let’s start again. Water. That part of the message is straightforward enough. Water is our world.’

  ‘Which corresponds exactly to the message we sent them.’

  ‘True. We told them that we live on land. Then we described our DNA and our body shape.’

  ‘Supposing they’ve responded point by point,’ said Shankar. ‘Could the lines represent their shape?’

  Crowe pursed her lips. ‘They don’t have one - I mean, it hardly characterises them. They’ve got more of a definable shape when they’re a collective, but that makes it even harder to pin them down: yrr-jelly has thousand of shapes, and none to call its own.’

  ‘So shape’s out. What other pieces of information might be of interest. Size of population?’

  ‘Murray! There’d be so many zeros behind that number you could scrawl it all over this ship and still run out of space. Besides, they’re continually dividing or dying…I bet even they don’t know how many of them there are.’ Crowe waggled the cigarette between her teeth. ‘Individual amoebas don’t matter. What counts is the whole. The idea of the yrr, if you like. The essence of yrr. The yrr genome.’

  Shankar peered at her over the rim of his glasses. ‘We only told them that our biochemistry was based on DNA. You’d expect them to tell us, “Ours too”. Surely they wouldn’t have sequenced their genome for us?’

  ‘They might have done.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Because it’s pretty much the only defining statement they could make. DNA and aggregation are at the heart of their existence. Everything else is based round that.’

  ‘Fine, but how could they describe it, if it’s constantly changing?’

  Crowe was back to staring helplessly at the lines. ‘What about the map idea again, then?’

  ‘A map of what?’

  ‘Who knows?’ She sighed. ‘Let’s take it from the beginning again. H2O. We live in water…’

  Behind Closed Doors

  Li had set the treadmill to maximum speed. Under normal circumstances she would have done her bit for team spirit and worked out in the gym. On this occasion, though, she didn’t want to be disturbed. It was time for her daily satellite consultation with Offutt Air Force Base.

  ‘How’s morale, then, Jude?’

  ‘Excellent, sir. The attack was a serious blow, but we’re in control of the situation.’

  ‘And everyone’s still motivated?’

  ‘More than ever before.’

  ‘Well, I’m concerned.’ The President was sitting all on his own in the war room at the air-force base. ‘Boston’s been fully evacuated. We’ve had to write off New York and Washington. And there’s a new wave of horror stories from Philadelphia and Norfolk.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘This country’s going to hell, Jude. There isn’t a single person in the world who doesn’t seem to know about the creatures in the sea. Someone couldn’t keep their mouth shut, and I’d like to know who.’

  ‘What does it matter, sir?’

  ‘What does it matter?’ The President slammed his hand on the desk. ‘The United States of America has agreed to lead this operation. I’m not about to tolerate some asshole from the UN taking matters into his own hands. They’re all so busy trying to push their ridiculous little countries to the forefront. Have you seen what’s going on out there? Things are escalating beyond our control.’

  ‘I know exactly what’s going on.’

  ‘It could be that one of your guys has talked.’

  ‘With all due respect, sir, there’s no reason why
other people shouldn’t have arrived at the yrr hypothesis on their own. Besides, from what I’ve heard, the bulk of speculation still centres around natural disasters and international terrorism. Only this morning some scientist from Pyon-gyang said—’

  ‘I know what he said.’ The President brushed aside her point. ‘He said we were the bad guys. Apparently we’re skulking round in silent submarines attacking our own cities so we can pin it on the Commies.’ He leaned forward. ‘Well, they can say what they like. I don’t give a damn about being popular. I just want to see this problem solved. I need some options, Jude. There isn’t a single country left with the strength to help anyone else. Even the United States of America has been forced to beg for aid. We’re being invaded and poisoned. The population is fleeing inland. I’m having to shelter in this goddamn security bunker like some kind of mole. We’ve got anarchy and looting on the streets, the military and security forces are hopelessly overstretched, and all we can offer our citizens is contaminated food supplies and drugs that don’t work.’

  ‘Sir…’

  ‘God’s still holding his protective hand over the West, but if you stick your feet in the water you’re bound to lose your toes. The worm colonies off the coasts of America and Asia are growing, and La Palma’s on the point of collapse. Regimes are crumbling. Heaven knows who’s going to inherit their armaments. We’re not in a position to intervene.’

  ‘In your last speech, sir—’

  ‘Don’t get me started. I spend all my waking hours coming up with impassioned statements. But do you think the speechwriters use them? I don’t believe they even understand what I’m trying to communicate to this country and to the rest of the world. Make the people feel confident, I keep telling them. The American people need to see the determination of their leader, to know he’ll do whatever it takes to win this war, no matter how many faces the devil might show. I want the world to take heart. I’m not saying we should give them false hope - we have to prepare for the worst - but people should know that we’re going to get through this. I keep explaining that to the speechwriters, but when they try to sound reassuring it comes across as insincere and overblown. You can even hear that they’re afraid. Do any of them listen to me?’