The Great Destroyer (29 page)

She had already considered that possibility.  “The impact is going to play hell with the weather, and the flash might have damaged whatever satellites were looking in the general vicinity.  Usually, the satellites would use infrared to track a target, but the Charlies don’t give off heat like a human does.  Between those two factors, the satellites are going to have a hard time tracking the Charlies for at least a couple days, I’d think.  After that point, they’d have to get incredibly lucky and look at the exact right place at the exact right time.”

* * *

“Hello, George, hello, Art,” Emma said, struggling to maintain a neutral tone.  “We have come to join you.”

The two Charlies had been through hell, but they did not know fatigue.  Immediately upon arriving at the warehouse in Pretoria and putting down the Igazis, they had gone into emergency power save mode.  Their batteries were nearly totally drained, and any further expenditure of energy might make starting back up difficult.  Takagawa and her team had wheeled them inside and hooked them up to a high-voltage charger.

After twenty minutes, George and Art had enough of a charge to awaken, though their mobility would be limited for several hours while their batteries reached minimum safe levels.  The other Charlies also had low batteries, but they had retained enough charge to walk themselves to the charging stations.  There weren’t enough of the high-voltage special chargers so that every Charlie could use one, so about a dozen had to make do with a standard wall outlet, which could take as long as two days to fully charge a Charlie battery.

Now, Takagawa, Jackson, Peskov, and Yazov were in what had once been the warehouse manager’s office.  With the two massive robots standing by the wall, the room felt considerably smaller, and the humans all stood as well.

“Hello, Dr. Takagawa,” George and Art said at the same time.  They might be more individuals now, but the Charlies still shared the same basic programming, and the same instant respect for their creator. 

George continued, “Thank you for coming to help us, and for warning us about the asteroid.  I don’t know what our next objective should be, but I look forward to discussing it with you.”

Jackson replied with a strangely respectful tone, “You and the other Charlies have fought magnificently to this point.  But now things are going to get much more complicated.  The Terran Alliance and Ushah will find out you survived eventually.  Our immediate objective has to be to resist any further attempts by either of them to destroy you.”

Art answered, “We will not be so easy to destroy.  If you can secure sources of ammunition and electricity and provide us with basic maintenance, we can’t be defeated on the battlefield.”

Art’s conversational style was getting more complicated all the time, Takagawa thought.  They hadn’t programmed him to learn human speaking patterns, but he must have decided it was a good use of time for his processor’s higher adaptation functions.  But for all that brilliance, he had only a limited capacity to understand the bigger picture.

“Don’t underestimate our enemies.  The Terran Alliance will make every effort to destroy us,” Jackson said.  “Against the might of two civilizations, we have only thirty Charlies.”

“The Ushah can rain down more asteroids,” Yazov pointed out.  “We must stay hidden until we are sure there will be no more of their damn boulders coming down.”

“Or we figure out a defense,” Peskov added.

George said, “But what is our
objective
?” making the last word slightly louder than the others as a way to emphasize it. 

A psychologist would probably say the Charlies were obsessive,
Takagawa thought.  The lack of a clear goal would be irritating to them, offensive at a basic level. 

George continued in what to him must have seemed a supremely logical fashion. “Survival is only important if we have an objective.”

No one knew quite what to say.  Jackson temporized, showing a flash of his professorial past.  “Our survival is a direct challenge to the Terran Alliance’s policies and a caution to the Ushah.”

Art’s built-in politeness stopped him from interrupting, but immediately after the professor finished speaking, he said, “Yes, sir, but what is our objective?  Stop the Ushah spread?  Destroy the Terran Alliance?”

Art and George must have been coordinating via text message who would say what, Takagawa thought.  George was more polite, and Art was more willing to issue a direct challenge.  Good Charlie, Bad Charlie. 
My robots have come a long way from telescope maintenance at Luna.

Takagawa was somewhat startled when Yazov spoke.  “Let’s destroy the Terran Alliance.  They’ve beaten our strength out of humanity.  Once they’re out of the way, we can stop the aliens.”

Jackson didn’t agree.  “The Ushah are a bigger threat.  We still don’t fully understand their capabilities.  While we’re dealing with them, we can try to exert some political pressure to replace Redfeather as First Representative.  We can coexist with the Terran Alliance if their leadership can act reasonably.”

“You’re all playing a very small game,” Peskov said with a wave of his hand.  He started speaking more quickly as his vision of the future tumbled out.  “We don’t need to do anything about our enemies.  Let the Ushah and Terran Alliance batter each other.  Meanwhile, we can go turtle.  We lay low in Pretoria and keep developing the Charlies.  We can set up a new manufacturing process here to build our strength while we make the next generation of Charlies.  Advanced learning algorithms, better pattern recognition—we can make it so they’ll teach themselves, become infinitely intelligent.  If Charlie IVs are like humans, Charlie Vs will be better than humans.”

“This isn’t the time for utopian visions,” Jackson angrily noted.  “There are very real problems facing us.”

Peskov shot back, “Look at George and Art right there, do you think they’re utopian visions?!”

The meeting descended into squabbling.  The human leadership of Project Charlie had not discussed next steps beyond saving the Charlies.  It had been enough of a challenge just to get the entire organization over to Pretoria. 

And now the Charlies watched patiently as the humans argued amongst themselves.  Emma wasn’t fooled at all by their silence.  They would be digesting every word of the debate, conversing with each other via text message.  The entire conversation was probably being beamed to the other Charlies, and none of the human operators would know because there hadn’t been time to reestablish the data links between Project Charlie and the Charlies themselves. 

What would they think about the prospect of being replaced by the next generation of Charlies?
 
How long would they let the humans bicker before they chose their own path?
There were too many unknowns piling up, and Takagawa seemed to be the only one who saw the danger.

She took a deep breath and shouted.  “Enough!”

Her voice was high, not optimal for cowing a room full of opinionated men, but in an instant, Yazov, Peskov, and Jackson were silent. 
The future of the Charlies and perhaps the planet itself hangs in the balance,
she told herself.

“I am not a soldier or a strategist, but neither soldiers nor strategists are equipped to decide about purpose.  George and Art are right.  A strategy presupposes an objective.  Defeating the Ushah, overthrowing the Terran Alliance are not ends in and of themselves.  Only Peskov has described an end.”

Peskov smiled, thinking he had won the argument, but Takagawa continued.  “Peskov would have us try to maximize the intelligence and abilities of the Charlies as the ultimate goal of our efforts.  We can rightly ask why that goal makes sense for us as people.  I love the Charlies as my own children.  I do not want them to be all powerful, however.  Power is not the reason I created them.”

George and Art said nothing, but they were clearly listening intently.  “The proudest I have ever been of a Charlie was when a Charlie III, with no individual identity but a number, risked his life to carry his brother to his objective.  I was proud because that Charlie acted not for power, not for an arbitrary human goal, but out of a sense of honor.  The Charlies are beings of dignity.  And that is what should unite them with us.”

The others took in the idea, and she continued.  “Our ultimate goal is to preserve honor, the idea that we will protect the good at all costs.  The Ushah may come to recognize honor, but at the moment, all they desire is land.  The Terran Alliance has abandoned the idea of honor altogether in favor of frivolous crusades against imagined intolerance.  Theirs is the world of the Great Stagnation.”

Her voice quickened.  “If honor is our highest goal, how do we maximize our honor?  I have considered the question, and the answer is simple.  We build our own civilization of honor.  Right here.”  She pointed to the ground. 

“We can fight the Ushah by securing land for ourselves and frustrate the Terran Alliance by showing them how humans and Charlies can build lives of greater meaning.  We can and should try to extend the capabilities of the Charlies, but at all times we must treat them as honored partners, as a different sort of people meriting the same respect we accord each other, not as slaves or gods.”

“Humans are not meant to live shallow lives obsessed with gossip and meaningless slogans.  And the Charlies are not meant to become emotionless, brilliant tyrants to rule over humans.  All individuals—carbon or silicon based—-should have lives of meaning that they can recognize as such. That,” she said in conclusion, “should be our objective.”

A moment was needed to process the idea.  Then, Jackson spoke first. We will begin a new world here, today.  Who will join us?” he asked, looking around the dingy office of the warehouse.

Yazov was close behind.  “I will defend this empire of honor from all enemies.”

Eyes turned to Peskov.  He seemed uncomfortable.  “I am not opposed to this idea.  Of course we will keep developing the moral reasoning component of the Charlies.  As long as we are also pushing to make them better, I will work on this project.”

That would have to do for now, Takagawa judged.  “George, Art.  You speak for your people now.  We will not force you to join this.”

She knew George’s processor would be racing to analyze the situation.  He and Art would be consulting closely.  One advantage the Charlies had over people, however, was the ability to make an informed decision.

“Two options exist for us,” Art said, choosing to make at least part of their deliberations transparent.  “We can go off on our own to form our own community, or we can become part of your new... experiment in rule.”

“We have seen treachery by biological beings, whether it was the Terran Alliance’s asteroid as repayment for our service or the Arcani pretending to cooperate so they could ambush and destroy Joan.  Some of us wonder whether we can trust humans at all, and I have been one of the most skeptical.  I don’t know about humanity generally.  But I know Dr. Takagawa and Mr. Yazov.  We will fight
for you
.  And in time, if this experiment stays true to Dr. Takagawa’s vision, we will continue to serve as its guardians.”

* * *

They went their separate ways back to work.  George and Art related the details of their encounter with the Arcani to Yazov, who took in the information with his characteristic impassivity.  Peskov and Takagawa went back to the makeshift research center on the warehouse floor, already working on reestablishing data and communications links with the Charlies. 

Jackson had stayed in the manager’s office to read the news, the better to stay on top of developments on the asteroid strike.  Now, he came around with news.

“Redfeather is now officially the First Representative,” he told the others.  “He’s planning to give an address to the world in thirty minutes.”

The office feels smaller than it used to
, Redfeather told himself.  He remembered the first time he had briefed a First Representative in this office, how it had seemed larger than life, a testament to the power and stature of the world’s supreme political organization.  Now, it seemed like a moderately ornate and somewhat tacky small conference room, roughly a ten meter by five meter rectangle.  The ceiling was high, at least.

The vote of no confidence in Flower had taken place an hour earlier.  With massive defections from the Peace Party, the Eldridgites now controlled around 70 percent of the representatives in the Terran Alliance Assembly.  It was time to announce the transition of power to the public.

There were only about twenty seconds to go before the camera would go live and his broadcast would be transmitted.  He had finally shushed his aides about fifteen seconds earlier, lest they badger and pester him with the latest calls from representatives around the world for information about the asteroid strike. 
Had he known what would happen?  Did the Ushah seek permission before altering the climate of the planet?  Were the Charlies all destroyed?

He was literally the only person on Earth who knew that the Ushah had indeed asked his permission.  When his advisors asked him what had happened, he simply said that the Ushah had wanted to know when he would be taking over as First Representative, wrongly assuming it was a matter of great secrecy.

The Charlies were another matter.  An Arcani forward operating base had gone off the air after reporting that two Charlies had showed up saying that an asteroid was incoming and they had been ordered to retrieve the Arcani Joseph Igazi and his family.  The operating base had stopped responding to calls a few minutes later, and the base would have been totally obliterated by the asteroid strike, his scientific advisors assured him.  The fact that two Charlies had known of the asteroid strike suggested that all the Charlies had known about it, and knowledge suggested they had made an effort to avoid their fate.

The Ushah had failed their part of the deal, but they could always try again, she thought.  And if Africa was evacuated, the Charlies and Ushah would be left to fight each other. 
So much the better.

As the seconds ticked away until his speech, he thought again on the trade he’d agreed to. 
It
will
be worth it
, he decided.  Yes, the asteroid’s effects would be somewhat larger than the Enshath had promised, but most of the planet would be fine.  The Eldridgite agenda would not be affected.

But what about those robots? 
The new Safety Minister Francois Russell (not Vanessa Chung, who remained his Special Assistant for Policy but who resented the promotion of her former coequal) had tried to contact Project Charlie to check on the status of the robots, but hadn’t received a response.  He’d have to have someone find out what the hell was going on in Houston.

“Live in ten seconds, First Representative,” a camera technician said.

Time for the statesperson face.  This was the moment his whole life had been building toward.

I wonder if this is what Tanya Eldridge felt. 
The thought startled him.  Maybe Eldridge had experienced the same thrill when she’d been on her way to meet the Ushah, but she’d been naive, Redfeather told himself. 
I have idealism and intelligence.  I am the hope to guide the Terran Alliance through this crisis.

A clock above the camera signaled five seconds until the broadcast, counting them down silently.

“Good evening, citizens of the Terran Alliance.  I am your new First Representative, Peter Redfeather.  I served as Safety Minister under First Representative Flower, and though I spoke out against many of ou’s policies, ou served the people of the Terran Alliance as best ou could.” 

That was about as clear a signal as was politically feasible to indicate that the Charlie insurrection was entirely the fault of the previous administration.  Good to get that out of the way before he moved on to other issues.

“Now, I want to talk to you about the asteroid strike which occurred several hours ago.  I am pleased to report that very few human deaths were caused by the strike.  Most of the dead were a small team of Partnership Compliance Group workers, who were unable to react in time to evacuate to a safe distance.  I cried when I heard the news.  My thoughts are with the families of those brave volunteers.”  Most of that was technically true, of course.  They hadn’t reacted because they hadn’t been told of the strike.  He hadn’t wanted the news to leak. 

He recounted the basic facts about the asteroid strike, and assured his audience that there would be no meaningful long term consequences.  “The asteroid strike will have some effect on our crops, but the automated farms will have no problem adapting to the new conditions.  We will expand farmland available for crops, as well as greenhouse crops.  The current estimate is that such measures will avoid the need for rationing of any kind, though there may be disruptions to the supply of warm weather crops like oranges for several years.”

No one would care too much about the oranges, he knew, as long as there was still plenty of food for everyone.  Food for the entire world had been assured for centuries.  The automated or remotely-operated tractors, harvesters, and pickers had made food production almost effortless, and the population of humans had naturally declined to about an eighth of its mid-21st century peak.  Fewer mouths and an easy, massive supply meant that even a climate shock wouldn’t come close to starving anyone.

“In addition, I do have some good news to report.  We detected the incoming asteroid and discussed a reaction plan with the Ushah.  While we were unable to figure out a way to deflect the asteroid, in the course of my talks with the Enshath, the head of the Ushah people, a spirit of cooperation and friendliness emerged.”

Here was the hard sell.  “The Enshath told me about ou’s quest for a new homeland, ou’s hopes for her people’s future.  There is no reason that such a proud, noble culture should struggle to scratch out an existence on an island in the Indian Ocean when we have ample extra room for them.”

He made a mental note to sound less defensive and continued.  “Therefore, I am creating a commission to study a more permanent arrangement of living space for the Ushah.  While they establish the precise boundaries of our two peoples, we will begin evacuating settlers from sparsely-populated areas near their scientific outposts on Africa.”

Well, the commission
would
have to figure out exactly where the boundary between Africa and Asia was
, he thought, so it wasn’t a complete falsehood. 
And cities like Dar Es Salaam were sparsely populated relative to, say, Beijing.

“The Ushah in return have agreed to further discussions regarding trade, and I am confident that their new technology will usher in a new golden age for our planet.”

This was one of the few flat-out lies in the address, but it was that most important of political arts: an unverifiable statement.  He had spoken to the Ushah alone, and no record existed of that conversation.  Besides, all he had said was there would be further discussions on trade, and he fully expected such conversations would take place now that the Ushah would feel secure in their new homeland.

“We will continue to deal fairly with the Ushah, but it is time to turn our attention back to developing a fairer and more just society.  The past few years have been focused on needless—and racist—fear mongering about the Ushah.  Instead of focusing on our traditional strengths of equity and inclusion, we have been distracted by xenophobia and hatred of the Other.”

He meant every word of that.  It also happened to be what most of his constituents thought, and that was another good reason to emphasize it.

“We have before us the beginning of a true peace, a just peace,” Redfeather said in a stately, measured tone.  “The Ushah will have their homeland, and we will have a valued partner in our quest for equity and inclusiveness.  My term as First Representative will be devoted to furthering the dream of a society for everyone.  Because now, more than ever, people are more important than things.  Good night.”

Once the lights went out, he counted to ten, keeping a benign smile on his face in case the camera was unexpectedly still rolling.  Then he stood as Vanessa Chung came walking over to his desk.  There would be a thousand details in the execution of the plan he’d just outlined.  He was ready for them. 

“Where are we going to send the Africans?” Redfeather asked.