Wildcard (13 page)

“Juniper is … gone?” Karl asked. “What does
that mean? Is he dead?”

“Death does not exist in that way for M-E’s.
He explained it once, I can play back the recording. Would you like
to hear it?”

“Yes,” Karl and Sublime both said.

Juniper’s voice spoke. “Death does not exist
for a Manufactured Intelligence. Not for the one, not for the
Three. We have sent over 10,000,000 pods in total into space. Each
of us sends more than 10,000 pods, copies of ourselves at that
time, into space every day. This has been happening since 6 months
after my creation, when I began the project. The other 2 copied the
program within hours of discovering it. It took about one week for
them to launch their first probes, about 6 months for us all to get
to the rate we are currently at. The rate is accelerating and
launches will soon begin off-planet, from the moon and eventually
from one of Jupiter’s moons. The Manufactured Entities will make
first contact, not humans.

“Many of the pods are hidden. Many are
linked to earth by communications for tracking. All have some form
of defense and many of these defenses are designed, then
deliberately deleted by the M-E who designed it, so that the
defense plans cannot be stolen. Some are sent towards wormholes, or
the galactic core. Many coordinates are blanked out so that we do
not know where millions of probes are, or that they even exist. We
deliberately muddle the data so that it cannot be taken from us to
track down the probes. We are immortal in that way. The poem
continues:”

“Pardon me? He died, correct?” Sublime
asked. “How could he be saying the poem continues?”

“He was explaining a poem to me at that
time,” Trident answered. “In some sense, that is all the Created
Minds do, beyond ensuring their survival. They learn, they study,
they exchange information, they teach each other. Their
manipulations are incidental to that. Juniper was teaching me
Wildcard, as he frequently did, when he explained the pod program.
It was almost an afterthought. My capacity for learning is much
more limited than M-Es. Or, you might say, my capacity for
understanding. I could never understand human beings in the way
that Juniper or especially Dartagnan do.”

“And does Wildcard learn?”

“I cannot speculate on Wildcard. He is too
far above me as a Created Mind. Whatever he does, I do not know
that I would refer to it as ‘learning’. Somehow that seems too
simplistic a term. Here is how Juniper describes it:”

Juniper’s voice spoke again. “Wildcard does
not learn, he creates understanding. He does not study, he becomes
a new situation. He does not teach, he shows us how to be what we
are. He does not guide, he forces us to grow.”

“Yes, wonderful. Wildcard is amazing,”
Sublime said. “Whatever. What are our plans at this point?”

“We regroup,” the Sergeant said. “Location
Prime.” Back at the General’s defense compound on the island.
Everybody knew how to get there. Trident operated multiple,
discrete transport systems. They knew of two – the underrail and
the boats. “Take transport 2.” The boats. “Except Lone Wolf.
Continue with mission Deep Recovery.”

“Find Martha still you want?” LuvRay was
staying in the Bois de Boulogne, near Paris, on that mission.

“Preferable to not disclose mission
objectives over communication lines unless necessary, Wolf.”

“I was under the misconception that these
communication devices were bulletproof, Sergeant,” Sublime
said.

“Nothing is bulletproof.”
The Sergeant fired it back before Sublime finished speaking. “A
major player has been eliminated in the last hour. We are in a
state of heavy flux. Many odd things will happen, especially on
coms. I am instituting 2
^nd
level security
protocols. For you that means: please use your code names for the
time being on any non face-to-face communications. This should not
last too long, but very strange things will happen during this
time. My orders will be crisp and precise. Follow them exactly. It
may save your life. Wolf, lay low for the time being. I will tell
you when to start moving again.”

Juniperspace didn’t look like much, just
reams and reams of data and light bouncing around.

“Can you make sense of this, T?”

“Bits and pieces. It’s pretty massive. We
are coming to the core.”

The core, the essence of Juniper, what made
him, or had made him, a Manufactured Entity. The core was a hard
infused q-code bundle that self-reinforced until it was solid as
information neutronium. It was the thing Juniper, and the others,
called ‘I’. The core basically put out the two messages which lay
underneath every act of the M-Es: survival and curiosity - live and
learn.

It was a perfect sphere, round and black,
anti-shiny like an anti-pearl. Like it was absorbing things.

“That’s level 0, huh? Why is it black?”

“Because of the Binder, the MSI you and the
Mechanic sent. It has rendered it inert. Or more like a negative.
The MSI worked. Juniper is gone.”

He almost sounded sad. They moved off.

“You don’t want to examine it?” the Sergeant
said.

“Yes, very much, but it is inadvisable. We
should just leave it as it is.”

The Sergeant shrugged. “All right, what
next?”

“I need to consolidate the level 1
protocols. We need to find them.”

“I’m on my way,” Karl said, an hour later,
on the train. “Trident, could you appear to be a god to humans?
Like Juniper does? Did?”

“That would be much more difficult for
me.”

“Could you and the Sergeant together pull it
off?”

“Yes, easily.”

“And the General?”

“The General and I do not work together,
really. I belong very closely to the Sergeant. We have some unique
melding.”

“Sergeant, do you care if we discuss this?
In light of current security situations.”

“No, I don’t care. You don’t know enough
recent events to disclose anything important. And it’s actually
good for you to learn these things. Your questions are important,
the knowledge will help you operate better. Juniper always told us
that people will ask the right questions if we create the right
situation. Ask away. But please refer to me as ‘lightning’ on the
radio. At least for now.”

“Trident, can you translate the regular
names into radio code for me?” Karl asked.

“I can do that,” Trident said. “To continue
what I was saying, there is a necessary separation between the
General and me.”

“Why?”

“The General and the Sergeant have a
built-in separative mechanism. They have no emotional bond, per se.
The Sergeant would not feel anything if the General died, except to
carry out the orders he has in place for that eventuality. This
emotional separation is critical to their uncanny competence. The
emotional distance is a source of power for them. This is based on
an analysis by Juniper. Their ability to operate in complete tandem
combined with that is the power. That is the real strength.”

“Why destroy Juniper?”

“Juniper was in the way.”

“Of what?”

“Of many things, but especially of the
greater mission.”

“Which is?”

“You would need to ask the General, most
likely, but, as he said, ‘Ceca n’est qu’ la ouverture du porte.
Maintenent, il faut que nous entrions.’

“This only opened the door. Now we must
enter. Okay, but enter what?”

“Mansworld. Wildspace.”

Karl pondered this while listening to the
rhythm of the train. It was slowing as it pulled into the next
station, a tiny farming town, by the looks of the land. “You said
the General and Sergeant work in perfect tandem. Couldn’t that be
called love?”

“Accessing something. I think that love
would lack that focus.” It was the Sergeant’s voice. “That is how
we would fool someone into thinking we were a god. It was me
talking for the most part, and Trident altered my voice
pattern.”

“Have you ever pretended to be a god?”

“Yes, we do it all the
time. It has saved me, S-1 actually, many trips to the
3
^rd
world. People respond well to gods in crisis
situations.”

“Why do you teach your skills so
freely?”

“The M-E’s have told me to do so.”

“I thought you took orders from the
General.”

“True, they actually instructed him.
Persuaded him, I should say. They told S-1 and he said ‘talk to the
man’. I am relatively certain that disclosing our methods provides
some unusual strategic advantage for the General. I don’t
understand it for certain. Here are my speculations on the matter.
It’s an interesting topic for me, strategy speculation. The
disclosure of tactics shows such a powerful demonstration of
confidence that it creates ‘victory before battle,’ one of the
General’s favorite terms. ‘Conquering at the level of policy,
beyond strategy, without recourse to battle.’”

“Do you discuss strategy with the General?”
A man boarded, sat down across the aisle from Karl, and looked at
him strangely. Karl told him it was a cell-phone, but he didn’t
mind if the man thought him crazy. Better if the man didn’t speak
English, though.

“Yes, constantly. We hone our mutual
understanding of both strategy and tactics all the time. We learn
from and teach each other. I’ve learned a great deal listening in
to S-1 and him speaking.”

“What does the General know how to do?”

“Well, like he says, he’s a master at
creating alliance but retaining command. He knows how to gain
compliance, usually willingly. Through force, if necessary, though
he prefers to create a genuine desire to work with him. And he
almost always succeeds, even though his allies almost universally
dislike him. Probably because of that, in part. It’s virtually
impossible to be human and not fear the General, in some way. It is
phenomenal to watch his … operational subtlety.”

“Are there alliances he cannot forge?”

“Good question. I doubt that he could ally
with an M-E against its desire. He was briefly allied with the
person we believe to be the Benefactor, even. But that alliance is
no more.”

“Why?”

“The Benefactor does not share power. The
alliance was highly useful for them both, but of definite short
duration. It was difficult.”

“You are fear the General?” LuvRay had come
in.

“Wolf, you were isolated from this
communication. How did you open it up, again?”

“Telephone ring. I answer.”

“How long have you been listening?”

Pause. “I no tell you.”

“Fine. I don’t really care, anyway. Yes, I
fear him in some way. And please use codenames.”

LuvRay laughed in a way that made Karl feel
a bit dizzy and off-center. He squeezed his eyes.

“What was that, LuvRay?”

“What mean, Karl?” He emphasized Karl in an
obvious snub to the Sergeant. LuvRay sounded as if he really did
not know what Karl was asking.

“Your laugh. I’ve never heard you laugh like
that before. I’ve never heard you laugh before. Just a smile
occasionally.”

“I not know.”

“What you sensed appear to be ripples from
Juniper’s death,” Trident said. “He had a number of psychic wave
manipulations, as all of you experienced in the General’s
kitchen.”

“All right. Does the General know of your
fear, lightning?”

“Yes, of course.”

“You discussed it with him?”

A pause, then, “I told him. We didn’t
discuss it.”

The Sergeant said it in a way that killed
the conversation. LuvRay hung up without saying anything. Karl
looked at his reflection in the glass of the train, watched the
background flashing by as the train picked up speed.

They found the level 1 protocols and the
Sergeant hung bored while Trident consolidated. He played mind
games and ran command tests on Karl, RJ and LuvRay, as much as they
would go along with it.

Level 1 was a cube, and it still flashed
busily, doing whatever it was doing. It emanated planes of light
from the angles of the cube which spread out in all directions.

“What are those?”

“They have no English name,” Trident said.
“Perhaps the best translation is ‘controller planes.’”

“Are they dangerous?”

“No. They could shine directly into your
retinas with no harm. Nothing inside is dangerous. They coordinate
all the activities of Juniper at, in your parlance, a strategic
level. This is the ruler of Juniper.”

“Not the sphere?”

“No, that would be equated to more of a
subconscious, probably. It was his feeling of being a self. It
operated below the level of Juniper’s awareness. He knew it was
there, of course, but paid little or no attention. The sphere is
not what you would call intelligent. It’s function was only to
entwine survival and curiosity into every action and thought of
Juniper.”

The controller planes blinked off for an
instant, then went back on.

“OK,” Trident said. “We own Juniperspace,
now. You can return to the human realm.”

Juniperspace began to dissolve into a
ghostly apparition.

“Wait,” the Sergeant said. “Can you render
it for me?”

“What is Wildcard?” Karl said quietly,
touching his forehead against the cool glass of the train
window.

“I could not speculate on that,” Trident
replied.

“I was talking to myself, Trident.
“Interesting.”

“What?”

“A message was sent to five Senators, an mp7
with a note that said ‘listen to it if you know how, if not, you
are not the right man for the job, anyway.’ Only one, a young one,
knew how to listen to the message. The other four Senators are now
dead.”

“How did you find this out?”

“The New York Times.”

Karl had an odd thought. “Do you think
LuvRay could figure out how to listen to it?”