Nostalgia Is Heartless, page 14
She freezes halfway up the stairs.
“Stress, yes,” he nods. “I imagine you’ve been under a fair amount of stress. Sorry about that. I hope it hasn’t affected your health. I didn’t mean for it to go down like this. It’s been a fucking disaster. You have no idea. I mean, I wouldn’t worry, you’ll lose it soon enough.”
“Are you serious? You kill two thousand people and blame it on me, and that’s the first thing you say to me? You’re worried about my weight?”
“Punch the puppy,” Mori says to the closest HOTROD.
The machine hesitates; it doesn’t understand the command.
“Shoot her,” Mori clarifies.
“What the fuck?” Matt steps in front of Quinn.
“I mean stun her, we’ve discussed this. Stun her, don’t kill her.”
The HOTROD raises its weapon and points it towards Quinn. She freezes. Her heart races.
The machine lowers its weapon. “She is pregnant,” it says.
“Nonsense. She can’t be.”
“Confirmed,” says the HOTROD.
Mori stares at Quinn. He says nothing. He touches his forehead, then he taps his lip with his fingertips and smiles.
Good lordt. There’s no way the math can add up.
“This is why you called off the wedding. Of course it is. You were in shock. Now I understand. Everything makes sense. Darling, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry I called you fat. Of course you’re not fat, honestly you look . . . great. Really, you do.” He smiles and gently taps his chest. “I can’t believe it. Well, I can. It’s true isn’t it, you are actually pregnant?”
She nods.
Matt, still standing on the landing next to Mori, smirks and casts his eyes to the ground.
“It makes complete sense,” Mori says. “Joining the spots backward, from the future to the present. Although that’s now the past, but you know what I mean.”
“Why are you here? Why have you brought these machines to my father’s house?”
“Two reasons—and trust me, I didn’t want to come.”
Quinn glares at him.
“But I’m so happy I did, honestly I am.” He swallows. “First, apparently you changed the message in the diamond. Lise was working on a formula for M-theory and—”
“I didn’t change the message.”
“Well . . . people think you did, so it was best that I came. Me personally. I was the best option. The others”—he scratches his ear—“well, they’re not like us, they’re not singing from the same sheet music.”
“Do you even know what M-theory is?”
“A theory of . . . everything?”
“Yes, a theory that unites quantum mechanics and general relativity. Trust me Lise was not working on M-theory.” She was working on time travel. “And these . . . people, are they Shun Mantra? You know it means Transhuman? They just jumbled up the letters. Shun Mantra. Transhuman.”
His lips tweak as he cross-references the letters. “You’re wrong, it doesn’t make Transhuman.”
“It does, and they’re crazy.”
“Yes, perhaps that’s true, or maybe they’re just peeling the onion a different way. Now, there’s also the Super AI-Plus. Niels says it’s his, and he wants it back.”
“You can tell Niels there is no way he’s getting his hands on it. Now, the G12 showed the mining in Antarctica. I know what you’re doing.”
“Transhuman only has nine letters.”
“It has ten.”
He counts them out on his fingers. “Okay, you might be right. But it means nothing, and all we’re doing is mining. The world needs metals right now. We’ve practically run out of everything—lithium, scandium, xenon. We’re doing the planet a service.”
“No, you’re not, and xenon’s not a metal. You’re creating a dynamo. There’s a spinning cylinder of molten iron under the surface of the planet. Why?”
He shakes his head. Fervently.
Steadily, she climbs the stairs towards him. “Tell. Me. Why?”
“Energy!”
“Energy? You’re capturing energy from the solar flares?”
“I can’t say anymore. I’ve said too much already.”
She narrows her eyes and steps towards him. A HOTROD blocks her way.
“It’s hot. I don’t feel well.” She feigns giddiness and grabs the veranda rail. “I need a drink. I’m going inside.”
A HOTROD blocks her way. Mori waves his hand, dismissing the machine.
Quinn enters the food prep. She knows there’s a laser strapped to the underside of the bench in the left corner, and she sidles along the bench and feels for it. It’s not there. The holster is empty. Interesting.
There’s another laser under the kickboard on the right side, just below the tea infuser. She runs her foot along the inside of kickboard, and again she feels nothing. The weapon is gone. It was there yesterday.
Her third option is a knife taped to the back of the cupboard where Matt keeps the vacuum-sealed jars of nuts.
She opens the nut cupboard and finds the knife. She slips the blade into the back of her shorts and makes a mental note to remove any weapons stowed below waist level before the baby starts crawling.
She fills a mug with water, all the way to the brim, and carefully carries it out to the veranda. She catches her father’s eye and tilts her head towards the storage area. He dips his head, indicating he understands; it’ll take them ten seconds to get to the bunker.
Quinn steps in front of her father. Matt pulls the knife from the back of her shorts. She tosses the mug of water at Mori and yanks the laser from his hand.
The HOTRODs step forward and raise their weapons.
Matt steps up, grabs Mori around the neck and holds the knife to his throat. “Tell them to stand down.”
“I’m dripping wet,” says Mori.
Quinn checks the setting on the laser and makes a show of moving the scale from benign to kill. She points the laser at Mori. “Tell them to stand down.”
“I’m completely drenched, there’s even water in my ear.”
Matt forces the blade against Mori’s neck. “Tell them to stand down. Now.”
“Okay, okay. Take it easy. But you can’t hurt me. I’m the father of your, your grandchild.”
“Actually, you’re not,” Matt says. “I will hurt you, and I’ll enjoy it.”
Mori flinches. He turns to Quinn.
Quinn takes a step towards Mori and points her weapon into the side of his face. “He’s right. You’re not the father.”
Mori sighs. “Oh, thank god. Such a relief, you’ve no idea. Kids . . .” He shakes his head. “There’s no way I want kids.”
Quinn scowls. “Let me make this very clear. The diamond means nothing. It was a joke. Lise wasn’t working on M-theory, and the Super-AI is mine. Now, get off our property.”
“Okay, okay. Back off, back off.” Mori flicks a hand towards the HOTRODs, indicating they should stand down.
The HOTRODs on the veranda lower their weapons. The machines positioned at the base of the stairs follow orders and step back.
There are two more in the field. One lowers its weapon, but the other takes a step towards them. “She comes with us,” it says.
Quinn and Matt share a confused glance.
Mori waves at the machine. “No. She doesn’t. Stand down.”
The HOTROD takes another step forward, its weapon aimed at Quinn. “She comes with us.”
“Laser down,” Mori yells.
The machine continues towards them, with its weapon raised.
“Rogue,” says Matt.
“Fuck,” says Quinn, and she fires half a dozen rounds into the machine. The HOTROD takes the hits. It shudders and crumbles to its knees.
Quinn sighs, relieved.
Then, in one swift motion, the machine draws itself back to a standing position and continues towards them.
Matt turns to Quinn. “Go.”
“You go.”
“Just fucking go!”
She retreats, walking backwards, firing rounds into the machine, then she turns and runs. The bunker entrance is in the floor at the far end of the storage area. She swings through the door and taps a button halfway down the wall. A hatch in the floor opens. Behind her, she hears Matt yelling, then heavy footsteps. She slides along the floor and drops into a chute that descends into the bunker.
Matt follows and the hatch behind them closes.
The chute delivers Quinn into a concrete box with meter-thick walls. This is the delivery port. The doomsday bunker is 200 meters down the hill.
Quinn flicks on the light in her Band. Ahead, she sees three tunnels. One leads directly to the bunker. The other two are dummies, programmed to collapse in one minute, along with the delivery port.
She picks herself up from the floor. She can’t see Matt, he is not behind her or beside her, but she is sure he followed her down the chute. She searches and in the dim light she finds him lying motionless on the floor behind the shoot.
“Oh shit, please be okay, please, please, please.” She crouches next him. “Are you hit?” She pats him down trying to find a wound.
When she touches his leg, he flinches. “Hey, take it easy. My thigh. Laser burn. Help me up. How long have we got?”
“About three seconds.”
Quinn helps Matt to his feet. He slings an arm over her shoulder, and they hobble across the delivery port and enter the tunnel on the right. Ten meters inside they pause and rest against the wall. Quinn switches off the light in her band.
“How long?” she whispers.
“Shhh,” he dismisses.
Then they hear them. The HOTRODs have the hatch open. They will be in the delivery port in seconds. Quinn wonders why the port hasn’t exploded; it should have happened by now. Surely, it’s been more than a minute.
She hears a HOTRODs skating down the shoot. Another follows, and then one more. There’s a heavy crash; they might have fallen or collided with one another. Now they are scrambling, trying to get to their feet.
It’s deathly quiet.
Quinn draws her laser.
A HOTROD appears at the end of the tunnel. It’s ten meters way. It looks directly at them; Quinn thinks it must be able to see her. She raises her weapon.
Matt places his hand on her arm. “Fireworks,” he whispers.
The house detonates. Quinn covers her ears as debris and dust fill the delivery port.
They wait for several minutes, huddled against the side of the tunnel, until the dust settles. Then Quinn switches on her light. Behind them, the tunnel is sealed. Matt throws an arm around her shoulder and they exchange a weary glance; both know how far they have to go. Together, they hobble down the tunnel towards the survival bunker.
“Everything’s gone,” Quinn mumbles. “Blown to smithereens. The tree, that beautiful tree, gone. Yesterday I hugged that tree and now it’s firewood. The house, all your books and music, gone. The staircase—how long did it take you to make that?”
“I’d rather not talk about it.”
She pauses. “Of course, of course, I’m sorry.” Then she remembers the birds. “What about the birds? Do you think they got out?”
“The birds are fine. Where’s Lupus?”
“She’s safe. She’s with Tig.”
“Where’s Tig?”
“He’ll meet us at the Source.” Quinn keeps her eyes fixed on the tunnel ahead.
“Surprised he let you come . . . alone.”
“Well, we sort of got into an argument, and I—I sort of shot him. I didn’t mean it. It was just a stun. He’ll be fine.”
“You did what?”
“I shot him . . . stunned, I mean, I stunned him.” She can see him staring at her out of the corner of her eye. “It worked out, didn’t it? We got out, we’re here, all safe, heading for the Source.”
“Did he have a plan? Because maybe there was another way. Maybe we didn’t have to . . . blow everything up.”
“No. This is the plan.”
“Really? Because I don’t know what sort of relationship you got going, but I’d be pissed off if my partner shot me.”
“You don’t have a partner.”
“Let’s hope you still have one.”
Twenty-Three
A dead chick, wearing a red dress.
MATT PURCHASED 100,000 HECTARES of wilderness northwest of Hobart in the 2030s, when it was still possible to buy large plots of vacant land. A decade later, tree-planting fever hit the planet and the “Tree Zone” land act was passed; after that, large parcels of unoccupied land were set aside for trees.
The land was expensive, but Matt’s music had made him wealthy. His most successful songs were melancholy tunes about life in the twenty-first century. He sang about climate change and the daily burden of too much sunshine, the eternal summer. He sang about lonely people living in crowded cities, and what it felt like to lose a job to a machine. The 2030s were a confusing time for the people of Earth. Millions of refugees roamed the planet, looking for a place to live. The property market collapsed, and quantum computing blew up the internet. It was in these years that Matt accrued most of his wealth.
He decided upon the location of the glass house after careful research. It faced east, capturing the morning sun (his favorite time of day) and overlooked a valley with a natural water source—perfect for a world grappling with climate change. But the crucial, defining feature of the site, and the one that drove his final decision to buy this land in particular, was its proximity to an underground cave system. As a doomsday prepper, this satisfied all his needs.
There are two connecting cave systems on Matt’s land. The first caves were formed by nature, honed by an ancient underground river hundreds of thousands of years ago. Then, in the mid-twentieth century, the coal mining industry hollowed out a complex network of tunnels, which are now abandoned. Together, these two systems form the escape route to the Source—a small, well-hidden natural fortress on the other side of the mountain.
Coal is dead plant matter, converted to carbon by heat and pressure. The mineral was laid down 250 million years ago, in the Permian age. In the early twentieth century it was quarried using the room and pillar technique—rooms were cut into the rich coal seams, leaving behind pillars, which held up the roof. Then, later, in the mid-twentieth century, the Longwall shearer machine was used. It swung back and forth across the wide seams, excavating the coal, while hydraulic supports kept the roof stable. After the coal was collected, the supports were removed and the roof collapsed.
The dark energy resource was brought on conveyor belts to the surface, where it was pulverized to a fine powder and burnt. This produced heat, which turned water into steam, which, at high pressure, turned turbines that powered generators. Heat energy was converted to mechanical energy, and the generators converted this to electrical energy.
The Western world wanted power on demand, and they got it. It made people rich, and it made corporations wealthy. It made people sick and governments greedy. It filled the Earth’s atmosphere with carbon dioxide, and the oceans and trees could only absorb so much, the remaining gas couldn’t escape. In 2050, it’s still there, warming the oceans and the earth.
Matt spent two years exploring and studying the caves before he built the survival bunker. He’d take provisions and a GPS and disappear for days, sometimes weeks, underground while he mapped the network of tunnels. He lived on site, in a mobile home, until the foundations and escape routes were laid. Then he built the glass house.
He knew they would come, and when they did, he was ready.
***
Quinn opens the door to the survival bunker. Anvil and Strat are seated on a large tapestry lounge. Before them, a small wooden card table holds a bottle of spirits, two half-filled glasses, and the Phaistos Disc, covered in dried insect snacks. Music—a piano tune–—is tinkling in the background.
Matt and Quinn, hot, sweaty, and covered in dust, pause in the doorway. They pause to consider the siblings in their refined setting.
Anvil squints at the two dusty figures. “Is it you?”
“Of course it’s us,” Quinn says. “Who else would it be?”
“Sorry, having trouble with distances. Up close everything’s good, but far away is still a blur.” Anvil leans towards Strat and examines his face.
Matt steps forward and stumbles. Quinn grabs his arm, but she can’t hold him. “Give me a hand,” she calls.
Anvil and Strat leap into action, knocking over the card table and sending the Disc and the bottle of spirits crashing to the ground. The bottle rolls to the side, leaving a trail of dark liquid across the floor.
The three of them help Matt inside and settle him on the tapestry sofa.
Using an automated locking device, Quinn seals the bunker door, then slides a heavy metal bar across the opening. She dusts her hands off; High-Tech, Low-Tech—the best of both worlds.
Matt collects the bottle and a glass from the floor and pours himself a drink, which he promptly skulls. Quinn flops onto the lounge next to him. Matt offers her the bottle. She shakes her head, and immediately changes her mind. She takes the bottle and sniffs the alcoholic scent. Wine? She runs a finger around the lip of the bottle and tastes the dark liquid. “Red wine. You have red wine down here?” She pours herself a shot and skulls it, then passes the bottle back to Matt.
“I got everything down here. Didn’t expect a surprise attack before breakfast, but we made it. We’re all safe.”
“Mori? Where’s the meerkat?” Quinn asks. “Is he here? Is he safe?”
Anvil and Strat shake their heads. Matt shrugs.
“We left him behind?” Quinn’s heart drops. She holds her head in her hands and stares at the floor. “Fuck.”
Matt looks sideways at her. “He was outside. I saw him follow you into the garden. I reckon he’s safe.”
“Shit,” says Quinn.
“Is there something you haven’t told us?” Matt asks.
“He can’t be switched off. He’s a Super AI-Plus, capable of replicating himself.”
“A new species, flyke,” Strat says. “Hope he’s not after world domination. If he falls into the wrong hands, then we’re all fucked.”
