The General's War

by Michael Poeltl

He places his head in his hands. “Forgive me,” he mutters, then throws both fists into the mattress at his sides laughing miserably. “I killed my mother and now my sister has returned.” He stands and fetches his mother’s crown from the closet. “Forgive me,” he tells it through the plastic, falls on his knees and lowers his upper body, elbows and forehead resting on the floor. The song reignites in his mind. His back arches as he sobs.

  “They’re real,” Ginny enters the room.

  Tobias stands slowly and stretches his arms out, the head of his mother in both hands. He nods. “Yes,” he manages. “And now my sister has surfaced.”

  “And my Great Aunt,” she tells him. Then, looking at what Tobias is holding, she approaches cautiously, taking the head from his grasp. She places SENTA gently on the bed and hugs Tobias tightly. He cries into her hair as she assures him he couldn’t have known the truth of it.

  They remain embraced several minutes before Tobias’ EC buzzes to life again. He releases Ginny and lets her know that he is alright. She nods and leaves him.

  “Have you called to say I told you so?” he asks his uncle, despondent.

  “Tobias, Sean, I’m so sorry you were placed in the middle of this. You couldn’t have known SENTA was truly your mother, not after all that Allfather had you do. I do not blame you for her death. Your mother would have forgiven you, you know that.”

  “That’s good of you to say.”

  “It’s the truth, Sean,” his uncle insists.

  “Thank you, Uncle,” he says back. “I never would have,” he pauses for a breath. “Did you see that my sister is alive? In a Host.”

  “I did,” Raymond confirms. “She wants to meet us both. I’ve asked her to stay safe. To stay out of the fighting.”

  “I need to see her,” Tobias explains. “I need to talk to her.”

  “And you will,” he assures him. “When you’ve completed your mission, come back. We will see your sister then.”

  “Thank you, Uncle,” Tobias swipes his EC and the chancellor disappears.

  SEEK AND DESTROY

  General August experiences the turmoil caused by the past life file first-hand in her war room as even her staff are not safe from the curiousity this release has stirred.

  “It’s a trick,” she explains to the World net from her media podium. “It’s all a hoax and I will explain it to you now. A Shadow Broker code called Allfather was planted in the data centers of the ‘aware’ AI Hosts over three years ago through a system called Lifi. This system then allowed the Host to access personal vids and holos from the World net and Shadow net to recreate deceased relative’s lives and pawn them off on the public as some miraculous reincarnation. It’s a façade, designed to make you question this war against the AI. To distract you. To give you pause enough so they can overthrow us. This is what they want.

  “I’m asking that each of you do the right thing – erase the file from your EC’s and don’t get pulled into this lie. Everything you ‘discover’ has been crafted from your departed relative’s past, not the soul of your relative reaching out to you. Remain calm and remember: religion is a lie, and reincarnation is a form of religion.”

  As she steps off the stage she asks herself: did the address seem desperate? Too accusational? To defensive? It was mostly thruths. She looks to her media officer who wears a grimmace, studying his screen, shaking his head. He doesn’t approve, she surmises. I should have run this past him.

  Fran watches in amazement as the war room buzzes with the news, and several aids lower their heads, looking at their EC’s, searching for dead relatives no doubt. Fran’s EC buzzes to life next, and she swipes to see what’s come up. What she discovers frightens her.

  A Host claiming to be the reincarnation of her mother has been linked to her. She shouts for the room to quiet and concentrate on the war effort. Afterward she turns on her heels and shuts herself in her office.

  “Just a trick,” she tells herself, pulling up the details of the Host. It’s an altered Host. A rebel. Active in its new capacity for the past five months. Reviewing the Host’s ‘memories’ via vids and holos and photos, Fran takes a seat on her couch. Her mother’s death when she was only five devestated her. It was very long ago, but the psychological damage it left, followed by the A-class Nanny Hosts death years later have sat like a stone on her heart and occupied the darkest corners of her mind since. It is what’s made her strong, she asserts, but has always felt like a weakness. She plays an excerpt from the greeting the Host has left her.

  ::I know I left too soon, Franny, I know you must have missed me terribly, and I’m so sorry I did not have the opportunity to get to know you beyond your five years, and that you missed out on having your mother. It was never my intention to die so young. I loved you then, and I love you now. If you would like to meet, please reach out to me. We have so much to discuss. Love Mom.::

  “Franny,” General August whispers to herself, hand hovering over her EC. She remembers her mother calling her that, but decides that tidbit of information could have been dug up through the videos and holos.

  Allfather is an alien, she tells herself. That alien wants this war every bit as much as she does. But it wants Host to overthrow humanity. Whether real or not, AI cannot be allowed to survive this war. “It would be all for nothing if I accept this invitation,” she whispers. Curiosity, though, the same which has excited the war room staff, envelops her now. It’s just research, she tells herself, pulling up the image of the Host.

  The thing is grotesque, she thinks. How could she ever allow such an abomination into her heart? No, this was good for her to see, she considers. It’s nothing but a machine, programed to fool humanity and take what is hers.

  She issues an order to scramble EC signals in and around the war room in an effort to bring her staff back to the present. She walks out of her office to witness the confusion on the faces of those who were preoccupied with the past life file.

  “Anyone who wants to pursue the lie is welcome to leave,” she announces. “Keeping in mind you will lose your rank and no longer enjoy the protection of United Earth’s military.”

  This news keeps the majority from walking out. Fran sends an order quickly via her EC to her soldiers standing beyond the war room doors while her staff considers her proposal. Three of the forty move towards the door, cautiously. When they open, the staffers are met with a security detail who fire on them. An audible gasp echos through the room. The three deserters are dragged through the doors as they close behind them.

  “You’ve made the right choice,” the general explains to those remaining. “Of course, we could not allow anyone willing to pursue this fantasy walk out into the world. Our location would have been compromised. This war room is one of twenty built in secret over the past two years. Those who know of them are loyal still, save the captains who currently threaten us from orbit. They knew of just ten of the twenty. Rest easy knowing we are not in any one of those ten.

  “Your safety is assured as long as you remain loyal to humanity, do your jobs to the best of your abilities and ignore the lies the rebel’s have released,” she pauses, careful to look as many in the eye as possible. “Are there any questions?” No one moves. “Then return to your work stations. I need a full report on our strengths in twenty minutes.” Fran’s staff leap into action, communicating through their headsets to the soldiers on the ground, in the air, and moving on coastal targets from the sea.

  ______________________________________________________________________

  Zander, Elf and Hydra move fifteen-metres under First City’s streets, avoiding the ever-curious city eyes. Elf listens for everything with her altered ears. Nothing escapes her, not the buzz of an electrical wire buried above their heads or a spider spinning a web one-hundred feet away.

  “Do you detect anything ahead, Elf?” Zander asks.

  “I detect everything,” she replies coyly. “I’m attempting to filter out the noise that does not serve us, but it is difficult.�
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  “Even in this place?” Hydra asks.

  “You might be surprised at what sounds come from the dirt,” Elf replies, crouching as she moves at the head of the team. “I am focusing now on frequencies known to the military machine. G-class in the streets above have excellent sonar for detecting Cells below ground, and at nine kilometres’ distance, the tunnel itself could have been breeched by soldiers at any point.”

  “Good work,” Zander tells her. “Stay sharp.”

  “I hope to find the general swiftly when we surface,” Hydra says. “I am anxious to meet her.”

  “As long as you stick to the plan, Hydra, you will meet her,” Zander warns. “Your part is paramount.”

  “When we surface, I will track the frequencies and be able to map the location the majority of those communication frequencies’ originate from,” Elf reminds them.

  “And then we find the general,” Zander adds. “And you will meet her, Hydra.”

  “She has not replied to my invite,” Hydra reminds them. “She has visited my page in the file, but not made any attempt to contact me.” There is a discernible sadness to her voice, Zander determines.

  “Once we’re in the position to contact her we will,” Zander assures her and stops in his tracks as Elf’s hand raises ahead, making a fist.

  “Say nothing more,” she tells them via their carrier network. “We’re being hunted.”

  An explosion overhead caves in the tunnel behind them and they sprint forward to outrun the collapsing ceiling. Before Hydra and Zander can get ahead of her, Elf turns and stops them both with outstretched palms. A moment later the ceiling ahead falls in, trapping them two-kilometres into their mission.

  “We’re entombed,” Hydra wheels around in their freshly dug grave.

  Elf kneels and concentrates on the sounds she’s hearing. “There are two G-class burrowing into the cave from above. Twenty-five soldiers accompany them. They will reach us in three minutes.”

  Zander charges at the pile of dirt and debris blocking their way forward and begins to dig. Elf tells him it is six metres thick, using her sonar, and that he’ll never dig through before they arrive.

  “We’re not exactly equipped to take on those numbers,” Zander shares. “This is a covert operation. In and out, if out were a possibility.”

  “It’s as though they were just waiting for someone to travel this tunnel,” Hydra adds.

  “Dig yourself into the dirt,” Zander orders. “Bury yourselves, and when you hear my flechette fire, use your weapons on whatever falls through this ceiling.” As he awaits the G-classes arrival – He surfs through their weaknesses catalogued in the Shadow net by his fellow rebels since the war began.

  A minute later two G-class land with a heavy thump on the tunnel floor. Zander opens up on one of them, targeting their weaknesses. The other G-class turns and fires on the dirt pile landing an explosive shell directly on Zanders chest, pushing him further into the dirt.

  Hydra’s middle head spits a high-pressure stream of propane and the lower head ignites it, resulting in a flame thrower, which scorches the back of the G-class firing on Zander.

  Elf releases a dozen small metallic balls from her wrists which roll out and settle around the other G-class. With a snap of her fingers she activates the miniature bombs and the ground around the heavy robots’ collapses sufficiently to put them off balance long enough that Hydra can keep the continuous flame on them. Hydra is not interested in burning the robots; she knows better than to think fire could affect the beast’s carapace. It is the heat she’s counting on. The heat will muddy the G-class’ sensors and hopefully keep them confused long enough for Zander to materialize from the dirt.

  Zander digs his way free, targets and fires a concentrated volley into an infinitesimally small seam along the carapace of both of the robots. He waves for Hydra to leave the relative safety of her dirt mound, sending instructions via their carrier network. Once the flechette’s puncture the armour, Hydra is there to spray her propane into the tiny openings. Before she is done, Hydra is hit by a missile squarely in the side, but was built substantially tough, and empties the last of her propane into the G-classes bodies. With no more flechettes to fire, Zander tells Elf to toss her grenades at the robots, timed to explode on impact. Then he orders everyone down.

  As the grenades explode around the G-class, the resulting flames ignite the propane now trapped in their chassis’. Exploding the robots from the inside, sending shrapnel everywhere.

  The blast opens up another tunnel beneath them, and what’s left of the G-class fall through it. Zander crawls to the hole and lights the space with his retractable headlamp.

  “The soldiers are coming,” Elf alerts them.

  “We don’t know what’s down there,” Zander tells them. “But it will be better then staying here.”

  ______________________________________________________________________

  General August is tipped off to the underground attempt to enter First City by her ground forces who have detained a dozen rebel Hosts, who were attempting to collapse a tunnel opening on the outer regions of the city’s ancient subway system. She is patched into the video cam of the captain leading the platoon.

  She watches the scene unfold from his point of view body cam, as he peers down the hole where the G-class just exploded. She enhances the picture with a filter to wash out the smoke billowing up at them and zooms in on the figures now peering down a second hole. One of the Hosts seems familiar, she thinks, targeting it and asking her computer to offer a reconstruction of the four-legged one. It brings up a perfect match to the Host supposedly connected to her. The one calling itself her mother.

  After a moment of shock, she orders the captain to take down the other two but to leave the one alive. She’s gone to all this trouble to find me, she thinks. The least I can do is welcome her.

  “Message received, General,” the captain says. Artillery erupts from the nozzles of their pulse rifles, targeting only the bi-pedal Hosts. One is cut down while the other two slip into the hole.

  “I want the four-legged one, Captain,” she reminds him. “Bring it to me unharmed. Do not use your Lifi.”

  ______________________________________________________________________

  Elf’s slim frame is torn apart by the firepower sent down the shaft at them. Zander hustles to lower Hydra into the hole and takes considerable fire on his rear Carapace. Hydra drops three metres before he hears a metallic crash. She explains she’s alright and urges him to follow. Zander dives into the hole and stands to assess their situation.

  “Are you hurt?” He asks Hydra.

  “No, but Elf,” she replies.

  “She is gone. I am wounded,” he tells her, ushering her along in the darkness unable to lift his right arm. Blind in his right eye.

  “Zander, I can’t do this alone,” Hydra pleads with him.

  “You won’t have to, Hydra. I’m still functional. What is this place?”

  “It looks to be an old railway,” she turns her headlamp down a long corridor fitted with tracks. “A subway system.”

  “This could get us to where we’re going,” Zander says and is hit with another blast to his back. The soldiers are here, he thinks. “RUN,” he commands Hydra, and she gallops noisily down the tracks.

  Zander turns and extends the metre-long blade from his working forearm. He sends a screeching metallic shout at the soldiers as they multiply in front of him, dropping from open ceiling. Next, he charges, raises his blade like a lance and impales two before he is met with countless, pulse fire in a melee of close-combat confusion, trimming limbs and crown from body until he is nothing more than a shuddering torso.

  ______________________________________________________________________

  Hydra knows she is heading in the right direction as the subway seems to point to the city center. She is upset by the loss of Zander and Elf, and without either feels the mission may now be lost. She stops and turns.

 
“Follow the thing that ran,” she hears the captain order, pulling the remaining horn from Zanders head as if taking a souvenir from the fight. “We need that one alive. General’s orders.”

  Her tank emptied of propane, she is weaponless. All she has is her charge now. She is big, built to ram and crush things. She could crush a human easily at full charge. She laments for her team and for her mission. She hears the soldiers rushing to meet her. She sits on her hind-quarters and waits. If she is to be taken alive then she will not fight them, she decides. Perhaps she will have an opportunity to see Franny once more before her end. To talk to her again. To tell her she loves her.

  The soldiers stop a few metres away when they find her. They look frightened. They seem cautious. They should be, she ruminates. She lays down on the tracks, preparing herself for death. Another death, she thinks, that has come too soon.

  “Is it a trick?” A soldier asks.

  “Let’s ask her,” the captain says, walking tentatively toward her.