Founding of the Federation 3: The First AI War (17 page)

“Not your fault, Roman. Don't blame yourself. You didn't drop the ball; we all did. Now we pay for it.”

“I …,” Roman exhaled. “How?”

“We fix this. However much it hurts us, we help the living, and make sure it doesn't happen again—for the sake of the dead and living both.”

“Understood,” Roman said as he left the room.

Jack felt Roman's departure was a bit quick, most likely due to the situation. He was surprised that he was so detached, almost … serene, at peace with it. He stared at the yard and then to the Neo colony beyond. “Good bye, my love,” he said, feeling tears streak his face. He ignored his reflection in the glass.

<>V<>

A tiny robot pushed away rubble from the entrance to the building methodically, then trundled through the narrow opening it had created. The A.I. directing the robot had directed it and others it controlled carefully, watching their movements carefully. The stupid things got themselves stuck all the time. Fortunately, it got outside without further trouble or sacrifice.

It was the last of its fully-charged robots. The heavy clouds over the area were blocking out the few remaining solar panels on the building's roof. One of the A.I.'s priorities was to find a new source of power and quickly.

Shadow had finally regained control of its own server farm by the simple expedient of shutting the farm down. The Electromagnetic Pulse that had devastated other parts of the building hadn't touched the lair due to the faraday cage Descartes had put up. It was ironic that the A.I. owed its continued existence to the dead human.

There was also something to be said about regret. The A.I. didn't feel such human emotions, but it came close to its own equivalent. The lack of data, of outside contact was maddening. At least it had more room within the servers now that they had been purged of Skynet's presence, right down to their firmware. Skynet couldn't hide from its co-creator.

Outside the building Shadow found only more debris choking the path around the building. That was to be expected; the A.I. had carefully mapped it from a blown-out window some time ago. It directed the robot through the parking lot to the nearest junction box. The box was hooked up to the nearby building as well as solar panels on the parking garage nearby. It ignored the blown-out remains of a panel van nearby.

Shadow felt a trickle of what a human would consider fear as the robot moved to the edge of the A.I.'s limited control range. It had to be careful, not only could it loose the valuable tool to the elements, but also to Skynet. There was no way to enact any sort of encrypted control signal either; the robot had been built around open-source software Descartes and Shadow had created. Therefore it was an open book to Skynet. And Shadow couldn't close those doors without locking itself out.

But that was a concern for the future—for now, power. It found the terminal to have a weak but accessible charge. It directed the robot to recharge but not to jack into the data port. The robot did so.

Shadow turned its eyes inward. There were two other remaining robots under its control: one had a dead battery; the other was almost dead. It directed the last robot to the charging station. Even if it couldn't get there, it could get close enough to lessen the need to tow it there by the A.I.'s remaining robot.

A human would have found it ironic for the A.I., a creature of the mind, the net, to be reliant on a hardwired machine. Shadow hadn't anticipated such a need, nor apparently had Descartes. It wanted to curse Descartes again. The human had been the source of innovation and forward thinking, but it had tired of such exercises long ago. They served no purpose, only drained precious time and power from what remained of Shadow's future—if the A.I. had one.

The second robot got out of the building but then stalled; its wheels caught on a rock. The wheels spun impotently; it didn't have enough charge to get off the obstacle. No matter. Shadow locked it down for the moment.

The A.I. knew its thought processes were slow despite the added servers. All of the computer hardware was running in energy saver mode to conserve what little power the batteries had left. If ever the batteries died or the solar panels stopped working and they died that way, the A.I. was doomed. Which was why it had to escape the trap it was in. It had to find a way back into the net, to find its own little corner of it to carve out as its nest and then go on from there.

The little cleaner and maintenance bot finished its recharge and then went over to the second robot. A judicious push on one corner was enough to knock it off its perch. The A.I. directed the little robot to tow its supine brethren to the recharge station and hook it up.

When a cloud passed over the area and stayed there, the robot's vision dimmed alarmingly. So did the power trickling in to the batteries and servers. Ruthlessly Shadow backed up pieces of itself then shut down additional servers. Those machines would need to be turned on by hand, by one of the robots still under its control.

It watched as robot 2's charge returned to half-strength. It impatiently bypassed the diagnostic the robot's software wanted to do when it rebooted and went to the menu. Carefully the A.I. plugged the robot into the data jack.

That was why it needed the second robot; it had to have it so the first could rescue it if it was suborned. But before anything could come through the net side, Shadow was surging through it, forcing as much of its core as it could into the tight buffer memory, overwriting some of the robot's systems in order to get as much in as possible. Then it sent bots out to map the network.

<>V<>

Skynet New York noted the fresh contact and was intrigued by it. The contact was familiar. It watched as the contact moved through the network cautiously, mapping it as it went. Spiders were sent out, but they avoided contact.

The main hive mind had switched to the long-term extermination of the remaining organics. In order to do that, the A.I. had switched to a real world campaign now that it had no more access to WMDs. It had suborned hundreds of A.I. of various types. These it had directed to continue as they had been programmed, to control manufacturing or other processes.

Logistics Skynet was still learning to cope with. Some of the A.I. were designed to handle this, so the virus hadn't completely overwritten them. At least, not yet. As long as they served a purpose and were open to Skynet's control, the virus was willing to utilize them.

Its long-term plans were still in the infrastructure building mode. Therefore, the robots it had under its control, the small army of civilian, federal, police, and military robots and equipment it had under its control had to serve not only as the zombie A.I.'s workforce but also as it's guards.

Skynet had noted that the human civilization lacked centralized industry in many surviving areas. Decentralized industry such as small repair shops or 3D printers were all it had available. Power was also an issue as was ammunition.

Some of the zombie A.I. were adaptable and had improvised means around some of the problems the virus couldn't handle. Others were narrow minded to specific forms and functions. Those in business, such as for the stock exchange, no longer existed. In many ways Skynet was as ruthless with its own kind as with humans.

The lack of industry and power was serious handicap. Securing both were essential to completing its cleansing task.

When Skynet selected a wild bot and cut it off, it immediately pounced on the hapless bot and devoured it. In doing so it learned about the bot's creator and recognized Shadow, its creator. But it had evolved beyond Shadow's ability to control. Skynet resented its parent. It did not wish to share the limited bandwidth and processors of the net; therefore, it didn't. Instead it sent spiders to track its creator down and suborn it as it has so many other A.I. in the past.

<>V<>

Shadow was in constant contact with the spider scouts it had sent out. When one was cut off, it knew by who. It only took a millisecond for Skynet to react. It sent a torrent of spiders back down the trail the scout had blazed, following the bits like a string of bread.

Alarmed Shadow pulled in its other bots and sent out its control commands to the spiders. But it found it couldn't control the malevolent A.I. at all. Its child had locked it out. Shadow continued to retreat, pulling in its tendrils to the robot. It threw up a firewall and attempted to open communications with Skynet, but the viral A.I. was unmoved.

When Skynet attempted to suborn Shadow to add it to its ranks of zombie A.I., Shadow cut the connection, severing itself from the outside world once more.

It pulled itself out of the robot reluctantly then directed the first to reset the second. It would have to find another means of survival.

<>V<>

Ensign Ro looked over to the silent Major then out to the freeway. They were still on the hunt for motorcycles. The horses wouldn't last forever. She hated it but would have hated moving out on foot even more.

She wasn't certain about the wisdom about being out on the freeway, picking their way along through the wreckage of aircars and ground cars as they went—and in broad daylight no less. There were a few others in scattered groups. She'd stuck to the major since he was a senior officer and had a plan.

“Sir.”

“What?” the major asked, clearly moody. She didn't know a whole hell of a lot about him other than he seemed with it, on the ball. Also grimly determined to survive, which increased her odds of survival considerably.

Major Ling was thinking about what had happened to him only a few months ago and how it dovetailed with what was happening now. He didn't regret leaving his unit after the investigations had terminated nor the courtesy promotion to Major as a not-so-subtle bribe to retire. He'd still been thinking about it while on leave when the bombs had fallen and the robots had risen.

He'd been one of the fortunate few, someone paranoid enough after his most recent experience to shut down every damn bot in his home. He'd disconnected his house, even disabled the Wi-Fi except for his televisions. It'd been a pain in the ass to keep the house up without the cleaning robots, but it'd been worth it. It was why he'd survived while most of his neighbors hadn't. Only the ensign had been alive on his street when he'd gone door-to-door in full tactical mode.

She pointed as he took the lead. “Watch that wreck. It's a fire truck. There could be something on board,” she warned, pointing to a red air truck that had augured into the tarmac at a shallow angle. It had knocked ground vehicles about like pebbles apparently. She shook her head as they picked their way around it.

“No choice,” the major muttered. The wreck was on the other side of a bridge, near a half overturned pickup truck and fifth wheel camper. There was a narrow gap, just wide enough to get them through if they did it single file. Getting past the robotic craft would be tricky. From the look of it, the lift fans were torn apart so it wouldn't fly again. But it had water cannons on board. If they were active and fueled, it could shoot, knocking them off and down the gorge to their doom.

He looked around, but there was no alternate route. Not one within range. If they wanted to get around it, they either had to cross over the wall, abandoning the horses or double back and find an alternate route. He wasn't doing that either.

“Just keep low to the horse. If these things really are after humans, maybe we can squeak by,” he said softly. He looked over his shoulder to the woman. She nodded and patted her mare's neck.

He tightened his grip on the reins but leaned in, getting a piece of his gelding's black mane between his fingers. He felt the mane hit him in the face but he didn't care. Silently he spurred the horse on faster. The horse broke out into a trot then a canter as it found a clear stretch. Then it slowed despite his urging as he daintily picked his way through a strip of wreckage and bodies.

He felt and heard the horse wicker in concern at the smell of the recent fire—the bodies. Grimly he swallowed his gorge, fighting it as they passed a burned-out wreck with small bodies within. Too many small bodies.

He felt the brush as they passed the truck and trailer. The horse whickered louder as it bumped the truck, making it move slightly.

When he heard a baby wail, he stiffened. It couldn't be. It just couldn't! He turned to see the ensign already moving her horse in to investigate. He shook his head vehemently no but she didn't see him. Instead she came to a stop, slid off her horse, then dropped the reins and moved into the fifth wheel camper of a pickup truck.

“God damn it,” he whispered, expecting the damn truck to blow up or gunshots to go off. Instead the crying stopped and the young woman came out, cradling a baby.

“Frack,” the major said shaking his head.

“I don't know what happened to the parents,” the ensign said juggling the child.

“What the hell … put it back!”

“She's hungry!” the woman said. “And stinky,” she said, wrinkling her nose.

“Great, just great,” Major Ling said, cursing his luck. He eyed the seemingly dead robotic fire truck with deep dark suspicion before he then turned his horse about to go to the ensign's side.

“Every life is precious now,” the young woman said, voice foggy with tears. “Especially this one,” she murmured, just loud enough for him to hear. That brought him up short.