“Helm, prepare to launch noisemakers, prepare for emergency blow.”
“Conn, sonar, impact in twenty seconds—”
“Launch noisemakers now! Emergency blow, left full rudder, steady to course two-seven-zero, thirty-degree up angle on the—”
Commander Dennis yells, “Rig ship for explosion!”
The two torpedoes race past the Mark 2 torpedo decoys and detonate, the explosions rolling the Scranton as she turns, pushing her keel out from under her, the impact wave shaking her interior like a pickup truck bolting over a curb.
Darkness blankets the control room, pressurized air hissing into the space.
The reverberations cease. The battery picks up loads, emergency lights bathing the internal compartments in red. The crew’s racing pulses slow.
“This is the captain …” the voice calm, restoring faith. “All stations report.”
“Conn, maneuvering, we’ve got a leak in the primary coolant system. Scramming the reactor. We’re restricted to battery power until we can rise to periscope depth and start the emergency diesel.”
“How bad is the leak?”
“Appears to be contained to the discharge station in engine room forward, sir.”
“Sonar, conn, report.”
“Conn, sonar, Sierra-2’s torpedoes were vectored off by our countermeasures. No other contacts to report.”
“Where’s Sierra-2? What happened to our own torpedoes?”
A long pause. “I’m sorry, Captain, she outran them. Sierra-2’s gone.”
“I don’t know what your destiny will be, but one thing I know; the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who will have sought and found how to serve.”
—Dr. Albert Schweitzer
“I was proud to be Nixon’s son-of-a-bitch.”
—H. R. Haldeman, President Nixon’s chief of staff, who participated in the Watergate scandal
“From our first meeting I swore to follow you anywhere—even unto death. I live only for your love.”
—Eva Braun, Adolf Hitler’s mistress
CHAPTER 8
Naval Undersea Warfare Center
Keyport, Washington
Gunnar feeds his dollar bill into the slot, presses E-6, and watches the chocolate bar drop into the bin.
“Breakfast of champions, eh G-man?”
He turns, recognizing the voice.
David Paniagua is a bit stockier than he remembers, and clean-shaven, with the ponytail of his brown hair pulled through the back of his Tampa Bay Buccaneers cap. An old pair of jeans is visible beneath his white lab coat.
Smiling, David rears back and punches Gunnar hard on the shoulder. “That’s for disappearing on me after I went out of my way to pick you up at Leavenworth. I spent four months looking for you, you bastard.”
“I was in rehab.”
“Yeah, man, I know. You doing okay now? Still going to meetings?”
“Twice a week. How ’bout you? How’s the Navy been treating you?”
“Surprisingly good. I spent the first six months after Keyport working for Cybersword, our new Cyber Commando Force.”
“Patrolling the world’s digital lines of communication, huh? You must’ve been bored to tears.”
“Granted, it wasn’t the kind of challenge I was looking for, but it’s the first true interdepartmental organization in the DoD, and we don’t pussyfoot around. Cybersword takes an offensive approach to Internet attacks. I’ve unleashed some pretty nasty viruses on our enemies, believe you me.”
“Yeah? Have one in mind for Sorceress?”
“A doozy. Covah will never know what hit him. Come on, walk me to the briefing.”
They head down the corridor.
“So, what have you been doing lately?” Gunnar probes.
David smiles coyly. “You’ll know soon enough. First, talk to me about Covah. I seem to remember you guys being pretty tight.”
“So I thought.”
“What’s he like?”
“Don’t you know? He worked in your department.”
“We barely spoke. The guy spent most of his days in the bacteria chamber. I know he was brilliant, but his looks kind of freaked me out. But you guys ate lunch together almost every day.”
“Simon claimed we were kindred souls, by-products of violence. He used to engage me in these endless discussions regarding the root of man’s evil. You know, what factors created the Hitlers and Milosevics of the world? Why do seemingly stable kids suddenly go on killing sprees? Simon was consumed with the whole nature-versus-nurture debate. He wanted to know how one human being could butcher another without showing the slightest sign of remorse. Simon was both a student and a victim of human nature. He hurt terribly inside. Most people don’t know that he was just as well versed in neurophysiology and psychology as computers. Like I said, the guy was a genius. Dr. Goode recruited him after he was kicked out of the Cangen.”
“No kidding? The Canadians kicked Covah out?”
“Don’t tell me you never heard the story?” Gunnar smiles. “Cangen’s security guards caught Simon attempting to jack into one of their mainframes.”
David’s eyes widen. “Come on, you telling me crazy Simon Covah was a cyberpunk? I mean, I know the guy looked like a cyborg, but wiring his brain into a computer? Geez—”
“Actually, it’s not so far-fetched. Masuo Aizawa started working on growing neurons into neural net computers more than fifteen years ago. Cochlear implants for the hearing impaired, prosthetic-limb control using implanted neural interfaces—those concepts have been around for years. And don’t forget virtual reality. The auditory and optic nerves are the most data-rich pathways for inputting information to the brain.”
“Get real, G-man. EEG-based systems have no possibility of inputting information.”
“Simon didn’t use an EEG, he used a printed circuit microelectrode. Simon said the PCM had three elements essential to an interface: tissue terminals, a circuit board reading from the terminals, and an input/output interpreter, in this case, a computer. Simon used a cochlear implant to forge a connection between the PCM and his brain, but the interface didn’t work.”
“Of course it didn’t work. The complexity of the human brain is the problem—that, and the difficulty of actually implanting a neural device. A successful human-to-machine interface requires two things; invasive surgery for implanting electrodes directly into the brain and a computer powerful enough to dissect the human brain’s complexities. It’ll happen one day, but not by using a Cochlear implant.”
They pause at the security checkpoint and show their identification badges to the guards.
David Henry Paniagua Jr. was born into wealth. His father, David Paniagua Sr. was president and CEO of American Microsystems Corporation (AMC), a computer company specializing in bioware, owned by the Mabus Tech Industries, a privately held corporation run by a host of former Reagan and Bush officials. Since its inception in 1991, MTI had been awarded over $19 billion dollars in Defense Department contracts, designing and building everything from 7.62-mm machine guns to guidance systems for Trident II(D5) nuclear missiles.
David Jr.’s career was forged during his childhood years. Weaned on computer combat games, he was doing his own programming by age ten. Two years later, he was working with an AMC team designing virtual-reality simulators to help train Apache chopper pilots.
Although he had no home life to speak of (his father being on his fourth marriage), working for Daddy’s company certainly had its rewards. By age sixteen, young David had a six-figure bank account, a new Dodge Viper, and had already accepted a scholarship to CalTech.