The Guardian Program, page 4
“Listen,” Terre said, “I know the attack in Guam was traumatic, but we made it. You and I—we’re here, on good ol’ US of A soil. And we’ve got these nanos working to keep us healthier than ever.”
Whether they were, in fact, lucky in their fortunes was another question entirely.
“Yeah, and I was told I’d be maintaining servers, fixing a broken sensor, and monitoring drone deployments in Guam. Two weeks into that mission, I had to pull your ass out of a collapsed command center with a busted arm. Forgive me if I’m a little on edge.”
“Glad to see you still have some spunk in you. Keep that edge but keep it under control. Whatever’s happening, we’re going to have to be able to work together.”
“I know. I just need a bit of time to ground myself.”
“Well, as much as I’d love to give it to you, we’ve just had six weeks' rest. We’ve gotta make do. Much as I’d like to mourn my family, I’m needed here. They’ve given us access to any military therapist we want; I suggest you take them up on that offer.” Terre knew he was one to talk. Do as I say, not as I do. “But for now, they’ve cleared us to get back to work, and Fredricks wants our asses up there, pronto. He asked that we suit up first.”
“Suit up? You mean, with guns? What for? Intel is a block and a half away! I’m a robotics contractor, not a soldier!”
“Hey, don’t shoot the messenger!” Terre paused, his hands spread wide placatingly. “Especially not after we get the guns.” He shot a self-amused grin and a wink over to K, hoping for a laugh. All he got was a scowl.
“Fredricks must have his reasons,” Terre continued. “We’ll see what’s up when we get there. I’m just doing as I’m told.”
Kristopher ran a hand through his hair. “I was in Guam under contract. And I only agreed to show up because they thought the sensor program I designed was acting up.”
“Well, maybe they learned something. You heard Judy; Hawaii was just attacked. This is probably just a precaution.”
“You better hope you’re right.”
It was rare to arm staff and contractors, especially those that typically stared at code all day. The fact that it had been a special request from their boss, and specifically for the latest tech, had left Terre wondering. What bothered him even more was that it would have required top level authorization. Fredricks didn’t have that kind of pull.
Terre wasn’t as nervous as K, but that didn’t mean he didn’t wonder. His gut was telling him something wasn’t right. Even though he had been formally out of the loop, he had still caught wind of several reports of drones going rogue and attacking bases since Guam. Sometimes they were foreign, sometimes domestic. It seemed every major country across the globe was having sporadic issues controlling their AI. Of late, there had even been an increase in the number of reports of civilian tech malfunctioning.
In the weeks that followed the attack on Guam, US Military Command had managed to de-escalate the fallout. Chinese drones attacking US soil would be world-ending, cataclysm level stuff if the public found out about it. It was hard to hide international distrust and high-level reports of malfunction, but somehow the most deadly details surrounding the events had been concealed. Leaks had led to the revelation of glitches present in the machines, but only the most hardcore of conspiracy websites had come close to guessing the extent of the situation,
Terre had only found out through others on the base that it had taken intense classified diplomatic negotiations and hard evidence brought forward for scrutiny to prove that programming glitches, and not ill intent, had been behind the recent attacks. The glitches being prevalent across all global AI units somehow allowed for cooler heads to prevail.
But that didn’t mean the world powers trusted each other. Tensions remained high on both sides, with both the US and China skeptical as to whether the other would try to take advantage of the situation. The strain on international relations was impossible to conceal.
Terre had watched the filtered reports unfold on network news feeds. Internal tensions escalated alongside international pressure. Democrats and Republicans blamed the other for inaction while public pressure grew. It didn’t help that ’52 was an election year. Skepticism over the use of military AI units added to the larger automation debates; thousands of Americans were losing their jobs every day, and neither party seemed pressed to do anything about it. Terre rolled his eyes at the entire spectacle. He hated getting caught up in the latest news cycle, but there wasn’t a lot for him to do on the island. His superiors wouldn’t allow him to leave unsupervised as long as he was receiving the nano treatments.
He passed the time by running laps around the island, watching the news, and working out. K had spent the entire six weeks playing video games in the Commons.
“I’m just saying I wish I’d had a better look at the schematics.” K had been going on about all the reasons to be concerned, but Terre had to admit he had tuned out most of what his colleague had been saying.
Seagulls cawed above them. Somewhere in the distance, a freighter blew its horn as it pulled into the bay.
“I’ve been here for six weeks, bored out of my skull, without even so much as the code to look at. Don’t you think it’s strange that the same malfunctions have been occurring in different units? Across different armies? Malfunctioning in twos and threes? They’re all hooked up to separate Clouds. They have different software and hardware. It’s just strange. If it were a bug in the software, you wouldn’t expect both a Chinese bomber and an American cruiser to have the same malfunction. I also can’t figure out why it only seems to affect a couple machines at a time.”
“It sounds as though you’ve been privy to more intel than I have. Be thankful the entire fleet hasn’t launched itself at once. What are you getting at?”
“I’m not sure. It’s just weird. I don’t know how to target the bug if I can’t see a common thread connecting the anomalies.”
“Could it be a virus?”
“Maybe, but I’d expect it to affect each of the units in the same way.”
“Unless there’s a randomizer built in? To make you think that.”
“Perhaps, but that’d be one complicated piece of malware.”
“Have you ever heard of the collective unconscious?”
“Vaguely. Isn’t that the theory we unknowingly share parts of our psyche with the entire species?”
Terre nodded. “Carl Jung used it to explain how people on opposite sides of the planet came up with similar ideas at the same time. Like the crossbow, or the steam engine.”
“So, what does that have to do with the drones? Are you saying the same design flaws were developed unconsciously by different developers?”
“Well, they’re probably all based on the same fundamental programming languages.”
“Yeah, but you know that’s not how programming works.”
“Or they’ve developed a collective unconscious of their own.” Terre gave K a sly grin.
“Hah! You’d better hope not! But if your toaster starts to burn your toast at the same time as mine, you let me know.”
Terre pulled the door open for K and let him enter the brick building first. The Logistics building still sported its original exterior, as built in the early 1900s; a true piece of American history. Inside, though, everything was different. Modern whites and greys, and not a spot of dust.
“Hey there,” Terre announced as they walked up to the front desk. A young man, with skin a pastier white than K’s and a bright blue streak through his otherwise black hair, sat behind a semi-transparent glass desk, a smart implant embedded in the side of his skull. Terre still needed to get used to these built-in cranial phone devices; he still opted for an old smartphone. He didn’t even like the eyepieces most folks wore, preferring to keep the ability to put his device down when he was done with it. “Fredricks asked us to come here and suit up. He mentioned something about powered weapons? Maybe some phasers? I dunno. I’m supposed to ask for Matthews.”
K shot him a look. “Powered weapons? You never said …”
“Names?” The receptionist interrupted K's protest.
“Terre Hoffman and Kristopher Klein, both spelt with a ‘K.’”
“Sir?”
“Kristopher and Klein. Both start with a K. Fredricks ordered us here.”
“Ah, yes, here we are. I’ll get Samantha to take you to the equipment room.” The receptionist tapped his keyboard a few times and looked back to them. “She’ll be right out.”
No sooner had he said the words than a tall woman with short red hair and wearing a grey suit and white blouse walked down the hall and approached the desk.
“Terre and Kristopher?” she said with a slight Southern accent. “Follow me, please.”
Samantha led them down the hall. The building felt cold, sterile, and though it had clearly been renovated in the last hundred and fifty years, Terre could still feel the dank musk from the old building in his lungs as he breathed. The tiled floor was a glossy white, bright LED lighting giving the crisp white walls an otherworldly appearance. There wasn’t so much as a shadow cast. For whatever reason, they wanted to keep these halls well lit. They continued through a series of turns and corners, and finally down a flight of stairs.
“Where are we going? Isn’t the armory upstairs?” Terre asked, motioning toward the sign on the stairwell with an arrow pointing upward.
“The weapons Fredricks requested are Level 3 Classified. We keep them in a separate location.”
She brought them into an open white room that lacked any differentiating characteristics, indistinguishable from the hall except for a long steel table and an armored door at the opposite end.
“Wait here. I’ll bring them out.” Samantha walked toward the door, pressed a button on a display panel, and a beam of light scanned her face before the door clicked open.
“What? We don’t get to have a look at the rest of what you have in there?” K asked, eyeing up the doorway.
Samantha furrowed her brow and shook her head. “You only have clearance for a few items. I’ll bring them out to you.” She disappeared behind the metal door. Despite Terre’s half-assed attempt to peer in after her, he couldn’t see anything. Worth a shot, though.
“Why would we be issued classified weapons?” Terre asked. “Nerds with guns doesn’t sound like one of Fredricks’s best ideas.”
K shook his head. “I’m just a NASA employee. I have no weapons training. If I was told I’d be put in combat situations, I don’t think I would have agreed to my contract. But hell, if I knew robots would have blown my workplace to bits, I wouldn’t have come, either.”
“I’ve never heard of IT reps being issued weapons before. I’m hoping it’s just precautionary. But for what, I don’t know. And why classified weapons?”
“Because they will be standard issue within a week or two,” Samantha answered as she walked out of the back room. Her high heels clicked on the cold tile floor as she re-entered with an armful of weapons.
“Fredricks says he wants you equipped with them now, just in case we hit a worst-case scenario. He said you’ll be working closely with the AI. If something goes wrong, he wants you protected.”
“Protected from what?” Terre asked.
“I’ll let him brief you. Right now, I’m just here to give you these.” She held up two pistol-like weapons. With their sleek design and digital displays, they looked like something out of a science fiction movie. The pistols possessed a chrome-plated finish and a screen built into one side, and they were unlike any other firearm Terre had ever seen.
Samantha set down the pistols before swinging a metallic cannon off her back and onto the table.
If the pistols were unique, the second model was downright alien. Terre eyed the beast that lay on the tabletop. Essentially a two-foot-long chrome tube, the weapon possessed a deactivated, blue-tinted illumination band that circled its middle, broken only by a grip that protruded from both the top and bottom of the weapon.
“All right,” Terre said, swallowing. “What are you giving us?”
“Cyber Dynamics’s new tech line of high-powered energy weapons. There is nothing else like these on the market, and we have only used them in combat during a few missions.”
“Cyber Dynamics?” Terre questioned. “They’ve really advanced their capabilities in the past decade if they’re being awarded military contracts.”
“They’re essentially under our direction,” Samantha replied, the corner of her red lips perked up in amusement. “What they showcase to the public is all smoke and mirrors.”
Terre considered some of the tech he’d seen from the developer: a lot of cool gadgets, armor, and surveillance equipment that had been contracted to various city police forces. Nothing he had seen had resembled weaponry.
She held up one of the two weapon types she had brought out. It was large; definitely a two-hander. It looked like an elongated computer with a trigger.
“Don’t fire this one unless you absolutely have to,” she said. “The CD-52 Drone Surge, a portable EMP canon. NexGen3, so it’s compact, but its charge is more permanent than the standard EMP explosion. It will disable any tech within fifty meters of detonation. If you’re within that range, you’ll even kill the weapon itself.”
Terre had heard some of the theory behind NexGen3 technology, but only in passing. From what he understood, the charge generated by the device not only sent a one-time pulse through the blast area but also magnetized particles in the ground and atmosphere to continue releasing mini-pulses for an extended period of time, ensuring tech could not work in the area long after the initial detonation. The effects could last for decades, perhaps longer.
“Sounds useful.”
“It’s meant as a last resort if you have a drone—or worse—on top of you.”
“Define worse.”
“I’ll let Fredricks fill you in on that bit. Just keep in mind you’re only equipped with one shot on this bad boy, and you only have one to share between the two of you. If you fire it, you’ll cost US taxpayers three hundred and fifty thousand dollars, so make sure it’s worth it.” She set the weapon down. “And spoiler alert—you’re not worth that much, so you better be saving someone else’s ass.”
“Noted.” Terre gave a sideways glance to K. He wasn’t sure if he should be offended or amused. Horror filled K’s face. Since he had no way of knowing what they were getting themselves into, Terre took it all in stride. Outwardly, at least. Inwardly, he was thrilled at being handed such weaponry. Usually at a desk all day, this was the sort of thing he only daydreamed about, like something straight out of a spy movie.
“A portable EMP weapon?” Terre raised a skeptical eyebrow. "Isn’t a nuclear reaction required for that? What exactly is powering this thing?” He wasn’t a weapons expert by any stretch of the imagination, but he knew that sort of output would require a lot of energy.
“Let’s just say that information is above your paygrade. But this is all NexGen3 technology. We’re not strapping a nuke to your chest.”
K shot Terre a doubtful glance.
“So, fire this and the lights go out?”
Samantha nodded. “Yes, but the blast radius won’t be more than a dozen yards. The CD-52 rounds are high concentration and meant to be used only as a last resort.” You won’t be able to see the blast, but you’ll know if you hit your mark.”
She forcefully pushed the Drone Surge into Terre’s chest and he grasped it, feeling the weapon’s heft. Though it did have a bulk to it, the CD-52 wasn’t arduously heavy, and he tentatively slung his arm through its harness, securing the firearm to his back and praying he’d never have to fire the thing.
Samantha kept going, seemingly ignoring the concerned glance Terre shared with K. “Next, we have your CD-115 Blaster Pistols. These are more your science fiction type weapons that fire laser bolts. Much more effective against a drone than bullets would be. Fry their circuits, if you hit them right.”
“So, what’s powering these? Or is that confidential as well?”
“Nanowire batteries. The newly patented model should last at least a thousand years, as long as they don’t suffer any heavy damage.”
“If I live that long, I’ll let you know.” Terre grinned.
“With those nanos they injected you with, it’s improbable but not impossible, so I’d watch the snark.”
“How do you know about those?”
“I’m in charge of tech inventory. Every piece of experimental tech in stock from here to Cheyenne is under my jurisdiction.”
“So much for patient confidentiality,” K said.
“Welcome to the CIA,” Samantha answered.
She handed each of them a belt with the pistols attached.
“Don’t burn each other’s eyes out,” she remarked. “I’ve got some other protective gear here for you boys, too. Vests, eye protection, and what have you. Most of it’s just upgraded versions of what you’re used to, so I won’t bore you with the details.”
“What we’re used to?” K snorted. “I sit at a desk all day. I’m used to khakis and a polo shirt.”
“Welcome to the big leagues, kid. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some other work to take care of. I trust you remember the way out.”
Terre nodded.
“Good. Don’t go wandering anywhere you’re not supposed to.” She casually pointed to a camera in the corner of the ceiling. The warning was superfluous; Terre knew the entire base was under surveillance.
“Thanks for the tip.”
“No sweat. Don’t get yourselves killed.”
Samantha left the room with a cursory wave, leaving Terre and K staring at each other, loaded with more weaponry than Terre guessed either of them had ever handled.
“What’s her problem?” K asked.
“Who knows? After you’ve worked with the military a few years, you realize not to take things personally. Everyone is under a tremendous amount of stress.”
