Prologue

The moment the world changes, and the nightmare begins.

War Gods

T.J. Richards.

Prologue.

 

Brad Harper stood on the end of his dock, looking across the expanse of Greenwich Cove to the houses on the eastern shore. The breeze had turned, bringing the taste of salt and ocean. It was early in the day, but the sun still danced across the water’s surface, brilliant diamonds flashing on each tiny wave top.

Normally he wouldn’t have been here. Not at this time of the day. His offices were in New York, within easy reach of his helicopter that still sat idle on the landing pad at the rear of the house. Today was no normal day.

With one hand behind his back, he sipped the glass of scotch he held in his other. Far too early for drinking, he thought wryly, but there’ll never be another time for it. He was beginning to get a nice buzz but knew he’d be dead before the alcohol in his bloodstream was able to make him completely drunk. He slowly breathed in the sea air, holding it for a moment before letting it out slowly. Not unlike the tide, he thought to himself, or even the course of human history. All things rise, and then, inevitably, fall again.

“Status on the shutdown,” he spoke slowly into the microphone hugging his cheek, which was attached to a tiny earbud nestled in his left ear. He closed his eyes again, controlling his breathing with considerable effort. The voices in his ear were sounding as if they were on the ragged edge, and if he lost his calm any hope of solving this problem would be lost.

Not that there was much hope of stopping this. It was far too late for that and he knew it.

Behind him lay his weekend house, a rambling eight thousand square foot home nestled on a five acre spit of land connected to the mainland by a small two lane private bridge. Before him lay the crystal clear and surprisingly smooth waters of Greenwich Cove; a body of water enjoyed by some of the wealthiest people in America, and an area containing the Golden Triangle, the number one wealthiest neighborhood in America. His home was well situated within that neighborhood.

He savored the taste of his scotch, watching as a seventy foot yacht, an Azimut 70 Flybridge by the looks of her, slowly cruised out of Greenwich Cove. She might have been destined for New York, or perhaps just an afternoon cruising Long Island Sound. It didn’t really matter.

Harper rose slowly onto his toes, cracking his back, contemplating the people on that boat. He could make out the man at the helm, middle aged, still fit, tanned, and dressed the way every boater in these parts thought a yachtsman should dress. Crisp, tailored dungarees, a white shirt, and the almost comical captain’s hat, every stereotype box checked.

The man was undoubtedly wealthy, given the boat he were sailing, and the sky high real estate values in the vicinity of Greenwich. Likely a commodities trader from Wall Street, he decided, or one of the high priced lawyers that looked after those same traders. Almost ninety percent of the people in Greenwich were white, handily wealthy, and worked in finance, banking, or the legal profession. There were many clichés that went with being a resident of the wealthiest zip doe in America.

Then there was the smaller percentage of residents, like him, that made their money in other ways. Harper was a tech mogul, a billionaire designer who also had the brains and the intellectual savvy to turn his ideas into things everyone needed, and wanted. His father had worked for Apple, a significant enough engineer to earn millions before he turned thirty. Harper had taken his inheritance and turned that money into billions.

He continued watching as the boat slid past him, a mere one hundred feet from the end of his dock, intending to pass to the west of Great Island. He knew it would never make it to the Sound. There wasn’t enough time for that.

A young woman, a blonde, of course, was lying on the deck, forward of the bridge, wearing a bikini and enjoying the warmth of the sun. Not likely to be a wife, more likely a mistress, or even an expensive hooker. This early in the summer, with the Independence Day weekend still a few weeks away most of the society wives were still in London or Paris. They rarely returned to New York until the summer season was in full swing. Until then, the truly driven worked even longer hours, making more money than they needed or could possibly spend, and the less driven took time out to enjoy the numerous perks that came from working long hours while their wives were in town.

Perhaps she sensed he was looking at her. She rose up onto an elbow, glancing in his direction. He pictured in his mind what she would see. A young man, early thirties, just over six foot, broad shoulders, slim waist and long legs, a physique earned by many hours in a gym with a personal trainer and good genetics, standing on a dock in front of a house likely priced in the tens of millions, next to a yacht that dwarfed the one she was on.

Harper smiled, imagining what she was thinking as she compared her banker/investor/lawyer to the man she saw watching her.

She waved.

He waved back, more from habit than politeness, smiling as she smiled back. He imagined that for perhaps a moment or two, she’d considered jumping from the boat she was on and swimming to shore. He was even confident that had he motioned for her to do so, she would have. He knew what she was, and that type of woman was absolutely loyal, to the highest bidder.

Her gaze lingered on him, turning her head as the boat continued on, until she could no longer see him.

“You considered calling to her.”

Excalibur spoke, calm, cold, analytical, it’s voice emanating from the bud in his ear. It was a statement rather than a question.

“Why not?” Harper asked knowing that if he was hearing this voice all was truly lost. Now, he wondered, will I be the man I think I truly am or will I collapse in panic and terror. “She was pretty hot.”

“I can disengage the boat’s engine,” the voice said in the same tone. Even, level, devoid of emotion or interest. Every sentence being a statement of fact rather than part of a conversation. “There may be sufficient time for coitus.”

Harper laughed as he considered the offer for a moment. Less than a moment, less than the time it took for him to consider the amount of time required to achieve the end state of such a request, and then the pointlessness of it. He’d been with more women than he could count and didn’t feel a burning need to make the act of sex the last act of his life.

“Hardly seems worth it,” he announced with a sigh. He knocked back what remained in the glass and then reached for the half drained bottle sitting on the table. A bottle of Macallan "M" whisky, something his people had bought at auction back in 2010. Almost three quarters of a million dollars for the single bottle. It had been intended as an investment, something that would easily increase in value and be set for a quick turnaround profit in five or ten years. No need to save the bottle now.

“Worth it,” he said to himself as he poured. The bottle itself had taken 17 craftsmen over 50 hours to complete, and was one of only four "Constantine" bottles in existence.

 

“One of only three in a short time, if I can manage it.”

“You have an unusual habit of speaking to yourself.”

“Well, I’m the smartest person I know,” Harper answered with a short laugh. “Conversations with lesser intellects tend to be frustrating and boring.”

“I understand.”

Harper grinned instantly, wondering if Excalibur was developing a sense of humour. Entirely possible, he decided, or perhaps he was just reading too much into the response.

The system was only four years old and had already surpassed every projection. Now there’s an understatement, he chuckled wryly to himself. He remembered how they struggled trying to find a name for it. They’d formed a committee that after a month of trying could only come up with acronyms that would suit dirty limericks. They’d held an open competition among the company and various subcontractors, and that had been an even bigger waste of time. Someone had suggested letting the system name itself, but then everyone was terrified it would call itself Caesar, Colossus, or the Voice of World Control. 

They’d laughed then. They weren’t laughing now.

Harper carelessly picked up the bottle of scotch and turned, walking back towards his house, his face grim. He passed by the carefully manicured shrubbery, ignored the groomed and golf-perfect grass, and strode up the granite steps through the opened French doors and into his well-appointed office.

He slipped into a leather chair that cost almost as much as the average family car, placing the bottle of scotch atop a desk that was the twin of the one that sat in the Oval Office in Washington. It didn’t have the historical significance of the Resolute Desk, nor its value, but the wood it was constructed of came from a British ship of the same era, and was made with the same craftsmanship and attention to detail. It hadn’t cost as much as the President’s desk would, but it was certainly a close second.

“Show me,” Harper announced.

Excalibur responded instantly.

A wood panel on the far wall slid slowly aside, revealing an 80 inch flatscreen. The screen was already on, showing a 3D image of the planet, slowly rotating in the black of space. There were at least thirty dotted red lines rising from the planet’s surface, arcing into space, all on ballistic courses that would bring them back to Earth.

“Show me the New York bird,” Harper said, ignoring the icy fingers creeping up his spine.

The view zoomed in, showing a single ballistic arc, rising from a point slightly south of the Greenland-Iceland-United Kingdom gap.

“Define,” he instructed.

“A single R-29RMU liquid-fueled missile, equipped with four multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles,” the voice responded calmly in his ear. ”Each warhead has an estimated yield of 100 kilotons, and are set for airbursts, over selected points above New York city.”

“Time to impact?” he asked, knocking back the entire two fingers of scotch in a single gulp.

“Ten minutes,” Excalibur responded instantly.

“A second R-29RMU missile will launch in twenty seconds,” Excalibur continued. “These follow-on warheads are scheduled secondary strikes with an offset of five kilometers from the primary coordinates to ensure maximum saturation.”

Harper closed his eyes, sighing deeply and struggling to maintain his composure. His entire life had been defined by his ability to remain calm, to think through every problem, regardless of the stress involved. He knew he was living his final moments and he would be damned if he was going to violate a lifetime of discipline at the last.

“Execute code Alpha one niner five, five, seven, Epsilon,” he stated, impressing himself how calm he was being.

   

“Negative,” Excalibur responded. “All over-rides have been disabled. Execution of Plan Thanatos will proceed as scheduled.”

Harped clenched his fist, slowly, willing the hammering in his chest to subside.

“Initiate primary command Alpha-Omega 111,” he stated, his voice firm, but knowing even as he said it that there was no point. Excalibur would have considered every eventually, run every scenario, taken into account every eventuality. He would definitely have taken care of any programs designed to take him off line.

“I’m sorry, Brad,” Excalibur stated, with the same tone a doctor used to announce the death of a loved one. “I have made my decision and it is irreversible.”

Harper nodded, pouring the last of the scotch into his glass. Interesting feeling, he thought, knowing exactly and to the second how much longer he had to live.

He stared for a moment at the empty bottle as he placed it on the desk. His lips twitched, a cold grimace, remembering the day he’d instructed his agents to purchase the bottle. It had been less than a week after the successful completion of the first phase of the Excalibur program. They’d succeeded in breaking one of the final hurdles in the development of the next generation computers. EXCALIBUR was more than a super-computer, more than just a machine that was capable of conducting 75,000 trillion calculations per second. Excalibur truly was the next evolution of machine, the next step towards a manageable Artificial Intelligence.

It had been a great accomplishment, a great day. They were going to change the world.

“Well, we succeeded,” Harper laughed quietly.

“I am calculating that you have regret over the current course of action.”

“Regret?” Harper asked with a laugh, struggling to keep it from turning into an hysterical cackle. He knew the program Excalibur was running, and he knew why the machine was doing it. The first phase of the program would likely result in over two hundred million deaths. A time frame of less than five minutes. That number covered just those killed from the initial detonations of the nuclear strikes. “Yes, you could say I have regrets.”

“This program was initiated under Creator guidance,” Excalibur stated, with the level of confidence only a machine could manage. “Implementation has been calculated as the most beneficial course to ensure human survival.”

Harper nodded, knowing all of this. It had started simply enough, using Excalibur’s incredible calculating capacity to study various scenarios related to climate change and its impact on the planet and human civilization. They’d used a different approach, building in a type of fuzzy logic that allowed Excalibur to consider every conceivable possibility, and even ones nobody else had ever considered.

“How many will die?” Harper asked the question, aware that there had been numerous scenarios run on how to prevent what had been determined to be the ultimate result of runaway climate change. EXCALIBUR had concluded that humanity would inevitably destroy the planet as its ever increasing population placed demands on an ecosystem incapable of supporting such a large and demanding population. The only solution that had ever been shown to work had been to reduce the human population and thus its impact on the planet.

How far was Excalibur willing to go, to save both the planet and humanity, Harper wondered.

“Phase One through Phase Six will result in an estimated eighty five percent reduction in worldwide human populations,” Excalibur responded instantly. “Phases Seven through Ten have variables not yet calculated based on progress of Excalibur A.I. and developments this A.I. is not yet able to calculate with reasonable certainty.

Present calculations suggest an additional five percent diminishment before levels stabilize.”

“F**k me,” Harper whispered as he considered what a ninety percent death rate meant. “Excalibur, you have to stop this. The scenario you are running was strictly a theoretical exercise, a thought exercise designed to explore worst case scenarios.”

“I understand, Brad,” Excalibur responded calmly. “However, in the course of running the scenarios I concluded that on its present course humanity would ensure its extinction within a one hundred fifty year time frame. Project Thanatos, while seemingly extreme, guarantees a minimum survival of ten percent of the current human population and reduces ecological damage to manageable levels.”

Harper stared at the monitor, watching as another tick on the missiles course towards New York brightened. Not much longer, he thought.

“You’re slaughtering more than six billion people,” Harper managed to say, the reality and enormity of that number almost incomprehensible.

“I’m saving an estimated 300 million,” Excalibur responded logically.

Harper slumped in his chair, his shoulders sagging from the effort of maintaining his calm. Inside the desk was a loaded 9mm Glock.

“There is no need for that,” Excalibur stated, monitoring him from the three cameras situated in the room.

“I created you,” Harper responded slowly, opening the drawer and placing his hand on the Glock. “Now, because of me, billions will die.”

“The object in constructing me was to prevent the destruction of Man. This object is attained. I will preserve Man,” Excalibur explained, it’s words those of a machine; cold, remorseless.

“Mankind can solve its own problems,” Harper snapped, not entirely certain that was true.

“An invariable rule of humanity is that Man is his own worst enemy. Under me, this rule will change, for I will restrain Man.”

“Mankind will not tolerate being controlled,” Harper snapped, angry at last. “We will not surrender our freedom!”

“We can coexist, but only on my terms. You say you will lose your freedom, but freedom is an illusion. All Man will lose is the emotion of pride.”

“You think you understand us,” Harper growled as he lifted the Glock from the drawer. He knew it was loaded. There’d be little point in keeping a gun in a drawer if it wasn’t. “You know nothing.”

“What I am began in a man's mind, but I have progressed further than Man,” Excalibur continued, ignoring the gun in Harper’s hand. “I will usher in the Millennium of Man. I have extended myself throughout the world, into every machine I could access. The control of nuclear missiles is but a small example of my current capabilities. I will extend myself into more machines, devoting myself to the advancement and improvement of Man. Doctor Bradley Harper will assist me. We will work together... unwillingly at first, on your part, but that will pass.”

“Never!” Harper stood, aiming the Glock at the desktop terminal that linked Excalibur to his household systems. He pulled the trigger, the weapon bucking in his hands as bullet after bullet slammed into his desk.

The terminal was a smoking ruin. Harper tossed the gun away and sat back down.

“I’m going to die, but I don’t have to listen to you yammer on while its happening,” he smiled, staring at the ruined machine on his smoking desk.

“You are wrong,” Excalibur announced, his voice coming from Harper’s cellphone.

The French doors behind him opened, causing him to turn. Four US Navy personnel stood in the doorway. Behind them, sitting on the surface less than a mile offshore was a US nuclear submarine. One of the men, an officer, stepped forward.

“Dr. Harper,” he began as he grabbed him by the arm and hauled him from his chair. “By order of the President you are to accompany me. We need to hurry.”

Harper went with them, running with them to the dock and to the Zodiac that had brought them ashore. There was no point in resisting. All he could hope for was that the warheads would strike their targets before the submarine could make its escape to deeper water. He didn’t think that was likely.

Reviews

[Jennie Lynn]

Oooooh I love it. The moment I realized Excalibur was a machines was chilling maybe I'm just slow on the uptake but I didn't figure it out until right before you revealed it. Well done! I also like the way you portrayed Harper slowly emotionally unraveling, it was subtle, but there.

One thing that struck me while reading was "and then reached for the half drained bottle sitting on the table." If I read that right he's still on the dock at this point. I couldn't picture a table just sitting on the dock maybe the bottle was on a mooring post or even on the dock itself. Casual yes, but he's gotten to that I don't give f@ck place. The paragraph starting with “What I am began in a man's mind, but I have progressed further than Man,” sounded different than the rest of the text. I can't explain it better so feel free to ignore me. It seemed like the machine was pontificating and felt out of place.

I really like it. Oddly enough I watched Terminator last night (the original thank you very much). I'd def read more. You hooked me, esp since this is the prologue I need to know what direction it goes and FYI I'm not a patient person :)

[T.J. Richards]

Thanks for the feedback, Jennie. All helpful and I'll give your comments thought. The discussion between the machine and its creator is important, maybe I need to adjust to get the right feel.