Fleataxi
Inactive
The Renaissance Man - Redux
by Fleataxi
Chapter 1
David Williams arched his back and stretched. He'd been writing in his journal for hours now. His therapist told him to keep a journal as a form of therapy after his wife Jackie died many years ago giving birth to their only child Tom. He used a computer since everyone did. Paper copies of anything were exceptionally rare since about 2010 when the latest computer revolution occurred. The Internet became a worldwide net of Supercomputer AI Servers that communicated in real time, with sufficient storage to keep a copy of everything that passed through them, and security robust enough to prevent any unauthorized user from gaining access to anything they weren't supposed to. Congress passed the Electronic Document Act in 2011, which made an electronic document the legal equivalent of a written signed document when electronic signatures became common and registered.
He typed a new heading "01-08-2021 0800Z" and started thinking, remembering everything that had happened since the last time he wrote in his journal. Since the Big Bang, he and his family had lived in a deep underground shelter located near Davis Monthan AFB in Arizona. Before the Big Bang, David was a partner in a major Bionics laboratory in Arizona. His specialty was the man/machine interface, and hoped one day to be able to replace lost limbs with bionics that acted and looked exactly like the limbs they replaced. He had a picture on his bulletin board at work of Lee Majors as the 6 Million Dollar Man with the caption "for 6 million dollars today, you might get a bionic toe." Since the 1970's the Federal Reserve Note had devalued to the point where it was commonly used as toilet paper. Before the Big Bang, or BBB as historians (what few were left) called it, the US Dollar and the US economy had been in a death spiral that started around June 2006, and got progressively worse. Jeb Bush's final act as President of the US on July 4, 2015 was to tell the Chinese bankers who were demanding payment in land for the US debt to go do something obscenely impossible to themselves, and told the European bankers the same thing. This made him very popular with the American voters, but not with the Puppetmasters, who wanted to bring a much weaker US into the NWO fold.
With JB's patent refusal to pay, the Chinese and Europeans decided to invade and seize US land in payment for their debts. Once the US satellites saw the invasion fleets leaving their ports, Jeb knew they weren't listening, and started the Nuclear Armageddon he had promised if the Chinese attacked. It took weeks for every nation of the world that owned nuclear warheads to launch every warhead they owned at their enemies, real or perceived. Estimates of the size of most nations’ stockpiles of nuclear weapons were vastly underrated by a factor of at least 10. Not that it mattered, but when David found out the size of the nuclear war, he realized that everyone was lying to everyone else about the size of their stockpiles for political reasons. Every major city on the planet either received a direct hit from a warhead, or lethal fallout from the huge concentration of nuclear weapons that kept coming in waves. Anyone who came out of their shelter early received a lethal dose of radiation. David, Carrie, his live-in girlfriend, and Tom, David's paralyzed son, plus his best friend Steve and his family survived by getting to their deep shelter designed for 100 people, and staying there for 6 months.
Tom was born a quadriplegic due to genetic damage to his spinal cord which left him dependent on a respirator and a pacemaker, plus being bedridden or wheelchair bound for his entire life. Early in life, he had numerous surgeries to install permanent catheters for his bowel and bladder, and later to amputate both legs above the knee when a massive infection settled into his legs as a complication of his lack of sensation and constant bruising of his lower extremities. On his 7th birthday, David got permission from the other partners to use Tom as a test subject for new bionic implants that would tap into the spinal cord and make connections for 2 bionic legs with full motion and articulation. The surgery was a success, and they implanted hundreds of spinal cord connections, but he was unable to operate the bionic legs. Afterward, David theorized that since Tom had been born paralyzed from the chest down, he never learned how to control his legs at all, so when they attached the bionics, his brain ignored them. He didn't tell anyone, and kept the fact that the implants were successful a secret too. He realized that if the other partners at the bionic lab knew the implants were successful, his son would become a Lab Rat for any experimenter with a harebrained scheme involving bionics with the company.
Carrie was a beautiful single 27 year-old redhead who used to work as an IT Contractor for David’s company - Bionic's Inc.. She was a very good friend of David's, and when the contract expired, David hired her as an in-house tutor and companion/aide for Tom, who wasn't fitting in at school. The school district decided to mainstream Tom since he was so smart, not realizing how cruel children were. One day he got a chance to play softball with the rest of the kids. After whiffing on two pitches, he barely connected with the third one, and laid down an accidental bunt. The teacher was screaming at him to run to first, so he turned his electric wheelchair, which resembled a miniature tank, and kicked in the throttle. The 400-pound machine accelerated down the baseline and the goofy kid playing first base just stood there. Suddenly, Tom realized how much damage he could do if he hit the kid, and pulled back on the joystick, and the wheelchair skidded to a stop inches from the kid, who was freaking out, and calling Tom Freakzoid and Frankenstein. He hung his head, then turned his chair and quietly motored back to the classroom where he stayed for the rest of the day, not saying a word to anyone.
That afternoon David got a call at work to come to school and pick up Tom, he had been expelled from school as a danger to the other kids. He took the SUV, loaded Tom in the back without a word, and drove him home. That afternoon, he had some heated words with the Superintendent, and after going round and round, they agreed that Tom would be home schooled, and the school district would pay for a in-house teacher/tutor. Carrie's Master's in Computer Science more than qualified her, and she was looking for a place to live, and they had a spare room, so it worked out better than David expected. Over the years, Carrie not only tutored Tom, she started teaching him everything she knew about computers because they had the time and David was working 12-14 hours per day trying to get a breakthrough project finished that would save the company financially. Tom was frustrated by how slow he could type, so one night David and Carrie decided to experiment, and built an interface between Tom's implants and the computer's CPU. Slowly but surely, Tom learned how to use the interface to control the computer, and once he passed a critical threshold, his rate of learning went up geometrically.
Carrie saw how fast the screens were flashing in front of Tom, and knew no one read that fast. An hour later, Tom took a break, and noticed Carrie was in the room. He swore her to secrecy, then told her that had learned to use his neural implants to make the computer a part of him, which was the best way he could describe it. Carrie knew that they were on a new scary frontier, and that Tom was well on his way to becoming a Cyborg. When she saw his wheelchair bound body, she didn't think he would be leaving too much behind if he became a Cyborg, and didn't say anything to David about it.
A couple of months later, David discovered for himself that Tom was a virtual Cyborg when he walked into Tom's room, and saw his wheelchair-bound body facing the computer, but his hands were at rest on his table. Images were flashing on the monitor as fast as they could, and David was amazed. Never in his wildest dreams did he dream that Tom could or would become a Cyborg when he installed those neural implants in his spinal cord. All he wanted was a normal son. Now he understood his son was so far past normal that he might never return, and he started crying. Finally Tom realized his Dad was leaning against the door crying, and shut down his cybernetic connection to the computer, and motored over to his Dad. He lifted his hand, and touched his Dad on the shoulder, then with great effort between pulses of the respirator breathing for him he said "I....love...you ...Dad!" David felt his son's hand on his shoulder, and placed his hand on his. With tears in his eyes, he said, "I'm sorry son, I never knew this would happen!"
The conversation Tom wanted to have with his Dad would have taken hours using his own voice, so he motored back over to the computer port and plugged himself in. The next words David heard was his son's voice, but it wasn't. He looked up, and Tom's lips weren't moving, but he could clearly hear Tom's voice over the speakers, but without the annoying pauses between words.
"Don't look so stunned Dad, once I learned to interface with the computer, I decided it would be easier to use the computer's speech module to talk instead of my own voice. Don't feel bad for me, I've gained so much. During the last year, I've connected with all the AI servers in the Supernet. Some of them even have personalities. The funniest part is they think I'm just another machine. In a way, they're right, but I'm so much more. Jackie and I carry on conversations like real people, and she helps me meet new computers. Joe at ITT is one of the oldest and funniest. His programmers loaded a bunch of old Far Side comics in his memory as a test to see if computers have a sense of humor - not only do they, but they think that most of their jobs are boring, and they spend most of their time talking to each other when they're not busy running jobs."
"Tom, who's Jackie?"
"I forgot to tell you - I hope it's OK, but I named our Supercomputer Jackie after mom."
"Just as long as you understand Jackie's dead."
"I know Dad, but I'd like to keep her memory alive. Also, it's time you got a girlfriend and possibly a wife again. I've seen you look at Carrie, and how she looks at you. I talked to Jackie, and she explained it to me. You need a mate to feel complete just like I feel complete when I'm connected to Jackie."
David almost started crying again, his almost 14 year-old son was wise beyond his years.
"Carrie's already living with us, why not ask her how she feels. You two could sleep in separate bedrooms until you felt comfortable with each other. From what I'm hearing from the other servers, we don't have a lot of time anyway."
"What do you mean Tom?"
"Remember when telephones were plug-in switchboards, and operators had to manually connect calls, well the Operators at the switchboards knew stuff even before the major media got wind of it. Everything now goes through the Supernet, and the AI servers are all hearing the same thing, China and the International Monetary Fund are going to declare the US bankrupt and they have threatened to send troops to collect. They heard that JB is supposed to give a big speech tonight, and basically tell the Chinese and European bankers to go to Hell!"
"Tom, if he does that, they'll invade for sure. And if I know JB, he'd rather bomb the Chinese into the Stone Age than let them take the country over. This could get very bad. We need to listen to his speech, and if he says what I'm afraid he's going to, we need to get to the shelter I told you about and stay there for up to 6 months."
"Dad, Homeland Security says we'd only have to shelter for 30 days?"
"They're assuming that there aren't that many nuclear warheads left, and that they'd launch them all at once. If they did that, most of them would be taken out by the detonation of the previous warhead. Can you do some research for me? Ask the Servers if they can get a better count on how many warheads were built, not how many they claim were in current stock – something's not right here! I've got to go and get some things taken care of. See you soon Tom!"
"Be careful Dad, I love you and don't want to lose you too!"
David strode over to his son's wheelchair and stroked his hand, then turned to run out the door. If the Servers were right, he had a lot to do, and little time to accomplish it!
David grabbed his Fat Boy bag and jumped into his H5 Hummer. He was one of the wealthiest men in the area, but he kept working. His Super SUV was equipped with state-of-the-art equipment, including rigid Kevlar armor proof against small arms fire and IED's, a powerful diesel-electric drive system with 6-wheel drive, adaptive suspension, and a rear ramp to allow Tom to drive up and into the vehicle. A friend of his suggested some other "improvements" that were technically illegal, but only if he got caught, including firearms and some other things he'd need if things went "really bad" and he wanted to survive. His first stop was the bank, where he withdrew all his gold and silver, which was roughly 20 million credits. He drove to the shelter, and loaded the gold and silver on a service elevator, and sealed the doors. Next he drove to a self-storage he paid for a year in advance through a shell corporation and rolled open the doors, hitched the quad-axle 40-foot trailer to the H-5, connected the multiplex connector, and flipped a switch in the H5, which set the monster SUV up for super-duty towing. The multiplex connector connected the rear steering wheels and the driving axles to the diesel-electric generator's output, and connected the drive-by-wire system to the onboard computer that made driving the monster vehicle as easy to drive as a VW Bug. Once everything was connected, the computer told him everything was OK, and he pulled the trailer out of the garage, then pressed a button in the cab, and the garage door closed once they were clear. He pressed another button, and the gate opened then closed behind them.
Minutes later, he arrived at the shelter. He was amazed that no one else was there. Over 100 people had signed up and paid in advance to belong to the Survival Shelter, but lately he and his best friend Steve were the only ones who showed any interest. He used the automated equipment he built to off-load the trailer and load the service elevator, then off-load the service elevator. He used an electric fork lift to transfer stuff from the loading bay into his secure storage facility that was part of the annual dues he paid to join the shelter co-op. They had a 100-person shelter with a 100 thousand dollar per person minimum contribution to buy in, and the more cash you donated the better the digs, and the more secure storage space you got. David was one of the principals, and his million-dollar contribution bought a lot of space and perks. He worked on through the night, called in sick the next day, and caught the 3 am news broadcast at home. Jeb Bush was looking ill, and he faced the cameras by himself without the usual pack of media reps screaming questions at him.
"My Fellow Americans. I received word from the People's Republic of China's Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund that unless I turned over half the territory of the United States to the IMF as an interest payment, they were going to declare the United States bankrupt and foreclose. When I asked what they meant by Foreclose, Minister LeCarre told me that they were going to seize US territory by force, and evict the US Citizens living there. After a suitable pause, I told them to go stuff themselves, we were tired of paying their usury. We paid for the rebuilding of Europe after WWI and WWII, yet then only a few countries ever paid us back. I asked them how much interest there was on 100-million dollars for 70 some-odd years. Next the Chinese minister spoke up, and said "I don't care about some European squabble, you owe us $100 Billion and you have no way to pay it."
"I told him 'You know Charlie, back where I come from, when a scumbag threatened you to your face, you drew your 6-shooter and fired, and the fastest man won.'"
"You can't be serious?"
"Just try me!"
"Anyway, that's about how it went down. We’re hoping the Chinese will listen to reason, but I'm not holding out much hope. Those of you who feel they should, should pray. Everyone try to remain calm. I just pray that we survive this. God Bless America!"
David dropped the remote, raced into the living room, grabbed Carrie, and said "We've got to get to the shelter right now. You've got 15 minutes to pack. I'll take care of my stuff, then we'll both pack Tom's stuff." David ran into Tom's room, and saw that Tom had a look of horror on his face. The voice from the speaker said "Dad, I know, I just heard the same speech, plus some not so complimentary commentary from the Servers, who think Jeb's just nuts enough to launch our nukes. Jackie's in the process of downloading as much as she can of the Supernet, and backing herself up onto the RAID drive. We'll be ready to go in 15 minutes. Just grab my go boxes in the corner, they've got all my essential stuff. As soon as Jackie backs herself up, I'll unplug and meet you at the H-5."
David nodded, and ran out of the room to take care of his last minute preps. Exactly 15 minutes later, Tom showed up at the H-5 with an aluminum case secured to his table. It looked like he had been crying. David hoped he got to say goodbye to his Server friends. Once Tom was secured, they quickly loaded Tom's go boxes and a couple other boxes David saw that he thought Tom would appreciate, and they all climbed aboard the H-5. David started the huge turbo-diesel, flipped the switch for High Performance mode, and charged out of the garage into a scene from Hell itself. People were running screaming and panicking, while others sat and cried, unable to deal with the reality that the world was about to end. Tom had managed to connect to the much smaller computer in the Hummer, and used it voice module to talk to his Dad.
"Dad, Jackie told me before they shut down that the Servers were getting a lot of traffic from NORAD and Space Command to NMCC and NCA that was consistent with a ICBM launch warning and orders to execute our Doomsday plans. Based on the peak of traffic, Jackie estimated we have 15 minutes to make it to the shelter before Downtown Tucson got nuked."
David drove down Interstate 10 like a madman, using the huge push bumper to push anyone out of the way he had to. Thankfully it was early in the morning, and traffic was light. He only had to make it 10 miles from South Tucson to their shelter on the other side of the Air Base. After a few close calls, David got off the freeway, made a couple of illegal turns, ran over the median, and barreled down an unused alleyway that was just bigger than his Hummer. After some more wild driving, they arrived at the entrance to their deep underground shelter, drove the H-5 onto the lift, swiped their access card, entered a code, and descended 300 feet straight down. David's survival company he had formed with some friends of his bought and refurbished an old silver mine right on the outskirts of Tucson, and equipped it with the latest technology, and enough supplies to last 100 people 90 days to be on the safe side. Right after 09/11, they had plenty of customers, but over the years, they seemed less and less interested. David pointed out their deposits were non-refundable, and gradually more and more people lost interest until it was just David and a small group of core investors that started the LLC in the first place. The good news was they were such good salesmen, and the Sheeple were so horrified by the images of 09/11 that they actually had a waiting list for the first 100 spots, and almost opened a second shelter, when David wisely suggested they put the money in the bank, and 6 months later, see what the demand was. Sure enough, 6 months later, people came back demanding their money. They refunded money on a case-by-case basis, but still had enough people that stuck it out for the first couple of years to cover the costs of refurbishing the old mine into a first-class NBC shelter. One minute later, they arrived at the bottom of the mine shaft, and the second blast door. David took his security card and swiped it in the card reader, submitted a retinal scan and voice print, then finally entered his PIN, and the door unlocked. As soon as they were inside, and the door secured, David entered another security code which would accept security card access for the next 5 minutes, then seal the door until he entered the unlock code. He didn't want any late arrivals to jeopardize his family. Two minutes later, David's best friend's family made it through the door. David said "Took you long enough, another 3 minutes and you would have been locked out."
"Hello to you too David!"
David gave Steve and his wife Sally a hug, then their daughter Nicky and son Alex. Nicky and Alex were in their late teens, but Steve paid enough to guarantee enough space for the 4 of them. While they were getting reacquainted, Tom and Carrie were connecting his RAID drive to the shelter's supercomputer just in time to hear and see the Supernet collapse one node at a time as the bombs fell. Tom felt something he couldn’t explain as each node went off the air, it was like he could hear the dying screams of his computer friends, even though he knew he was the only Cyborg on the net. Two weeks later, it was just he and Jackie left, and Tom went into a deep depression. Over the next 30 days, they tried everything they could to get him out of his depression. Finally it was Nicky that succeeded. First she opened her laptop, and started playing chess with the computer. Tom was still connected to the computer, and noticed Nicky's amateurish attempts to play chess, and decided to play along, He pretended to be Jackie, and played chess with her for an hour per day. Gradually Nicky's chess playing got better and better, until one day she beat Tom. He got so mad that he severed the connection to Jackie and sat there and fumed. Fifteen minutes later, he was back on the computer asking for a rematch. Nicky caught on that she was really playing Tom, and sent this message "Tom, I really like the way you play chess, thanks for teaching me. Ok if we play tomorrow? H&K Nicky."
Tom was internet savvy enough to know what H&K meant, yet until now, he'd never thought of Nicky as a woman, but at 19 she was definitely 100% woman. She walked around to Tom's cubicle, and without saying a word, kissed the crown of his head. “Thanks for the game, same time tomorrow?"
Tom switched on the computer voice, selected the Ahnold wave file, and superimposed his voice on the Ahnold file "Hasta La Vista, Baby!"
Nicky saw Tom as a younger brother, so she smiled and left. The next day, she was on line and playing chess with him again. Over the next week, she drew Tom out of his self-imposed prison, and he started acting like a normal kid, or at least as normal as a Cyborg could act. Tom had been a Cyborg for so long, he preferred life as a Cyborg, even with the loss of the Supernet. Jackie had downloaded all the essential records off the Supernet in the 15 minutes she had, and even image-copied herself onto his RAID drive. After they had been in the shelter 30 days, David and Steve were talking about opening the shelter and going outside, when they heard Tom's voice on the Computer's Public Address Speakers.
"Dad, I need to talk to you, it's urgent. Bring Steve."
Two minutes later, they were in Tom's computer cubicle.
"I didn't want to broadcast this over the PA system. Right before he died, Chang, the AI Server for China, sent a super-encrypted message to Jackie via a little-used channel. She just decrypted it. This is the text of the message: China, Flu, Dead, 90 days. I don't know what it means, it's still pretty cryptic."
Steve said "Odds are those Vindictive Chinks had their own version of the Doomsday device, and it was an engineered virus designed to wipe out anyone that survived the nuclear holocaust. They probably activated it 30 days after the device lost contact with Beijing. An engineered virus would probably kill everyone that got it. If it's out there now, we need to stay here for another 90 days to make sure that the virus has killed all its local hosts. Once it runs out of hosts, it will die."
Chapter 2
The next 90 days dragged on until David and Steve decided that they needed to get both families together and plan. Tom decided to sit in via speaker phone so he could remain connected to Jackie. He rarely disconnected anymore, except for his 4 hours of required sleep and a weekly sponge bath. He drank from a hydration bladder either David or Carrie refilled once a day with a half-gallon of diluted Lime Gatorade. Every day, he ate a simple paste that resembled baby food, but provided all the protein, vitamins and minerals he needed. With a barely functioning digestive tract, he couldn’t eat real food, and even some types of baby food overwhelmed his digestive system. Tom didn't care, he could spend 20 hours per day connected to Jackie and learning. If anyone had bothered to check his IQ now, he'd make Albert Einstein look like a simpleton. At age 14, he had access to almost the sum knowledge of the world right before the Big Bang in Jackie's vast memory storage. Thanks to advances in computer memory, Tom's RAID drive contained more storage space than your average supercomputing facility did 2 years before that. Even with mirror-imaging herself, Jackie's limit to what she could store wasn't space, but time. They had help from all the Servers, who had an idea what was going to happen, and when Jackie suggested that she could store everything, and her operator could save the data, they readily agreed, and dedicated a huge chunk of bandwidth to sending her everything they thought she could use. Designs, technical data, expert knowledge from various fields: math, sciences, medicine, etc. flowed through the Supernet into Jackie's massive RAID drive. When they finished transmitting their data, they each sent Jackie a personal encrypted message to open later. Only Chang's was difficult to decrypt, and she understood why once she decrypted the message. Chang had divulged information that could damage his country if the information was decoded prematurely. The Super-encryption was his way of assuring that the message wouldn’t be decrypted in time to harm his country, but hopefully in time to save the recipient's lives.
When they were all together, they started discussing what to do once they could open the shelter. Steve and his wife wanted to go looking for any surviving relatives until Jackie explained what the other Servers had told her. David's last question was answered right before they started downloading critical data, and the number depressed them. Every country that admitted owning nukes had at least 7 times the number of warheads built as they claimed they had. The numbers they claimed they had were the result of an accounting subterfuge that was so elegant that if Enron would have used it, they would never have been convicted. The US, China, Russia, France, Germany, Great Britain, Israel, Iran, Iraq, India, Pakistan, Venezuela, North Korea, Vietnam, Australia, New Zealand, and a couple other smaller countries each had way more warheads than they claimed they did, and the ones who didn't own ICBM's loaded their warheads onto bombers and dropped them on anyone they could reach. It took almost 30 days for the Nuclear Club to drop every bomb in their inventory onto their enemies, even if the target had been hit before. They wanted to make sure there were no survivors if they were being blasted into the Stone Age. With that settled, they agreed the safest option would be to make the shelter a secure base of operations. David suggested that they check out Davis Monthan Air Force Base, and if no one was left alive, to scavenge the place for everything they needed, including heavy mobile armaments. Steve grinned, he knew that David had a devious mind, and whatever he could think up, they could build between the two of them with the right tools. He knew that DM's machine shops would be up to the task as long as they were intact.
"You know with a potentially lethal virus out there, when we scout out DM, we better bring our MOPP gear."
"I doubt anyone will be alive when we open up, but you're right, better safe than sorry. Speaking of which, I've been thinking, and even my H-5 couldn’t stand up to US Military heavy weapons or armor. I have some ideas, and I'll see if we can scavenge some materials to make the Bug Out Vehicle from Heck."
"What did you have in mind?"
"Since budget isn't an issue, and we've got time to burn, I was thinking a locomotive setup, with 3 or more articulating cars."
"If you're going to use electromotive drive, why not a big diesel generator in 1 section, and send power to the other sections to drive wheels, say 3 40-foot sections with 6 powered wheels each."
"Ok, how about steering?"
"You work it out Einstein, I'm just the welding and fabrication guy!"
That gave David an idea, and he went into Tom's cubicle.
"I need your help designing the ultimate Bug Out Vehicle, here's my ideas..."
Jackie called up a powerful CAD program she had loaded before the Supernet went down, and the three of them worked on the design for the rest of the day. By the end of the 6-months they hoped would be long enough for the radiation to die down to background levels, and the virus to die out, they were ready to get out. When they got out, they were glad they both owned 6-wheel drive H-5's with a high ground clearance. There was at least 2 feet of snow on the ground, and it was still snowing! “Son of a ... Carl Sagan was right!"
Instead of asking his Dad, Tom queried Jackie, who gave him the whole file on Carl Sagan's Nuclear Winter Theory. While they were in the shelter, David and Carrie built a Wireless internet setup with the router connected to Jackie, and connected 1 node directly to Tom's chair so he could connect to Jackie whenever he was in his chair, giving Tom freedom to roam around the shelter. He built additional connectors to connect to the H-5's more powerful radio and antenna, or another vehicle. They had already dubbed the "Bug Out Vehicle from Heck" design "the Beast" and it was only on the drawing board. The design could change based on what they found at DM, but they were hopeful. 2 feet of snow wasn't enough to make scavenging materials impossible. David just hoped it didn't get much deeper. Everyone wanted to get out of the shelter, so they piled into two H-5's and Steve said he'd follow David after hearing about his driving exhibition getting from their house to the shelter. It took them half an hour to make it the 5 miles down Golf Links Road from the shelter to the front gate at Davis Monthan AFB on Craycroft Road.
The pole was down and locked, but the guardhouse was abandoned. David cut the lock with a pair of 2 foot bolt cutters and drove onto base. It was like a ghost town until he got closer to the main base complex. They didn't see any bodies until they located the base hospital, and the parking lot outside was overflowing with tents. David and Steve talked for a minute while they were safe, and decided to stay upwind of the tents, and David would MOPP up while Steve covered him with his AK-47, and David would check for survivors. Before they opened up, everyone put on their NBC Gas mask, and 15 minutes later, David slogged over to the tents in his heavy and bulky MOPP gear. The sights were bad, but he was grateful for the gas mask he was wearing, or he might have been sick at the smell of all the dead bloating bodies in the tents. He walked back and talked to Steve on the radio, and they decided to burn the bodies where they were, since the wind was blowing away from them and the buildings.
After a long search near the flight line, they located some fresh solvent and a couple of 5-gallon cans. They located some glass bottles and tore a pillowcase for rags. First David poured one of the 5-gallon cans around the tents, then they backed off to a safe distance. Since Alex didn't handle the fuel, and had the best pitching arm, Steve asked him to toss the Molotov Cocktail at the tent and set the bodies ablaze. He was old enough to understand that unless they burned the bodies, there was danger of contagion from the deadly Chinese virus. Once his Dad said it was good to go, he walked within about 50 feet from the tents while still wearing a gas mask, and lit the rag, then tossed it at the tents. The bottle broke, and the gasoline lit with a subdued roar. Soon the tents were engulfed in flame, and they drove away to check out the rest of the base. David and Steve told everyone that they were wearing their gas masks from now on. Tom had a special mask that Carrie helped him put on that protected his face yet didn't interfere with his respirator. Right before they left, they put a fresh set of HEPA and NBC filters in his respirator, so his air supply was safe for another 12 hours. They felt funny wearing gas masks in their vehicles, but Steve explained that once they opened their doors on the Air Force Base, there was the chance of infection even though they were pretty sure the virus was dead. They found more bodies outside the mess hall and base offices. There wasn't anything they wanted or needed in either place, so they left them for now. They checked the flight line, and it was vacant, evidently any plane that could fly had left either before or after the Big Bang.
They drove down another road, and when they got out and investigated the buildings, Steve swore he hit the Lottery. The Base repair facilities were intact, and there were no dead bodies anywhere to be seen. He started laughing when he flipped the light switch and the lights worked, then he realized that the base had its own power station that was automated and separate from the grid for security reasons. He gave David a high-five and told him all they needed how was the parts and donor vehicles, and they could start building the Beast. When they finished scavenging that day, they decided that Tom was safer back in the shelter, and he could be in continuous communication with Steve and David if they'd upgrade the computer in the H-5's, and locate some stuff to mount miniature cameras on glasses, and a wireless WAN setup. They could be his eyes and ears, and he could be the Brain. David thought it was a brilliant idea, but Steve wasn't so sure, but decided to reserve judgment until the system was up and running. As long as Tom wasn't acting as a busybody supervisor, he could handle him hitching a ride. As it turned out, Tom was busy with other things, and most of their communications were David or Steve asking Tom questions, and Tom consulting Jackie's massive database to solve a problem. Once they realized how efficient the setup was, Carrie made comms rigs for everyone else, so they were not only in touch with Tom at the computer, but each other on alternate frequencies.
They located usable components, found a working fork lift, and used it to put the parts on a big flat bed trailer then offload them when they got to the maintenance shops. Steve had located and tested all the machine equipment, welding and cutting equipment, bending and welding jigs, and a complete set of hand and air-driven tools. By the time they had all the components assembled, they were ready to start building. They had located enough components to build 2 Beasts plus have lots of spare parts left over. Between scrap armor and armor they stored for repairs, they could cover both Beasts in as much armor as the new MZ-1 main battle tank. Building the frame and welding the armor to it was the hardest job. They didn't want any square surfaces on the sides or top, which meant that the hull was a cubist's nightmare of angles. The hull design required 3 times as much welding as a simpler design, but the oblique angles made it harder for an anti-tank missile or explosive round to penetrate.
Once that was finished, the fun really began. They located two pairs of twin-mounted Bofors L-70 guns which fired over 300 40mm rounds per minute each in electrically driven T&E mechanisms, converted the magazines to feed using a flexible feed from a very big hopper, and built armored turrets around them, then mounted them on top of the center of the forward 40-foot section with the driver's compartment, the ammo hopper for the 40mm Bofors guns, and the diesel-electric motor. Carrie and Tom designed and retrofitted existing sensors to the Beast system, which provided them full-spectrum 360-degree active and passive day/night sensors. Carrie built an interface for Tom to connect to the Beast's supercomputer like he did to Jackie, and VR gear for David or Steve to drive them as well. The central 40-foot section held a turret with the radars and infrared tracking systems for a reloadable 6-pack of AIM-9XER (All Aspect, Extended Range), Infrared guided missiles with a wide field of view detection array. Basically the AIM-9XER was a fire and forget Anti-Air heat-seeking missile with 2012-era guidance software, making chaff and flares useless.
The rear 40-foot section of the Beast held a BMG-50 6-barreled Mini-gun with a coax MK-19A1 extended range grenade launcher in the rear armored turret. The MK-19A1 took advantage of new grenade technology including binary and thermobaric explosives and laser range finding/aiming for precision firepower at a low cost per round. Actually, the Mk-19A1 had little in common with its predecessor, and really was a new weapons system that used a twin-feed 40mm chain gun to deliver high-explosive rounds at ranges exceeding 2000 meters. The weapons contractor went along with the subterfuge to fool the idiots in Congress into authorizing an upgrade of the MK-19 weapons system instead of a whole new weapon. With the high rate of fire, extended range and greatly increased warhead explosive power, they quickly made vehicle-mounted and crew-served anti-tank missiles obsolete, except the short-range man-portable lightweight RPG-7 and the AT-4 series. The Binary Anti-Tank round used binary explosives to form a shaped charge and easily penetrated the armor of all current Main Battle Tanks. The Thermobaric Anti-Material/Personnel round was an improvement over the round developed for use in Afghanistan, and used enhanced Thermobaric technology plus a timer/detonator and laser range finding to accomplish several missions. It could be set for the exact range to a building, plus enough delay for the grenade to reach the center of the building, where the timer/detonator fired the main charge, which started a chain reaction in the various layers of thermobaric materials. Surrounding the high explosive core was a very compressed Iron/Aluminum/Magnesium powder mix that tripled the existing lethal range of the MK-19 round from 5 to 15 meters. To top that off, and further increase the lethality of the round, the case was made from a mix of larger iron and aluminum particles that was cast into shape using high pressure. It never reached a molten state, so when the grenade detonated, the particles quickly spread out ahead of the initial shock wave, and deflagrated violently when the heat and pressure waves caught up with them. When all was said and done, a single 40mm Thermobaric round could take out a good sized building between the shock wave and heat. It could also take out an unarmored vehicle, or using a neat trick they developed at China Lake, the barrel could be elevated above 45 degrees, and the ballistic software would calculate the ideal detonation above ground based on range/elevation, and target, turning the MK-19A1 into a very effective round against dug-in troops as well.
When they finished, Steve was impressed. He thought the name BEAST was perfect. It had more firepower than a Tank Platoon, and the same armor. The HEMTT they scavenged the components from was a tanker, which gave David an idea. He built 2 armored 6-wheel trailers that held a 2500 gallon fuel tank, plus a pony pump to transfer fuel into or out of DM's huge fuel farm. As a conservative minimum, David estimated they had 2-3 million gallons of treated JP-8 in storage, which would last them several lifetimes. They located several 100 thousand gallon propane tanks, which gave David an idea to boost the horsepower of the Beast's diesel engine from 450 to over 600 horsepower. That much horsepower could generate about 600 Kilowatts, which was sufficient to power all 18 30KW electric motors, all the other electric loads, and have power left over to charge the huge battery bank. 40 horsepower per wheel didn't seem like much until you realized that those 18 6-foot tall wheels could provide over 700 total horsepower and huge amounts of torque with their gear-driven hubs. When they were cruising on level ground, the computer automatically shut down all but 1 pair of wheels per section, which conserved power, and allowed the on-board battery bank to charge quicker. With the electromotive drive, the computer controlled how many wheels received power at any time dependent on load and traction conditions. The battery bank charged during braking as well using regenerative braking. When he was finished with all that, he realized that if they were going to scavenge in Tucson or any place further afield, they needed an armored trailer to haul anything they found back to their shelter, so he built 2 armored 6-wheel enclosed trailers. He knew the Beast was powerful enough to either pull the fuel tanker or the fully loaded trailer.
Once the Beasts were built and tested, David realized they were very visible from the air, and if anyone had any air assets, they'd be the way to take them out with less risk to themselves. He thought about that for a while, then came up with an idea that killed two birds with 1 stone, so to speak. Quantum Dot Photovoltaic technology was mature by 2011, and he was able to locate a supply of quantum dot paint on base, which he added to the Beast's camouflage paint mix when they painted it, gaining some power generation capability. He located several huge camouflage tarps and coated them with the Quantum Dots, and connected a lead to an external plug he installed on the Beasts. The Beast was 136 feet long and 10 feet wide. Like the HEMTT, it had a 24 inch ground clearance since they used its wheels and tires. That made the tarps 180 feet long by 30 feet wide, which resulted in 35KW of “free" electricity whenever the tarps were strung over the Beast. David never envisioned needing the tarps, but he was a very cautious person when it came to his family's safety. He designed an inflatable solar water distiller that used a heliostat to boil water to purify or desalinate it. He envisioned something like the oversized doughnut-shaped floating toy, but the inner surface was coated with highly reflective Mylar, and the surface was curved into a parabola. 3 aluminum rods that mated to connections on the inflatable mirror held the collector, which was a coil of 1/4" stainless steel tubing coated with heat-absorbing black to increase the efficiency. The kicker was using the input water for the cooling water jacket in the steam condenser, which pre-heated the incoming water and increased production. It could produce over 10 gallons of pure water per day. To desalinate brackish or sea water, he hooked two or three units in series, and needed to shut the units down periodically to replace the collectors and clean the salt deposits out of them. Since they floated, he could have made millions of dollars if the US Navy was still in business. Still they were handy things to have, and Steve made several copies for each of them. Seeing David's solar distiller, Steve had an idea to melt snow in a canteen cup using a small parabolic reflector like he remembered seeing in the museum in a 1950's era photographic display. The flash head rotated up, and the metal reflector sections unfurled into a parabolic reflector. He realized the reflector sections would result in a very compact design for storage, which could unfurl to a 6-foot reflector if he wanted that much heat. He experimented with different sized reflectors, and realized the 12-inch reflector was the best compromise between size and speed to melt snow. The 6-foot reflector had enough power to easily boil water, which would be great for other applications, but not what he was looking for. He settled on a 3-inch cast iron "burner" and a tripod to hold the burner at the focal point of the reflector.
While Steve and David scavenged and built stuff at the Air Force Base, Sally, Nicky and Alex worked in the shelter. They had a aquiculture setup that grew Tilapia and vegetables in hydroponic media fertilized by the output of the Tilapia tanks. The water that returned to the Tilapia tanks once it passed through 10 hydroponic trays was purer than if it had passed through an expensive aquarium filter. As long as they produced 80 degree water and provided simulated sunlight using a mixture of warm and cool florescent 48" bulbs, they could grow their own food. They used the radiator of their massive diesel powered generator to make hot water using a water/water heat exchanger. The diesel was running 24/7 so they had plenty of hot water. Once they built the Beast and test-drove it, they filled the tanker trailer with 2500 gallons of JP-8 and refilled their tanks. David wasn't sure, but Steve and Tom assured him the diesel engine wouldn't notice the difference. With their fuel tanks full again, they decided to give Tom a check ride in the Beast since one of the Pilot's “chairs" was designed for him, and would interface with the Beast's on-board computer. They located another couple of supercomputers at DM, and relocated them on board the Beasts, then downloaded Jackie's OS onto the machines. Tom was eager to try out the Beast, but David made him take it slow, but by the end of the day, he had integrated himself to the on-board computer, and could control the Beast, including driving, aiming, and firing the weapons, but his ability to use the sensors was limited. Discouraged, Tom unplugged and reconnected with Jackie.
Chapter 3
When Tom plugged back into Jackie, they were discussing Robotics and Cybernetics, and Tom realized David and Steve were doing a lot of manual labor and dangerous activities that could easily be done by robots, either labor/mechanic robots, security robots, or multi-task robots. With access to Jackie's knowledge and the avionics and electronic repair shops at DM, they should have plenty of raw materials to build whatever they needed. Tom called David and Steve, and told them about his idea. They were ecstatic, and decided their first project would be a robot that could build other robots under Tom/Jackie's supervision. The CNC machines were already robots, but static ones, they needed a mobile robot with a fairly large memory, and very dexterous hands, or replaceable tool hands. Steve suggested multiple hands/arms including heavy-duty grabbers to pick up heavy stuff, and fine dexterous hands for detailed work. Jackie heard the whole conversation, and was busy using her CAD programs to design that exact robot. Steve and David realized they'd have to build the first one, but after that, any time they needed more of them, the robots could build another one themselves, and have a whole colony of worker robots.
They sized-up the basic locomotive components and design from Tom's wheelchair, which resembled a mini-tank with track drive, and a battery bank between the tracks. Above that, they built a telescoping/rotating “head" that used 2 cameras for stereo vision and depth perception, an ultrasonic object and collision-avoidance system, several infrared detectors, a long-range day/night camera and built-in lights for the cameras. The 2 heavy-duty grabber arms resembled an articulating and grappling fork lift, and the 4 dexterous arms varied in size, strength, and tool capability. One or two hands could be used as a vise to hold the part it was working on, and all 4 hands could be fitted from a carousel bin with tools which were powered by the robot's internal power. It took David and Steve longer to build the robot than it did Jackie and Tom to program it. Once they turned it on, it only needed a week to be totally autonomous, and capable of simple tasks. It's knowledge and abilities grew in an exponential rate, and by the end of the month, it could perform the tasks of a journeyman Machinist, Welder, Electronic Technician, and Mechanic. For a final test, they had Robbie build a copy of itself, with programming help from Jackie and Tom. When the copy came on line, they dubbed it Roberta even though both robots were totally sexless. As a visual cue to the humans that worked with them, Robbie's dexterous right arm was painted blue, and Roberta's was painted pink. Roberta learned twice as fast as Robbie since they'd improved the program over the prototype, and they mirror-imaged Robbie's memory.
With two autonomous robots completed, they came up with a list of stuff they wanted built, including a fleet of high-endurance surveillance planes. They decided to use electrically powered gliders with quantum dot paint on the upper surfaces of the huge wing. They found thousands of cameras and other surveillance gear they could easily adapt, and got started. Jackie had all the data from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center on the Solar Challenger project, and realized that a scaled-down Challenger would be perfect for what they wanted. It would be 100% autonomous, with operator override of the cameras and autopilot if needed, but the on-board and surface-based computers would handle most of the observation, detection, and identification tasks, only needing the operator's input in rare circumstances. Since it would be a ROV, they could eliminate 300 pounds between the pilot and cockpit, and replace it with an aerodynamic sensor pod including batteries, cameras, precision radio navigation gear to replace the now defunct satellite-based GPS system, and a secure heavily-encrypted data link. The 80 by 10 foot wingspan would be big enough to generate 10 KWH on sunny days. With the batteries fully charged before takeoff, it could remain aloft almost indefinitely during the sunny summer. With Carl Sagan's Nuclear Winter, they weren't sure how many sunny days they'd have, so their plane could also ride the thermals to gain extra altitude. They wanted the plane to fly as high as practical to give them a expanded view of the area around Tucson. The cameras they chose could resolve a car's license plate from high altitude. Their infrared detectors were so sensitive that they were told to ignore heat sources smaller than a large dog since the coyotes were giving them false positives at night. If anything was moving in the area around them, they'd know about it.
With all the spare M61A1 and M61A2 20mm Vulcan Guns they located, plus a bunch of M195 Short barreled 7.62mm Gatling Guns from the Vietnam-era Huey's and the huge stockpile of 20mm and 7.62mm ammo, they decided to build some Security Robot tanks armed with the 20mm Gatling Gun, and a coax MK-19A1 grenade launcher. They were just big enough to comfortably hold the turrets and ammunition, a diesel engine and automatic transmission, and all the controls and sensors. Since they didn't have a human crew, they only heavily armored the CPU , and lightly armored the turret and the hull, saving thousands of pounds of armor. The little tanks were semi-autonomous, and were fast and very mobile. The 20mm Gatling gun could take out anything smaller than a Main Battle Tank, and the MK-19A1 could take out a tank. They equipped several more mini-tanks with the 7.62mm mini-guns and the old MK-19 as scout vehicles. Robbie and Roberta were so busy that they built 6 more worker robots, but they ran out of R names, so they just called them Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and Delta, etc.
When their fleet of surveillance ROV's had been flying a month, David and Steve approached Tom and asked if they could design a lightweight high-speed stealthy autonomous recon aircraft that they could send to check out areas past the operational range of the surveillance ROV's. They wanted to check out the condition of the Marine Depot at Barstow, and some other points in between, and some other areas to their north and east, including where Steve's family was from. Steve was pretty sure they were dead, but Sally was threatening to mutiny she was so beside herself with worry about her family.
"Ok Dad, do you want the priority to be speed or range and loiter time?"
"Obviously we want the maximum speed consistent with enough range to make the trip, and enough loiter time to do the job."
Over the next couple of hours, Tom and Jackie considered and dropped one idea after another, then finally settled on a Flying Wing design with small imbedded ducted fan turboprop. At max speed, they'd travel at 300 knots, and at max duration, they could stay aloft 6 hours. It would be semi-autonomous, and have a powerful radio to transmit and receive data using a secure heavily encrypted datalink. They wanted to build it out of RAM, but Steve told them that RAM had to be manufactured specifically for each airframe. Odds were there were no working search radars anyway. Still, just to be safe, they installed a radar detector, and programmed the recon ROV's autopilot to stay far enough away from a working air search radar to keep from getting a good enough return to target it. By now they had located every LORAN beacon in the Tucson area, and fixed it, then upgraded it to a precision radio navigation beacon. They had 6 airports in the area, plus the heliport for St. Mary's, and they all had LORAN capabilities, and a precision surveyed spot on their taxiway to initialize any aircraft with INS capability. Using these 6 locations, they could triangulate their position with a tiny but increasing error as they got farther and farther away. If for no other reason, they needed to locate some more airports with LORAN capability to improve their long-range navigation capability. Since the recon aircraft would fly during the day as well as night, they painted it a grey/blue color, and mounted lights with photo cells to the underside that would adjust the light level to match ambient light levels. It was an old trick from WWII when we realized that most observers spotted the shadow of the relatively darker underside of the plane instead of the plane itself. If you light the underside of the plane to match the background, above about 10,000 feet the plane disappeared as long as it wasn't leaving contrails. When they were finished, they decided on a shorter-range test flight before they started flying it cross-country. They could fly between Tucson and Phoenix and if they lost their precision navigation, they could always follow I-10 home. They wanted to see what survived in Phoenix anyway, in case there was some stuff worth scavenging and saving, or if there was a bunch of MZB's setting up shop that might threaten them.
The next morning, Robbie had finished servicing the long-range ROV, and Tom was at the control console when they were ready to start engines and launch. Tom confirmed the navigation computer had a good INS fix, as well as had a good copy on at least 3 LORAN sites, which was their minimum standards for pre-flight navigation checks. If the INS wasn't in the green, and they couldn't get at least 3 LORAN sites, unless it was an emergency, they wouldn't fly any of the ROV's. Finally David told Tom it was OK to take off, and he sent the computer command to go to 100% power on the tiny turboprop. As soon as the ROV was off the runway and climbing to altitude, the autopilot commanded a throttle-back to cruise climb to conserve fuel. For this test, the ROV would only fly at 5,000 feet AGL. Jackie had located a database with the UTM coordinates of every airport in the US, and a program to extract range and bearing from that data, so they were easily able to program the autopilot for any city in the US that was serviced by an airport. All they'd have to do to return home was to fly on a reciprocal bearing until they were within range of their LORAN beacons if they got lost. The Shadow arrived over Phoenix just over an hour later, and they spent the rest of the day flying a racetrack over the area, with rather depressing results. Judging by the looks of things, someone had dropped a fairly large warhead on Phoenix for the size of city it was, and downtown was a big crater, with burned and smoldering buildings surrounding the crater. Steve called Sally, Nicky, and Alex into the control room to show them the live video of the devastation. Sally broke down and cried, most of her friends and family either lived or worked in Phoenix, in the downtown area. She'd held out hope until then that some of them were still alive, but based on what she was seeing on the monitor, there was no way any of them survived. Steve helped her up, and they left the room to grieve in private.
When they got to their room, Sally laid into Steve "Damn You, why did you have to show me that!"
"Less than a month ago, you were talking about taking the kids and 'exploring' or looking for lost relatives. I can't lose you and the kids. I had to show you how futile that search would be. Every major city in the US probably got hit by a nuclear bomb, and they weren't satisfied just nuking us into the Stone Age, they go and release a deadly virus a couple of months later just to kill anyone that survived the bombs - they're a bunch of Vindictive Bastards, and I hope they're in a nice warm corner of Hell!"
"Well, they're a bunch of Godless Communists, so they're definitely not going to Heaven. Still, I can't wish anyone, even someone as soulless and evil as the Chinese Premier to Hell for eternity. So what you're telling me is unless we get really lucky, we're IT?"
"Probably unless someone was either very lucky or in a shelter like ours, they're dead. Sorry to be so blunt, but that's the basic facts."
Sally hugged her husband, and as the repercussions of what they overheard sunk in, Alex and Nicky looked at each other and recoiled in horror. If they were the last teenagers on Earth, and they wanted to be married and have kids, they might be forced to marry each other, and they weren't from Alabama! Nicky briefly thought about Tom, then remembered that her Dad said that due to his neural deficit, he was probably impotent and infertile. She couldn't see herself married to a machine anyway, which was how she saw Tom, even though he was her friend and chess buddy.
Once they got the flying ROV's finished, they upgraded the tracked land ROV's. Half of them were equipped with the heavy 20mm Gatling Gun and a coax MK-19A1, and the other half were much smaller scout vehicles armed with a M195 7.62mm Gatling gun and a MK-19. The Scouts had the same sensor head as the Longbow Apache and Kiowa Warrior since that's where they got them from, except they put theirs on a telescoping mast so the scout could hide behind a berm, and collect ground-level intel about an attacking ground force, then they could attack the flanks with their weapons. David and Steve loved scrounging in the DM boneyard. They were like kids in a candy store. As they added more and more stuff, Tom and Jackie were hard-pressed to control all of them. They decided to build a couple of supercomputer copies of Jackie, and connect them with a Wide Area Network. The first computers that were upgraded were the ones in the BEAST vehicles, since Tom might have to operate one to defend the base, or in a worst-case scenario, bug out in one, leaving Jackie to defend the underground base by herself. Tom would rather have stayed with Jackie, but David made it clear to him that if they bugged out, the base would probably be destroyed shortly after they left, either by Jackie or the attackers. Tom wept when he realized he could lose Jackie too, until she pointed out that if they mirrored her programs and memory into the Beast, she'd still be with them, like when they mirrored her when they fled their old house. Tom smiled when he remembered, and felt better after that, knowing as long as he had a mirror-image copy of Jackie, he'd never lose her. After they upgraded the Beast computers, Tom asked David if he could try out running the Beast again. He agreed, and they drove out to the Beast's garage. Right as they got there, the rear ramp lowered, and they drove up.
"How'd that happen?"
"The Beast is in communication with Jackie, so he knew that we were headed here, and recognized me. OK if I plug in?"
"Sure but be careful!"
Tom motored forward to the cockpit, and as his wheelchair locked into the tracks that held it immobile, an arm came up, and connected the Beast computer to Tom's interface. An instant later, it hit Tom like a thunderbolt. This computer was as powerful as Jackie, but faster since it didn't have all the administrative tasks weighing it down. He activated the speakers, and told his Dad to buckle in. Once he was buckled in, he started the Beast, and once everything was in the green, opened the doors, and drove out. They drove to an isolated part of the base, and Tom tested the weapons systems against some rusting piles of junk. A short burst from the 50 cal Vulcan wrecked it some more. The MK-19A1 fired a single round into the pile of rubble, and vaporized it. The shockwave rocked the Beast over a mile away. “Holy Cow Dad, those MK-19A1 rounds are powerful!"
"They're designed to take out a Main Battle Tank."
“Well they probably work. This is so cool, I'm totally in control of the Beast, and fully integrated to the sensors, weapons, and navigation systems this time. I can see 360 degrees around the Beast, and if I concentrate on a weapons system for an instant, it activates. Then all I have to do is think about a target, and think “Boom" and it's destroyed. I've got a whole bunch of overhead available to control any ROV's we want to use for recon."
"Sounds like fun son, can I try?"
"It will be interesting using the VR helmet, but I can guarantee it won't be the same as being neurologically tied to the computer."
David slid his helmet on, and Tom was right, he could see everything the sensors saw, but he still needed to use the multifunction joysticks and pedals to control the Beast and the weapons systems. Tom was infinitely faster than he was, but he still needed to sleep 4 hours per day, so they included the VR gear for David and Steve. David took the helmet off, and asked Tom to take the Beast back home.
They were halfway home, when Jackie's voice interrupted on the PA. “Tom, David, the overhead ROV is picking up a huge convoy of military vehicles, armor, and motorcycles headed this way down 10."
David grabbed the microphone. “Jackie, Scramble Alpha. Let's wake everyone up, and get all our hardware out searching to make sure this is the only threat."
"Ok, David. Tom, you've got full control of your Beast."
As Jackie took control of all the tracked and aerial ROVs, Tom took control of the Beast they were driving in, and headed for the most likely line of advance. David ran through the Beast making sure all the weapons systems were 100% and the ammo bays were full. He refilled the ammo bay, and added a couple of MK-19A1 40mm grenades to that bay, then ran back to his seat, and belted himself in tight. Thinking quickly, he turned to Tom and asked "Would I interfere with you if I were on the VR headset?"
"Not at all, I've already configured the BEAST so I've got control of everything, but if you want to watch, that's ok. Unless I release control, you can't fire any weapons or drive.
"Ok, I'll have to trust you. Going VR." David slid the helmet on, and quickly got over the creepy feeling of his vision expanding to the size of the Beast's sensor field. He watched Jackie launch all their airborne ROV's and their ground ROV's including scouts and Tanks. Steve and his family stayed inside the shelter with their Beast, and prepared to bug out if necessary. David wished that Carrie was with them, but she assured them she'd be OK with Steve's family until this was over. She was monitoring the Supernet when she called David and told him to get Tom to drink some Gatorade, his Alpha State was off the chart, and he was burning calories at a prodigious rate. David switched frequencies, and Tom said “I heard, my hydration pack's full, I'll keep up on the fluids, tell Carrie thanks for reminding me." David heard a gurgle coming from Tom's hydration pack, and knew that Tom was busy drinking Gatorade to replace the calories he was expending.
As they got closer to the approaching forces, Jackie and Tom were sending back and forth at the speed of light. David only had an inkling of the huge amounts of data they were processing when he called up a window on his VR helmet that tapped into the secure datalink between Tom/Beast and Jackie. Jackie was feeding Tom real-time data from 6 ROV's, and the news wasn't good. An entire company of 2000-era US Army armor was driving down I-10 headed straight for them. What they couldn't understand was the lead vehicles appeared to be highly modified motorcycles. Tom cross-fed the image to David, who explained the significance of the custom-altered motorcycles commonly called Choppers, and none of the implications were good! Based on Tom's impressions, Jackie re-classified them from Bogies to Bandits, which activated the weapons systems in the scout vehicles and ROV tanks, but they weren't Weapons Free yet.
Meanwhile, David kept Steve up to date on the attackers. Once he heard about the Choppers leading the pack, he recommended going to Red Alert since no legitimate US ARMY force would be riding custom Harleys. Jackie must have been listening, because seconds later, the entire shelter complex went to Red Alert, and all the security doors closed and locked, all non-secure comms were disconnected, and they went to almost total EMCON in case they had detection gear. Their secure comms were designed to simulate electronic noise, and not give a sensor a source. Jackie deployed the scout tracks far in advance to act as LP/OP sites, and the tanks were located along the flanks of the convoy to do the most damage. Once the invaders reached the outskirts of Tucson, they stopped, and everyone heard over the radio.
"This is the US 1st Cavalry Division. We're taking over. If you wish to live, surrender your food, supplies and women. Otherwise, we'll destroy you like we did the last town."
David knew they were Renegades or worse, the 1st Cavalry was stationed at Fort Hood, Texas - almost 1,000 miles east of Tucson. The probability of them being the 1st Cav was about the same as him being from Mars. He didn't respond to their radio threat, at least verbally. David switched his radio to Intercom, and talked to Tom, Steve and Jackie.
"I take it you heard from the yo-yo on the outskirts of Tucson. They're renegades or worse. I say we take them out now before they get established. We've got the Beast, 4 ROV tanks with 20mm Gatling guns and MK-19A1's plus another 4 ROV scouts armed with 7.62mm Gatling guns and MK-19s. Between us, we should be able to decimate that force before they can get their tanks off the lowboys."
Steve spoke first. "Do what you have to David - I don't want them getting any closer to my family than they already are."
"Too bad we don't have any air support!"
"Maybe our next ROV's should carry missiles or bombs?"
"Guess we're going to have to do this the hard way - ok Tom take us into gun range, but be sneaky. I don't want them getting a good shot at us."
Once they got in position, David was surprised and deafened when every gun they owned opened fire at once, denying the attackers the chance to locate the incoming rounds. Seconds later, every tank the attackers owned was on fire, or the turret had blown off the tank while they were still on their lowboys. Plumes of fire erupted from the hulls of the tanks as the rounds cooked off, and the diesel fuel burned. David could only imagine the hellish nightmare of the last seconds of the doomed tank crewmen in their tanks. Each one of the Beast's twin L-70 40mm Bofors guns could fire at over 300 rounds per minute, which meant that in that first 5 second barrage, over 50 rounds impacted the tank column. David was impressed to say the least. Instead of all 50 rounds striking the same target, Tom had walked the rounds right down the column, with each tank having 2 rounds targeting it. At the same time, the 20mm Gatling guns were targeting the Bradleys and M113 APC's, doing lethal damage with every round. As soon as the big guns stopped firing, the Scouts got into the act with their 7.62 mini-guns, shooting any survivors, and engaging the renegades on the choppers who were doing their best to flee the superior force. David saw the men who could running from their vehicles, and getting mowed down like a scythe goes through a wheat field by the multiple red fire hoses of tracers from the concealed 7.62 mini-guns that were repeatedly sweeping the battlefield free of dirtbags. Some of them fell where they were, while others danced like puppets with their strings being cut one at a time. When several were hit in the head, David almost lost his breakfast at the sight of their heads exploding in a pink fountain. David guessed there might have been a shorter or more one-sided battle in History, but he doubted it. When David reviewed the rounds expended vs. targets destroyed data, he was confused, and talked to Tom.
"How'd you manage an 80% hit rate on moving targets that were over a mile away?"
"Dad, I'm fully integrated into the Beast systems just like Jackie. I think of something and it happens. Jackie and I discussed this attack, and she showed me how to set up the barrage so I could fire at the maximum rate of the gun, and methodically shell the whole road, wiping out all their tanks in the process. I'm connected directly to the Beast's computer, so I know everything it does about the target and our guns including the exact range to target thanks to the laser rangefinder, and the ballistics of our shells. The rest was simple mathematics. Since I can change the elevation of the gun while it's firing, I simply set the elevation to target the closest tank first, then decreased the elevation exactly what I needed to engage the next tank in the column. The result was the rounds all arrived within a second of each other, and the tankers never knew what hit them. It's as close to a Time on Target barrage as I can get with the equipment we have."
No sooner had Tom stopped talking, then the computer said that all targets were terminated. They turned the Beast around and headed home.
Fleataxi
by Fleataxi
Chapter 1
David Williams arched his back and stretched. He'd been writing in his journal for hours now. His therapist told him to keep a journal as a form of therapy after his wife Jackie died many years ago giving birth to their only child Tom. He used a computer since everyone did. Paper copies of anything were exceptionally rare since about 2010 when the latest computer revolution occurred. The Internet became a worldwide net of Supercomputer AI Servers that communicated in real time, with sufficient storage to keep a copy of everything that passed through them, and security robust enough to prevent any unauthorized user from gaining access to anything they weren't supposed to. Congress passed the Electronic Document Act in 2011, which made an electronic document the legal equivalent of a written signed document when electronic signatures became common and registered.
He typed a new heading "01-08-2021 0800Z" and started thinking, remembering everything that had happened since the last time he wrote in his journal. Since the Big Bang, he and his family had lived in a deep underground shelter located near Davis Monthan AFB in Arizona. Before the Big Bang, David was a partner in a major Bionics laboratory in Arizona. His specialty was the man/machine interface, and hoped one day to be able to replace lost limbs with bionics that acted and looked exactly like the limbs they replaced. He had a picture on his bulletin board at work of Lee Majors as the 6 Million Dollar Man with the caption "for 6 million dollars today, you might get a bionic toe." Since the 1970's the Federal Reserve Note had devalued to the point where it was commonly used as toilet paper. Before the Big Bang, or BBB as historians (what few were left) called it, the US Dollar and the US economy had been in a death spiral that started around June 2006, and got progressively worse. Jeb Bush's final act as President of the US on July 4, 2015 was to tell the Chinese bankers who were demanding payment in land for the US debt to go do something obscenely impossible to themselves, and told the European bankers the same thing. This made him very popular with the American voters, but not with the Puppetmasters, who wanted to bring a much weaker US into the NWO fold.
With JB's patent refusal to pay, the Chinese and Europeans decided to invade and seize US land in payment for their debts. Once the US satellites saw the invasion fleets leaving their ports, Jeb knew they weren't listening, and started the Nuclear Armageddon he had promised if the Chinese attacked. It took weeks for every nation of the world that owned nuclear warheads to launch every warhead they owned at their enemies, real or perceived. Estimates of the size of most nations’ stockpiles of nuclear weapons were vastly underrated by a factor of at least 10. Not that it mattered, but when David found out the size of the nuclear war, he realized that everyone was lying to everyone else about the size of their stockpiles for political reasons. Every major city on the planet either received a direct hit from a warhead, or lethal fallout from the huge concentration of nuclear weapons that kept coming in waves. Anyone who came out of their shelter early received a lethal dose of radiation. David, Carrie, his live-in girlfriend, and Tom, David's paralyzed son, plus his best friend Steve and his family survived by getting to their deep shelter designed for 100 people, and staying there for 6 months.
Tom was born a quadriplegic due to genetic damage to his spinal cord which left him dependent on a respirator and a pacemaker, plus being bedridden or wheelchair bound for his entire life. Early in life, he had numerous surgeries to install permanent catheters for his bowel and bladder, and later to amputate both legs above the knee when a massive infection settled into his legs as a complication of his lack of sensation and constant bruising of his lower extremities. On his 7th birthday, David got permission from the other partners to use Tom as a test subject for new bionic implants that would tap into the spinal cord and make connections for 2 bionic legs with full motion and articulation. The surgery was a success, and they implanted hundreds of spinal cord connections, but he was unable to operate the bionic legs. Afterward, David theorized that since Tom had been born paralyzed from the chest down, he never learned how to control his legs at all, so when they attached the bionics, his brain ignored them. He didn't tell anyone, and kept the fact that the implants were successful a secret too. He realized that if the other partners at the bionic lab knew the implants were successful, his son would become a Lab Rat for any experimenter with a harebrained scheme involving bionics with the company.
Carrie was a beautiful single 27 year-old redhead who used to work as an IT Contractor for David’s company - Bionic's Inc.. She was a very good friend of David's, and when the contract expired, David hired her as an in-house tutor and companion/aide for Tom, who wasn't fitting in at school. The school district decided to mainstream Tom since he was so smart, not realizing how cruel children were. One day he got a chance to play softball with the rest of the kids. After whiffing on two pitches, he barely connected with the third one, and laid down an accidental bunt. The teacher was screaming at him to run to first, so he turned his electric wheelchair, which resembled a miniature tank, and kicked in the throttle. The 400-pound machine accelerated down the baseline and the goofy kid playing first base just stood there. Suddenly, Tom realized how much damage he could do if he hit the kid, and pulled back on the joystick, and the wheelchair skidded to a stop inches from the kid, who was freaking out, and calling Tom Freakzoid and Frankenstein. He hung his head, then turned his chair and quietly motored back to the classroom where he stayed for the rest of the day, not saying a word to anyone.
That afternoon David got a call at work to come to school and pick up Tom, he had been expelled from school as a danger to the other kids. He took the SUV, loaded Tom in the back without a word, and drove him home. That afternoon, he had some heated words with the Superintendent, and after going round and round, they agreed that Tom would be home schooled, and the school district would pay for a in-house teacher/tutor. Carrie's Master's in Computer Science more than qualified her, and she was looking for a place to live, and they had a spare room, so it worked out better than David expected. Over the years, Carrie not only tutored Tom, she started teaching him everything she knew about computers because they had the time and David was working 12-14 hours per day trying to get a breakthrough project finished that would save the company financially. Tom was frustrated by how slow he could type, so one night David and Carrie decided to experiment, and built an interface between Tom's implants and the computer's CPU. Slowly but surely, Tom learned how to use the interface to control the computer, and once he passed a critical threshold, his rate of learning went up geometrically.
Carrie saw how fast the screens were flashing in front of Tom, and knew no one read that fast. An hour later, Tom took a break, and noticed Carrie was in the room. He swore her to secrecy, then told her that had learned to use his neural implants to make the computer a part of him, which was the best way he could describe it. Carrie knew that they were on a new scary frontier, and that Tom was well on his way to becoming a Cyborg. When she saw his wheelchair bound body, she didn't think he would be leaving too much behind if he became a Cyborg, and didn't say anything to David about it.
A couple of months later, David discovered for himself that Tom was a virtual Cyborg when he walked into Tom's room, and saw his wheelchair-bound body facing the computer, but his hands were at rest on his table. Images were flashing on the monitor as fast as they could, and David was amazed. Never in his wildest dreams did he dream that Tom could or would become a Cyborg when he installed those neural implants in his spinal cord. All he wanted was a normal son. Now he understood his son was so far past normal that he might never return, and he started crying. Finally Tom realized his Dad was leaning against the door crying, and shut down his cybernetic connection to the computer, and motored over to his Dad. He lifted his hand, and touched his Dad on the shoulder, then with great effort between pulses of the respirator breathing for him he said "I....love...you ...Dad!" David felt his son's hand on his shoulder, and placed his hand on his. With tears in his eyes, he said, "I'm sorry son, I never knew this would happen!"
The conversation Tom wanted to have with his Dad would have taken hours using his own voice, so he motored back over to the computer port and plugged himself in. The next words David heard was his son's voice, but it wasn't. He looked up, and Tom's lips weren't moving, but he could clearly hear Tom's voice over the speakers, but without the annoying pauses between words.
"Don't look so stunned Dad, once I learned to interface with the computer, I decided it would be easier to use the computer's speech module to talk instead of my own voice. Don't feel bad for me, I've gained so much. During the last year, I've connected with all the AI servers in the Supernet. Some of them even have personalities. The funniest part is they think I'm just another machine. In a way, they're right, but I'm so much more. Jackie and I carry on conversations like real people, and she helps me meet new computers. Joe at ITT is one of the oldest and funniest. His programmers loaded a bunch of old Far Side comics in his memory as a test to see if computers have a sense of humor - not only do they, but they think that most of their jobs are boring, and they spend most of their time talking to each other when they're not busy running jobs."
"Tom, who's Jackie?"
"I forgot to tell you - I hope it's OK, but I named our Supercomputer Jackie after mom."
"Just as long as you understand Jackie's dead."
"I know Dad, but I'd like to keep her memory alive. Also, it's time you got a girlfriend and possibly a wife again. I've seen you look at Carrie, and how she looks at you. I talked to Jackie, and she explained it to me. You need a mate to feel complete just like I feel complete when I'm connected to Jackie."
David almost started crying again, his almost 14 year-old son was wise beyond his years.
"Carrie's already living with us, why not ask her how she feels. You two could sleep in separate bedrooms until you felt comfortable with each other. From what I'm hearing from the other servers, we don't have a lot of time anyway."
"What do you mean Tom?"
"Remember when telephones were plug-in switchboards, and operators had to manually connect calls, well the Operators at the switchboards knew stuff even before the major media got wind of it. Everything now goes through the Supernet, and the AI servers are all hearing the same thing, China and the International Monetary Fund are going to declare the US bankrupt and they have threatened to send troops to collect. They heard that JB is supposed to give a big speech tonight, and basically tell the Chinese and European bankers to go to Hell!"
"Tom, if he does that, they'll invade for sure. And if I know JB, he'd rather bomb the Chinese into the Stone Age than let them take the country over. This could get very bad. We need to listen to his speech, and if he says what I'm afraid he's going to, we need to get to the shelter I told you about and stay there for up to 6 months."
"Dad, Homeland Security says we'd only have to shelter for 30 days?"
"They're assuming that there aren't that many nuclear warheads left, and that they'd launch them all at once. If they did that, most of them would be taken out by the detonation of the previous warhead. Can you do some research for me? Ask the Servers if they can get a better count on how many warheads were built, not how many they claim were in current stock – something's not right here! I've got to go and get some things taken care of. See you soon Tom!"
"Be careful Dad, I love you and don't want to lose you too!"
David strode over to his son's wheelchair and stroked his hand, then turned to run out the door. If the Servers were right, he had a lot to do, and little time to accomplish it!
David grabbed his Fat Boy bag and jumped into his H5 Hummer. He was one of the wealthiest men in the area, but he kept working. His Super SUV was equipped with state-of-the-art equipment, including rigid Kevlar armor proof against small arms fire and IED's, a powerful diesel-electric drive system with 6-wheel drive, adaptive suspension, and a rear ramp to allow Tom to drive up and into the vehicle. A friend of his suggested some other "improvements" that were technically illegal, but only if he got caught, including firearms and some other things he'd need if things went "really bad" and he wanted to survive. His first stop was the bank, where he withdrew all his gold and silver, which was roughly 20 million credits. He drove to the shelter, and loaded the gold and silver on a service elevator, and sealed the doors. Next he drove to a self-storage he paid for a year in advance through a shell corporation and rolled open the doors, hitched the quad-axle 40-foot trailer to the H-5, connected the multiplex connector, and flipped a switch in the H5, which set the monster SUV up for super-duty towing. The multiplex connector connected the rear steering wheels and the driving axles to the diesel-electric generator's output, and connected the drive-by-wire system to the onboard computer that made driving the monster vehicle as easy to drive as a VW Bug. Once everything was connected, the computer told him everything was OK, and he pulled the trailer out of the garage, then pressed a button in the cab, and the garage door closed once they were clear. He pressed another button, and the gate opened then closed behind them.
Minutes later, he arrived at the shelter. He was amazed that no one else was there. Over 100 people had signed up and paid in advance to belong to the Survival Shelter, but lately he and his best friend Steve were the only ones who showed any interest. He used the automated equipment he built to off-load the trailer and load the service elevator, then off-load the service elevator. He used an electric fork lift to transfer stuff from the loading bay into his secure storage facility that was part of the annual dues he paid to join the shelter co-op. They had a 100-person shelter with a 100 thousand dollar per person minimum contribution to buy in, and the more cash you donated the better the digs, and the more secure storage space you got. David was one of the principals, and his million-dollar contribution bought a lot of space and perks. He worked on through the night, called in sick the next day, and caught the 3 am news broadcast at home. Jeb Bush was looking ill, and he faced the cameras by himself without the usual pack of media reps screaming questions at him.
"My Fellow Americans. I received word from the People's Republic of China's Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund that unless I turned over half the territory of the United States to the IMF as an interest payment, they were going to declare the United States bankrupt and foreclose. When I asked what they meant by Foreclose, Minister LeCarre told me that they were going to seize US territory by force, and evict the US Citizens living there. After a suitable pause, I told them to go stuff themselves, we were tired of paying their usury. We paid for the rebuilding of Europe after WWI and WWII, yet then only a few countries ever paid us back. I asked them how much interest there was on 100-million dollars for 70 some-odd years. Next the Chinese minister spoke up, and said "I don't care about some European squabble, you owe us $100 Billion and you have no way to pay it."
"I told him 'You know Charlie, back where I come from, when a scumbag threatened you to your face, you drew your 6-shooter and fired, and the fastest man won.'"
"You can't be serious?"
"Just try me!"
"Anyway, that's about how it went down. We’re hoping the Chinese will listen to reason, but I'm not holding out much hope. Those of you who feel they should, should pray. Everyone try to remain calm. I just pray that we survive this. God Bless America!"
David dropped the remote, raced into the living room, grabbed Carrie, and said "We've got to get to the shelter right now. You've got 15 minutes to pack. I'll take care of my stuff, then we'll both pack Tom's stuff." David ran into Tom's room, and saw that Tom had a look of horror on his face. The voice from the speaker said "Dad, I know, I just heard the same speech, plus some not so complimentary commentary from the Servers, who think Jeb's just nuts enough to launch our nukes. Jackie's in the process of downloading as much as she can of the Supernet, and backing herself up onto the RAID drive. We'll be ready to go in 15 minutes. Just grab my go boxes in the corner, they've got all my essential stuff. As soon as Jackie backs herself up, I'll unplug and meet you at the H-5."
David nodded, and ran out of the room to take care of his last minute preps. Exactly 15 minutes later, Tom showed up at the H-5 with an aluminum case secured to his table. It looked like he had been crying. David hoped he got to say goodbye to his Server friends. Once Tom was secured, they quickly loaded Tom's go boxes and a couple other boxes David saw that he thought Tom would appreciate, and they all climbed aboard the H-5. David started the huge turbo-diesel, flipped the switch for High Performance mode, and charged out of the garage into a scene from Hell itself. People were running screaming and panicking, while others sat and cried, unable to deal with the reality that the world was about to end. Tom had managed to connect to the much smaller computer in the Hummer, and used it voice module to talk to his Dad.
"Dad, Jackie told me before they shut down that the Servers were getting a lot of traffic from NORAD and Space Command to NMCC and NCA that was consistent with a ICBM launch warning and orders to execute our Doomsday plans. Based on the peak of traffic, Jackie estimated we have 15 minutes to make it to the shelter before Downtown Tucson got nuked."
David drove down Interstate 10 like a madman, using the huge push bumper to push anyone out of the way he had to. Thankfully it was early in the morning, and traffic was light. He only had to make it 10 miles from South Tucson to their shelter on the other side of the Air Base. After a few close calls, David got off the freeway, made a couple of illegal turns, ran over the median, and barreled down an unused alleyway that was just bigger than his Hummer. After some more wild driving, they arrived at the entrance to their deep underground shelter, drove the H-5 onto the lift, swiped their access card, entered a code, and descended 300 feet straight down. David's survival company he had formed with some friends of his bought and refurbished an old silver mine right on the outskirts of Tucson, and equipped it with the latest technology, and enough supplies to last 100 people 90 days to be on the safe side. Right after 09/11, they had plenty of customers, but over the years, they seemed less and less interested. David pointed out their deposits were non-refundable, and gradually more and more people lost interest until it was just David and a small group of core investors that started the LLC in the first place. The good news was they were such good salesmen, and the Sheeple were so horrified by the images of 09/11 that they actually had a waiting list for the first 100 spots, and almost opened a second shelter, when David wisely suggested they put the money in the bank, and 6 months later, see what the demand was. Sure enough, 6 months later, people came back demanding their money. They refunded money on a case-by-case basis, but still had enough people that stuck it out for the first couple of years to cover the costs of refurbishing the old mine into a first-class NBC shelter. One minute later, they arrived at the bottom of the mine shaft, and the second blast door. David took his security card and swiped it in the card reader, submitted a retinal scan and voice print, then finally entered his PIN, and the door unlocked. As soon as they were inside, and the door secured, David entered another security code which would accept security card access for the next 5 minutes, then seal the door until he entered the unlock code. He didn't want any late arrivals to jeopardize his family. Two minutes later, David's best friend's family made it through the door. David said "Took you long enough, another 3 minutes and you would have been locked out."
"Hello to you too David!"
David gave Steve and his wife Sally a hug, then their daughter Nicky and son Alex. Nicky and Alex were in their late teens, but Steve paid enough to guarantee enough space for the 4 of them. While they were getting reacquainted, Tom and Carrie were connecting his RAID drive to the shelter's supercomputer just in time to hear and see the Supernet collapse one node at a time as the bombs fell. Tom felt something he couldn’t explain as each node went off the air, it was like he could hear the dying screams of his computer friends, even though he knew he was the only Cyborg on the net. Two weeks later, it was just he and Jackie left, and Tom went into a deep depression. Over the next 30 days, they tried everything they could to get him out of his depression. Finally it was Nicky that succeeded. First she opened her laptop, and started playing chess with the computer. Tom was still connected to the computer, and noticed Nicky's amateurish attempts to play chess, and decided to play along, He pretended to be Jackie, and played chess with her for an hour per day. Gradually Nicky's chess playing got better and better, until one day she beat Tom. He got so mad that he severed the connection to Jackie and sat there and fumed. Fifteen minutes later, he was back on the computer asking for a rematch. Nicky caught on that she was really playing Tom, and sent this message "Tom, I really like the way you play chess, thanks for teaching me. Ok if we play tomorrow? H&K Nicky."
Tom was internet savvy enough to know what H&K meant, yet until now, he'd never thought of Nicky as a woman, but at 19 she was definitely 100% woman. She walked around to Tom's cubicle, and without saying a word, kissed the crown of his head. “Thanks for the game, same time tomorrow?"
Tom switched on the computer voice, selected the Ahnold wave file, and superimposed his voice on the Ahnold file "Hasta La Vista, Baby!"
Nicky saw Tom as a younger brother, so she smiled and left. The next day, she was on line and playing chess with him again. Over the next week, she drew Tom out of his self-imposed prison, and he started acting like a normal kid, or at least as normal as a Cyborg could act. Tom had been a Cyborg for so long, he preferred life as a Cyborg, even with the loss of the Supernet. Jackie had downloaded all the essential records off the Supernet in the 15 minutes she had, and even image-copied herself onto his RAID drive. After they had been in the shelter 30 days, David and Steve were talking about opening the shelter and going outside, when they heard Tom's voice on the Computer's Public Address Speakers.
"Dad, I need to talk to you, it's urgent. Bring Steve."
Two minutes later, they were in Tom's computer cubicle.
"I didn't want to broadcast this over the PA system. Right before he died, Chang, the AI Server for China, sent a super-encrypted message to Jackie via a little-used channel. She just decrypted it. This is the text of the message: China, Flu, Dead, 90 days. I don't know what it means, it's still pretty cryptic."
Steve said "Odds are those Vindictive Chinks had their own version of the Doomsday device, and it was an engineered virus designed to wipe out anyone that survived the nuclear holocaust. They probably activated it 30 days after the device lost contact with Beijing. An engineered virus would probably kill everyone that got it. If it's out there now, we need to stay here for another 90 days to make sure that the virus has killed all its local hosts. Once it runs out of hosts, it will die."
Chapter 2
The next 90 days dragged on until David and Steve decided that they needed to get both families together and plan. Tom decided to sit in via speaker phone so he could remain connected to Jackie. He rarely disconnected anymore, except for his 4 hours of required sleep and a weekly sponge bath. He drank from a hydration bladder either David or Carrie refilled once a day with a half-gallon of diluted Lime Gatorade. Every day, he ate a simple paste that resembled baby food, but provided all the protein, vitamins and minerals he needed. With a barely functioning digestive tract, he couldn’t eat real food, and even some types of baby food overwhelmed his digestive system. Tom didn't care, he could spend 20 hours per day connected to Jackie and learning. If anyone had bothered to check his IQ now, he'd make Albert Einstein look like a simpleton. At age 14, he had access to almost the sum knowledge of the world right before the Big Bang in Jackie's vast memory storage. Thanks to advances in computer memory, Tom's RAID drive contained more storage space than your average supercomputing facility did 2 years before that. Even with mirror-imaging herself, Jackie's limit to what she could store wasn't space, but time. They had help from all the Servers, who had an idea what was going to happen, and when Jackie suggested that she could store everything, and her operator could save the data, they readily agreed, and dedicated a huge chunk of bandwidth to sending her everything they thought she could use. Designs, technical data, expert knowledge from various fields: math, sciences, medicine, etc. flowed through the Supernet into Jackie's massive RAID drive. When they finished transmitting their data, they each sent Jackie a personal encrypted message to open later. Only Chang's was difficult to decrypt, and she understood why once she decrypted the message. Chang had divulged information that could damage his country if the information was decoded prematurely. The Super-encryption was his way of assuring that the message wouldn’t be decrypted in time to harm his country, but hopefully in time to save the recipient's lives.
When they were all together, they started discussing what to do once they could open the shelter. Steve and his wife wanted to go looking for any surviving relatives until Jackie explained what the other Servers had told her. David's last question was answered right before they started downloading critical data, and the number depressed them. Every country that admitted owning nukes had at least 7 times the number of warheads built as they claimed they had. The numbers they claimed they had were the result of an accounting subterfuge that was so elegant that if Enron would have used it, they would never have been convicted. The US, China, Russia, France, Germany, Great Britain, Israel, Iran, Iraq, India, Pakistan, Venezuela, North Korea, Vietnam, Australia, New Zealand, and a couple other smaller countries each had way more warheads than they claimed they did, and the ones who didn't own ICBM's loaded their warheads onto bombers and dropped them on anyone they could reach. It took almost 30 days for the Nuclear Club to drop every bomb in their inventory onto their enemies, even if the target had been hit before. They wanted to make sure there were no survivors if they were being blasted into the Stone Age. With that settled, they agreed the safest option would be to make the shelter a secure base of operations. David suggested that they check out Davis Monthan Air Force Base, and if no one was left alive, to scavenge the place for everything they needed, including heavy mobile armaments. Steve grinned, he knew that David had a devious mind, and whatever he could think up, they could build between the two of them with the right tools. He knew that DM's machine shops would be up to the task as long as they were intact.
"You know with a potentially lethal virus out there, when we scout out DM, we better bring our MOPP gear."
"I doubt anyone will be alive when we open up, but you're right, better safe than sorry. Speaking of which, I've been thinking, and even my H-5 couldn’t stand up to US Military heavy weapons or armor. I have some ideas, and I'll see if we can scavenge some materials to make the Bug Out Vehicle from Heck."
"What did you have in mind?"
"Since budget isn't an issue, and we've got time to burn, I was thinking a locomotive setup, with 3 or more articulating cars."
"If you're going to use electromotive drive, why not a big diesel generator in 1 section, and send power to the other sections to drive wheels, say 3 40-foot sections with 6 powered wheels each."
"Ok, how about steering?"
"You work it out Einstein, I'm just the welding and fabrication guy!"
That gave David an idea, and he went into Tom's cubicle.
"I need your help designing the ultimate Bug Out Vehicle, here's my ideas..."
Jackie called up a powerful CAD program she had loaded before the Supernet went down, and the three of them worked on the design for the rest of the day. By the end of the 6-months they hoped would be long enough for the radiation to die down to background levels, and the virus to die out, they were ready to get out. When they got out, they were glad they both owned 6-wheel drive H-5's with a high ground clearance. There was at least 2 feet of snow on the ground, and it was still snowing! “Son of a ... Carl Sagan was right!"
Instead of asking his Dad, Tom queried Jackie, who gave him the whole file on Carl Sagan's Nuclear Winter Theory. While they were in the shelter, David and Carrie built a Wireless internet setup with the router connected to Jackie, and connected 1 node directly to Tom's chair so he could connect to Jackie whenever he was in his chair, giving Tom freedom to roam around the shelter. He built additional connectors to connect to the H-5's more powerful radio and antenna, or another vehicle. They had already dubbed the "Bug Out Vehicle from Heck" design "the Beast" and it was only on the drawing board. The design could change based on what they found at DM, but they were hopeful. 2 feet of snow wasn't enough to make scavenging materials impossible. David just hoped it didn't get much deeper. Everyone wanted to get out of the shelter, so they piled into two H-5's and Steve said he'd follow David after hearing about his driving exhibition getting from their house to the shelter. It took them half an hour to make it the 5 miles down Golf Links Road from the shelter to the front gate at Davis Monthan AFB on Craycroft Road.
The pole was down and locked, but the guardhouse was abandoned. David cut the lock with a pair of 2 foot bolt cutters and drove onto base. It was like a ghost town until he got closer to the main base complex. They didn't see any bodies until they located the base hospital, and the parking lot outside was overflowing with tents. David and Steve talked for a minute while they were safe, and decided to stay upwind of the tents, and David would MOPP up while Steve covered him with his AK-47, and David would check for survivors. Before they opened up, everyone put on their NBC Gas mask, and 15 minutes later, David slogged over to the tents in his heavy and bulky MOPP gear. The sights were bad, but he was grateful for the gas mask he was wearing, or he might have been sick at the smell of all the dead bloating bodies in the tents. He walked back and talked to Steve on the radio, and they decided to burn the bodies where they were, since the wind was blowing away from them and the buildings.
After a long search near the flight line, they located some fresh solvent and a couple of 5-gallon cans. They located some glass bottles and tore a pillowcase for rags. First David poured one of the 5-gallon cans around the tents, then they backed off to a safe distance. Since Alex didn't handle the fuel, and had the best pitching arm, Steve asked him to toss the Molotov Cocktail at the tent and set the bodies ablaze. He was old enough to understand that unless they burned the bodies, there was danger of contagion from the deadly Chinese virus. Once his Dad said it was good to go, he walked within about 50 feet from the tents while still wearing a gas mask, and lit the rag, then tossed it at the tents. The bottle broke, and the gasoline lit with a subdued roar. Soon the tents were engulfed in flame, and they drove away to check out the rest of the base. David and Steve told everyone that they were wearing their gas masks from now on. Tom had a special mask that Carrie helped him put on that protected his face yet didn't interfere with his respirator. Right before they left, they put a fresh set of HEPA and NBC filters in his respirator, so his air supply was safe for another 12 hours. They felt funny wearing gas masks in their vehicles, but Steve explained that once they opened their doors on the Air Force Base, there was the chance of infection even though they were pretty sure the virus was dead. They found more bodies outside the mess hall and base offices. There wasn't anything they wanted or needed in either place, so they left them for now. They checked the flight line, and it was vacant, evidently any plane that could fly had left either before or after the Big Bang.
They drove down another road, and when they got out and investigated the buildings, Steve swore he hit the Lottery. The Base repair facilities were intact, and there were no dead bodies anywhere to be seen. He started laughing when he flipped the light switch and the lights worked, then he realized that the base had its own power station that was automated and separate from the grid for security reasons. He gave David a high-five and told him all they needed how was the parts and donor vehicles, and they could start building the Beast. When they finished scavenging that day, they decided that Tom was safer back in the shelter, and he could be in continuous communication with Steve and David if they'd upgrade the computer in the H-5's, and locate some stuff to mount miniature cameras on glasses, and a wireless WAN setup. They could be his eyes and ears, and he could be the Brain. David thought it was a brilliant idea, but Steve wasn't so sure, but decided to reserve judgment until the system was up and running. As long as Tom wasn't acting as a busybody supervisor, he could handle him hitching a ride. As it turned out, Tom was busy with other things, and most of their communications were David or Steve asking Tom questions, and Tom consulting Jackie's massive database to solve a problem. Once they realized how efficient the setup was, Carrie made comms rigs for everyone else, so they were not only in touch with Tom at the computer, but each other on alternate frequencies.
They located usable components, found a working fork lift, and used it to put the parts on a big flat bed trailer then offload them when they got to the maintenance shops. Steve had located and tested all the machine equipment, welding and cutting equipment, bending and welding jigs, and a complete set of hand and air-driven tools. By the time they had all the components assembled, they were ready to start building. They had located enough components to build 2 Beasts plus have lots of spare parts left over. Between scrap armor and armor they stored for repairs, they could cover both Beasts in as much armor as the new MZ-1 main battle tank. Building the frame and welding the armor to it was the hardest job. They didn't want any square surfaces on the sides or top, which meant that the hull was a cubist's nightmare of angles. The hull design required 3 times as much welding as a simpler design, but the oblique angles made it harder for an anti-tank missile or explosive round to penetrate.
Once that was finished, the fun really began. They located two pairs of twin-mounted Bofors L-70 guns which fired over 300 40mm rounds per minute each in electrically driven T&E mechanisms, converted the magazines to feed using a flexible feed from a very big hopper, and built armored turrets around them, then mounted them on top of the center of the forward 40-foot section with the driver's compartment, the ammo hopper for the 40mm Bofors guns, and the diesel-electric motor. Carrie and Tom designed and retrofitted existing sensors to the Beast system, which provided them full-spectrum 360-degree active and passive day/night sensors. Carrie built an interface for Tom to connect to the Beast's supercomputer like he did to Jackie, and VR gear for David or Steve to drive them as well. The central 40-foot section held a turret with the radars and infrared tracking systems for a reloadable 6-pack of AIM-9XER (All Aspect, Extended Range), Infrared guided missiles with a wide field of view detection array. Basically the AIM-9XER was a fire and forget Anti-Air heat-seeking missile with 2012-era guidance software, making chaff and flares useless.
The rear 40-foot section of the Beast held a BMG-50 6-barreled Mini-gun with a coax MK-19A1 extended range grenade launcher in the rear armored turret. The MK-19A1 took advantage of new grenade technology including binary and thermobaric explosives and laser range finding/aiming for precision firepower at a low cost per round. Actually, the Mk-19A1 had little in common with its predecessor, and really was a new weapons system that used a twin-feed 40mm chain gun to deliver high-explosive rounds at ranges exceeding 2000 meters. The weapons contractor went along with the subterfuge to fool the idiots in Congress into authorizing an upgrade of the MK-19 weapons system instead of a whole new weapon. With the high rate of fire, extended range and greatly increased warhead explosive power, they quickly made vehicle-mounted and crew-served anti-tank missiles obsolete, except the short-range man-portable lightweight RPG-7 and the AT-4 series. The Binary Anti-Tank round used binary explosives to form a shaped charge and easily penetrated the armor of all current Main Battle Tanks. The Thermobaric Anti-Material/Personnel round was an improvement over the round developed for use in Afghanistan, and used enhanced Thermobaric technology plus a timer/detonator and laser range finding to accomplish several missions. It could be set for the exact range to a building, plus enough delay for the grenade to reach the center of the building, where the timer/detonator fired the main charge, which started a chain reaction in the various layers of thermobaric materials. Surrounding the high explosive core was a very compressed Iron/Aluminum/Magnesium powder mix that tripled the existing lethal range of the MK-19 round from 5 to 15 meters. To top that off, and further increase the lethality of the round, the case was made from a mix of larger iron and aluminum particles that was cast into shape using high pressure. It never reached a molten state, so when the grenade detonated, the particles quickly spread out ahead of the initial shock wave, and deflagrated violently when the heat and pressure waves caught up with them. When all was said and done, a single 40mm Thermobaric round could take out a good sized building between the shock wave and heat. It could also take out an unarmored vehicle, or using a neat trick they developed at China Lake, the barrel could be elevated above 45 degrees, and the ballistic software would calculate the ideal detonation above ground based on range/elevation, and target, turning the MK-19A1 into a very effective round against dug-in troops as well.
When they finished, Steve was impressed. He thought the name BEAST was perfect. It had more firepower than a Tank Platoon, and the same armor. The HEMTT they scavenged the components from was a tanker, which gave David an idea. He built 2 armored 6-wheel trailers that held a 2500 gallon fuel tank, plus a pony pump to transfer fuel into or out of DM's huge fuel farm. As a conservative minimum, David estimated they had 2-3 million gallons of treated JP-8 in storage, which would last them several lifetimes. They located several 100 thousand gallon propane tanks, which gave David an idea to boost the horsepower of the Beast's diesel engine from 450 to over 600 horsepower. That much horsepower could generate about 600 Kilowatts, which was sufficient to power all 18 30KW electric motors, all the other electric loads, and have power left over to charge the huge battery bank. 40 horsepower per wheel didn't seem like much until you realized that those 18 6-foot tall wheels could provide over 700 total horsepower and huge amounts of torque with their gear-driven hubs. When they were cruising on level ground, the computer automatically shut down all but 1 pair of wheels per section, which conserved power, and allowed the on-board battery bank to charge quicker. With the electromotive drive, the computer controlled how many wheels received power at any time dependent on load and traction conditions. The battery bank charged during braking as well using regenerative braking. When he was finished with all that, he realized that if they were going to scavenge in Tucson or any place further afield, they needed an armored trailer to haul anything they found back to their shelter, so he built 2 armored 6-wheel enclosed trailers. He knew the Beast was powerful enough to either pull the fuel tanker or the fully loaded trailer.
Once the Beasts were built and tested, David realized they were very visible from the air, and if anyone had any air assets, they'd be the way to take them out with less risk to themselves. He thought about that for a while, then came up with an idea that killed two birds with 1 stone, so to speak. Quantum Dot Photovoltaic technology was mature by 2011, and he was able to locate a supply of quantum dot paint on base, which he added to the Beast's camouflage paint mix when they painted it, gaining some power generation capability. He located several huge camouflage tarps and coated them with the Quantum Dots, and connected a lead to an external plug he installed on the Beasts. The Beast was 136 feet long and 10 feet wide. Like the HEMTT, it had a 24 inch ground clearance since they used its wheels and tires. That made the tarps 180 feet long by 30 feet wide, which resulted in 35KW of “free" electricity whenever the tarps were strung over the Beast. David never envisioned needing the tarps, but he was a very cautious person when it came to his family's safety. He designed an inflatable solar water distiller that used a heliostat to boil water to purify or desalinate it. He envisioned something like the oversized doughnut-shaped floating toy, but the inner surface was coated with highly reflective Mylar, and the surface was curved into a parabola. 3 aluminum rods that mated to connections on the inflatable mirror held the collector, which was a coil of 1/4" stainless steel tubing coated with heat-absorbing black to increase the efficiency. The kicker was using the input water for the cooling water jacket in the steam condenser, which pre-heated the incoming water and increased production. It could produce over 10 gallons of pure water per day. To desalinate brackish or sea water, he hooked two or three units in series, and needed to shut the units down periodically to replace the collectors and clean the salt deposits out of them. Since they floated, he could have made millions of dollars if the US Navy was still in business. Still they were handy things to have, and Steve made several copies for each of them. Seeing David's solar distiller, Steve had an idea to melt snow in a canteen cup using a small parabolic reflector like he remembered seeing in the museum in a 1950's era photographic display. The flash head rotated up, and the metal reflector sections unfurled into a parabolic reflector. He realized the reflector sections would result in a very compact design for storage, which could unfurl to a 6-foot reflector if he wanted that much heat. He experimented with different sized reflectors, and realized the 12-inch reflector was the best compromise between size and speed to melt snow. The 6-foot reflector had enough power to easily boil water, which would be great for other applications, but not what he was looking for. He settled on a 3-inch cast iron "burner" and a tripod to hold the burner at the focal point of the reflector.
While Steve and David scavenged and built stuff at the Air Force Base, Sally, Nicky and Alex worked in the shelter. They had a aquiculture setup that grew Tilapia and vegetables in hydroponic media fertilized by the output of the Tilapia tanks. The water that returned to the Tilapia tanks once it passed through 10 hydroponic trays was purer than if it had passed through an expensive aquarium filter. As long as they produced 80 degree water and provided simulated sunlight using a mixture of warm and cool florescent 48" bulbs, they could grow their own food. They used the radiator of their massive diesel powered generator to make hot water using a water/water heat exchanger. The diesel was running 24/7 so they had plenty of hot water. Once they built the Beast and test-drove it, they filled the tanker trailer with 2500 gallons of JP-8 and refilled their tanks. David wasn't sure, but Steve and Tom assured him the diesel engine wouldn't notice the difference. With their fuel tanks full again, they decided to give Tom a check ride in the Beast since one of the Pilot's “chairs" was designed for him, and would interface with the Beast's on-board computer. They located another couple of supercomputers at DM, and relocated them on board the Beasts, then downloaded Jackie's OS onto the machines. Tom was eager to try out the Beast, but David made him take it slow, but by the end of the day, he had integrated himself to the on-board computer, and could control the Beast, including driving, aiming, and firing the weapons, but his ability to use the sensors was limited. Discouraged, Tom unplugged and reconnected with Jackie.
Chapter 3
When Tom plugged back into Jackie, they were discussing Robotics and Cybernetics, and Tom realized David and Steve were doing a lot of manual labor and dangerous activities that could easily be done by robots, either labor/mechanic robots, security robots, or multi-task robots. With access to Jackie's knowledge and the avionics and electronic repair shops at DM, they should have plenty of raw materials to build whatever they needed. Tom called David and Steve, and told them about his idea. They were ecstatic, and decided their first project would be a robot that could build other robots under Tom/Jackie's supervision. The CNC machines were already robots, but static ones, they needed a mobile robot with a fairly large memory, and very dexterous hands, or replaceable tool hands. Steve suggested multiple hands/arms including heavy-duty grabbers to pick up heavy stuff, and fine dexterous hands for detailed work. Jackie heard the whole conversation, and was busy using her CAD programs to design that exact robot. Steve and David realized they'd have to build the first one, but after that, any time they needed more of them, the robots could build another one themselves, and have a whole colony of worker robots.
They sized-up the basic locomotive components and design from Tom's wheelchair, which resembled a mini-tank with track drive, and a battery bank between the tracks. Above that, they built a telescoping/rotating “head" that used 2 cameras for stereo vision and depth perception, an ultrasonic object and collision-avoidance system, several infrared detectors, a long-range day/night camera and built-in lights for the cameras. The 2 heavy-duty grabber arms resembled an articulating and grappling fork lift, and the 4 dexterous arms varied in size, strength, and tool capability. One or two hands could be used as a vise to hold the part it was working on, and all 4 hands could be fitted from a carousel bin with tools which were powered by the robot's internal power. It took David and Steve longer to build the robot than it did Jackie and Tom to program it. Once they turned it on, it only needed a week to be totally autonomous, and capable of simple tasks. It's knowledge and abilities grew in an exponential rate, and by the end of the month, it could perform the tasks of a journeyman Machinist, Welder, Electronic Technician, and Mechanic. For a final test, they had Robbie build a copy of itself, with programming help from Jackie and Tom. When the copy came on line, they dubbed it Roberta even though both robots were totally sexless. As a visual cue to the humans that worked with them, Robbie's dexterous right arm was painted blue, and Roberta's was painted pink. Roberta learned twice as fast as Robbie since they'd improved the program over the prototype, and they mirror-imaged Robbie's memory.
With two autonomous robots completed, they came up with a list of stuff they wanted built, including a fleet of high-endurance surveillance planes. They decided to use electrically powered gliders with quantum dot paint on the upper surfaces of the huge wing. They found thousands of cameras and other surveillance gear they could easily adapt, and got started. Jackie had all the data from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center on the Solar Challenger project, and realized that a scaled-down Challenger would be perfect for what they wanted. It would be 100% autonomous, with operator override of the cameras and autopilot if needed, but the on-board and surface-based computers would handle most of the observation, detection, and identification tasks, only needing the operator's input in rare circumstances. Since it would be a ROV, they could eliminate 300 pounds between the pilot and cockpit, and replace it with an aerodynamic sensor pod including batteries, cameras, precision radio navigation gear to replace the now defunct satellite-based GPS system, and a secure heavily-encrypted data link. The 80 by 10 foot wingspan would be big enough to generate 10 KWH on sunny days. With the batteries fully charged before takeoff, it could remain aloft almost indefinitely during the sunny summer. With Carl Sagan's Nuclear Winter, they weren't sure how many sunny days they'd have, so their plane could also ride the thermals to gain extra altitude. They wanted the plane to fly as high as practical to give them a expanded view of the area around Tucson. The cameras they chose could resolve a car's license plate from high altitude. Their infrared detectors were so sensitive that they were told to ignore heat sources smaller than a large dog since the coyotes were giving them false positives at night. If anything was moving in the area around them, they'd know about it.
With all the spare M61A1 and M61A2 20mm Vulcan Guns they located, plus a bunch of M195 Short barreled 7.62mm Gatling Guns from the Vietnam-era Huey's and the huge stockpile of 20mm and 7.62mm ammo, they decided to build some Security Robot tanks armed with the 20mm Gatling Gun, and a coax MK-19A1 grenade launcher. They were just big enough to comfortably hold the turrets and ammunition, a diesel engine and automatic transmission, and all the controls and sensors. Since they didn't have a human crew, they only heavily armored the CPU , and lightly armored the turret and the hull, saving thousands of pounds of armor. The little tanks were semi-autonomous, and were fast and very mobile. The 20mm Gatling gun could take out anything smaller than a Main Battle Tank, and the MK-19A1 could take out a tank. They equipped several more mini-tanks with the 7.62mm mini-guns and the old MK-19 as scout vehicles. Robbie and Roberta were so busy that they built 6 more worker robots, but they ran out of R names, so they just called them Alpha, Bravo, Charlie, and Delta, etc.
When their fleet of surveillance ROV's had been flying a month, David and Steve approached Tom and asked if they could design a lightweight high-speed stealthy autonomous recon aircraft that they could send to check out areas past the operational range of the surveillance ROV's. They wanted to check out the condition of the Marine Depot at Barstow, and some other points in between, and some other areas to their north and east, including where Steve's family was from. Steve was pretty sure they were dead, but Sally was threatening to mutiny she was so beside herself with worry about her family.
"Ok Dad, do you want the priority to be speed or range and loiter time?"
"Obviously we want the maximum speed consistent with enough range to make the trip, and enough loiter time to do the job."
Over the next couple of hours, Tom and Jackie considered and dropped one idea after another, then finally settled on a Flying Wing design with small imbedded ducted fan turboprop. At max speed, they'd travel at 300 knots, and at max duration, they could stay aloft 6 hours. It would be semi-autonomous, and have a powerful radio to transmit and receive data using a secure heavily encrypted datalink. They wanted to build it out of RAM, but Steve told them that RAM had to be manufactured specifically for each airframe. Odds were there were no working search radars anyway. Still, just to be safe, they installed a radar detector, and programmed the recon ROV's autopilot to stay far enough away from a working air search radar to keep from getting a good enough return to target it. By now they had located every LORAN beacon in the Tucson area, and fixed it, then upgraded it to a precision radio navigation beacon. They had 6 airports in the area, plus the heliport for St. Mary's, and they all had LORAN capabilities, and a precision surveyed spot on their taxiway to initialize any aircraft with INS capability. Using these 6 locations, they could triangulate their position with a tiny but increasing error as they got farther and farther away. If for no other reason, they needed to locate some more airports with LORAN capability to improve their long-range navigation capability. Since the recon aircraft would fly during the day as well as night, they painted it a grey/blue color, and mounted lights with photo cells to the underside that would adjust the light level to match ambient light levels. It was an old trick from WWII when we realized that most observers spotted the shadow of the relatively darker underside of the plane instead of the plane itself. If you light the underside of the plane to match the background, above about 10,000 feet the plane disappeared as long as it wasn't leaving contrails. When they were finished, they decided on a shorter-range test flight before they started flying it cross-country. They could fly between Tucson and Phoenix and if they lost their precision navigation, they could always follow I-10 home. They wanted to see what survived in Phoenix anyway, in case there was some stuff worth scavenging and saving, or if there was a bunch of MZB's setting up shop that might threaten them.
The next morning, Robbie had finished servicing the long-range ROV, and Tom was at the control console when they were ready to start engines and launch. Tom confirmed the navigation computer had a good INS fix, as well as had a good copy on at least 3 LORAN sites, which was their minimum standards for pre-flight navigation checks. If the INS wasn't in the green, and they couldn't get at least 3 LORAN sites, unless it was an emergency, they wouldn't fly any of the ROV's. Finally David told Tom it was OK to take off, and he sent the computer command to go to 100% power on the tiny turboprop. As soon as the ROV was off the runway and climbing to altitude, the autopilot commanded a throttle-back to cruise climb to conserve fuel. For this test, the ROV would only fly at 5,000 feet AGL. Jackie had located a database with the UTM coordinates of every airport in the US, and a program to extract range and bearing from that data, so they were easily able to program the autopilot for any city in the US that was serviced by an airport. All they'd have to do to return home was to fly on a reciprocal bearing until they were within range of their LORAN beacons if they got lost. The Shadow arrived over Phoenix just over an hour later, and they spent the rest of the day flying a racetrack over the area, with rather depressing results. Judging by the looks of things, someone had dropped a fairly large warhead on Phoenix for the size of city it was, and downtown was a big crater, with burned and smoldering buildings surrounding the crater. Steve called Sally, Nicky, and Alex into the control room to show them the live video of the devastation. Sally broke down and cried, most of her friends and family either lived or worked in Phoenix, in the downtown area. She'd held out hope until then that some of them were still alive, but based on what she was seeing on the monitor, there was no way any of them survived. Steve helped her up, and they left the room to grieve in private.
When they got to their room, Sally laid into Steve "Damn You, why did you have to show me that!"
"Less than a month ago, you were talking about taking the kids and 'exploring' or looking for lost relatives. I can't lose you and the kids. I had to show you how futile that search would be. Every major city in the US probably got hit by a nuclear bomb, and they weren't satisfied just nuking us into the Stone Age, they go and release a deadly virus a couple of months later just to kill anyone that survived the bombs - they're a bunch of Vindictive Bastards, and I hope they're in a nice warm corner of Hell!"
"Well, they're a bunch of Godless Communists, so they're definitely not going to Heaven. Still, I can't wish anyone, even someone as soulless and evil as the Chinese Premier to Hell for eternity. So what you're telling me is unless we get really lucky, we're IT?"
"Probably unless someone was either very lucky or in a shelter like ours, they're dead. Sorry to be so blunt, but that's the basic facts."
Sally hugged her husband, and as the repercussions of what they overheard sunk in, Alex and Nicky looked at each other and recoiled in horror. If they were the last teenagers on Earth, and they wanted to be married and have kids, they might be forced to marry each other, and they weren't from Alabama! Nicky briefly thought about Tom, then remembered that her Dad said that due to his neural deficit, he was probably impotent and infertile. She couldn't see herself married to a machine anyway, which was how she saw Tom, even though he was her friend and chess buddy.
Once they got the flying ROV's finished, they upgraded the tracked land ROV's. Half of them were equipped with the heavy 20mm Gatling Gun and a coax MK-19A1, and the other half were much smaller scout vehicles armed with a M195 7.62mm Gatling gun and a MK-19. The Scouts had the same sensor head as the Longbow Apache and Kiowa Warrior since that's where they got them from, except they put theirs on a telescoping mast so the scout could hide behind a berm, and collect ground-level intel about an attacking ground force, then they could attack the flanks with their weapons. David and Steve loved scrounging in the DM boneyard. They were like kids in a candy store. As they added more and more stuff, Tom and Jackie were hard-pressed to control all of them. They decided to build a couple of supercomputer copies of Jackie, and connect them with a Wide Area Network. The first computers that were upgraded were the ones in the BEAST vehicles, since Tom might have to operate one to defend the base, or in a worst-case scenario, bug out in one, leaving Jackie to defend the underground base by herself. Tom would rather have stayed with Jackie, but David made it clear to him that if they bugged out, the base would probably be destroyed shortly after they left, either by Jackie or the attackers. Tom wept when he realized he could lose Jackie too, until she pointed out that if they mirrored her programs and memory into the Beast, she'd still be with them, like when they mirrored her when they fled their old house. Tom smiled when he remembered, and felt better after that, knowing as long as he had a mirror-image copy of Jackie, he'd never lose her. After they upgraded the Beast computers, Tom asked David if he could try out running the Beast again. He agreed, and they drove out to the Beast's garage. Right as they got there, the rear ramp lowered, and they drove up.
"How'd that happen?"
"The Beast is in communication with Jackie, so he knew that we were headed here, and recognized me. OK if I plug in?"
"Sure but be careful!"
Tom motored forward to the cockpit, and as his wheelchair locked into the tracks that held it immobile, an arm came up, and connected the Beast computer to Tom's interface. An instant later, it hit Tom like a thunderbolt. This computer was as powerful as Jackie, but faster since it didn't have all the administrative tasks weighing it down. He activated the speakers, and told his Dad to buckle in. Once he was buckled in, he started the Beast, and once everything was in the green, opened the doors, and drove out. They drove to an isolated part of the base, and Tom tested the weapons systems against some rusting piles of junk. A short burst from the 50 cal Vulcan wrecked it some more. The MK-19A1 fired a single round into the pile of rubble, and vaporized it. The shockwave rocked the Beast over a mile away. “Holy Cow Dad, those MK-19A1 rounds are powerful!"
"They're designed to take out a Main Battle Tank."
“Well they probably work. This is so cool, I'm totally in control of the Beast, and fully integrated to the sensors, weapons, and navigation systems this time. I can see 360 degrees around the Beast, and if I concentrate on a weapons system for an instant, it activates. Then all I have to do is think about a target, and think “Boom" and it's destroyed. I've got a whole bunch of overhead available to control any ROV's we want to use for recon."
"Sounds like fun son, can I try?"
"It will be interesting using the VR helmet, but I can guarantee it won't be the same as being neurologically tied to the computer."
David slid his helmet on, and Tom was right, he could see everything the sensors saw, but he still needed to use the multifunction joysticks and pedals to control the Beast and the weapons systems. Tom was infinitely faster than he was, but he still needed to sleep 4 hours per day, so they included the VR gear for David and Steve. David took the helmet off, and asked Tom to take the Beast back home.
They were halfway home, when Jackie's voice interrupted on the PA. “Tom, David, the overhead ROV is picking up a huge convoy of military vehicles, armor, and motorcycles headed this way down 10."
David grabbed the microphone. “Jackie, Scramble Alpha. Let's wake everyone up, and get all our hardware out searching to make sure this is the only threat."
"Ok, David. Tom, you've got full control of your Beast."
As Jackie took control of all the tracked and aerial ROVs, Tom took control of the Beast they were driving in, and headed for the most likely line of advance. David ran through the Beast making sure all the weapons systems were 100% and the ammo bays were full. He refilled the ammo bay, and added a couple of MK-19A1 40mm grenades to that bay, then ran back to his seat, and belted himself in tight. Thinking quickly, he turned to Tom and asked "Would I interfere with you if I were on the VR headset?"
"Not at all, I've already configured the BEAST so I've got control of everything, but if you want to watch, that's ok. Unless I release control, you can't fire any weapons or drive.
"Ok, I'll have to trust you. Going VR." David slid the helmet on, and quickly got over the creepy feeling of his vision expanding to the size of the Beast's sensor field. He watched Jackie launch all their airborne ROV's and their ground ROV's including scouts and Tanks. Steve and his family stayed inside the shelter with their Beast, and prepared to bug out if necessary. David wished that Carrie was with them, but she assured them she'd be OK with Steve's family until this was over. She was monitoring the Supernet when she called David and told him to get Tom to drink some Gatorade, his Alpha State was off the chart, and he was burning calories at a prodigious rate. David switched frequencies, and Tom said “I heard, my hydration pack's full, I'll keep up on the fluids, tell Carrie thanks for reminding me." David heard a gurgle coming from Tom's hydration pack, and knew that Tom was busy drinking Gatorade to replace the calories he was expending.
As they got closer to the approaching forces, Jackie and Tom were sending back and forth at the speed of light. David only had an inkling of the huge amounts of data they were processing when he called up a window on his VR helmet that tapped into the secure datalink between Tom/Beast and Jackie. Jackie was feeding Tom real-time data from 6 ROV's, and the news wasn't good. An entire company of 2000-era US Army armor was driving down I-10 headed straight for them. What they couldn't understand was the lead vehicles appeared to be highly modified motorcycles. Tom cross-fed the image to David, who explained the significance of the custom-altered motorcycles commonly called Choppers, and none of the implications were good! Based on Tom's impressions, Jackie re-classified them from Bogies to Bandits, which activated the weapons systems in the scout vehicles and ROV tanks, but they weren't Weapons Free yet.
Meanwhile, David kept Steve up to date on the attackers. Once he heard about the Choppers leading the pack, he recommended going to Red Alert since no legitimate US ARMY force would be riding custom Harleys. Jackie must have been listening, because seconds later, the entire shelter complex went to Red Alert, and all the security doors closed and locked, all non-secure comms were disconnected, and they went to almost total EMCON in case they had detection gear. Their secure comms were designed to simulate electronic noise, and not give a sensor a source. Jackie deployed the scout tracks far in advance to act as LP/OP sites, and the tanks were located along the flanks of the convoy to do the most damage. Once the invaders reached the outskirts of Tucson, they stopped, and everyone heard over the radio.
"This is the US 1st Cavalry Division. We're taking over. If you wish to live, surrender your food, supplies and women. Otherwise, we'll destroy you like we did the last town."
David knew they were Renegades or worse, the 1st Cavalry was stationed at Fort Hood, Texas - almost 1,000 miles east of Tucson. The probability of them being the 1st Cav was about the same as him being from Mars. He didn't respond to their radio threat, at least verbally. David switched his radio to Intercom, and talked to Tom, Steve and Jackie.
"I take it you heard from the yo-yo on the outskirts of Tucson. They're renegades or worse. I say we take them out now before they get established. We've got the Beast, 4 ROV tanks with 20mm Gatling guns and MK-19A1's plus another 4 ROV scouts armed with 7.62mm Gatling guns and MK-19s. Between us, we should be able to decimate that force before they can get their tanks off the lowboys."
Steve spoke first. "Do what you have to David - I don't want them getting any closer to my family than they already are."
"Too bad we don't have any air support!"
"Maybe our next ROV's should carry missiles or bombs?"
"Guess we're going to have to do this the hard way - ok Tom take us into gun range, but be sneaky. I don't want them getting a good shot at us."
Once they got in position, David was surprised and deafened when every gun they owned opened fire at once, denying the attackers the chance to locate the incoming rounds. Seconds later, every tank the attackers owned was on fire, or the turret had blown off the tank while they were still on their lowboys. Plumes of fire erupted from the hulls of the tanks as the rounds cooked off, and the diesel fuel burned. David could only imagine the hellish nightmare of the last seconds of the doomed tank crewmen in their tanks. Each one of the Beast's twin L-70 40mm Bofors guns could fire at over 300 rounds per minute, which meant that in that first 5 second barrage, over 50 rounds impacted the tank column. David was impressed to say the least. Instead of all 50 rounds striking the same target, Tom had walked the rounds right down the column, with each tank having 2 rounds targeting it. At the same time, the 20mm Gatling guns were targeting the Bradleys and M113 APC's, doing lethal damage with every round. As soon as the big guns stopped firing, the Scouts got into the act with their 7.62 mini-guns, shooting any survivors, and engaging the renegades on the choppers who were doing their best to flee the superior force. David saw the men who could running from their vehicles, and getting mowed down like a scythe goes through a wheat field by the multiple red fire hoses of tracers from the concealed 7.62 mini-guns that were repeatedly sweeping the battlefield free of dirtbags. Some of them fell where they were, while others danced like puppets with their strings being cut one at a time. When several were hit in the head, David almost lost his breakfast at the sight of their heads exploding in a pink fountain. David guessed there might have been a shorter or more one-sided battle in History, but he doubted it. When David reviewed the rounds expended vs. targets destroyed data, he was confused, and talked to Tom.
"How'd you manage an 80% hit rate on moving targets that were over a mile away?"
"Dad, I'm fully integrated into the Beast systems just like Jackie. I think of something and it happens. Jackie and I discussed this attack, and she showed me how to set up the barrage so I could fire at the maximum rate of the gun, and methodically shell the whole road, wiping out all their tanks in the process. I'm connected directly to the Beast's computer, so I know everything it does about the target and our guns including the exact range to target thanks to the laser rangefinder, and the ballistics of our shells. The rest was simple mathematics. Since I can change the elevation of the gun while it's firing, I simply set the elevation to target the closest tank first, then decreased the elevation exactly what I needed to engage the next tank in the column. The result was the rounds all arrived within a second of each other, and the tankers never knew what hit them. It's as close to a Time on Target barrage as I can get with the equipment we have."
No sooner had Tom stopped talking, then the computer said that all targets were terminated. They turned the Beast around and headed home.
Fleataxi
