***Retrieving selected files, Base…tabulating and sorting by relevance rank now***
Bit by bit, a series of windows opened in mid-air, Doc forming file headers and portals in 3D for them to view. Soon the air over Kincade’s desk was thick with cloud-like images, each one a separate file.
“There!” pointed Taj Singh. He stood up to cup one cloud with his hands, which he drew down to the desk, using command gestures to expand the image. The cloud grew to form a neatly stacked deck of images, each laid out like a card deck ready to be cut by a dealer. “See the spike in deco wakes? I’d bet a month’s salary that’s where Config Zero’s main processor is.”
Kincade was impressed with the Bengali trooper’s analysis. “Okay, Sergeant, if that’s so, work us up a tactical algorithm to load into Major Winger here, so he can find the target.”
Winger spoke up. “It’s a valid approach, sir but just getting into Paryang is going to be a problem. We managed it before using deception and disguise.”
Kincade said, “So I heard and I’ll decide on any disciplinary actions later. For now, Major Lofton may have an answer to the problem.”
Lofton used his own wristpad to project an image, which he lifted up for all to see, waving aside Doc’s images. “The fact that Major Winger here is now an angel…as it were, gives us options we didn’t have before. I know from contacts at U.S. Cyber Command, up in the States, that Config Zero is plugged into the Net. In fact, intel supports the idea that Config Zero and his replicant buddies have been using the Net to get around, go places, bollix up networks, server farms, various nodes, even parts of the Cloud. Major Winger, in his new… er condition, can do the same thing. In fact, my contacts at Cyber Command have even worked up a new method for launching and controlling semi-sentient packet sweepers through the Net, to recon enemy bots and packets. Nanoscale robots are small enough to ride on the carrier waves that slosh back and forth around the Net. So could the Major here. With the General’s permission, while we work on a virus weapon we can use to infect Config Zero, I’d like to arrange for Winger and perhaps troopers Barnes and Singh to make a little trip up to Herndon, Virginia…talk with a man I know. His name is James Tsu. And he may just have the ideal way to send our assault teams right into the heart of Paryang.”
Kincade listen gravely to Lofton’s pitch. When he was done, the decision was made. Winger would travel to Cyber Command headquarters in the States, inside a containment capsule maintained by a real live trooper. Taj Singh would accompany and escort the Major. In the meantime, Mighty Mite Barnes was given another assignment.
“Find out what Tsu and Cyber Command have in mind, Major. I’ll put our own teams to work designing a virus to use against Config Zero. And take Doc II with you—“ he indicated the smoke-like wraith still hovering in the corner. “—in containment. Sergeant Barnes--?
“Sir?”
“We’re going to assault Paryang from multiple axes. Winger here will use the Net and whatever Cyber Corps has for us. You work me up a TOE for a subterranean assault too…two geoplanes with full combat ANAD support. Pick your own crews. And get me a mission plan by 2200 hours tonight. This I have to put before UNSAC.”
“Yes, sir,” Barnes replied.
The troopers departed. And Thomas Kincade sat back in his seat, staring out at the pelting rain now lashing the windows of the Ops center.
“God help all of us,” he muttered, as he lit up a cigar. “Battlefields the size of a thimble. Troops the size of a molecule. An enemy who can be anywhere at any time, looking like anyone or anything.” Deep down inside, Kincade yearned for the certainty of a massive armored assault across a wide open countryside, cannons booming, tanks burning, explosions geysering dirt all around. Or maybe just a few thousand drones, swooping down on unsuspecting infantry.
“Nobody can see, hear or smell anything now. Warfare has come to this…a quantum affair, entangled here and not here at the same time. All smoke and ghosts. It would’ve been better if Schrodinger’s cat had just gone ahead and died.”