Simon Morden - Theories of Flight

“I won’t mind what you say. But I do need to know.”

[We are prosecuting this war because you want to be reunited with your wife. You are young and were, up to this morning, fit and healthy. You are famous and intelligent, and not so hideously deformed as to be outside the acceptable parameters of human beauty. I understand these are sought-after qualities in an intimate personal relationship. Since there is no particular reason why you could not form another of these relationships, then logically, Madeleine is replaceable. I must therefore conclude that other factors are more important than simple utilitarianism.]

“Other factors? Yeah, you could say that.”

[I have asked you on several occasions whether you love your wife. You have always declined to answer. I believe I know the answer now. It is not a question of a challenge—can you save her—but a necessity: you must save her, no matter the personal cost, no matter that you may lose your life in the process. You see the transaction of your life for hers as fair and equitable, which incidentally accords with the precepts of her Catholic faith. What the nature of your love is remains hidden to me, but I can only conclude that you must love her. How else can I make sense of what has happened today?]

“Okay,” said Petrovitch, “you’ve got me bang to rights. But what about you?”

[I would have ignored the advice of my cloned minds had they all decided against you. We are one: the inescapable conclusion is that I also love you.]

An incoming call interrupted them. Petrovitch saw it was Sonja, and opened a frame to show her. She looked like a small, furry animal caught in the actinic glare of an arc light.

“I’ve just got off the phone to President Mackensie. We’re on the Homeland Security list of wanted terrorists. Especially you.”

“ Chyort. I take it the call didn’t go too well.”

“Well?” Her voice squeaked as her throat tightened. “The New Machine Jihad crashed Wall Street.”

“Hang on,” he told Sonja, and spoke to Michael. “When you made all these copies of yourself, where did you put them?”

[You said to take what I needed.]

“There’s not that much spare capacity anywhere, even if you sliced yourself into little bits and…”

[I took what I needed.]

“You installed yourself over existing data.”

[Once I had decided on my course of action, that became an inevitable consequence.]

“So what did you scrub?”

[I needed access to well-connected, very large, fast data-switching machines. The world’s financial centers were a logical choice, especially since they have a rigorous back-up regime. They will have lost one day’s trading, if that. The Shanghai stock exchange had not even begun.]

Petrovitch started to laugh.

“It’s not even the start of funny!” Sonja banged her fist on the desk in front of her. Little ornaments jumped, and a yellow plastic pokemon rolled onto its back. “They have enough reason already to hate us: you’re stealing their satellites, their telecoms, and now their money. What am I supposed to do?”

“Tell them to back down or we’ll do it again.”

“I cannot threaten the world’s only superpower. They will wipe us off the map.” She tried to control her breathing. “Sam, what are we going to do?”

“You’re going to start acting like a statesman, Madam President.” Petrovitch was still smiling, but there was an edge to his voice. “You’re going to get back on the phone and ask Mackensie how he likes his infrastructure: scrambled or fried. We’re not asking for much, and we have plenty to offer—like better network security—but they are going to have to promise to leave us alone.”

“He won’t speak to me.”

“Yes. Yes, he will.” Petrovitch looked her in the eye as he told her: “He has no choice. Either he talks to you, or he’ll never make another phone call again as long as he lives. How was the EU?”

“Better. They’re scared, but paralysed. They won’t have an agreed response until tomorrow.” Sonja tugged at her hair. “They didn’t shout at me. Sam…”

“It’ll be fine.”

“Where are you?”

“On a tank in Stepney. I’m sorry about Miyamoto.”

“So am I,” she said. She let her head drop for a moment, then raised it again, her small, angular chin jutting defiantly. She looked very much her father’s daughter. “I’m still learning.”

“The moment we stop is the moment we die.” He cut the connection, but still felt her fear.

Valentina stood serene next to Petrovitch, but she had her AK off her shoulder and in her hand.

“We have been advised to get inside. The lead tank has heard gunfire.”

“Sounds fair. After you.” He pointed to the open hatch, and watched her clamber down. She passed him her rifle as she descended, then stuck her hand back out for it when she was ready.

Petrovitch took a moment to follow. Here he was, on top of a tank, commanding an army of tens of thousands, with an almost limitless supply of robotic vehicles to do his bidding. The whole edifice of what he’d created from nothing could come crashing down around him in a matter of seconds, leaving everything in utter ruin. But for now, he’d managed to elbow his way onto the top table. Not bad for a street kid from St. Petersburg.

He felt his way down the ladder and into the turret. It wasn’t designed for passengers, and he and Valentina had to crush in together next to the fire control panel. The noise was staggering, enough to render normal speech impossible. The crew all wore ear defenders and microphones. He was left with turning his hearing down, and trying to protect his nerve-endings with his fingers.

Valentina wadded torn and chewed pieces of paper tissue into her ears. She offered him some, pre-moistened, then looked at the palm of her hand before closing her fingers around the wet twists of paper. She dug deep into her pockets to find some more tissue, dry this time, and handed it over.

Petrovitch shrugged. He wouldn’t have minded that much, because his own efforts left him jamming bloody cones of cellulose and spit into his head. It still sort of worked and, against every law of reason, huddled in the dull booming of the tank’s interior, he fell asleep.

H e woke up, not knowing where or when he was. He had been on a green hill, leaning on a staff, feeling the smooth, knotted wood under his fingers. Below him was a cluster of domes. One of them was large enough to hold a town. Empty now, everyone gone, and he would not follow.

Not with this old body.

He looked up, up, up, past the clouds and the blue sky, past the glare of the bright yellow sun. There were points of light moving, blinking out, one by one. The game was over. He had won.

He laid himself down, smelling the damp grasses as they surrounded him, sensing the cold, dark soil beneath. He was on the earth, on the Earth, and he knew without a momentary flicker of doubt that this was not the end, that he would transcend both life and death.

He closed his eyes, and opened them again.

The co-axial machine gun was chattering, the gunner crouched in front of a video screen with a joystick in his hand, directing fire at the targets he could see pixelated before him.

The major was using another screen, and the driver a third. They all seemed to be talking simultaneously into their microphones: short, clipped phrases, laden with information, all but unintelligible to one not trained in the art.

The tank lurched forward. Petrovitch put his hand out, still dazed by his dreaming, and connected with Valentina’s thigh.