John Ringo - There Will Be Dragons

She considered the “improvements” that had been made and thought, not for the first time but perhaps for the first time in a concentrated fashion, how they had been made. The obvious answer was “Change protocols” but that begged the question, what went into a Change protocol.

Becoming a council member meant far more than just being able to split your personality and survive. The first requirement of a member is that they have some fundamental understanding of the Net and she kicked herself for forgetting that simple piece of information residing entirely within herself. She had been studying the politics of the Council and information and power management for so long, she had forgotten that it all rested on the back of a series of programs and protocols. Change was the Net, upon a simple command “change thus” bringing up various resources and managing the Change. She called up a theoretical Change program similar to what Celine was apparently doing and then had the full process open up its detailed list of subprograms and requirements. Frankly, it was not as power intensive as she would have thought, especially if you drew spare power from the human body itself. That program was buried in the mix, a medical program for reducing epileptic side effects from botched Change. There hadn’t been such in a thousand years, but the program was still out there, hanging around.

She studied the detail of the process for more than thirty minutes and then smiled, sending a mental message out to her allied council members and summoning avatars for a meeting.

“I think I have a way to put a stick in Paul’s wheels,” she said with a smile.

Celine looked up in annoyance as Chansa entered her lab without permission.

“I’m working on a very delicate experiment,” she said, irritably, her hands continuing to shape the form before her. “Couldn’t this have waited?”

Chansa glanced at the humanoid figure in the hologram and grimaced; it was all hair and fangs with odd, floppy, patches of skin in places. “No, not if you want to be able to actually make a monster like that. All of the Change stations are reporting that the Changes have failed.”

“What?” she asked, waving at the design program to halt. As she did it flickered and then died. “That wasn’t supposed to happen,” she muttered, waving at the spot where the hologram had stood. “Genie, reactivate design program.”

“Unable to comply,” the genie said, forming. “Program unavailable.”

“What in the…”

“That’s what’s going on at the Change stations as well,” Chansa said, smiling at her discomfiture.

“Genie, diagnostic, design program,” she said then watched as the box unfolded. Four of the subroutines of the programmed were in red, indicating unavailability. As she watched, another turned red. “Genie, override lockouts.”

“Authorization required.”

“I’m a council member! I’m all the authorization you need!”

“Override, Celine Reinshafen. Set password. Minimum fifteen characters. Password required for each lockout. Authorization council members only unless further authorizations distributed.”

“Genie, this is stupid. Full override.”

“Unable to comply. Security implemented by five member Council vote.”

“Damn them!” Celine shouted. “Those…”

“What’s happening?” Chansa asked.

Paul looked thin and worn as the meeting members appeared, but for the first time in days his eyes were alive; the challenge presented seemed to have woken him up from whatever dark place his mind had been traveling.

“So the rebels are locking out subroutines,” he mused. “Two can play at that game.”

“They can’t touch teleportation or communications,” Celine said, fury in her voice. “But they’re locking out everything else. And they can’t lock out groups, they’re having to go through routine after routine. But they’re shutting down my research!”

“You can override,” the Demon rumbled.

“Yes, but it’s a pain. I have to… chant damned passwords over and over again!”

“Can we override the overrides?” Chansa asked.

“We have six Keys,” Celine said. “We can override them all, if we have a vote to pass authorization for that from all our Keys and get the Finn to side with us.”

“I’m not comfortable with passing authorization,” Ragspurr said.

Celine looked at Paul but he simply looked at Ragspurr then nodded. “Who would have this… extraordinary override?”

“Whoever is running down the lockouts,” Celine said. “Someone, some human has to do it. Not an avatar or a nannoform.”

“And the person could not be externally controlled in any way,” the Demon said. “I, too, would be uncomfortable with such an override. They could apply lockouts as well as remove them.”

“Well, I don’t want to take up all my time doing it, but I will if I have to,” Celine said, looking around at her fellow council members.

“The Finn has, thus far, sided with the Coalition,” Paul pointed out. “His day is coming, but in the meantime I think that it is unlikely he would support us.”

“This is restriction on the use of the Net,” Celine argued mulishly. “He will surely find that unacceptable!”

“You would also need my authorization,” the Demon said. “Passed to a third party. I do not so authorize and would certainly not pass it to anyone else.”

“Are you mad?” Celine snapped. “This is going to hamper us more than them!”

“No, it will hamper you, ” the Demon said, a note of malicious delight in his voice. “It will hamper me not a bit.”

“Pretty soon you won’t be able to summon a cup of blood to drink without chanting some damned password!” Celine snarled.

“Unlike some, I already use passwords,” the Demon replied. There was no way to read face or body language through the black armor, but if anything could be read from his tone, he found her suggestion amusing.

“This will not stand in the way of our ultimate triumph,” Paul said, standing up. “Ours is the side of right, and no one can stand before the right and triumph. We will deal with this as we have dealt with all the other actions of those who stand against the progress of the human race! We will defeat them, drive them down and bury them in the mists of history!”

Celine looked at him in surprise then shook her head. “And that’s your final word.”

“We will deal with this as we have all the other slights,” Paul said, leaning forward on the table. “They send their spies against us, their sneaking creatures in the night. Well, we shall send against them. If it is war that they want, then war they will get, they who have killed millions! Celine, we will not be able to overcome this directly, but we shall in the end. You must make greater strides in your research. If they will not come to their senses, then we must ensure that they understand the consequences! Prepare your monsters, for we will send upon them horror ! We must win this war for the good of all mankind and if we fail, all mankind will fail!”

“Oh, that’s easy,” she smiled brightly then looked over at Chansa. He was leaning back in his chair, a blank expression on his face, looking at the Demon.

“Easy,” she repeated, happily. Getting the programs functioning would be a pain in the ass, but compared to free rein to open up some of her projects that had been put “on hold,” that was nothing.

“Very well,” Paul said, smiling in triumph. “We will win! For all of mankind! Meeting adjourned.”

Daneh stood in the doorway of the house looking out at the encampment and then set her shoulders and stepped out. She walked steadily down the hill and into the crowds, occasionally nodding at people she recognized, until she reached the newer buildings near the town hall. Edmund had told her that somewhere in this mess Lisbet McGregor was running the logistic end of things. And Daneh was damned if she was just going to hide in the house.