Singularity
an excerpt

The acrid smell of gunfire filled the offices of Calliston Technological in downtown Seattle. Gibson had to admit, it would have been easier to keep his helmet and face mask on, but he wasn't feeling like it, not after the bloodbath he'd just witnessed.

Pursuant to the 2021 Advanced Technology Act, he and the third response unit of MI0's finest combat operatives made forceful entry to the building at 11am local time. They'd been shipped in from the UK only 24 hours previously, and to be honest, Gibson still felt like shit from the jet lag. Even when the flights only took four hours, it still grated on him. He never liked flying in the first place.

Forceful entry had been made. He had been one of the first in, landing on the roof in a Night Eagle helicopter and entering through the windows of the top floor; and he had been met with lethal resistance, gunfire aimed to kill him.

He'd done his job. The fruits of that – and the rest of the third unit's labours – were littered around the place, waiting to be flagged, tagged and bagged by the Seattle police department.

The rest of his team were outside; smoking, talking amongst themselves. Generally winding down after a hostile operation that none of them wanted to see. They were the emergency team, only called in when absolutely necessary, when the remit of MI0 came into action and a threat was deemed to be too potent to ignore.

He knew what the threat in Calliston Technological was. He was looking at it.

2029 was a flashpoint year in terms of technology. It had been predicted with great accuracy and consideration that it would be the year that computational technology overtook the human mind in processing power. This had been latched onto by all sorts of people; but it wasn't just the computers that caused problems, of course.

In this case, though, it had been just that computational power which had broken the law of the 2021 act. The search to create machine intelligence – sentient machine intelligence – was not something that was approved of; in fact it was banned by law – which didn't stop people trying. It merely introduced lethal consequences for those that did.

The final result of Calliston Technological's research, or at least the last possible extension of it due to the staff being either arrested or killed, sat before him. The body of the last researcher to take up arms against the third unit was slumped over it, but Gibson knew what it was.

It was a fair attempt at a trapped ion quantum computer. It was designed a little theatrically, in Gibson's eyes; it was a little sci-fi to believe that computers of the future really would have blue glowing internal lights and smooth glass lines. It was even a sphere, which made him wonder; it was perhaps as large as a medicine ball, and sat in a black cradle, which was plugged into all manner of other computers in the office.

It looked somewhat out of place. The office was just that – an office. Not a lab. Perhaps they were afraid of having any academic inspectors notice it, as likely they should be afraid. Very few research labs or business had the required papers and authority to construct quantum computers, and Calliston wasn't one of them.

The problem, he found, was that some of them took it a few steps too far.

He'd read the case file before the raid on Calliston. The company had been disquieted at initial investigations into why they needed certain parts, which were appropriated through non-standard channels. Then they had simply refused any co-operation, becoming belligerent, then demanding the right to continue their research. In their words – they refused to have the rite to expand the human understanding of science and technology taken away from them by any authority. It was all starting to sound a little cultist, even before employees started calling home and saying that they were being held hostage.

Some of them genuinely were; and unfortunately, they started killing the hostages long before the third unit even arrived.

All that, for a quantum computer that they probably couldn't even use anyway.

He sighed softly and scratched his chin, his SA-95 resting lightly against his hip. With the exception of the helmet he was still in combat dress and would stay that way until debriefed; after nine years in various military institutions it wasn't something he was unused to. He scratched his pec through the rather unyielding black impact armour that covered his torso, turned to look back at the entrance to the office that he was stood in as a shadow fell across it.

“Nicely executed,” said Ellen DuBois softly. Ellen was dressed impeccably in a trouser suit, her blonde hair brushed back from her face, a blue tooth earpiece on her left earlobe, her arms folded behind her ramrod-straight back. Her voice was ice, her eyes cold as the gap between stars.

“No problem,” Gibson replied, standing up straighter. He rolled his left shoulder, felt something pop. “I just wish these crazies would stick to the woodwork where they belong.”

“Deus Ex Machina cultists, Adam; you know as well as I do that they will keep showing up as long as the preachers keep talking up the concept of finding God in the machine.”

“We can't shoot the preachers, can we?”

Ellen smirked and turned away, stepping out of the office. He followed her. She was technically his supervisor, though in truth she ranked a lot higher than that in MI0; she ranked so highly that she didn't need to give out her rank when she spoke to people in the know. She possessed the kind of status that spoke silently for itself.

“We do what we can, Adam. We put out the fires where possible, and sometimes the arsonist gets free. But we are working on that. In fact I think you'll find that one of them will be falling from grace very shortly, probably before you even get home.”

Gibson nodded. She waved him on and he went down the stairwell; pock-marks painted the walls where bullets had been exchanged by fervent believers and the third unit. Of course, the third unit were equipped with only the best weapons, armour and combat pharmaceuticals that money could buy – it was horribly one-sided whichever way one looked at it.

Arriving on the ground floor, he stepped out of the lobby over broken glass and dead bodies. Large trucks were arriving, marked with neutral tags; the men and women in them got out and descended on the building. They weren't there for the bodies. They were there for the hardware.

Third unit were waiting for him as he stepped out past the extractors. They sat on the front steps, all nine of them; Cookie smirked at him as he emerged, lighting up a cigarette and offering him one which he accepted. “You see the article?” she said in her almost purring Canadian accent, smoke framing her words.

He nodded a little, lit up his smoke. “Yeah. Not worth it.”

“Is it ever?” asked Cookie. She'd been in the military for just as long as he had; a natural redhead with the same fiery temperament, from Vermont, one of the growing number of women to have passed US special forces selection. She was fitter than he was, or at least, he suspected as much.

Grunting, he shook his head softly. “No.”

“Those freaks keep springing up though,” muttered Kanto. He was sat polishing his entry shotgun, a weapon that he favoured over almost any other. “I swear, it's like people in this country just forgot the bible existed and started pushing for hardware...it must be rough to be an atheist at a time like this.”

“Wasn't it always in America?” said Rawlins from her perch on the hand rail. “Now is just like any other time; at least now there are laws in place preventing religious persecution against atheists as well. Five years ago you'd be screwed. All the Founding Land laws that got passed, it was like Salem all over again.”

“So what's the story, chief, are we going home?” asked Cookie. “Or are we staying here for the foreseeable?”

Home was, to the MI0 offensive units, London. They were all stationed within ten minutes of the MI0 head office on Canary Wharf, when not on duty; what Cookie was really asking, he supposed, was if they were dismissed for leave.

“I doubt it. I haven't been told yet but I'm sure Ellen will let us know when she leaves the building.” Gibson couldn't keep a touch of weariness out of his voice. He missed London; it was his home, his place of birth. For all the shit in the streets it was where he would always feel he could be at rest.

“Kuso,” said Kanto softly, shaking his head.

“Dammit?” asked Cookie, looking at him. He looked up at her, nodded curtly.

“Hai.”

“I'm getting better at this; I learned Mandarin in school, how was I meant to know I wouldn't ever damn well need it?”

“None of us did,” Gibson replied, taking a long draw off his cigarette and watching the city of Seattle. He exhaled, the warm glow leaving his lungs as he concealed the skyline of the city with a haze of smoke.

“Alright,” said Ellen as she emerged from the building, heels clicking on the tiled pathway leading to the stairs. The unit stood up, facing her, though not saluting and not bothering to put out their cigarettes just yet.

“Cleanup is under way; we have seventeen secured hostage survivors, the remnants of the quantum processor they were developing, and a truckload of dead bodies. I understand that all of you are due a little leave, as we called you into action early; that is, unfortunately, going to have to wait. The first unit has been compromised and you are replacing them here on the West Coast, at least until such a time as they can be replaced.”

A series of nods. Nobody asked questions; they wouldn't get answers. Still, Gibson understood that something rather bad had happened to the first unit. For a squad of MI0 offensive operatives to be considered compromised implied that they hadn't just taken a few casualties; they'd all been killed, or enough that those remaining needed to be reshuffled.

“We'll arrange somewhere more permanent to stay for you in the next couple of days. As it is, for now, you will be stationed at a hotel in Seattle. I predict no combat duty, so your issued weaponry will be held by our prep and arms team. You may keep any personal weapons you are licensed to carry, of course.”

Which for all of them meant a carry-and-conceal license for their side-arms, which were by and large Glock .242 handguns. Gibson liked the Glock. It was reassuring to have it to hand, even if at times it felt a little bit too light for comfort. He was used to guns that weighed as much as they looked like they weighed.

“That is all. Report to the mobile command centre and disarm.”

A series of nods, and the group started over toward the one large, black truck that was parked some way away from the new arrivals. It was somewhat unfolded, and doors were opened on each side; as a unit they crushed out their cigarettes and started up the steps, into the rough-and-ready mobile command truck that acted as MI0's offensive operation outpost whenever they had to engage in an overt mission.

Almost on autopilot, Gibson handed his rifle, helmet, breathing apparatus and goggles over to one of the techs on standby. He moved into one of the tiny cubby-hole areas in one of the extended wings of the truck, where he doffed his armour and boots, leaving them in a plastic crate; then he stepped into the shower in the cubby-hole and closed his eyes, letting the hot water wash over him.

He didn't relish the idea of being involved in further engagements with cultists. He knew it would happen – his unit wouldn't exist if such things didn't. He'd had to deal with people defending AI-enabling computers as if they were the channels of God himself; he'd had to gun down neo-Nazi terror groups compiling viral weaponry designed to kill anyone of a Jewish ethnic background; he'd even had to shut down the operation of one of the most spectacularly talented hackers in recent history.

Reaching out a hand, he gathered up the small sealed packet on the shelf and opened it, popping the pill contained within into his mouth and swallowing it dry. The neutralising agent was meant to remove the effects of the combat drugs from his system, and to be honest, he was glad for it; but it always made him feel somewhat spaced out afterwards, like he was disconnected and not all there. A necessary sacrifice, he supposed, for being a member of an elite combat team.

Shaking his head, he let the warm water take him away.