Ramez Naam - Nexus

"No!" he yelled.

They were half-carrying, half-dragging him towards the door of his tiny cell.

Kade thrashed.

"No!"

His ferocity surprised them. He slipped free of their hold and clattered onto the ground. They stared at this crazy American who wouldn't come with them to safety.

The slate was on the table, out of his reach. His crutches were by the bed, out of his reach. He tried to lever himself up onto his good leg and collapsed back to the ground in pain.

"The slate!" he yelled. He pointed madly at it.

Bahn grabbed it, pushed it into Kade's hands.

"Helicopter!" the young monk yelled, pointing up at the sky.

Kade pulled the chain around his neck up over his head with one hand.

"Helicopter." Kade nodded. "American helicopter."

Bahn nodded enthusiastically, tried to take his arm.

Kade shook himself free, jammed the data fob into the I/O slot on the cheap slate. Did he have net signal right now? Yes.

A window blossomed on the slate, showing the contents of the data fob. He hunted for the script Wats had placed there.

[Mass-Distrib]

His finger hovered over it. Did he really want to do this? He hadn't done any of the work to make Nexus 5 safe from abuse.

Images came to him unbidden. Narong pointing a gun at Ted Prat-Nung's head, his will the ERD's. The Dalai Lama, dead in a pool of his blood, murdered by his subverted friend. Sam's parents, their eyes glazed by Communion virus, watching her floggings, sending her off to be beaten and raped. He thought of all the horror stories he'd ever heard about DWITY.

People would abuse this. Monsters would use it for monstrous things. There would be blood on his hands, coercion on his hands, unthinkable terror and pain on his hands.

His finger trembled.

Bahn tugged at his arm, urgently. It was far away, another world.

He thought of Wats, of the way Nexus had changed him; of Shu, of her vision of picking and choosing who would make the jump to the posthuman condition, of her vision of a posthuman elite ruling over the rest of humanity; of Ilya, of her words to him on their call.

Broad dissemination and individual choice turn most technologies into a plus. If only the elites have access, it's a dystopia.

He thought of what he'd told Ananda just hours ago.

Because I think people would use it for more good than harm, he'd said. And because I think it's just good.

Kade's heart pounded in his chest. He was sweating. His whole body was beginning to shake. He could be dead in minutes. Dead or on his way to some deep dark hole he'd never emerge from. Was this how Wats had felt, just before he'd dropped through the ceiling to save them?

It was now or never.

He stabbed the icon with his trembling finger. God help him.

DISTRIBUTE DATA FOB CONTENTS WORLDWIDE? Y/N?

Yes. Fucking yes.

A progress bar appeared.

CONNECTING…

UPLOADING…

14 MINUTES REMAINING.

There was no way back. Whatever happened to him now, whether he died or went to jail, at least he'd done something with his life. Kade hoped it was the right thing.

He slid the slate under his narrow bed where it would be out of sight and let Bahn and the other monk carry him away.

"Target in sight," Bruce Williams said. "No lights. No movement. All clear on IR and radio."

Nichols nodded. "Commence operation."

"Roger that," Williams said. "Starting jamming… now. Jamming active."

Both Banshees lit up their wideband signal jammers.

"Deploying SEALs now," Williams said.

• • • •

In the cell Kade had fled from, a discarded slate flashed a new message on its screen.

CONNECTION LOST.

No one was there to see it. After a few minutes, the screen dimmed to black.

SEAL Sergeant Jim Iverson fast-roped silently down the line from Banshee One. His heads-up display pointed the way to Target One's cell. His team assembled around him. Together they crept silently, nearly invisibly through the complex.

Building in sight. West entrance approaching.

What was that sound?

Then the first dot appeared on his HUD. Three dots, moving away from this building, out the other side. Heading away from them.

Then more dots. Tens more. Everywhere.

The handle of the door turned. It opened, and monks filed out in their orange robes, bald heads, serene expressions on their faces. Dozens of them. Scores of them. Hundreds of them.

Bells began ringing, like the church bells of his youth. Bright lights came to life around the courtyard where they'd fastroped down.

Oh, fuck.

Nichols watched as Teams One and Two dispersed, heading for Lane's cell and the nun's dormitory where Cataranes was housed.

"Contact, contact," Jane Kim said. "I've got shapes moving on IR."

"What the hell?" Nichols asked.

"More contacts," Williams said. "All over the place."

Doors were opening on buildings all over the complex, spilling visible light out into the courtyards. Warm bodies were walking out of all of them, all over the place.

And then the bells began ringing. Great bells. Monastery bells. Ringing and ringing and ringing.

Lights came on. Floodlights illuminating the courtyard, illuminating the orange-robed monks filing silently and calmly into it, beatific smiles on their faces.

"Abort!" Nichols yelled. "Abort abort abort. Get them out of there, ASAP!"

He looked at screen 3. Becker was ashen-faced. The mission was a bust.

Jim Iverson's HUD flashed a message from command at him.

ABORT ABORT ABORT

Abort? There were fucking monks between his squad and the choppers! They were everywhere! He whispered back furiously at command.

"Sir," Jane Kim called out, "We have Lane on scope. Banshee One has a shot on him."

It didn't matter. They had to abort.

"Stand down," he told Kim.

"Teams One and Two both pinned by monks," Williams said. "Still stealthed. Lots of bodies between them and the zip line."

"Move the line to them," Nichols ordered.

A flash of light lit up one of the screens.

"Oh, fuck," Williams said.

Nichols looked over. Faces everywhere. Serene faces. Bald heads. Orange robes. All crowding closer. "What the hell was that?"

"Photo," Williams said. "The monks are taking pictures."

"Complete the mission," Becker said from the screen.

"What?" Nichols asked.

"We're made," his boss said. "Too late to change that. Take the shot on Lane. Grab Cataranes. Get the hell out."

Nichols was stunned. Complete the mission. But their orders were not to get caught.

They were caught already…

Complete the mission.

"Take the shot," he ordered. "Tell Team Two to proceed towards Blackbird's cell. We're go to finish the mission."

Kade hopped madly along, his arms around Bahn and the other monk's shoulders, letting them half carry him. He heard a pfffft sound and the monk to his left fell with a clatter. Oh, fuck. Kade almost fell too, Bahn barely keeping him upright. They rounded the corner, out of sight from the helicopters, and kept running.

"Where are we going?" Kade yelled as he hopped.

"Hide!" Bahn said. "Stairs!"

They turned another corner and Kade's good leg slipped on a wet cobblestone. His leg went out from under him and the ground rushed up. Bahn tried to grab him, overextended, and they both fell to the hard ground. Kade heard a crack from inside himself, felt fresh pain in his side.

Fuck.

Bahn got back on his feet, slowly dragged Kade up as well. Oh God, that hurt.

Iverson winced as another flash went off from another camera. He almost missed the message from command.

Proceed? Follow the targets. Roger that.

The HUD showed Target One forty meters to the north-west, but all he could see in that direction was row upon row of bald men in orange robes, hands folded into their sleeves, serene expressions on their faces. They pressed in close around him. He whirled to go around them. More monks blocked his way. He pressed forward. A dozen bodies pressed back. Another two SEALs were behind him. They elbowed and pushed their way through the press. It just reformed around them, pushed back against them. The mass of monks moved like a single organism, shifting and reforming to block them any way they turned.