Ramez Naam - Apex

A girl ran up to them. Then other people were there, first aid kits, tourniquets. Someone brought a needle full of some fluid.

He was screaming, screaming. There was so much blood.

She stepped back, out of the way. “Dear gods.”

Lu Song put his arms around her. “They can save him,” he said. “They can save him.”

It sounded more like a prayer than a statement.

More gunfire sounded from outside.

Zhi heard more screams, someone out there crying, plaintively, asking for help.

She looked up at Lu Song. “We have to help.”

Lu stared down at her, fear plain in his eyes.

She put her arms around him, buried her head in his chest. “I’m so frightened, lover,” she said.

He wrapped his arms around her. “I know. I am too.”

She felt it. Felt his fear. Felt his courage. Felt his immense love for her.

She’d never felt so close to him as now. To have him in her mind. To be in his.

What a gift. The gift of love, in the middle of hell.

She wanted stay like this, in his arms, forever.

But she couldn’t.

Zhi pushed back, looked up at her lover. “We have to help.”

Lu nodded down at her. She felt his courage and his love for her overwhelm his fear.

Her heart was so full right now.

Zhi turned, headed to the door, the love of her life at her back, towards the sound of whoever was out there on the battlefield, injured, needing help.

Then she heard the sound of gunfire again, horribly close.

Something punched through her. Her body shuddered. She felt her midsection go cold, like ice. She gasped.

Then the pain hit her, pushing aside all else.

Lu watched as Zhi turned and walked for the door.

His heart was on fire. His feet were paralyzed by fear.

She took one step. Two. Three.

Walk, he commanded himself. Then he was moving, following this woman who amazed him, who was so much smarter, more courageous, more giving than he could possibly be.

Then she screamed at the doorway. Horror shot through his mind as he felt her agony. He saw blood blossom, saw bits of her expelled through the back of her blouse. She fell towards the cold tile of the floor and he was falling too, to catch her.

She was in his arms, bleeding, in agony, her chest, her belly, a mess of blood.

She coughed, and blood came up.

Her eyes were frantic, searching his.

She opened her mouth wider, tried to speak, coughed up more blood.

Her mind touched his, with pain, with fear, with love. So much love.

I’ve never loved you so much,she sent him. And she was weeping in her thoughts. She was crying. She was terrified, but so full of love, so full of passion, so determined. Finish this, lover. Please.

“You’re not going to die!” he yelled at her, tears falling from his face, horror coming out from his mind. “You’re not!”

He rose with her in his arm. He turned, back towards the people inside the building. They could help!

“HELP ME!” he yelled. “HELP ME!”

HELP ME!

Her blood soaked into his shirt, spilled onto the floor. People stumbled towards him, in shock. He saw phones held up, and hated them.

love you…Zhi sent.

He looked down at her. I love you! You’re not going to die! You’re not!

Lu Song looked up again, at the people all around. “HELP ME!” he yelled.

And then her mind was fading, jumbling, melting into confusion, confusion of pain, of love, of fear, of hope.

Lu Song…

Zhi!He cried, looking down at her.

Of nothing.

Her eyes were wide open, staring at nothing.

Lu Song sobbed, shaking, holding her in his arms.

And then he fell to his knees, his lover’s body clenched to his chest, and wept as the sobs wracked him.

General Ouyang Fan, Minister of National Defense, walked back into the Standing Committee meeting room, his face grim.

They looked up at him.

“Our assault on Jiao Tong is stalling,” Ouyang said. “It may fail entirely. We’re being fought off by airpower from Dachang, in addition to the clones.” He watched as their faces paled, and kept on. “We’ve also confirmed that a facility storing one of the data cubes was attacked yesterday. Plundered. Su-Yong Shu may well be back, and she has control of one of our air bases.”

“Try harder,” Bo Jintao said. “Use every resource!”

“More units are mobilizing,” Ouyang said. “Time is the issue. She has taken control of an air base . Do you not see the seriousness of that? What if she can take control of more?”

“What do you propose?” President Bao Zhuang asked, his face ashen.

Ouyang took a deep breath.

I will go down in history as a monster or a savior, he realized.

“The ultimate recourse,” Ouyang said. “Nuclear attack.”

In Beijing, in Tiananmen square, Pan Luli falls to her knees, screaming. Her mind is in Shanghai, in horror.

Lu Song stands before her, covered in blood, shaking, his body wracked in sobs, tears flowing down his face.

Zhi Li in his arms.

Zhi Li is dead.

Zhi Li is dead!

“They’ve killed Zhi Li!” she yells. Around her there is shock, grief, hundreds of thousands of minds, screaming in horror at what they’ve done, huge numbers of them tuning in to the same few streams, some seeing the scene from the perspective of those watching Lu Song, some feeling Lu Song’s thoughts as they spill into the mind of mindstreamers near him.

Some replaying Zhi Li’s last few seconds over and over.

A giant angry scream goes up all around Pan Luli, the scream of half a million men and women who loved Zhi Li!

And then, more than a thousand kilometers away, Pan Luli sees through another woman’s eyes, hears through another woman’s ears, as Lu Song looks up to the sky, and screams himself, in rage that eclipses any he’s ever shown on the screen.

“BO JINTAO!” he roars, like an animal, like a creature in such pain it’s been driven mad. Veins bulge in his neck. His eyes are tinged in red.

“BO JINTAO!” he roars again, the cry of a man beyond hope, beyond fear, beyond anything but rage.

And in Beijing, in Tiananmen square, half a million lungs scream the name of the man who’s murdered his beloved.

“BO JINTAO!”

Pan Luli hears it all around her, hears it from every mouth of every man, every woman, every child. She feels it from their minds

Then, as one, half a million pairs of eyes turn, turn to the north and west, beyond the Gate of Heavenly Peace, beyond the soldiers and tanks and guns, towards the walled refuge of Zhongnanhai, the palace of the modern day Emperors of the nation.

And like a great, angered beast, enraged beyond its senses, the crowd surges.

“Nuclear attack,” Bao Zhuang whispered softly. “On Shanghai?”

Ouyang nodded.

“This is insanity!” Wang Wei cried. “She’s dead! We shut her down.”

“Shut up, old man,” Fu Ping said.

“Tactical weapons?” Bo Jintao asked.

Ouyang shook his head. “No. She is a kilometer down. Her forces control the surface all around her. Strategic weapons must be used. Even then they may not destroy her. But they will knock out her connections to the outside world.”

The blood left Bo Jintao’s face entirely.

Bao Zhuang spoke softly, “The death toll?”

“Twenty to thirty million,” Ouyang said. His voice was steady, his face a mask. Inside he felt sick with it. His stomach was rebelling at the thought. Could he kill millions of his own people?

“Better than a billion,” he said aloud.

“Is there no other way?” Bo Jintao asked.

“Authorize it,” Ouyang said. “I’ll wait until the last possible moment. We’ll do everything possible to win via conventional means. But if defeat appears imminent – if she seizes control of more military assets – then we must strike immediately.”