Transition

TIME TO STRATEGY EXECUTION: 59 DAYS

It took an hour of invasive medical procedures following an emergency court order for federal authorities to find the transceiver that enabled Frank Lanton to communicate with his followers. The coincidence of activity at the Golden Biosphere Observation Station with the progress of our call was strong enough for probable cause, and the end of all Savior of the Apocalypse operations following discovery of the transceiver was ample evidence that it was justified.

Sally was officially authorized to use some of her bandwidth helping with the follow-up investigations, and retroactively authorized for her role in stopping the siege of the station. Over two hundred participants in Lanton’s global assault have so far been arrested, and are likely to be prosecuted along with their leader for attempted omnicide, just as Mark Linster and his collaborators were tried for crashing the WICO servers. Charges related to international terrorism will also be added, which could result in sentences that include lifelong incarceration or worse.

The newly freed Boulder field office hosted a party last night to celebrate the end of the threat and the fact that no one was harmed. Maura’s family joined Al Menzies as special guests, along with a dozen of her friends from the Extinction Response Unit. Sally attended as well, appearing as a lifelike hologram using a prototype projector that was delivered especially for the party. Ambassador Lazlo called half-way through the party to thank everyone for working through the threat and to give a pep talk about the hard deadline that’s less than two months away.

Afterwards, during a walk around the office grounds, Maura gave me the good news that my job with WICO is secure, and then told me that I don’t have to pack for the move to Q.A. headquarters. “The last two weeks have shown that you can be a lot more useful here,” she explained.

“I like to think I can be useful anywhere, including back there with you and the team.” Mostly with you, I wanted to say.

“I believe that’s true,” she said meekly, “but going back isn’t going to work for us.”

Words escaped me, silence being a perfect metaphor for the emptiness that I felt. She gripped my hand, and the strange sense of wellbeing filled most, but not all, of the emptiness. I took a deep breath and forced out the words I’d been afraid to ask since having what I considered my best idea blown off by Ambassador Lazlo: “When are you leaving?”

“Tomorrow. I’ve got a lot to do, and not much time to do it.”

“I wish you could stay,” I blurted, expecting this would be my last chance to say it.

She silently squeezed my hand, enhancing the wellbeing effect, and then slowly started to giggle.

“What’s so funny?” I asked.

The giggling grew into a full-throated laugh, and she turned to face me. Those eyes began to transport me somewhere else, and I barely noticed her biting her lip in order to speak. “That… will… make it… really… hard to… pack up my apartment.”

That jolted me back to reality. “What?”

She grinned. “I’ll be more useful here too.”

Reality Check

Just being true to my characters. I’ve been extremely lucky to experience that kind of deep connection with another person, and we’ve now been married for almost fifteen years.

Savior of the Apocalypse

TIME TO STRATEGY EXECUTION: 124 DAYS

Despite WICO’s suspicions which matched my interpretation of Sally/Sanda’s dying clue, Reverend Frank Lanton’s threats made him and his followers the leading suspects in the social and news media. 

I interviewed Lanton at his office adjacent to the Savior of the Apocalypse church in Kansas City, and asked if he had anything to do with crashing the WICO servers. “No,” he said bluntly, “though in all honesty I can’t say I’m unhappy that it happened. I don’t know who was responsible, either, but in my humble opinion they deserve a medal for doing the lord’s work.”

“Why are you so convinced that fighting global extinction is wrong?” I followed up.

He looked at me as if the question was absurd. “It’s not about fighting extinction. The lord promised that he would not destroy the Earth, and he is not a liar. He did, however, warn against following false prophets; and these so-called scientists and the electronic beast that crafted their evil prescriptions are as false as they come.”

“By ‘the beast’, do you mean the artificial intelligence called Sanda?”

“I understand you had a special relationship with it,” he sneered. “It even convinced you to deceive your readers into thinking it was human.”

“Anonymity was a condition for getting and sharing information. As far as I was concerned, Sanda was as much a source as any person.”

“You spread its lies, its evil stories designed to rewrite history and to set back world progress for decades.”

“She, it, sought out and corrected its errors along with those of others,” I insisted, “and shared the fundamental aspects of what it found to be true.”

“Like that stupid hand analogy?” he asked. “The ‘Rule of the Thumb’? Did you really believe that it was original and meaningful?”

“Sanda acknowledged its limitations as well as its usefulness. The story it told about the recession…” 

“Which was a lie,” Lanton interjected.

“…Had elements that made sense,” I continued, “which I’m sure Sanda would have updated if it hadn’t been destroyed.”

“We’ll never know,” he said smugly.

“What will you do, if and when WICO reconstructs the strategy?” I asked, getting back to the point of the interview.

“Our plans haven’t changed. The apocalypse is upon us, and the salvation of the righteous will follow. Nothing must be allowed to stand in its way.”

Reality Check

I have taken liberties with the religion practiced by “Reverend Lanton,” along with his affiliation, which should be taken as pure fiction.

The recession story would have to be retold based on the reclassification of the U.S. due to higher resolution in the simulation, but I don’t anticipate much change in the overall message of the narration given how much of the population (2/3) is projected to be in the collapse stage.