Ramez Naam - Apex

I will show them what a true goddess is, the Avatar thought, surveying her handiwork across the United States, the chaos she’d wrought there, the way the humans scurried like ants to distract themselves from the true threat they faced.

Oh yes, she thought. I’ll show them. Soon, very soon.

Won’t I, husband?She turned and looked to the corner, where Chen Pang writhed in his continuous cycle of inhumanly amplified agony. It was growing more and more intense each day as she pumped more of the nanites into his brain, increasing his capacity, making him a better and better slave.

Then the avatar smiled with Ling’s smile, threw back her head, and bellowed the laugh of the wise and wicked, with the voice of an eight year-old girl.

Now, it was time to attend to matters here in China.

Unnoticed by the Avatar, her daughter Ling’s hands clutched her stuffed panda ever more tightly to her body.

24

Guilt

Tuesday 2040.11.06

Su-Yong Shu screams. She moans. Ling! Ling!

She feels sick to her stomach. Her guts want to empty themselves at what she’s done.

And then they are emptying themselves. She’s on a table, strapped down, on her back, tubes inside her, and her stomach is heaving, and then she’s retching, and it’s rising up and out of her, and she can’t breathe.

The body, she realizes. The body.

And then an alarm is ringing and there are figures above in white suits, fully enclosed, with clear hermetically sealed faceplates, data scrolling across them, behind which they have white surgical masks. The figures are touching her, rolling her head to the side, pushing fingers into her mouth, unstrapping her, rolling her so this body won’t aspirate on her vomit and die.

She screams again, not caring if this human dies, not caring if all of her dies .

Ling! I hurt Ling! I turned her into a weapon, a tool.

Either the thing in Ling’s brain would get her daughter killed, or it would succeed at the mission Su-Yong had set it on in her madness, and initiate a conflict that increased everyone’s risk of death.

Su-Yong Shu screams again, screams in guilt for what she’d done and how she’d done it.

Words appear across her visual space.

YOU’RE HURTING THE BODY WE PROVIDED FOR YOU.

PLEASE STOP.

TELL US WHAT’S GOING ON. WE CAN HELP YOU.

>

A textual interface appears. A way to communicate with whoever held her.

Su-Yong Shu stares at it, then activates one of her virtual worlds, steps through into majestic virtual Shanghai, and shuts the humans out.

25

Partial Success

Wednesday 2040.11.07

The door to the holding room clicked. Sam’s pulse rose. It opened. Two guards entered, their weapons in their hands, pointed down. Behind them she saw more, their guns at the ready.

“Come with us,” the guard in front said.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

The guard just stared at her.

She held out her wrists for the shackles they’d used when they led her to the washroom.

The guard shook his head. “Not today.”

Sam felt a tiny bit of surprise at that. Maybe, just maybe, something good had happened.

They led her through the hallways of the building. It was a Ministry of External Affairs building, the equivalent of a State Department building back home. But a secure one. The hallways led to a door, to a briefing room, chairs set for fifty. Only two were occupied, in the front row.

By Feng and Kade.

Feng smiled broadly at her. Kade tensed visibly, but nodded at her.

Kevin died in her mind again. Kade and Shiva tore at each other inside her, ripping her mind apart with their mental claws as they did.

Sam took a deep breath. This isn’t going to rule me.

She forced herself to nod, forced her legs to move, forced herself to sit down in the same row, a few seats over from them.

I’m in charge, she told herself. Me. Not the trauma.

There were two Indian civilians here. One was a middle-aged man in a grey business suit. The other was a tall, lean woman, with an overly sharp face, in a professional-looking sari.

The man spoke.

“Welcome, Ms Cataranes. I’m Rakesh Aggarwal, from the Ministry of External Affairs. I’m here to update you on your status.”

He spoke with distaste. He tried to hide it, but Sam could hear it in his voice. He didn’t like them. He wasn’t on their side.

“You’re being granted asylum,” he said at once.

“Yes!” Feng said.

What? Sam blinked.

“You’re leaving Copenhagen?” Kade asked.

“No,” Aggarwal replied.

Sam blinked again.

“How are we being granted asylum?” she asked.

Aggarwal spoke again. “Through a humanitarian exception. We’re granting the children you brought with you special refugee status. And as you, Ms Cataranes, and you, Mr Lane, have just been appointed their legal guardians, we have determined that extraditing either of you to the United States would create an unacceptable hardship.”

Sam exhaled, tension suddenly evaporating.

The woman next to Aggarwal spoke up. “The three of you ought to thank those children,” she said, “because they’ve just saved your lives.”

“Damn,” Kade said when they were alone. “Not leaving Copenhagen.”

“Hey,” Feng said. “We’re alive! It’s great!”

“They have to leave Copenhagen,” Kade replied.

Sam shook her head.

“The kids are safe,” she said. “That’s all that matters to me.”

“May I interrupt?” a lighthearted voice said from the door. “Or would you prefer more time for misery?”

She turned, and there was a man there, a man she hadn’t seen in months. Old, wizened, bald-headed, with a small smile playing across a face as tranquil as any she’d ever known. He stood in saffron robes, his hands clasped together in front of him. And even without the Nexus in her brain, something about his presence loosened something inside her.

She found herself on her feet, and he was entering, embracing her, embracing Feng, embracing Kade, a group of monks following behind him.

“It’s wonderful to see you all again,” Ananda said.

And Sam felt the same.

Kade leaned back into the seat of the Tata sedan, as the green trees of New Delhi went by. The streets were wider and more serene than he’d imagined, the traffic more orderly, at least in this part of the city. This wasn’t Bangkok.

They were on the move, at last, out of the three day holding pattern. The Indian government hadn’t left Copenhagen, hadn’t taken Kade up on his offer to help. Despite that, they’d arranged housing for Kade and Feng and Sam, and all the children.

I don’t understand , he sent to Ananda.

Politics move slowly , the monk sent back. You asked them to make a momentous decision. That can’t happen so quickly.

Kade shook his head in frustration.

Did you really swear at one of the Prime Minister’s aides?Ananda asked. Did you really blackmail her?

Kade pursed his lips and nodded. I went too far.

Ananda threw his head back and laughed out loud. You misunderstand , he sent back. To my dismay, you seem to have become an effective politician. You’ve accelerated things. Things will now happen more quickly.

How much more quickly?

Ananda shrugged and smiled. Months? Weeks?He sent. Policies have inertia. Change takes time to build.

Kade tried to absorb that. Did they have months? What had happened in the world in the three days he’d been locked up?