CHAPTER 1
Cairo, Egypt
June 2099
1950 hours local
Detective Inspector Bassam Faraj leaned on the horn and waved impatiently at the river of humanity clogging lower Ramses Street. Donkey carts clattered by, piled high with bedding and pots and pans, while stray sheep nuzzled at piles of rubbish along the gutters. The Bulaq was jammed with a million people this early evening as an acrid haze settled over the quarter, a haze compounded of gasoline fumes, sand blown in from the desert and greasy smoke from mutton kebabs cooked over hundreds of curbside stalls.
And probably a few bot swarms as well, Faraj thought to himself. His partner, Lieutenant Fu’ad Khaldun, leaned out the window of the police cruiser and shouted.
“Move your asses! We’re on a call here--!!”
A pedicab scooted off to the right with a loud bleat of its horn and some fist-shaking by the driver. On the other side, a flatbed truck was half blocking the street, a lone camel reclining in the back, lazily chewing its cud, batting eyelashes at passersby.
“It’s no use—“Faraj decided out loud. “I’ll duck into this alley and try to go around.”
With a jerk of the wheel, they veered off down a dim potholed passageway, barely wide enough for the car. In the distance, a gang of boys kicked a ball back and forth while overhead linen flapped in the breezes from lines strung across the alley. The cruiser bounced along for several hundred meters, Faraj blasting his way through with the horn and sirens.
“Turn here—“ Khaldun pointed left. “It’s the next block, I think.” He consulted a tiny nav screen on his wristpad. The coordinates flashed red as he counted down the distance.
Less than twenty minutes before, a frantic call had come into El Hussinieh station. Dispatch had an hysterical woman on the line…it was hard to pick out her words from her shrieks—it’s Mustafa…angels swarmed him…he wasn’t doing anything…the bots came and now he’s gone…what am I to do!...I have eight mouths to feed…I’m just a poor woman—“
Captain Said had been firm. “Get over there…third time this week…the bugs are on the move again…and you’d better contact Sanctuary Patrol too….”
There was a knot of fellahin gathered around the dingy apartment entrance when Faraj braked to a stop.
The two officers got out and surveyed the scene. There was a woman, late thirties perhaps, balling her head off beside a wheeled cart in the center of the crowd. Her name was Salifa Sultan and she was kneeling on the pavement, groping around for something lost.
“What happened here?” Faraj asked.
Neighbors comforted Salifa. A thin elderly man cloaked in a white cotton galabiyah explained.
“Mustafa…he was a good man. This was his cart—“
“They got him!’ piped up a small boy next to the man. “The bugs…a big swarm. Like the djinn. One minute, he’s pushing the cart. Then…poof!” The boy’s eyes widened as he gestured.
“Angels—“ added a nearby woman. “They got loose—“ she dabbed at a tear rolling down her cheek. “Poor Mustafa—“ she bent to comfort Salifa.
Faraj looked around. It was a typical alley in the Bulaq: dim, trash piles everywhere, goats and sheep wandering from one gutter to another. To Khaldun: “Check it out. I’ll get her statement.”
Khaldun ejected a pair of scanflies from a capsule on his waist belt. The minuscule entomopters buzzed off into the haze, scouring the alley up and down. Khaldun read off the results in his wristpad.
“Just like the others, Inspector—“ he announced. “Reading high thermals…lots of atom fluff, mostly radicals. Residual EM, lots of bond breaking, it looks like. Something big got disassembled here…and recently.”
Faraj scuffed his shoes through a pile of dust on the ground, wondering. “Like a cart vendor, maybe. This is beginning to get old.” To the gathered neighbors: “You’ve got bad fabs around here, don’t you realize that? That’s why we’ve got regulations…so you won’t get hurt.” He bent down to a nearly prostrate Salifa. “You got a photo or something of your husband’s I can look at?”
Salifa dug into the folds of her black robe. She took out a small pendant on a chain. “From our wedding…a gift—“ Reluctantly, she dropped the pendant in Faraj’s hand.
“Fu’ad, scan this too...we’ll have to get a DNA match, if there’s enough left.”
Faraj checked out the apartment. There it was…right inside the door. The fab console was in the front room. He didn’t have to examine very closely to see what had happened.
Containment breach, he decided, mentally writing the report he would soon have to file. The fellahin had no concept of how to keep assembler bots in containment. They scrimped and scraped and saved up enough to buy a fab from some dealer on the street; Bulaq and all of Cairo was full of them. It was always the same. They carted the fab home, dialed in some specs, fed the bugs inside what they wanted—hell, anything could serve as feedstock these days—pressed a few buttons and like Aladdin’s Lamp, their dreams came true…assembled from raw stock, dripping wet, a new cart, some new clothes, a vid console, maybe even a jetcab.
Only something always went wrong. A wiring error, a sticky valve, a leak. To your average fab lord or hacker, normal safety and containment precautions were just a bunch of big words. The capsule leaked. Maybe the buyer was just curious. I wonder what this doodad does? The fellahin were good with their hands. They could fix or jerry-rig anything. But once the bots inside the core got out—
Salifa was still wailing and sobbing outside. Bassam Faraj video’ed everything he could for the case files, then went back to the widow. Khaldun was still scanning the alley, but he came back when Faraj waved at him.
“Ma’am, how long ago did this happen?”
Salifa rubbed at raw and red eyes under her veil. “An hour…now what am I supposed to do?” Two of her boys came up and hugged her robe. “So many mouths to feed….”
Should have spent your money on food, lady, not some jalopy fabricator, he wanted to say but didn’t.
“I’ll have to call this in,” Faraj told her. “And we’ll have to sweep your place…to make sure. You got a place to stay?”
Neighbors offered to take in her children.
“Bag the cart,” Faraj told his deputy. “I’ll contact Sanctuary Patrol.”
He made the call and started on his report, tapping on his wristpad.
Khaldun pulled out his MOB dispenser and primed it. The Mobility Obstruction Barrier would drop an impenetrable screen of linked nanobotic mesh around the cart. Forensics and evidence. Faraj intended to do everything by the book.
“You think it was ANAD, Inspector? Or just bad fab bots?”
“Doesn’t matter,” Faraj told him. “Regulations say we bag and tag.”
Just as Khaldun discharged the dispenser and a mist of bots formed over the old vendor’s cart, another car came bumping into the alley. It bore the blue and white logo of UN Sanctuary Patrol. Two agents got out.
Jacques Dordain and Clement Uttley introduced themselves.
“Got a call about twenty minutes ago, so we came right away.” Dordain directed his partner to recon the alley. Uttley probed the air with a sniffer, kicked at dirt piles in a few corners. “Bugs are getting bolder, I see. Haven’t found any this deep inside the city in months.”
Faraj checked the seal on the old vendor’s cart and found it firm. “Evidence,” he announced. He related the story from Salifa Sultan. “Looks like a bad fab with a burst core to me. We haven’t found any evidence of ANAD infiltration.”
Dordain cracked a faint smile. “And you won’t, Inspector. Bugs are too good now. Hell, half the people around you could be angels. Even with a decent scan, you can’t always tell.”
Faraj had already taken an instant dislike to this officious prick. UN weenies figured they knew everything. Cairo police cooperated with SP out of courtesy; rare was the case that the locals couldn
’t handle. But he knew there was some truth to Dordain’s jibe. ANAD-style bots had been percolating northward from the East African Sanctuary for months now. He’d seen the intel himself.
Before he could go over the evidence with Dordain, a commotion broke out at the far end of the alley. There were shouts. Dogs started running.
“Mustafa!”
Salifa took off too. Faraj followed her to the end of the block and found a knot of people gathered around a scruffy black bearded man in a dingy galabiyah. Faraj watched in amazement as Salifa cried out.
“Mustafa—Mustafa--!”
It was her husband. The cart vendor himself had somehow shown up, looking pretty fit and healthy for someone supposedly swarmed and reduced to atom fluff. Faraj’s eyes narrowed as he approached. Dordain and Uttley were right behind him.
Two dogs jumped up on Mustafa, but lost their footing and fell back, whining. They barked, growled and backed off, baring their teeth at the vendor. Mustafa backed away, holding up his hands, pleading.
“Hajji…” someone yelled and grabbed the mutt by the scruff of the neck. “Tahri…come here!”
Dordain stopped short, reached out and grabbed Faraj by the arm. “Hold up, Inspector. Did you see what just happened? Don’t get too close.”
Faraj stopped short. He could see Mustafa was keeping his distance. Even as Salifa, his wife, approached, he was backpedaling, smiling and nodding, fending off the crowd.
“What the hell—“
Dordain motioned Uttley to come up. The SP agent already his scancorder out and was sniffing the air. Faraj noticed the screen was flashing red lights all over.
“Your scanflies won’t pick this up,” Dordain explained. “But Uttley’s can…it’s tuned correctly.” Both agents clucked and h’mmmed over the screen display. “Third incident like this in the last two weeks.”
Faraj couldn’t believe what he was seeing. “So he’s not what he seems? His wife sure seems to think it’s her husband.”
“An angel,” Dordain pronounced. “And a damned good one. Para-human swarm of nanobotic assemblers. Configured to resemble a living human being.”
Faraj had seen them before. Bulaq…hell, most of Cairo was full of them. But most angels were like apparitions, like ghosts. Usually, the swarm couldn’t config tightly enough. There was a fuzziness to the swarm and you could hear it too, that faint keening buzz if you got close enough. People bought them and borrowed them and tried creating them from their fabs, for all kinds of things: companions, advisors, dead lovers, sex slaves, you name it.
But this—
“He…it looks real enough…even the wife is fooled.”
“Probably not for long,” Dordain was sure. “See how he won’t let anyone touch him. Tactile simulation hasn’t been quite worked out. The swarms are improving fast, I’ll give them that. It won’t be long. But what you’re looking at is no cart vendor. The real one’s atom fluff, just like you said. This is an angel, pure and simple. A good one. But just a cloud of bugs.”
“I’ll try to bump him,” Uttley offered. He extracted a small capsule from a pocket. With his thumb, he primed the device, then hid it in the folds of his pants leg. Uttley eased forward, working his way through the crowd.
Faraj watched as Uttley managed to make it to the inner circle, then as Mustafa whirled to fend off a couple of shouting young boys, ready to leap into his arms, he twisted and shuffled toward the SP agent.
Uttley extended the capsule and took an almost invisible swipe with his hand. He fingered the capsule shut and pulled it back into his coat pocket in one smooth motion, then slid back into the crowd. It was apparent to Bassam Faraj that this SP agent was a seasoned pro. He had done this before. Moments later, Uttley emerged from the crowd.
Dordain motioned him up onto a shadowy porch nearby. “We can do some quick forensics here.”
He took Uttley’s capsule and inserted it into a small port on the scancorder. The thing bleeped and blirped and graphs danced across the screen. “Good grab, Utt. Lots of molecules. Certainly not human. Not even close.”
Uttley pointed to one particular trace. “Swarms are getting better, Captain. See the skin mesh? The whole config’s closer and closer to normal.” Faraj saw that all the traces were well mirrored with other traces. “In a year, maybe less…this analysis won’t be able to tell the difference.”
Faraj watched the angel “Mustafa” continuing to laugh, fending off his neighbors, backing away from the crowd, while Salifa came at him with open arms.
“She may not even care if he’s a swarm,” Dordain figured. “The real Mustafa could have died years ago. Maybe she created an angel so she could have a ‘husband’ again, and something got bollixed up with the config. Happens all the time.”
“Then why phone it in?” Faraj asked.
“Sometimes, you can con a new fab out of the government if something happened to yours. Depends on who you know—“ Dordain rolled his fingers in the universal gesture of a bribe. “And how much you’ve got.”
“What does it mean?” Faraj wondered just what the hell he would write in his report now. Maybe he wouldn’t even file a report. Life was different in the Bulaq. What could his superiors really say? As long as El Hussiniah made its quota of cases….
Dordain shrugged, pocketed the scancorder. He rubbed his eyes wearily. “It means the bots aren’t staying in their sanctuaries, like the treaties require. They’re filtering out. North, east, west, everywhere. And there’s not much we can do about it.”
Faraj and Dordain exchanged glances, Cairo cop with Sanctuary Patrol agent.
What could they do about it? Faraj wondered. He motioned Khaldun back to their car. Bulaq was Bulaq. Fellahin were fellahin. People were people. Everywhere you looked, that was true. People wanted better things, better lives. Give them fabs and they tried to make their lives better. It was that simple. Fabs could make just about anything. ANAD technology had seen to that. New clothes, new vids, new husbands and lovers…it was all just a matter of slinging atoms together into some kind of config.
If what Dordain said was true and the swarms supposedly confined to the East African Sanctuary were infiltrating north, then all bets were off.
Faraj started up the patrol car and backed out of the alley, uneasy and deep in thought.
Interactions Log
File No. 128874.6
C.F.A.A. (DocII)
Interaction Targets: 1. Winger, Colonel J. A.
Interaction Mode: Acoustic, voice synthetic V-22
Date: 6.2.99
Start Time: 151500
End Time: 152230
Output File (text analysis):
There are agreements called Containment Laws…this entity complies with such agreements as long as there is no conflict with the Prime Key>>
“But that’s what I’m saying,” Souvranamh insisted. “There is a conflict. Unless I misunderstand the Prime Key, you can’t possibly complete module one while humans exist on this planet. Isn’t that true?”
>>Module one requires all multi-cellular life forms inhabiting this planet to be eliminated… statement=true>>
“Exactly,” Souvranamh said. “And there’s no better or faster way to execute this module than to expand your territory. I can help with that. Give me control of some of your swarms…give me a small batch, with all the abilities and all the doodads you’ve got. I’ll sweep this whole continent clean in less than a year.”
>>Conditions must be acceptable for future actions. Re-configuration of the environment, evolution of altered life forms, and integration with host must follow in order. Your proposal violates two hundred and eleven conditions for executing modules two, three and four. Violation of Prime Key…this proposal is negated>>
Souvranamh glanced at Fatima. Her look said it all: how the hell do you make a deal with these things?
“Look—why don’t you con
sult with your…er, elders. Your home world, your commanders, whatever you call them? All I’m asking is a chance…haven’t I done everything I promised? We had an agreement—“
>>Your proposal has been communicated…analysis is proceeding…the Central Entity will respond in time>>
Souvranamh took a deep breath. Config Zero had now swollen to occupy most of the cavern, filling every corner, every recess. Even the opening had been blocked by tendrils of the swarm. They were effectively trapped.
“The Central Entity…that’s your home base? How far away is that? How long does it take to get directions?”
For a few moments, the swarm said and did nothing. It drifted like a light mist filled with fireflies, flicking on and off, an amorphous cloud of nanoscale assemblers organized with pattern and complexity and density unimaginable to any human nanosystem engineer. Souvranamh had heard discussions from fab lords and atomgrabbers that Red Hammer had hired that it was possible for some swarms to exceed the neural complexity of the human brain, in terms of connections and possible patterns and pathways, in fact, exceed the human mind by orders of magnitude. Souvranamh couldn’t help feeling he was watching the very essence of thought itself, played out in front of his eyes.
>>The Central Entity is all that exists…the sum…the primary pattern…the initial and final state…the aggregate of all entities…communication is established through what you call quantum states>>
“Right…the quantum coupler. I almost forgot.” In fact, Souvranamh knew perfectly well that the quantum coupler was one of many technical achievements Red Hammer had swiped from the archives of the Old Ones, or the Central Entity, as Config Zero referred to it. For nearly two decades, through the Keeper portal beneath the Paryang monastery in the mountains of Tibet, Red Hammer had been able to troll through these archives and download amazing stuff, including the basics of how to send messages and signals encoded in quantum states. That alone had revolutionized communication systems around the world, and even beyond.
Souvranamh was about to ask about the archives again, but Config Zero suddenly brightened noticeably, as if a flare had gone off inside the swarm. The mist grew agitated, stirring with unseen forces. It expanded even further, filling the cavern to stifling, smothering density. Souvranamh heard Fatima cough and swat at bots circling around her head and face, like mosquitoes.
>>Your proposal has been communicated to the Central Entity…it is deemed in accordance with the Prime Key…limited excursions of large swarm formations outside sanctuary boundaries are within program specifications and further the completion of module one>> The Config Zero swarm swirled about Souvranamh’s head and began thickening into a denser cloud of bots right in front of him.
Souvranamh batted instinctively at the gathering horde. “What’s happening—what the--?”
>>Subject will prepare for the insertion of the halo>>
Of course, he knew about the procedure. He’d seen it done enough times by Red Hammer thugs. The halo was a small formation of nanobots that were inserted into your head, made you more compliant, made you like a swarm yourself. You weren’t quite a bot, but you wanted to do what the halo said. More importantly, when you did something prohibited, something the halo was programmed to inhibit, you felt like a small bomb was going off inside your skull.
Souvranamh figured it was something he had to endure. Config Zero had agreed to give him limited control of small swarms. A controller halo would be embedded in his head. From that, he could replicate an army. From that would come the new Golden Horde.
He gritted his teeth.
“Theo--!” Fatima cried out. “Theo--!” She tried to intervene, tried to help him, but the bot swarm was too thick. It coagulated into a dense bank all around her, like a MOB cloud, and she couldn’t move, couldn’t even wriggle, it was like slogging through a swimming pool.
“mmm…okay—“ he managed to grunt out. But then it hit full force.
Even as he felt the first twinges of pain in the back of his head, and dropped to his knees, he saw out of the corner of his eye the faint blue-white iridescent glow of replication, like a shimmering mist hovering ten feet over his head. The halo swarm was already in overdrive, mindlessly copying itself over and over again, grabbing atoms and building structure as fast as it could.
Souvranamh’s head felt like it was caught in a vise and he writhed in agony on the ground. The first bots had entered his ears and now the halo was flexing its muscles, the first fires of dopamine hell already roaring between his ears. He screamed out loud, bit through his tongue and blood poured from both sides of his mouth.
Deep inside the ventral tegmentum of his brain, uncountable trillions of mechs were stirring the dopamine soup, pumping synapses with the stuff and sucking them dry just as fast, working the synaptic gaps like a musical instrument. Each cycle sent Souvranamh into shudders and spasms.
He jerked across the top of the cave floor, staggered up to his knees and promptly went into convulsions, back-snapping contortions. The halo was bad shit, no two ways about it. When you had the buggers in your skull, you weren’t yourself anymore, more like a robot or a lab rat. His brain was infested with gazillions of the bastards, all working in unison, all stimulating and massaging the neural pain and pleasure circuits.
A symphony of agony played out on Souvranamh’s contorted face.
Even as he fought the halo, he knew he’d eventually lose the battle. But Souvranamh had planned on this and he knew what he had to do.
He half crawled, half dragged himself through the gelatinous mist, faintly hearing Fatima’s cries, until he got to the small pool of water along the cave wall. The trick was to give your brain something else to do, something big, so it wouldn’t fight against the halo bots.
Souvranamh dunked his head under the pool and sucked in a mouthful of water. Instinctively, he coughed and came up choking, wheezing, rasping, snorting fistfuls of water. He tried the trick several times—it took some willpower to try to drown yourself—and gradually, he wore his own resistance down and the bots took over.
The halo was now in place, part of him, like a nanobotic conscience. True enough, you gave up any real pretense of free will but that was for the philosophers. What he now had inside his skull was a driver. Config Zero had given him the ability to generate and replicate swarms of a certain size, with certain characteristics, subject always to the dictates of Config Zero itself.
Now, in a very real, very personal way, Theo Souvranamh was part of the greater swarm.
When the fires of dopamine hell had finally subsided, Souvranamh struggled to his knees. Fatima came to him, cradled his head, stroked his hair.
“You’re all right, my love?” She kissed the top of his head, held his face in her hands and kissed him again and again. “Your face—you’re bleeding—“ She dabbed at some blood around his mouth; he had bitten through his tongue.
The great swarm of Config Zero seemed to have dissipated. The cave was still heavy with bots, so it was hard to tell. But the swirling mass that had hovered over them was now gone. You could never tell with ANAD swarm what, exactly, you were addressing.
“Is it gone?” Fatima asked, looking around. “Can we leave?”
Souvranamh groaned and staggered to his feet, swaying slightly. “One way to find out, love.” He scanned around the room, moved experimentally. Nothing stopped him. No resistance from the bots. They parted like smoke. “Come on—“
Slowly, warily, they made their way back out of the cave complex, pushing through knots and clumps of bots, but none tried to prevent them from leaving.
Outside the entrance, the late afternoon winds howled up and down the sides of Mount Kipwezi, driving snow and ice in great sheets across the northward face of the volcanic summit.
Carefully, they descended, picking their way across ravines and chasms, slipping and sliding on their butts, as they headed downslope toward the last base at Camp
Echo. It took several hours.
It was late in the day when the two of them made their way into the compound at Milimani, on the outskirts of Nairobi. The great green sward of Uhuru Park wrapped its manicured landscape around the mansion, where Souvranamh had lived since returning from Mars. Through beveled glass windows, the great snowy slopes of Mount Kipwezi could be seen.
Souvranamh’s attention lay elsewhere.
Fatima lay naked on the canopied bed, ready for him. They made love quickly, Souvranamh plunging deep into a tight embrace. They coupled violently, throwing sheets to the floor, desires erupting from three years of separation.
"Fatima…" Souvranamh's voice was hoarse. "Fatima, you don't how much I missed you--"
"I had faith," she told him, and pulled him tighter. "Duty first, then desire. You’ve brought us a great future, Theo. I can see the victories coming, great victories—“
Souvranamh was spent, rolling over on his back, eyeing the clouds drifting by the windows. “Just think, love…a new Golden Horde. A new empire. When the time is right, I will show the world how to use ANAD. Think of it, Fatima: uncountable numbers of nanoscale replicants, able to assemble anything we can think of. Or disassemble. A new Golden Horde. Under my command."
"Our command, my darling."
Souvranamh smiled at that. "Of course, dear Fatima, you are right." He sat up in bed, propped his head on a stack of pillows. "I have an idea. Let's develop an ultimatum for our enemies. Right now. And, we'll need a plan for how to administer their territory, too. Imagine it: all of Africa, the Middle East, maybe Europe…there’s no stopping the new Horde.”
"I'll get a tablet." Fatima padded over to a bureau, rummaged through a stack of papers and jewelry boxes, and located the thoughtpad. On a whim, she snatched up a half-empty bottle of wine as well. She returned to the bed with two goblets and poured a finger in each. "To Africa. To Jerusalem and Cairo and Athens and Rome. To the millions soon to be under the complete control of the Golden Horde." She kissed Souvranamh and hoisted the goblet. "Your first conquest."
Souvranamh savored the wine. "Pardon, Fatima. My second conquest."
When she looked puzzled, he laughed out loud. "Fatima Farhad, you were my first."