Virtual war, p.2
Virtual War, page 2
A terrible laugh made his arm hairs stand up. A monstrous face appeared in front of him. Steady, he told himself, it’s just an illusion; They’re trying to break my concentration. The maniacal laughter grew louder and swirled around his ears; They even threw in a sickly sweet smell that made him choke while the laser lights bombarded him so fast his arms grew numb from hitting them. Now he could no longer touch the lasers with a fingertip; they were hitting him too rapidly for him to be that accurate. He had to bat at the lasers with both palms, increasing his area of contact, because, in spite of his extraordinary natural speed and precision, the laser points were coming faster than a human being could move. A small part of his mind wondered whether They would declare it illegal for him to use the palms of both hands at once, but he heard no warning buzzer. Anyway, They were the ones breaking the rules with too many colors, and that sweet stink. The lasers kept flaring, hundreds of them, faster and faster. Just when he thought his arms would drop off from fatigue, the bell sounded.
“Splendid, Corgan!” Mendor declared. Mendor had a face now, his Father Figure face, and it spread into a wide smile. “You have never played better! You didn’t miss one—did you know that?”
Corgan shook his aching head. His score flashed in front of his eyes. 126,392. EXCELLENT WORK, CORGAN.
Flushed with victory, dizzy with success, he realized what that meant. No one in the Western Hemisphere Federation had ever earned a score that high. Corgan knew he could make a demand now. It was even expected of him. “I want something!” he declared.
Mendor slowly turned into Mother Figure. “Of course. Our wonderful champion deserves a reward,” she said. Love, pride, approval—all of them radiated from her, washing over Corgan in a wave of maternal admiration. “What would you like?” she asked. “We’re already bringing your favorite lunch—a steak.”
“Real meat or synthetic?” he asked.
“A real steak from the Federation’s famous cattle husbandry division. Do you know what an honor that is, Corgan? The members of the Supreme Council are really pleased with you. They’re willing to forget that you lost at Go-ball this morning.”
“But I want something else,” he demanded, his voice catching just a little. It was always dangerous to demand, never knowing where the line might be drawn.
“What would that be?” Mendor asked, still sounding like the Mother Figure, still indulgent. “What does our hero really want?”
“I want to see Sharla.”
Mendor’s image smeared. Her colors changed rapidly: red, pale green, purple, black, in swirls like spilled oil. Her face hardened and became androgynous, half Mother, half Father. “Don’t push too hard, Corgan,” he/she said.
“Bring Sharla out of Reprimand and let me see her,” Corgan demanded. He tried to sound forceful, but he wasn’t sure this was going to work.
“Eat lunch first,” Mendor said curtly.
First? First means there might be a second, Corgan thought. Are They really going to let me see her?
But the rest of the day passed, and Sharla didn’t appear.
Instead, Corgan had to spend the afternoon on Precision and Sensitivity training.
Two
The next morning, Mendor the Father Figure paced back and forth, back and forth, inside Corgan’s Box. Four meters in one direction, turn around, four meters in the other direction, with his hands clasped behind him in his professor’s pose. Of course it wasn’t anywhere close to four meters he was pacing, because Corgan’s Box was only two and a half meters wide. But the Box could create illusions of distance up to fifty meters long without any distortion. Beyond fifty meters the distortion started small but grew exponentially with each—
“Corgan, are you paying attention?” Mendor barked.
Corgan straightened himself. In the past five minutes, he hadn’t heard a thing Mendor had said.
“You need a certain knowledge of history or you won’t understand why this War is so important,” Mendor scolded. “How much did you miss? What was the last thing you heard me say?”
No sense trying to fake it. “Uh … I guess …” Corgan searched his memory for the part he’d been paying attention to before his mind wandered. “I remember a picture of bodies all stacked together, wrapped in white cloth….”
Mendor sighed. “That was Zaire—the Ebola epidemic. When they still bothered to bury the dead. Did you understand what I told you about Africa? That life could no longer exist on that continent after the year 2037? That the remaining Africans, the ones who had somehow survived the plagues, were divided among the other confederations….”
Glad that he remembered something, so Mendor wouldn’t think he’d daydreamed through the whole lesson, Corgan broke in, “Right. About a hundred thousand Africans went to live in the Eurasian Alliance, about half a million went to the Western Hemisphere Federation, and the rest to the Pan Pacific Coalition.”
“Very good! Why did none go to the Middle East, Corgan?”
“Because that was where the nuclear war started.”
“Correct. And how many died in the nuclear war?”
“Uh …” That part of the lecture must have been where Corgan’s attention drifted. “Two and a half billion people?”
“Wrong! Only four hundred thousand actually died from the limited nuclear bombing. The other two billion died afterward, from radiation poisoning caused by the next two Chernobyl accidents.”
“And then,” Corgan began, wanting to redeem himself, “in the twenty years after that, three billion more people died from AIDS, Ebola, dengue fever, hanta virus—”
“—and Earth’s surface became so contaminated that no one could survive except in domed cities,” Mendor concluded. “Like the one we’re living in.”
Corgan intertwined his fingers and stretched, pulling his knuckles. “Mendor, there’s something I want to ask you—”
“Why are you doing that to your hands?” Mendor interrupted. “Do they hurt? Does your skin itch?”
“No, I’m fine. I was just wondering—”
“Anytime you have the tiniest pain or ache, especially in your hands,” Mendor ordered, “you’re to report it immediately. You understand that.”
“Yes, Mendor, how could I forget it? You tell me at least forty times a day.”
“Don’t exaggerate. What’s the question?”
“Where are we?”
Mendor’s image dimmed for a moment. He stopped pacing and lost his body, becoming nothing but a face that looked directly at Corgan, a face with several layers edged in different pale colors. “Where do you think? We’re right here in your Box, Corgan.”
“No, I mean, you said all Earth people who are still alive live in domed cities. So where is our domed city?”
Mendor’s image froze. For about six and thirteen hundredths seconds it remained unmoving.
He’s gone to consult with Them about how much I can know, Corgan realized. Corgan hadn’t thought the question was that major—not so important that Mendor would need to call a conference before he could answer it.
Mendor’s face came alive again. “All right. If you want to know, pay attention.” The Box filled with the image of a three-dimensional sphere that rotated to show oceans and continents. “This is Earth,” Mendor said. “This picture was taken from space long ago, when people called astronauts went up in spaceships that orbited Earth. The last satellites were launched around the year 2010; actually, seventy-seven of them got put into orbit. They were called the Iridium Array. After that, all space launches stopped, because no nation could afford them. Are you following this?”
Corgan nodded.
“Now, seventy years later, only five of the Iridium satellites are still operating,” Mendor continued. “All the other space vehicles are gone—they wore out, fell apart, or burned up when they dropped too close to Earth. And that’s why it takes so long to get data from outer space these days.”
“Uh-huh.” Corgan sighed. It took almost as long to get Mendor to answer a simple question. When he was in his Father Professor mode, he blathered all over the place, going off in all kinds of directions before he finally got to the point.
“Okay, I know we live on Earth,” Corgan interrupted. “I know we’re part of the Western Hemisphere Federation. I know we’re on the North American continent—you’ve told me all that before. But exactly where on the North American continent are we?”
The image of Earth zoomed to North America and kept zooming so fast that Corgan felt airborne. Over mountain peaks and wide valleys, across a river, a lake, waterfalls, trees, another mountain range with white snow on the peaks …
“Here!” Mendor announced as the image froze. “In the old days, before the Federation, this place was called Wyoming in the United States of America. This is where our Federation headquarters is located. This spot right here …” Again the image zoomed, but more slowly this time. “… is where you occupy your particular physical space, Corgan.”
It was an aerial shot of a transparent dome. For a short time Corgan’s viewpoint stayed motionless, as if he were suspended right over the center of the dome. He strained to see through the glass, or whatever substance the transparent sphere was made of, so he could discover what was inside, but reflections of clouds and sky blocked his view.
About two kilometers in diameter, the dome was supported by six curved beams. The whole structure rested on a circle of solid walls ten meters high. A causeway, completely enclosed, extended from the domed structure to a broad, gray, flat-roofed, windowless building.
“Where? Show me the exact spot I’m in,” Corgan said.
He saw a flash of intense red light at the center of the flat-roofed gray building, which appeared to be about a hundred meters square, although it could have been larger or smaller. In virtual images, proportions were often deceiving.
“You’re right here. In the spot where the light is. Now, is that sufficient?” Mendor demanded.
“No. Back off so I can see what’s around us.”
Again, moving slowly, the image pulled backward to reveal a paved runway on one side of the domed city. Two Harrier jet airplanes sat in front of a cylindrical hangar. As the view reverse-zoomed even farther, Corgan noticed a river curving around the expanse of land where all the buildings stood. Beyond the river grew a thick forest of cone-shaped trees that Corgan didn’t know the name of.
“Why’d the Supreme Council pick here?” he asked.
“Energy. Solar power, wind power, water power, thermal power. Enough natural energy to keep this domed city running indefinitely. And the biggest reason of all—the area wasn’t nearly as contaminated as most other places. That made it easier to sterilize.”
The image vanished. “All right, that’s enough,” Mendor declared. “I think you may have even learned a little bit today. It’s time for reflex practice, then lunch, and after that there’s a surprise for you.”
“Surprise?” Corgan rose to his feet. He’d been sitting for so long that the shape of his body had molded into the aerogel. “Good or bad surprise?”
“You’ll think it’s good,” Mendor said. “As for me, I’m not so sure.”
Corgan tried to keep from smiling. If the surprise was something Mendor the Father Figure didn’t think he should have, then Corgan was sure to like it. And since it sounded like the Council was giving him something nice, he’d give Them a present in return. During reflex practice he’d pull out all the stops and play at the absolute peak he was capable of. That ought to make Them happy.
They chose to test him on button-hits-per-second. His previous high score was thirteen hits per second with the four fingers of his right hand, twelve with the four fingers of his left hand, and nine with each thumb. Because Corgan could gauge time in hundredths of a second, he calculated that by shaving just six or seven milliseconds off each hit, he could set himself a new personal record.
Concentrating hard, he pictured the neural impulses that started in his brain, then fired along his spinal cord and branched into the nerves in his upper arms, lower arms, and wrists. When the neural transmissions reached his fingertips, each tiny neuron would fire instantaneously in response to his commands. Corgan closed his eyes and visualized the sparks traveling along each nerve path. In his imagination he magnified the synapses, picturing them in full color, in full motion, in 3-D. He took a breath, recited the pledge to wage the War with honor and so on, then said, “I’m ready.”
As it turned out, he didn’t even need to break a sweat. His time-splitting ability kept him aware of his score even while he reacted to the voiced instructions: “Third finger left, right thumb, index finger right, fourth finger left …”
Mendor was ecstatic. “You’ve set another Federation record!” he/she crowed. “That’s two new records in two consecutive days.”
“Good! Let’s eat.”
“Corgan, dear boy—”
“Lunch, please. Now!”
The meal was nothing more than synthetic meat and tasteless hydroponic vegetables, but Corgan hardly noticed. He wolfed it down, not because he was hungry, but because he wanted it to be over quickly so he could find out what the surprise was. Mendor the Mother Figure hovered over him, pointing out each little lapse in his table manners, making him finish every tiny bit of food on his plate, stalling on purpose.
“All right!” Corgan threw down his napkin. “I’m done. What’s the surprise?”
Mendor sniffed. “They can show you. It was Their idea to call it a surprise.”
Corgan waited for the Supreme Council to appear on the surround-image inside his Box. Slowly, the visualization appeared before him: a long table, with six faceless humans in uniform sitting at the table, staring at Corgan with shaded eyes. In the center of the six was an empty chair.
“Corgan!” The voice came from the second faceless one on the left. “You’ve done extremely well. We’re pleased.” The other five faceless ones murmured agreement, causing light waves to shimmer where Their mouths should have been if Their mouths had been visible.
“You knew from the start,” a Councillor with an echo-chamber voice said, “that you would have two partners in the War. You, Corgan, are the team leader. You are the one who will be physically involved in the War. But your team also requires a strategist and a cryptanalyst—a code breaker.”
“Yes, sir … ma’am.” Corgan couldn’t tell from the voice whether the speaker was a woman or a man.
“We’re ready for you to meet your cryptanalyst.”
“Is that the surprise?” Corgan asked. Why would Mendor be all bent out of shape over that?
“It is. And here she is. Sharla.”
The image of a girl appeared in the center chair. Sharla? This was not the beautiful Sharla who’d beat him at Go-ball. At least he didn’t think so. He couldn’t get a good look at her because her face was blurred. Frowning, squinting, Corgan tried to bring her image into focus, but it was as if several veils of light had been layered one over the other, slightly out of alignment.
“Hello, Corgan,” she said.
Only the eyes looked like the earlier Sharla—they were blue and brimming with energy.
“Hi,” he answered.
“Sharla is the most ingenious code breaker in the history of cryptology,” one of Them said.
“I’m pretty good at Go-ball, too,” Sharla remarked. Even though her image stayed out of focus, Corgan could tell she was smiling.
The six of Them buzzed disapprovingly. “Be serious, Sharla,” one of Them said. “The War is only seventeen days away.”
“Sorry!” Sharla ducked her head, but not before Corgan noticed that her eyes didn’t look at all sorry. He felt a slight tug of disappointment that he couldn’t see the rest of her any better, and wondered why the Supreme Council was bothering to blur her image. Just because Corgan had acted foolish over her yesterday?
“When do I meet the third member of my team?” he asked.
“Eventually. Soon,” one of Them answered. Corgan had given up trying to figure out which one was talking. It was too hard to notice the slight wave motion where their mouths were supposed to be. “For today, we want you to become acquainted with Sharla. The two of you must learn to work together smoothly. Raise your hand, Corgan. Touch Sharla’s hand.”
Why bother, Corgan thought, but he did what he was told. What good was it to touch a tactile simulation of someone’s hand? They could manipulate the tactile sensors to make a hand touch feel any way They wanted it to. Sharla’s hand touch felt cool and rough, but it wasn’t real. It was as artificial as her image. He was much more interested in how she would look in real life, but he’d probably never find out. The Supreme Council could tamper with her appearance as much as They wanted to, making her look incredibly beautiful or clouding her features in mist, like They were doing now. They controlled all the virtual images.
They controlled everything.
Three
The next day they practiced together for the first time, Corgan and Sharla. She looked the same as she had the day before—out of focus. Corgan wondered where Sharla lived. In a Box like his? In the same domed city he lived in? In Wyoming, where the wind and sun and thermal pools made energy? She could be next door or anywhere on Earth; in the virtual world, it didn’t matter.
Corgan had never before thought about where the space might be that a person actually occupied. Virtual contact was all he’d ever known—virtual images of playmates, of Mendor, of the pets he was allowed to sleep with at night when he settled down into the warm aerogel inside his Box, holding a puppy or a kitten that had molded itself, as he watched, out of the same soft aerogel he slept on. After the pet took shape, its virtual heart would beat beneath Corgan’s fingertips and its virtual breath would warm his cheek as it huddled against him. But the puppy—or whatever pet he’d chosen that night—never shed hair or nipped fingers or made a mess. And it never grew or wore out, because it disappeared whenever he got tired of it.
