John Ringo - Von Neumann’s War

Richard examined the “brain tube” of the alien bot that Helena had acquired for him. The twinning bot did not have a brain tube yet, but it did have a nucleus. Assuming that the biological analogy held, then a higher function organ would develop first in a fetus. This led him to the conclusion that the brain tube was not a first order function and that its “mother” was performing that function — whatever that was — for it.

He soon came to the realization that the government’s second guess was closer — communications. When does a fetus’s vocal cords develop? The electron microscopy and X ray data in the government report led him to the conclusion that there were pseudorandom semiconductor and unlike metal junctions. These junctions only appeared to be random. After several fractal pattern overlays Richard discovered that there was a methodology to the junctions. They were logic gates. In fact, the logic gates of the tube shaped device appeared much like the circuitry — but on a much smaller and more complex scale — of a transceiver system.

The tube was a solid-state software ultra-wideband transceiver — it had to be. That is where that spread spectrum signal must have come from. Without having a powered and operational bot to study there was no way to really be certain. But, it looked like the type of device that might have created those odd signals that he had detected with his spectrum analyzer the day the bots attacked the cabin.

Those signals were spread spectrum and centered about 1.420 gigahertz — the so-called famous 21 centimeter line from radio astronomy and SETI circles. Did that mean anything? Richard was formulating that in the back of his mind.

The government had been monitoring the bots’ signals for some time and a more detailed analysis of them was in their report. The fact that the center portion of their communications systems was around the band that hydrogen emitted and that astronomers thought would be the band that one day aliens would broadcast a message to us in could be just a coincidence. Horton thought it could be significant but none of the scientists and engineers from the government program had much to offer on that regard. He would think on that later. Right now he had more imminent and pressing matters; the bots were coming and he needed to find a way to stop them.

From the size of the microscopic conductor tube running from the power block of the bot’s interior to the transceiver tube it didn’t look like the bot was designed to transmit anything at large distances or at high bandwidths. At the same time there did not appear to be large receiver amplifiers within the thing’s systems either. That told Richard that the bots were not receiving direct detailed data downloads from these mechanized central city locations that were discussed in the government reports. Not unless the other pieces of the bot like the motivator ball, the power section and so on had some sort of magical communication system. But Richard did not believe that to be the case. His theory was that the bots communicated large data dumps through physical contact and/or short-range dissemination of instructions. There was also the possibility of the DNA including built-in hardwired instructions.

It was possible that operating instruction upgrades were installed each time these things flew to some central city location or since they were analogous to biological cells, perhaps when they reached a particular cellular density they would evolve. He was speculating there.

One thing he was not speculating on was the main reason for the transceiver tube. He knew what it was, or at least he thought he did. But he needed some live ones to find out for certain. So he decided to “acquire” some more of them. The government reports told him all he needed to know to lure them. The bots liked radio. Something about radio attracted them; he had been right all along about that. The government analysis of the alien spread spectrum signal emissions also showed that the frequency shifting pulses were not truly randomly shifting in frequency. There was a method to the transmissions. In fact, they followed a 256 bit encryption sequence. That told Richard plenty. Unfortunately, what it told him was that without the key it wouldn’t be likely they would decrypt the sequence by a simple hacker password dictionary attack. That is, continually insert all the passwords possible from a to z — not likely.

So, the government report suggested that they would attack the encryption algorithms themselves. Richard thought they might have luck there. After all they had the might of the CIA and the NSA with them, but a 256 bit encryption method was damned near impossible to break without the key. One note on one of the mirror sites said that hackers across the U.S. had combined forces to crack the code using a distributed system. They might even beat the government.

Richard had a different idea. He needed to watch the bots when they started “handshaking” and talking to each other. The handshaking was a simple process of passing binary code back and forth between the computer and the bot. Understanding an alien language was not necessary at this level of coding, only simple instructions would be needed. These instructions were to turn on or off certain functions and algorithms. It was simple ones and zeroes — math universal to all computers — that any code writer could understand. There was something about this handshaking that told the bots not to eat each other and therefore they must be passing the encryption key code. If he could watch them closely while they interacted with each other, he might be able to copy the encryption sequence without having to understand it. It was a long shot, perhaps. But he had used similar approaches to crack credit card company computers.

“We have lost all contact with Manhattan Island, Mr. President,” Dr. Vicki Johnson said calmly. The National Security Advisor had been with the current administration since before the President was governor of Oklahoma and they were good friends. Vicki feared that even speaking candidly as his friend now would not be enough to convince him what they should do. “General Mitchell and I think it’s time to—”

“No! We’re not going to nuke New York City!” The President pounded the conference table in the War Room. He looked at his friend in the eyes and shook his head. “I don’t care if that entire map of the world turns red. We’re not nuking our own cities.” He pointed to the continuously updated world map that showed the occupied areas in red. All of New York City including the outer boroughs were under bot control.

“Sir,” General Mitchell sighed. “It might slow them down. We laced the major cities with enough HE, fuel air bombs, and nukes to vaporize them. We might wipe out millions of the bots. But we would have to do it now before we lost communications with the bombs or before the bots eat them or render them useless.”

“What about our new fighters and bombers?” the President asked.

General Mitchell shrugged. “Sir, it’s likely that there are nowhere near enough to support an all-out attack against the bots. There are just not enough of them. We will use them to support evacs and defense of the redoubts.”

“Did it slow them down in China and in Russia and across the Asian continent? No, it didn’t. If we ever take back our country, I don’t want it to be so radioactive that we can’t move back in.”

“Then, uh, sir, what are your orders?” the general asked.

“We wait.” President Colby hung his head and then leaned back in his chair. “That is all we do. We wait and hope the redoubt scientists figure out what to do.”

Ronny Guerrero and Roger Reynolds were poring over the current intel data on the New York invasion hoping for some insight into stopping the alien machines. They were having very little luck. The two men had once only known each other through brief customer-to-contractor acquaintance and interaction. But over the last three years they had become coworkers, then friends, and now refugee scientists in a redoubt city hoping to find a way to stop the Von Neumann probes.