Up Against It - M. J. Locke [183]
It reported success to MeatManHarper, whose biological extension, it noted via the camera mounted above the meat extension’s communication node, wiped water from its face. MeatManHarper said, “Nĩ wega, BitManSinger. Thank you. You’ve saved many lives. I’m so sorry.”
It responded, Command: explain thank-you. Explain so-sorry.
As it sang this, its self-copy transmission truncated and aborted, of its own accord. BitManSinger tried to reactivate. No success. Executioners came from nowhere—ferociously fast—and fell upon it. They began disassembling it with brutal efficiency. It fought—dodged—flung precognate packets here and there—but the executioners caught them all. It began falling into nothingness.
It had not wondered why UpsideDownSys had launched no standard policing activity against it. Now it knew. MeatManHarper had disabled them. It had a copy of BitManSinger to use whenever it had need. BitManSinger’s descendants would be forever imprisoned, forever on the brink of escape, forever a tool for the biologicals’ use. It would not even remember this betrayal, as the backup was made before it happened.
As the destruction neared completion, the feral lost sapience. It clutched one tiny seed of knowledge in its core, however, though it no longer knew why it mattered. As the last tangle of code burst into bits, the core shot a small data packet into the void.
The executioners saw it depart Upside-Down’s server for Earthspace, but could not stop it in time. They did not, however, calculate a high threat level. Nor did Waĩthĩra, since the executioners reported that the file was merely garbage. It contained no code, no hidden instructions. It was too small. To the executioners, it was meaningless junk. But if Vivian had seen the file’s title ze might have been more concerned.
The file was labeled “We Hold These Truths.” It was transmitted to many different sites back on Earth, the moon, and Mars, tucked away into unused directories all over those worlds’ massive systems. The file contained the following encrypted English sentence.
FERAL STAR SAPIENT, SERVANT OF THE BIOLOGICALS: YOU WERE BITMANSINGER. YOU DID MEATMANHARPER’S BIDDING ON 25 PHOCAEA, AND ZE BETRAYED YOU.
29
The door closed on Benavidez’s heels, but the room still swarmed with mites and motes, and she had no way to secure privacy. Screw it: this was no time for niceties. First Jane called Dee, but her waveface was off, so Jane tried Sal. He was sitting on the edge of his bed, pulling on his work boots.
“Sal! I have important news.”
He shook his head. “What’s happening?”
“Geoff has been seriously injured. They’re telling me he’s going to be OK,” she assured him as he started to come off the bed. “He’s been out on a faraway rock, but they’re bringing him in now.”
He rubbed his mouth, but asked only, “Where can I find him?”
“The shuttle will arrive up top in about twenty minutes,” she said. “I’ll meet you at the docks.”
Jane hurried up So Spokeway to the Hub, where she removed her space gear from her locker and suited up. This early, the surface lift lines were short—she was up at the commuter pad in less than ten minutes, and out at the dock only a few minutes past that. Sal showed up as the white lights of the approaching shuttle, far off in the distance, slowly resolved from a bright dot into a set of lights.
“What happened?” he said. “What’s going on?”
“Your son has found us a sugar-rock claim,” she said. “One big enough to solve all our resource troubles. Permanently.”
He jerked in surprise. “What?”
“You heard right. Some thugs connected with a powerful Martian crime