Once the nexus possessed all the facts about the humans' rebellion at Tharsis Montes and their weapons, then it was only a matter of time—measured probably in milliseconds—before the machines took defensive action.
Ellen not only feared retaliation but also feared her inability to predict its source and vector. Not being human, nor even consciously human-designed, the grid's intelligence could not be expected to respond in humanly predictable ways. The machines' take on the problem of defending themselves might come from unexpected angles and arrive at unexpected conclusions. Sorbel was not afraid just for herself or Lole, but afraid that the grid would begin its retaliation with the destruction of the space fountains to isolate Mars and then slowly poison or asphyxiate the 30,000 people living in its various tunnel complexes. The machines just might regard all humankind within their reach with the same disdain that humans viewed the bacteria and blue-green algae from which their form of life arose a billion years ago. The time scale was certainly right—if you equated years of human thought, perception, and history with a computer's nanoseconds of cogitation.
Sorbel only knew she had to work fast now.
The trouble was finding her entry point.
Her first thought had been to establish a radio-frequency link with the grid's communications paths. That was the way a Creole like Jory most often traded tokens with the local nexus. Except that Creoles and Cyborgs usually had reason to converse with the grid while they were working outside, on the planet's surface. That was where reception with the grid's antennas would be at optimum. Inside the radio-opaque tunnels, however, Creoles either kept their thoughts to themselves or tended to plug their systems physically into the circuits, with their pigtails.
Ellen knew she didn't have time to check out a walker and carry Lethe's components out onto the sand, set them up while wearing a clumsy pressure suit and gloves, and try to tune in a channel Jory might have routinely used. She didn't even know if the grid would pass her through the airlocks now. So the three conspirators had to work with what resources were at hand, from inside the tunnels.
They didn't have a spare pigtail. The closest one available to them was back in the safe zone, attached to Jory den Ostreichers skull. Even if they took the time to go back, surgically remove it, and bring the jack here to the pile of Lethe's disassembled parts—they still didn't have an input port that would tie it to their rogue central processor. They would have to splice something.
That gave Sorbel an idea.
She studied the face of a nearby public terminal, recessed into the tunnel's rock wall.
"How does that thing talk to the grid?" she asked aloud, more rhetorically than for information.
Willie Lao shrugged. "Dunno."
Dr. Lee gave it some thought before responding. "By fiberoptic, I would assume."
"The same as Lethe's cabling, sure!" Ellen felt a growing enthusiasm. "We take apart that panel, and we'll find our own pigtail."
"What? I don't—"
"Listen, we want to link up with the grid, right? If Jory were inside the complex, he'd jack in through a terminal like this one, wouldn't he? He'd use his connectors to go through the terminal's switching circuits, of course, but eventually it's just the nexus and him, passing code. Well, Lethe can emulate a terminal easily enough. If we can just splice into the fiberoptic behind that panel, we're home free."
"We'll get in trouble!" Lao objected.
"You think we aren't already?' she replied.
Dr. Lee ran a hand across the smooth steel of the terminals bezel. 'These things are pretty heavily armored against vandalism."
"Willie, go find us a hammer and a crowbar," Sorbel ordered. "Or a locking wrench with a slip head—" She pointed out the recurved heads of the bolts positioned around the bezel. "—if you can find one."
"Yes, ma'am." He nodded and ran up the tunnel.
"Now, Doctor," she said, turning her attention to Wa Lixin. "How's your surgical technique with teeny-tiny ligatures?"
"Not to worry." He grinned. "I wasn't sure about the issue date on Jory's internal hardware, so I came fully prepared to cut glass. I've got an optical junction box with me." He pulled a black L-shape, about two centimeters long, out of his pocket. "Just thread in the ends and crimp the sockets."
"Excellent!" Ellen Sorbel suddenly felt better about the whole enterprise.
Willie Lao appeared at the top of the ramp, brandishing an angled tool that might be a wrench. "Got it! There's a maintenance closet right around the comer."
"Better and better," she purred. "We'll lick the machines yet."
Demeter's throat was still raw and scratchy from the toxic smoke. But she could lift her head and kick with her feet as Lole helped her swim down the bare corridor into the power station's interior. It was like being swallowed by an elephant's esophagus.
Because of the orientation the space tug had given them, the three inside the walker never got a clear view of the station from the outside. But the size and curvature of the tube they were traversing hinted at a bulk and complexity far larger than the simple, silicon sunflowers she had once visited by proxy
While Lole Mitsuno guided her right elbow, Roger Torraway preceded them both. The Cyborgs left wing fluttered helplessly in the air currents he stirred; the right one was folded obediently against his backpack, giving him extra clearance against the walls. Demeter had the impression the colonel was limping as he led their party in infiltrating the satellite.
After what felt like a hundred meters of travel—but could have been as little as ten, or more than a thousand—they came to a door blocking the end of the corridor. It was made of interlocking triangular plates, like the irising diaphragm of an old-fashioned film camera.
"Self-reinforcing design," Torraway said.
"Huh?" from Demeter.
"The edges of the plates are made to support each other," he explained, "probably to hold against a sudden pressure loss. From the way they overlap, I'd say the drop was expected from this side. That would protect against someone cutting through the airlock from the outside."
"How do we get through?" she asked.
"No lockplate or controls," Lole observed.
On impulse Demeter called, "Open sesame," and the door began to dilate. The plates rubbing against each other sounded like sword blades slithering edge against edge.
Inside was a spherical room in more of the matte-gray wall material. Low lighting came from a dozen soft, moon-faced panels set in an equatorial belt that aligned with the entrance. Hanging in the center of the room were three sets of full-body V/R gear—helmets, gloves, boots, and numbered sensor pads—that were webbed into three umbilicials sprouting from a ring in the celling. Well, "ceiling" was a relative term here; at least the point was ninety degrees offset from the ring of room lights.
Demeter had done hundreds of hours of freefall virtual-reality aboard the transport that brought her to Mars. With the right amount of feedback pressure from the boot soles, you could quickly forget that you were drifting with your stomach higher than your throat and imagine you were walking along in full gravity. The rest was a cooperative fantasy between you and the machine.
There was no way out of the room.
No way back through the crippled walker.
No options but to float there and grow old and starve.
"I guess we're supposed to play along," Demeter said, pushing off the portal's coating with her feet and paddling through the air with her cupped hands. She headed toward one set of gear.
Lole followed her, but Torraway hung back.
"Come on, Colonel!" she called. "Choices aren't on the menu today."