“Now, allow me a digression, which I promise will come around to a compelling point. As you may or may not know, one of the interesting properties SmartBlood has is the ability to instantly oxidize—to combust. I can’t help but think someone encoded that property into SmartBlood as something of a cruel joke, because I first saw it being used to kill insects that were trying to suck SmartBlood out of a Special Forces soldier. But it turned out to be useful too—it once saved my life in combat.
“Charles, you have engineered a virus that you plan to use to conquer the Colonial Union. Since you know about viruses as they relate to computers, maybe you’ve heard of the term Trojan horse as well. This message, my friend and brother, is a Trojan horse. When you opened the letter, you also executed a small program I created. The program instructs every nanobot in my SmartBlood to combust simultaneously on my command. I estimate it’s taken exactly this long for the program to propagate through all of my SmartBlood.
“Let’s find out.”
Sagan received a message as she was placing Zo? into the capture pod. It was from Jared Dirac.
::If you’re reading this, Charles Boutin is dead,:: it said. ::I had this message scheduled to be sent right after my former BrainPal executed a program to combust my SmartBlood. If the combustion doesn’t kill him—and it will—he’ll be dead of asphyxiation in just a few minutes. Either way, he’s gone and so am I. I don’t know if you’ll get it but I hope you do, and that you are safe and well. Good-bye, Lieutenant Sagan. I’m glad to have known you. And if you see Cainen again, tell him I listened to him and made my choice.::
Sagan shared the message with Harvey. ::Very nice,:: Harvey said. ::He was Special Forces through and through.::
::Yes, he was,:: Sagan said, and motioned Harvey toward the capture pod. ::Get in, Harvey::
::You’re joking,:: Harvey said.
::Someone needs to go back with Zo?,:: Sagan said. ::I’m commanding officer. I stay behind.::
::Lieutenant,:: Harvey said. ::That kid doesn’t know me. You’re the one who pulled her out of there. You’re the one who needs to go back with her. And besides, I don’t want to go back yet. I’m having too much fun. I’m guessing that between now and the time the Colonial Union drops a rock on this place I can clean it out. And when I’m done with that maybe I’ll go in and see if there’s anything worth salvaging. So you go ahead, Sagan. Have them send a capture pod for me in a couple of days. I’ll be fine, or I’ll be dead. Either way I’ll enjoy myself.::
::All right,:: Sagan said. ::If you do go into the compound again, try to get the storage devices from the transfer module in Boutin’s lab. Make it a priority.::
::What’s on them?:: Harvey said.
::It’s not what,:: Sagan said. ::It’s who.::
There was a hum in the distance. ::They’re on to us,:: Harvey said. ::Get in, Lieutenant::
“Are we safe now?” Zo? asked, a few minutes after launch.
“Yes, Zo?,” Sagan said. “I think we are.”
“When is Daddy coming to see me?” Zo? said.
“I don’t know, Zo?,” Sagan said, and stroked Zo?’s hair. “I don’t know.”
In the cramped confines of the capture pod, Zo? put her arms up to be held. Sagan held her.
FIFTEEN
“Well, Szi, you were right,” General Mattson said. “Jared Dirac came in handy after all.”
Mattson, General Szilard and Colonel Robbins were in the general’s mess, eating lunch. All of them, this time: General Mattson had been the one to formally break the tradition of not letting subordinates eat by ordering Robbins a huge plate of spaghetti Bolognese, and responding to another outraged general’s reaction by saying, clearly and loudly, “Shut the fuck up, you dried-up turd. This man deserves some goddamned pasta.” Since then, other generals had begun to bring in their staffs as well.
“Thank you, General,” Szilard said. “Now, if you don’t mind, what I want to know is what you’re doing to fix these problems with our BrainPals. I lost seven ships because your people left a back door wide open.”
“Robbins has the details,” Mattson said. They both turned to Robbins, who had a mouthful of beef Wellington. Robbins swallowed carefully.
“In the short run, we pulled out that back door, obviously,” Robbins said. “We’ve propagated the fix on a priority upgrade to the BrainPals. That’s fixed. In the slightly longer run, we’re going through all the BrainPal programming looking for legacy code, back doors and other code that could represent a security issue. And we’re also instituting virus checks for messages and information sent between BrainPals. Boutin’s virus transmission wouldn’t work now.”
“It shouldn’t have worked at all,” Szilard said. “There have been virus blockers since right near the dawn of computing and you didn’t implement it for BrainPals. You could have killed us all because you forgot to program in basic computer hygiene.”
“It was never programmed in because there was never a need for it,” Mattson said. “BrainPals are a closed system, totally secure from outside attacks. Even Boutin’s attack ultimately didn’t work.”
“But it came damn close,” Szilard said.
“Yes, well, it came damn close because someone at the table wanted to create a body we could stuff Charles Boutin’s consciousness in,” Mattson said. “Not that I’m going to name names.”