The Turing Test Page 12

  The room was lighter, now. Somebody must be parked at the end of the street with their lights still on. “Maybe you could help me out with that,” he said. “You’ve been saying we should go out with some of your friends, and I’ve been holding back. I could try for a change. Maybe turn a corner and try and rejoin the land of the living, as Marla likes to put it. What do you think?”

  But Shannon had fallen asleep. Down the street, the driver turned off his lights, and the bedroom returned to its usual darkness.

  12

  I Saw What You Did

  Three hundred miles above the earth’s surface, a spy satellite detected a half-dozen tightly concentrated explosions in the darkness far below. Within seconds, other satellites detected strikingly similar events across most of Russia’s eleven time zones.

  The satellites beamed the data to the bank of computers the North American Aerospace Defense Command had assembled and upgraded ever since the early years of the Cold War. One of those computers began comparing the data to the launch profiles held in its database. Three seconds later, it found a potential match and transmitted the information to the display of the appropriate terminal in the NORAD Alert Monitoring Room.

  The information triggered audio and visual alerts, jolting the technician sitting at the terminal to immediate attention. He leaned forward and peered at the text on the screen. In the two years he’d spent at this console, he’d never received a potential attack warning. Simulated alerts in training exercises, yes. But never one that might be the first hint that a nuclear war had just begun. He pushed the red button on the pad next to his keyboard. People throughout the room came alive as the technician got back to work, scanning additional data as it appeared on his screen.

  The senior duty officer appeared at his elbow. He bent over to look at the screen. “What have you got, Corporal?”

  “I don’t know yet, Sir. Something on the Murmansk Peninsula. Here’s a visual of what the satellite detected. It’s just about dawn there. All you can see distinctly are six simultaneous explosions. The system identifies it as a possible hostile launch from a mobile missile battery. We’re receiving almost identical captures from more locations across Russia.”

  The major stared at the image and felt a knot growing in his stomach. The bright lights formed a tight, precise grouping – almost like an exploding six pack of beer. “Did the system identify the type of missile battery?”

  “No, Sir. It’s a generic identification based on the configuration of the explosions – a lot like a SCUD mobile battery firing but bigger. It’s not matched to any known weapon system.”

  The major tapped his foot. In less than two minutes, he’d have to classify the event as either harmless or a potential attack. If he did nothing, the alert would default to the latter conclusion and send a warning up the chain of command. Could the Russians have developed a mobile missile launch system we’d never seen before? It wasn’t impossible. He wondered where his wife and children were right now.

  He stepped quickly across the room to another technician.

  “Sergeant Butler, are we tracking anything on radar yet?”

  “Nothing, Sir, from any of the sites.”

  The major glanced up at the large digital display on the wall that had begun counting forward as soon as the alarm sounded. Already, one minute and twelve seconds had elapsed since the incident had been identified. Did that mean there was nothing to worry about or that the launch sites weren’t close enough to Russian borders for the missiles to show up on radar yet? Or maybe they were cruise missiles flying close to the ground and couldn’t be detected until they were much closer to their targets?

  “Call up a map of the launch sites.”

  “Yes, Sir.” A map of Russia bloomed on one of the wall screens, with each location marked. It was a mixed bag; most were clustered between Russia’s western borders and Moscow, but a few were near Russia’s Pacific coast. Not what you’d expect if Russia was attacking the U.S. But it could be consistent with an attack on Europe using mid-range missiles, with some U.S. military bases in South Korea and Japan thrown in as well. If that’s where they were headed, they’d reach their targets very soon. The numbers on the time screen now read 2:18, and he felt a bit unsteady from the adrenaline coursing through his system.

  “Major!” someone called from across the room. “I’ve got something.”

  He looked up as another large screen came to life, displaying an extremely grainy picture in gray and black.

  “What are we looking at?” the major called back.

  “The next satellite in line just sent in a new picture of the Murmansk site. It’s a little lighter there now, and the camera picked up more detail.”

  But what was it? The major walked closer. It was a still picture, hazy on one side. That must be smoke still drifting away from the large blackened area. It looked like there might be some flames, too. But that could be foliage ignited by missile exhaust.

  “Any computer pattern recognition yet?”

  “No, Sir.”

  The major could feel the eyes of every unoccupied person on him. “Zoom out some on that picture – I want to see the surrounding area. And call up an archival picture of that location immediately.”

  As the magnification decreased he could see more, and the resolution sharpened. He thought he was beginning to understand what he was looking at. “Do you have pictures of any other sites in the Far East?”

  “Yes, Sir. Two more. I’ll put them up on the other screens.”

  “Give me the archival shots for those sites, too. And I want any other data we’ve got on those locations.”

  The pictures of the other sites came on screen just as his aide arrived at his side with a ringing telephone. Before he took it, he called across the room for one last piece of information. “Sergeant Butler – are you tracking anything yet in Europe?”

  “No, Sir!”

  Thank God. That nailed it. He sank heavily into an unoccupied chair and accepted the phone.

  “Sorry to bother you, Colonel. Everyone can stand down. Yes, Sir. I’m sure. It looked very suspicious at first. Preliminary computer analysis identified possible missile launches in forty-eight locations across Russia. We have better pictures now, showing nearly identical damage at multiple locations. Comparison with archival photos supports the conclusion that what the satellite cameras captured was the destruction of electrical transformers. That’s right, Sir. Each location is a power transmission station. I don’t know how someone pulled it off, but it looks like our buddies in Russia have a heck of a lot of equipment to replace.”

  * * *

  It wasn’t just Russia that had lost hundreds of transformers, Frank learned from the incident summary. The U.S, China, and a half-dozen other countries had as well. All the transmission facilities were associated with high greenhouse gas production sites – coal-fired generating facilities, diesel truck manufacturing plants in India, and so on.

  The summary also informed him that the transformers used at large transmission facilities weren’t commodity items. They were extremely expensive and customized to their specific use and location, so not many were kept in inventory. In the space of a few moments, the attackers had destroyed more transformers than existing manufacturers would be able replace in an entire year. As a result of the ongoing attacks, and whether it liked it or not, every country meaningfully contributing to global warming was meeting its commitments under the Berlin Accords far sooner than expected.

  Measured by impact, it was one of the more devastating attacks so far. And one of the most elegant. The attacker had simply sent a massive burst of electricity to the transformers to short them out after disabling the surge protectors that otherwise would have protected them. It would take a long time to design and install new safeguards against similar attacks across the power grids of the countries
affected. And who was to say those upgrades couldn’t be hacked as well?

  “What I don’t understand is why the attacker doesn’t come out in the open?” Frank said to Shannon. “You’d think if he really wanted to save the world, he’d announce what he was up to. That would give countries an incentive to cut their emissions the way they want to instead of letting the attacker decide what to blow up next.”

  “Maybe he thinks it wouldn’t work,” Shannon said. “After all, it’s not like we don’t know what will happen if we don’t cut emissions, and so far, we haven’t done enough. The attacker may figure countries would tighten up just long enough to catch him, and then go back to their bad old ways.”

  “And he’s probably right,” Frank said. “But it does make me worry.”

  “How come?” Shannon asked.

  “Well, if the attacker is that determined, what happens if he decides things are getting worse faster than he can prevent with attacks like the ones he’s launched to date? What happens if he’s got the same ethics as Jerry’s Turing program? Would he start changing his own rules?”

  “To what?”

  “I don’t know. Here’s hoping we don’t find out.”

  * * *

  “Say,” Shannon said on their way back from dinner that night. “Do you mind if we take an extra ten minutes so I can get something at my apartment? It’s right around the corner.”

  “Of course not. Lead the way,” Frank said.

  She stopped in front of a plain-looking brick structure and unlocked the door.

  “This is where you live?” Frank said. “It doesn’t look like an apartment house.”

  “It isn’t. It’s an old commercial building converted into lofts. Most of my neighbors are artists. You can wait for me here.”

  “Here? Why don’t I just come upstairs with you? I’ve never seen your place.”

  “I know,” she said, looking sheepish.

  “Well?” he said.

  “Well, okay, but don’t make fun of me. I don’t usually let people see where I live.”

  “Of course not.” He followed her into the elevator, wondering what could possibly be in her apartment that she’d be self-conscious about. Lots of stuffed animals? A Justin Bieber poster?

  “Okay, here we are,” she said when they reached her apartment. “Now remember, you promised not to laugh.”

  She opened the door, and there, hanging from the high ceiling of a large room with ten-foot-tall windows was a sleek, gossamer-winged airplane. Frank guessed it must be at least eighteen feet from wing tip to wing tip.

  “Wow!” Frank said. “That is insanely cool! Where’d you get it?”

  “I built it,” she said simply.

  “Really?” For the first time, Frank noticed the rest of the room. Aside from a bed in one corner and a small kitchen table in another, there was almost no furniture as such – just a big work bench in the middle of the room, covered with tools and surrounded by shelves filled with materials and equipment. “That’s incredible. Tell me about it.”

  “It’s a solar-powered plane. I’ve been refining the design ever since grad school, each time making it lighter and the energy source and engine more efficient. I’ve completely rebuilt the wings and solar panels three times now. Kind of like Jerry coming out with new versions of Turing, I guess.”

  “That’s fantastic! How did you get started making unmanned aircraft?”

  “I was in love with the space program as a kid. My dream was to work for NASA when I grew up, so I took all the courses in college I’d need to go into aerospace. But then NASA announced they were going to wind down the shuttle project, and all the jobs dried up. So, it was the usual story. Lots of loans to repay, so I switched all my courses halfway through grad school and scrambled to retool my resume. When I graduated, I interviewed for the jobs that were available.”

  “I’m sorry. That must have been a big disappointment.”

  “It all worked out well enough, so I can’t complain, but I didn’t want to give the dream up entirely. I started tinkering around with the kind of aircraft you could build and fly on your own – it’s basically just a really big model airplane. The whole thing weighs less than eighty pounds. I guess I’ve gotten a bit compulsive about it.”

  Frank was walking around in circles and rapidly deepening engineering love, craning his neck back so he could appreciate every detail of Shannon’s creation.

  “And before you ask,” Shannon said, “yes, I can take the wings off. This is the biggest plane I could build in my apartment and still remove in no more than three pieces using the freight elevator.”

  “Have you flown this version yet?”

  “Yes, several times.”

  “How high can it fly?” Frank said, already revising his weekend plans.

  “Above 30,000 feet.”

  “Incredible! How long can it stay up?”

  “It can stay up indefinitely at this latitude from about May fifteenth to July thirty-first, provided it stays sunny all day. Before and after that, the nights are too long for the batteries to last. But there’s new equipment coming out all the time – lighter engines, more efficient solar panels and batteries, and so on. I’m sure I’ll keep upgrading it.”

  Frank finally quit admiring the plane and turned to her, his eyes gleaming. “Shannon,” he said, “I’ve never met a girl like you before!”

  “In that case, you could give me a kiss.”

  But a new detail of the aircraft had already caught Frank’s eye, and he was once again circling the room, his face a mask of awe and delight.

  13

  Tear Gas and Television

  Shannon was out for an evening with her girlfriends, and Frank was rummaging around his apartment, looking for his can opener. Darn it! His kitchen was tiny – where could it be hiding? More to the point, where had Shannon put it? He shoved the drawer shut and decided to order a pizza instead.

  Shannon hadn’t moved in. But she was spending enough time at Chez Adversego for more and more of her possessions to sneak in and claim spaces in places convenient and otherwise. Like his bathroom. For years, he’d cohabitated with a bottle of the same brand shampoo he’d used since childhood. Now the shelf in his shower stall was cluttered with an astonishing array of expensive shampoos and conditioners – six at last count. Lately, he’d been amusing himself during his showers by stacking them in what he thought were artful arrangements. Just this morning, he’d constructed a replica of the facade of the Parthenon he was particularly pleased with. Surprisingly, Shannon was unimpressed.

  He settled into the living room while he waited for his dinner and turned on a cable news channel, wondering what the pundits had to say about the latest attacks.

  What they were saying was that things were turning ugly. He turned the sound up as the anchor began presenting the lead story.

  We begin our broadcast tonight with an update on the impact of the ongoing assault on the energy infrastructure of the U.S. and many other countries. Today, several more American utilities revealed they will need to institute so-called brownouts during times of peak electrical demand. Abroad, those living in major cities in countries including China, Russia, and India are enduring total power shut downs for several hours every day. And the cost of electricity is skyrocketing everywhere.

  The video cut to a picture of a gas station with a line of cars extending far down the road from its pumps.

  Gasoline is also in short supply, resulting in long lines at the pumps in all states and actual rationing in some. And although government officials claim there will be adequate supplies of heating oil and gas this winter, executives of some oil and gas companies, speaking anonymously, are not so sure.

  The scene cut to an aerial shot of an enormous crowd of people gathered in front of the Capitol.

&nb
sp; As conditions worsen, citizens are demanding action. But there’s not much governments can do until they know who the enemy is. As you can see, there’s a big crowd demonstrating in Washington, D.C. today. Jan, do we have an estimate on how many folks are there?

  The Washington police are estimating at least 250,000, Don. Tens of thousands of protesters are being reported in many other cities across the country. That’s impressive, since the organizers announced this National Call for Action protest less than a week ago.

  Thanks, Jan. Let’s go next to William Bradshaw. He’s on location outside the Department of the Interior in Washington, D.C. Hello, Bill. What can you tell us about the demonstrations there?

  They’re getting heated, Dan. Behind me, you can see the environmentalists on the left, and on your right, the pro-drilling demonstrators.

  The camera panned back, showing hundreds, if not thousands, of people carrying and waving signs behind temporary barriers. Walking back and forth in between were the police.

  What are the demonstrators hoping to accomplish?

  As you know, things have gotten more and more political as the attacks have continued. The environmentalists are supporting President Yazzi’s reelection. They don’t endorse the attacks, of course, but they’re not entirely sorry to finally see results on climate change, however that happens.

  And the conservatives?

  They think the whole thing is a liberal plot. They claim global warming is a hoax and that the attacks are being launched by some secret government task force. According to them, when Yazzi realized he couldn’t get Congress to ratify the Berlin Accords, he decided to take matters into his own hands.

  Isn’t that kind of crazy?

  Well, they don’t think so. They’ve pledged to win back the White House, and their numbers are growing. People are really upset about the shortages and the cost of energy, and no surprise. The national average price for gasoline reached $5.78 a gallon last week. That’s hitting people’s pockets hard, which means consumers have less to spend on other things. Rising energy costs are forcing businesses to announce layoffs, too.