Iron Sunrise

HARMLESS

Earth, seen from orbit in the twenty-fourth century, was a planet harrowed by technological civilization, bearing the scars left by a hatchling transcendence. Nearly 10 percent of its surface had been concreted over at one time or another. Whole swaths of it bore the suture marks of incomplete reterraforming operations. From the jungles of the Sahara to the fragile grassland of the Amazon basin it was hard to find any part of the planetary surface that hadn’t been touched by the hand of technology.

Earth’s human civilization, originally restricted to a single planet, had spread throughout the solar system. Gas giants in the outer reaches grew strange new industrial rings, while the heights of Kilimanjaro and central Panama sweated threads of diamond wire into geosynchronous orbit. Earth, they had called it once; now it was Old Earth, birth-world of humanity and cradle of civilization. But there was a curious dynamic to this old home world, an uncharacteristically youthful outlook. Old Earth in the twenty-fourth century wasn’t home to the oldest human civilizations. Not even close.

For this paradoxical fact, most people blamed the Eschaton. The Eschaton — the strongly superhuman AI product of a technological singularity that rippled through the quantum computing networks of the late twenty-first century — didn’t like sharing a planet with ten billion future-shocked primates. When it bootstrapped itself to weakly godlike intelligence it deported most of them to other planets, through wormholes generated by means human scientists still could not fathom even centuries later. Not that they’d had much time to analyze its methods in the immediate aftermath — most people had been too busy trying to survive the rigors of the depopulation-induced economic crash. It wasn’t until well over a hundred years later, when the first FTL starships from Earth reached the nearer stars, that they discovered the weirdest aspect of the process. The holes the Eschaton had opened up in space led back in time as well, leading a year into the past for every light year out. And some of the worm-hole tunnels went a very great distance indeed. From the moment of the singularity onward, SETI receivers began picking up strong signals; hitherto silent reaches of space echoed with the chatter and hum of human voices.

By the third century after the immense event, the polities of Earth had largely recovered. The fragmented coalitions and defensive microeconomies left behind by the collapsing wake of the twenty-first century’s global free-trade empire re-formed as a decentralized network able to support an advanced economy. They even managed to sustain the massive burden of the reterraforming projects. Some industries were booming; Earth was rapidly gaining a reputation as the biggest, most open trading hub within a hundred light years. The UN — even more of a deafening echo chamber talking shop than the first organization to bear that name — also included nontribal entities. Restructured to run on profit-making lines, it was amassing a formidable reputation for mercantile diplomacy. Even the most pressing problem of the twenty-second century, the population crash that followed in the wake of the singularity, had been largely averted. Cheap anti-aging hacks and an enlightened emigration policy had stabilized the population at mid-twentieth-century levels, well within the carrying capacity of the planet and in the numbers required to support advanced scientific research again. It was, in short, a time of optimism and expansion: a young, energetic, pluralistic planetary patchwork civilization exploding out into the stellar neighborhood and rediscovering its long-lost children.

None of which made for a bed of roses, as Rachel Mansour — who had been born on this same planet more than a hundred years previously — probably appreciated more than most.

“I’m ready to go in,” she said quietly, leaning against the wall next to the cheap gray aerogel doorslab. She glanced up and down the empty corridor. It smelled damp. The thin carpet was grimy, burdened by more dirt than its self-cleaning system could cope with, and many of the lighting panels were cracked. “Is everyone in position?”

“We’ve got some heavy items still assembling. Try not to call a strike for at least the first ten seconds. After that, we’ll be ready when you need us.”

“Okay. Here goes.” For some reason she found herself wishing she’d brought Madam Chairman along to see the sort of jobs her diplomatic entertainment account got spent on. Rachel shook herself, took a deep breath, and knocked on the door. Madam Chairman could read all about it in the comfort of her committee room when the freelance media caught on. At the moment, it was Rachel’s job, and she needed to keep her attention 101 percent locked on to it.

“Who is that?” boomed a voice from the other side of the partition.

“Police negotiator. You wanted to talk to someone?”

“Why are you waiting then? You better not be armed! Come in and listen to me. Did you bring cameras?”

Uh-oh. “Schwartz is right,” Rachel muttered to her audio monitor. “You going to take off now?”

“Yes. We’re with you.” MacDougal’s voice was tinny and hoarse with tension in her left ear.

Rachel took hold of the doorknob and pushed, slowly. The rentacops had applied for the emergency override, and the management had switched off all the locks. The door opened easily. Rachel stood in the doorway in full view of the living room.

“Can I come in?” she asked, betraying no sign of having noticed the whine of insect wings departing her shoulders as the door swung wide.

The apartment was a one-room dwelling: bed, shower tray, and kitchen fab were built to fold down out of opposite walls of the entertainment room. A picture window facing the front door showed a perpetual view of Jupiter as seen from the crust of smoking, yellow Io. It had once been a cheap refugee housing module (single, adult, for the use of), but subsequent occupants had nested in it, allowing the basic utility structures to wear out and trashing the furnishings. The folding furniture was over-extended, support struts bent and dysfunctional. The wreckage of a hundred ready-meals spilled across the worn-out carpet. The sickly sweet smell of decaying food was almost masked by the stench of cheap tobacco. The room reeked of cigarette smoke — a foul, contaminated blend, if Rachel was any judge, although she’d given up the habit along with her third pair of lungs, many years ago.

The man sprawled in the recliner in the middle of the room made even the mess around him look like an example of good repair. He was nearly two meters tall and built like a tank, but he was also clearly ill. His hair was streaked with white, his naked belly bulged over the stained waistband of his sweats, and his face was lined. He swiveled his chair toward her and beamed widely. “Enter my royal palace!” he declared, gesturing with both hands. Rachel saw the dirty bandage wrapped around his left wrist, trailing a shielded cable in the direction of a large crate behind the chair.

“Okay, I’m coming in,” she said as calmly as she could, and stepped inside the room.

A hoarse robot voice burbled from the crate: “T minus thirty-five minutes and counting. Warning: proximity alert. Unidentified human at three meters. Request permission to accelerate detonation sequence?”

Rachel swallowed. The man in the chair didn’t seem to notice. “Welcome to the presidential palace of the Once and Future Kingdom of Uganda! What’s your name, sweetie? Are you a famous journalist? Did you come here to interview me?”

“Um, yes.” Rachel stopped just inside the doorway, two meters away from the sick man and his pet talking nuke. “I’m Rachel. That’s a very nice bomb you’ve got,” she said carefully.

“Warning: proximity alert. Unidentified human at—”

“Shut the fuck up,” the man said casually, and the bomb stopped in midsentence. “It is a lovely bomb, isn’t it?”

“Yes. Did you make it yourself?” Rachel’s pulse raced. She blipped her endocrine overrides, forcing the sweat ducts on the palms of her hands to stop pumping and her stomach to cease trying to flip out through the nearest window.

“Moi? Do I resemble a weapons scientist? I bought it off the shelf.” He smiled, revealing the glint of a gold tooth — Rachel managed to keep a straight face, but her nostrils flared at the unmistakable odor of dental decay. “Is it not great?” He held up his wrist. “If I die, poof! All funeral expenses included!”

“How big is it?” she ventured.

“Oh, it’s very big!” He grinned wider and spread his legs suggestively, rubbing his crotch with one hand. “The third stage dials all the way to three hundred kilotons.”

Rachel’s stomach turned to ice. This isn’t your run-of-the-mill black-market bomb, she subvocalized, hoping MacDougal would be listening carefully. “That must have cost you a lot of money,” she said slowly.

“Oh yes.” The grin faded. “I had to sell everything. I even gave up the treatments.”

“Which treatments?”

Suddenly he was on his feet and ranting. “The ones that make me Idi Amin! King of Scotland, Victoria Cross, KBE, MBE, Governor of Kiboga and Mayor of Bukake! I am the President! Respect me and fear me! You chickenshit white Europeans have oppressed the people of Africa long enough — it’s time for a new world of freedom! I stand for Islamic values, African triumph, and freedom from the oppressors. But you don’t give me no respect! Nobody listens when I tell them what to do. It’s time for punishment!” Spittle filled the air in front of her. Rachel tried to take a step forward without attracting his attention, but the bomb noticed.

“Alert: close proximity alert! Unidentified human, believed hostile, at—”

“Don’t move,” MacDougal whispered tinnily in her ear. “The fucking thing just armed itself. If you get any closer without him telling it you’re friendly, it could blow.”

A bead of sweat trickled down the side of Rachel’s face. She forced herself to smile. “That’s really impressive,” she said slowly. Insects whined softly overhead, police wasps circling his head, waiting for an opportunity to strike safely. A thought dug its unwelcome claws into her mind: Got to get closer! But how? “I like impressive men,” she cooed. “And you’re really impressive, Mister President.”

I’m going to try to get close enough to immobilize him, she subvocalized. Tell me exactly what your bugs are loaded with again.

“Glad you think so, little lady,” said the Last King of Scotland, rubbing his crotch. Isn’t priapism a late-stage symptom? she subvocalized, staring at his dirty sweats and forcing herself to lick her suddenly dry lips.

“They’re loaded with a really strong serotonin antagonist targeted on his reticular activating system. Ten seconds and he’ll be in a coma. We just need to stop him telling the bomb to go bang after it goes in and before he nods off. And, uh, yes, it is a symptom.”

“Your little king looks like he wants to hold court.” Rachel smiled invitingly, dry-swallowing and steeling herself for the next step. First get his confidence, then abuse it … “What’s the protocol for approaching a President, Mister President?”

“You do it naked. Naked folks are my friends. Naked people don’t have no guns. You hear that, bomb? Naked women are my friends. Naked bitches. My special friends.” He seemed to have calmed down a bit, but the set of his jaw was still tense, and he squinted angrily, as if he had a bad sinus headache. “You going to get naked, bitch?”

“If you say so, Mister President.” Rachel locked her jaw muscles in a painful rictus that imitated a smile as she unsealed her jacket and slowly shrugged her way out of it. Did you hear that? she subvocalized as she rolled her leggings down around her ankles and stepped out of them. She stood in front of him and held the forced grin, trying to look inviting, willing her endocrine override to give her a flush of subcutaneous blood vessels and a crinkling of nipples. Trying to fake arousal, to do anything to keep the sad bastard distracted from the prospect of wanking his way into nuclear oblivion, taking half a city with him. Anything to let her get closer to the trigger -

“You may approach the throne,” declared Field Marshal Professor President Doctor Idi Amin Dadaist, spreading his legs. With a moue of vague disgust he yanked his pants open. His penis was indeed large and stiff: it also bore several weeping sores, like a blighted aubergine. “Kneel to kiss your emperor!”

Rachel saw his hands raised above his head. His right fingertips brushed against the dead man’s wristband as he smiled lazily. She knelt before him, tensing. “I can do good things with my hands,” she offered as she reached toward his crotch, her skin crawling.

“Then do so,” he said magisterially. “Remember, as your President I hold the power of life and death over you.”

Rachel nodded and gently stroked his glans. She could see a vein pulsing in it. She leaned closer, trying to judge the distance, swallowing bile. “May I kiss you, Mister President? You’re a very powerful man. Would you like that? I’m your loyal subject. Will you let me kiss you on the mouth?”

The Field Marshal and Professor sat up slightly. “Certainly,” he said, mustering up a slightly pathetic gravitas: his breath caught as she stroked him.

“Hey, that’s a funny smell,” Rachel said quickly. Then she leaned forward and clamped her mouth down onto his lips, tongue questing, fingers busy with his shaft. He tensed slightly, back arching, and she reached up to grab his right arm by the wrist. Something insectoidal flickered past her eyes in a blur of wings as he spasmed and pumped a ropy stream of hot imperial semen across her thigh. His jaws flexed: she stuck her tongue into his mouth as far as she could, squeezing her eyes shut, holding her breath, and prayed that he wouldn’t have a seizure as he bucked and jerked against her. The President for Life twitched a couple of times: then his eyes rolled up and he slumped backward in the recliner. His right arm fell sideways as she let go of it. She straightened up, gasping, and managed to turn aside. She spat, trying to get the taste of decaying teeth out of her mouth, then doubled over and vomited noisily across the would-be dictator’s feet.

After a few seconds, she felt strong arms around her shoulder. “Come on,” said MacDougal. “Let’s get you out an’ away. It’s all under control.”

“Under—” Rachel moved to wipe the tears from her eyes, then realized her hand was sticky. “Ugh. It’s over?”

The room was filling up with naked policewomen toting toolboxes and talking into throat mikes. “Ordinary bomb team’s already here to take over — half of it, anyways. You can come away now.” Without her uniform and body armor, Inspector MacDougal had the most remarkable tattoos Rachel had seen in a long time: angel wings on her shoulder blades, a snake around her narrow waist. She pointed at the four nude women who were leaning over the bomb with instruments and neutron counters. “That was inspirational, Colonel! ‘Naked women are my friends.’ ”

Rachel shook her head. An insect buzzed overhead. Not police issue, it was probably the first harbinger of a swarm of journalists. “I’m not really a colonel, I just play one in the banana republics.” She shuddered. “I needed to get close enough to gag him and hold his arm out of the way. Whatever it took.”

“Well, if it was up to me, you’d get a medal.” MacDougal looked hard at the recliner and shook her head. “Took guts. Some assholes will do anything for a handjob.”

“Need water,” Rachel gasped, feeling another wave of nausea coming on.

Someone passed her a bottle. She rinsed and spat, rhythmically, until the bottle was empty, trying to remind herself how much worse it could have been. She could have had her tongue bitten off if he’d into a seizure. Or he might have wanted something worse. Another bottle appeared, and she poured half of it over her left hand and thigh. “I need a shower. Antibiotics. Lots of antibiotics. How long does that shot put him out for?”

“How long?” MacDougal sounded puzzled, then spotted the insects: she straightened up, tried to look severe, and went into press-management mode. “Laughing Joker Security takes WMD incursions extremely seriously. In accordance with our zero tolerance of nuclear sidearms policy, we deployed a destroyer payload targeted on the offender’s reticular activating system. He hasn’t got one anymore — he’ll stay asleep until the rest of his cerebellum fails.” Which, judging from the way she glanced at the erratically snoring figure, would be sooner rather than later. Impromptu art happenings involving nuclear weapons tended to get a bad press even in the laid-back Republique et Canton Geneve.

There was a shrill beeping from the pile of discarded clothes near the doorway. Rachel was leaning over it and fumbling for her interface rings before she realized she’d moved. “Yes?” she said hoarsely.

“You haven’t heard the last of this!” Judging from her hectoring tone, Madam Chairman had been following events on multicast, and she was royally pissed off at something — probably the fact that Rachel was still alive. “I know about you and your cronies in the enforcement branch! Don’t think you can get out of the audit hearing the same way!”

“Oh, fuck off!” said Rachel, killing the call. I’ll get you later, she thought dizzily, leaning against the doorframe. Find out what your game is and beat you … She tried to get a grip, paranoia running out of control. “Inspector, can you see I get home? I think I’m about to collapse.” She slid down the wall, laughing and crying at the same time. On the other side of the room a naked lady held up something like a fat shotgun cartridge in both hands, triumphantly. Everyone else seemed to be cheering, but for the life of her Rachel couldn’t see why.