Chapter Sixteen

“So you’re telling me we have a rogue smart weapon that is selecting its own targets based on… on what? Motherfuck! Do you understand the implications of this? How other countries are going to retaliate if they learn—”

“Mr. McCreary’s job is to make sure that nobody else knows.” Collette faced her press secretary. “I’m going to apologize right now but I need you to go upstairs, face down the ravaging beasts we call the White House press corps and spin the most eloquent and evasive piece of wordsmithing you can come up with. That will give us time to develop a plan and pray to God for a resolution to this insanity.”

“Yes, Madam President.”

Keiji shuddered at the thought of the press secretary’s job. It sounded like the ninth circle of hell to him. He sat in the back corner of the Situation Room working, trying to remain invisible as proposals, debates, and outright fights erupted around the table. The setup here wasn’t quite what he’d had in his Batcave, but it had some toys that made his fingers thrill as they danced across the keyboard.

One thing that kept driving him nuts was how the three pieces of the puzzle fit together. He tried moving them around, but nothing seemed to make them fit just right. Yes, they all shared components from Blackraptor, but were ultimately built by three different companies. They didn’t share networks, so it wasn’t as if one piece of malware could infect all three devices, and yet all three were exhibiting symptoms of corruption from the same virus. No wait! They weren’t. Not really.

Oracle predicted requisition needs of a specific unit based on values such as number of troops, location, and current status of engagements. Keiji stood up. “Rick! Can you get me a list of the exact changes Oracle made to the supply orders?”

Rick typed away at his own secure laptop, “There you go, what are you looking for?”

Keiji opened up the secure file-share program they were using and ran a quick analysis. “Give me a minute.” His heart sped up as he went line by line. Maybe. He shifted to Battlehawk and read the notes King had kept on his investigation. Unfortunately, this was the hardest part because not only was he reading King’s words, but they no longer had him to explain any thoughts and ideas other than what was documented on the CID server. Keiji knew firsthand how impressions and ideas didn’t always make it into official reports. He had an entire file of what he called his shitty first drafts.

Battlehawk had altered a physical flight path, but to the drone operators it appeared as though the flight was going normal. Was that based on camera feed or trajectory maps? Please, please, please. Bingo!

He dug into the archives of Ascaris. Not just his project milestones but the complete system.

“It’s the perfect storm.”

Keiji stood up and looked across the room to see everyone’s eyes on him. He swallowed hard. What separated him from the nation’s most powerful individuals was only a dozen or fewer steps but Keiji felt every one of those steps reverberate up his spine and thump against his heart.

“Ascaris is using the predictive AI algorithms of Oracle, combined with the machine learning abilities of Battlehawk, and making autonomous tactical decisions. It’s a perfect storm of technology.”

Keiji projected his data onto the massive monitor and organized the multiple desktops so they displayed the evidence for the others. Rick, Tate, and BB crowded around and started pointing out bits and pieces. Even Col. Riggs, who’d been Dmitriy’s point of contact for years, studied the board. Keiji held his breath; would they see it too or was he imagining connections that weren’t really there? Had he gotten too deep into his head and made a story out of convoluted ideas that wouldn’t make sense to outside experts? If he was wrong, he could take it from anyone other than Rick. He respected the man’s intelligence and expertise but if Rick looked at him and told Keiji that his conclusions were absolute shit, he didn’t know if he would survive.

Tate looked at Keiji. “How did you figure this out?”

Rick smiled, and Keiji started breathing again.

“Because my boyfriend is an absolute genius.”

“For those of us in the room who do not hold advanced degrees in information and cyber technology can you please give us a high-level briefing on what we are dealing with.”

“Yes, Madam President.” Keiji inhaled and exhaled then squared his shoulders and stood to his full height. Col. Riggs gave him a nod. “The artificial intelligence used by Ascaris is implementing neural networks and deep learning.” He saw more than one confused face and knew he had to change tactics. “Let me back up. We have all kinds of technology that uses AI. It’s so commonplace that most people don’t even realize the extent it’s integrated in our lives these days. Neural networks are a type of machine learning that mimic the brain. So when Blackraptor was developing the platform for Oracle we used deep learning. We trained it with twelve million complex real-life scenes, which it then learned to analyze, organize, and balance. It used this learning to identify and predict. The Army Corps of Engineers then took our platform and used it in a logistics application. Now Battlehawk uses autonomous flight systems in a UAV. General Dynamics developed it, and its flight system is the same as what Blackraptor used in Ascaris. Is everyone with me so far?”

There were a few nods, some expressions that Keiji interpreted as ‘no fucking way but I won’t admit it’ and Rick, who smiled with his eyes so blue that Keiji wanted to sigh like a lovesick teenager.

“Aside from the technology itself, what I’m hearing is that all of our defense research and development companies buy, sell, and steal ideas from each other to make their individual projects work.”

Keiji thought about the secretary of defense’s statement for a moment then nodded. “Yes. Basically. But it’s not just American companies. It’s companies all over the world. There are literally thousands of applications in which this technology could be utilized. When I was at MIT all the professors and graduate students were on the quest for the holy patent. What I’ve seen at Blackraptor is the absolute ruthlessness in the quest for the holy defense contract.”

“So now we have Ascaris. A weapon using deep learning, predictive algorithms, autonomous flight ability, and has enough munitions on board to take out two highly trained military units. Did nobody see how this might become a problem!”

Keiji jumped.

BB raised his hand. “There is one thing I don’t understand.”

“Just one thing?”

“How did Ascaris decide to target us in Montenegro, or for that matter, King as he was driving? Tate and I reviewed CCTV footage from all the immediate area surrounding Agent Vasilyev’s condo. There was no strike force. A barrage of 7.62 ammo and what I suspect may have been a Spike missile hit us. A UAV can launch both.”

“That would track with what we saw at the office just before King’s car exploded,” Tate said, looking at Keiji.

“I have a theory, but it’s a bit out there.”

Rick pointed to the screens that held all the information they’d been going over for hours. “I think we are way past the realm of normal. Let’s talk through all ideas.”

Keiji paced, “There are two major questions we have yet to answer. The first is how is Ascaris receiving data to analyze? The second is how do we stop it? With the president’s permission I reached out to the head of the Ascaris program at Blackraptor. I explained the situation and once they stopped denying any possibility of their design being involved, then cleaned up their pants after I explained the definitive proof thereof, I was told that Ascaris was officially shut down. Two months ago. After several of the drones stopped responding to flight commands.”

“Just how many is several, and what did they do about it?”

“Five altogether. They issued self-destruct codes, then wiped the servers clean.”

“Didn’t they confirm the destruction? How are they still operational?”

Keiji was getting a headache from all the yelling. He had the chief of staff in one ear and the secretary of defense in the other. The nausea that had forced him to vacate the room in a rush after talking to his former colleague threatened to return and wouldn’t it just be a fitting part of the day that he’d get sick all over the floor in the White House? He studied the president, sitting quietly in the middle of all the chaos. Rick and Col. Riggs were in quiet conversation, and Keiji wished he could phase over to them and get away from the hot seat.

Riggs rolled his eyes and stood up. “If you are not contributing to a solution, then shut up!”

Rick cleared his throat. “Keiji? Babe? You want to finish talking?”

“Babe?” Secretary Wendle said, head swinging back and forth between Rick and him.

“Yes. Keiji is my partner.”

Secretary Wendle held up his hands. “Couldn’t care less. Just wasn’t aware of your relationship. Mr. Pacheo, I apologize for my outburst. Please continue.”

“So, Blackraptor is disavowing all responsibility for Ascaris, but they gave me access to the archives of its mainframe. I saw a feature that wouldn’t be notable but given what we’re experiencing, requires consideration. The flight team added an IoT network that connected Ascaris with Blackraptor’s maintenance crew. The idea was that they could monitor its performance and troubleshoot issues while out in the field.”

“How does the drone run internet? Doesn’t it have to have a connection?” BB asked.

Keiji nodded. “It does, in a way. It can pick up a Wi-Fi signal from literally anywhere. Think of how many unsecured Wi-Fi access points there are in the world.”

“And you think Ascaris is gathering data from the internet instead of phoning home.” Rick added.

Keiji shrugged. “That’s my guess. It’s certainly capable judging by what I’ve seen. We have machines that learn by scanning available data, project scenarios, have stopped taking orders, and are now making use of its onboard weaponry to engage with targets. Is it such a far leap to consider that it’s scanning the internet for media postings across social networks, local, national, and international news feeds? Think of all the vitriol that is out there from literally millions of sources. Maybe it learned to dispense its own form of justice?”

“And King? Montenegro?”

“Us. We are the common denominator there. Although we were using secure networks, nothing is one hundred percent isolated. It simply learned that we were after answers and made the tactical decision to eliminate a threat.”

“Are you trying to tell us that this drone has become sentient?” The chief of staff asked.

“No, it can’t make moral judgments or have feelings. It simply analyzes probabilities and selects a target based on the information available.”

Rick closed his eyes and Keiji could tell he was thinking everything through. Among everyone else in the room, he had the most understanding of coding and how technology integrations work. Keiji almost hoped that his partner could come up with a better answer. He didn’t want to be right, but as fictional as it all seemed he couldn’t come up with an alternative. Rick opened his eyes and the answer they held made Keiji want to both shout with success and cry with defeat.

“I think he’s right.”

“Me too,” Colonel Riggs added. “I don’t have the technical know-how of these two, but I know there are genuine concerns among certain individuals about the use of autonomous artificial intelligence entities within the military structure. Concerns that a certain officer brought to my attention on several occasions.”

“Carpenter. You think he’s involved?”

Col. Riggs shrugged. “I don’t know, but he’s been awfully vocal, and I’ve seen people try to teach others lessons for less.”

“But I cleared him of any connection to Blackraptor or other defense industry parties.”

“Maybe he really is just a giant asshole then.”

The president clasped her hands together. “So, we have five rogue drones that are combing the internet and distributing their own form of unilateral justice. How do we stop them?”

Keiji smiled for the first time in what felt like hours. “We give them a taste of their own medicine.”

“You think this is going to work?”

Rick looked over at Keiji and rubbed his back. The muscles were so tight it was like trying to caress a rock.

“I hope so. I’m ready to escape from this dystopian nightmare and go back to my bitching about bad action movies, eating junk food, and burning off the calories with my boyfriend in bed.”

Keiji grinned and Rick’s fingers skipped a key on the laptop, causing him to type in gibberish.

“I like that last part. Things have moved at such a frantic pace; I’ve lost focus of my center.” Keiji stopped typing and Rick held his breath. “When this is all over, I think I’d really like to date you.”

“Whew. You had me worried there for a second.”

“I’m serious. There are so many things I don’t know about my future. I don’t have a job to go back to, like you. Blackraptor sent me a politely worded fuck off letter after my conversation with Simon, the Ascaris project leader. They cited that I had shared proprietary data with outside sources and that violated the NDA I signed upon joining the company. Maybe I should go back to my family? I miss them, you know?”

Rick spun his and Keiji’s chairs so they faced each other. “You’ve figured out how to potentially save the world. I think finding a new job will be a piece of cake. And, if you want to go see your family then do so, hell I’ll go with you. I’ve never been to Okinawa. We can make a whole thing of it and stop by San Diego to see my parents, cross the Pacific to see yours, then back around the world and stop by Germany to see my brother. Of course that might take some advanced planning, maybe for our one-year anniversary?”

“One year, huh?”

“One of many, I hope.”

He wanted nothing more than to kiss the man sitting across from him. To take him in his arms and into his body until their whispered words of love mingled together within their shared breaths.

“I want you.”

Keiji pulled on the back of Rick’s neck until their foreheads rested against each other. “I’m here. I’ll always be here.”

“Assuming we don’t all die in the next few hours?”

“Yes, there is that. We should get back to work.”

Together they went back to working on a virus that would attack the entire neural network of Ascaris’s system, effectively killing it. He’d asked Col. Riggs if they could see some of Saber’s old projects to use the same language. The man had been absolutely brilliant, and Rick thought there was some poetic justice in letting Dmitriy get the last word against the drone that had stopped such a brilliant mind who’d dedicated his life to serving from the shadows. The others were working on baiting Ascaris into engaging. They’d opened communication channels within the group and started spreading seeds of dissent between the Joint Chiefs and the president. The goal was to make Ascaris intercept the communications and calculate the probability of a military coup within the United States.

Even knowing it was all fake, there was a part of Rick that lurched at some of the language flying around. The poor press secretary’s team was monitoring all media outlets and in constant updates with the press corps when something slipped through.

Their job was to make sure the public or media outlets didn’t pick up on any of the chatter. God, the shitstorm that would cause could be more disastrous than what they were trying to prevent. He looked over at BB, who was doing witchy NSA things a few seats over.

“Whoa! So either E.T. has decided he really wants to steal everyone’s Wi-Fi so they can watch Netflix or we have some thieving drones headed our way.”

“Can you see where they are?”

“Not exactly, I’m monitoring all the unsecured Wi-Fi networks in the surrounding area. Every few seconds I see a surge of energy then it moves to the next router. I can tell you they haven’t locked onto the router I set up yet. How close are the two of you to being ready?”

They’d obtained the alphanumeric registration numbers for the five missing drones from Blackraptor. They hoped that when the machines hacked into their Wi-Fi trap, the registration numbers would appear so BB could identify them and pass the information on to Rick and Keiji.

“We’re good to go.”

He picked up his phone and texted Col. Riggs.

“Incoming. Is the welcoming party ready?”

“Party favors locked and loaded.”

They intended to use the IoT connection Blackraptor had set up to upload the virus he and Keiji had written. The virus would shut down all AI features and allow them to regain flight control. The president wanted to recover the drones, if possible. She wanted them studied to find out what had gone wrong but if their operation went to hell in a handbasket the team had the authority to shoot down the drones.

The most problematic issue was that he and Keiji could only upload the virus to one drone at a time, so there was a genuine possibility that the others might take exception to their interference and attack. It was the reason the team was setting up in different locations.

“They’re about a mile away. I’m going to pull up the network map for our router and see if I can get more information. Oh, you sneaky little bastard! Now! Keiji, we have an unregistered lurker on our network.” BB yelled.

Rick focused on his screen and let his fingers fly as he connected to the drone’s data share. “God, these things have more firewalls than the Batcave.”

He tried again and again to get past the firewall so he could gain access. The surgical approach wasn’t working, maybe it was time for brute force.

“Keiji, we’ve got another one. Echo-Charlie-Tango-three.”

The sound of Keiji’s keyboard clicking joined Rick’s. He heard Col Riggs’s voice over the radio as they spotted the drones from their position.

“We’re taking fire!”

Rick worked faster. Riggs was out there along with Tate. The president, her staff, and the secretary of defense were secured in the PEOC. Finally, he made it through and his screen filled with the inner workings of Ascaris. Keiji had given him a lightning quick guide on the drone and its system. Rick clicked Enter. He held his breath as he watched the code upload. “Yes!” He activated his comm unit. “Flight control this is Havoc One, you are green on drone Bravo-two-Foxtrot-eight.”

“Roger Havoc, hold for confirmation.”

Riggs had brought in two unmanned aircraft systems operators to do the flying for their mission. All they knew was that there were drones in test flight that needed guidance getting home. Their comms only connected to Rick and Keiji, so they segregated from everything else happening.

Please work, please work!

“Motherfucker, stop shooting at me! Riggs, hold your position, I’m going to draw it out.”

Tate and Col. Riggs had taken position over at the East Potomac Golf Links. They wanted as few civilians at risk as possible. The downside of course was that there were very few places for Tate and Riggs to set up defensive zones.

“Havoc, we have regained control of Bravo-two-Foxtrot-eight.”

Rick let out a breath and looked over at Keiji, who was still typing away on the keyboard.

“Rick, head’s up! Quebec-Kilo-seven-Uniform within range. Do your thing.”

He locked on and tried the same balls-to-the-wall approach that had worked once, but apparently this drone was smarter than its brother. The firewalls held.

“Drone down. I repeat drone down and so is Riggs. Shit!”

Fuck! They had to work faster.

“Flight Control, Havoc Two. Echo-Charlie-Tango-three is yours.”

Keiji’s announcement made three. Rick kept tracing the IoT map, but he couldn’t find a way through.

“Incoming, Havoc. Take cover!”

Tate’s yell over the radio had BB diving for cover under the table. Rick figured the old fallout shelter would provide decent protection, but then the room shook. That asshole had somehow found them and shot one of the Spike missiles Blackraptor had confirmed were on board. The screen of his laptop flickered. Shit, if the drone took out their generator they were fucked. “No! You will not win you ass-whore.”

“There!” Keiji pointed to the screen at the entry point Rick almost missed.

“Thanks, babe.” Rick got the virus uploaded while Keiji sat next to him mumbling in Japanese and striking the keys on his laptop as if the poor machine had offended him. “Flight Control, this is Havoc One. I’ve cleared Delta-Mike-Zulu-niner for landing.”

There was one more, and of course it was the one that was determined to bring the building down around them.

“Come on you two!” BB shouted.

“We’re trying, keep your goddamn pants on!”

“It’s not working, Rick. Why isn’t it working?”

“You got the virus uploaded but the pilots don’t have control.”

Dust rained down on them from the ceiling as the shelter took another hit. An ominous groan signaled that there’d been structural damage. What was wrong? He squinted at the screen and reversed out of the IoT directory to take a bigger look at the general menu. He started clicking and realized that he was in control of the drone. Somehow they’d disabled the AI but instead of him being able to transfer control to the pilot, his laptop was flying the drone.

“Oh fuck me, I’m flying the damn thing.”

“What?” BB popped his head up from underneath the table.

Keiji pulled his chair closer “How? Do you know what you’re doing?”

“No! Like I said to Carpenter when this whole thing started, I haven’t flown anything since a paper airplane in the fourth grade. Keiji help. You know this system inside and out.”

“Not the flight part. That was so not my department. Okay, we don’t have cameras but we have flight path data. Look here. Altitude, heading, airspeed.”

“If anyone makes a comment about an African swallow, I will beat your ass,” Rick growled.

“I say we send this sucker back to Tate. We don’t have a joystick, but we’ve got arrows, right? See what happens if you hit the Down key.”

“Why down?” BB asked.

“Because, down is up and up is down. Didn’t any of you see Independence Day?”

“Fantastic, we’re taking flying lessons from Will Smith. Hold on to your butts!” Rick hit the key several times while wincing at the screen.

“See, it worked! The altitude numbers went higher.”

Keiji was so excited; Rick couldn’t help but grin. “Can somebody tell Tate that he has incoming and I promise not to shoot him, but I can’t promise I won’t land on top of him so get out of the way.”

Rick made the drone turn so it was flying up the Potomac. That way if he completely fucked this up, it wouldn’t land in the heart of D.C. He punched the Up key little by little until the altimeter read thirty feet. He lined up with the southernmost tip of the island that made up the golf course.

“Um, question. Does this thing have wheels?”

“Oh, shit! I don’t know. Let me look.”

“Look fast, babe.”

“What the hell are you yahoos doing over there? I just got a haircut and don’t need another one!” Tate yelled through the radio.

“I got it.”

Keiji hit several keys.

“You guys better do whatever it is you’re going to do because you are running out of runway!”

“Oh, to hell with it!” Rick kept hitting the Up key until the numbers all read zero on the screen.

The room was silent as the three of them stared at the screen then each other. Then Tate’s laughter came over the radio.

“It’s a good thing this wasn’t the Congressional Country Club or the senators would be pissed tomorrow.”

Rick’s phone rang, and he saw Tate was calling him on FaceTime. He hit the button, and the screen came to life with the image of the fifteen-foot wingspan drone lawn-darted into the ninth green.

“Nice landing, ace.”

“How’s Riggs?”

“He’ll survive. The president is already sending a containment unit over here and they’re sending a helo to evac him to Walter Reed. I’ll meet you back at the palace.”

They all planned on meeting back at the White House Situation Room to debrief. Personally, Rick couldn’t wait until all he had to worry about was making sure he turned in his quarterly reports on time to Lieutenant Carpenter.

“I’ll see you two in twenty.” BB looked around the shelter. “I might suggest you not stick around too long.”

Rick leaned back in the chair that threatened to either collapse altogether or flip him ass over teakettle. He closed his eyes and heard Keiji and BB talking softly a few feet away. There was a loud screech when the door at the end of the room opened and he jumped a little when it slammed shut again.

“Is it really over?”

Rick opened his eyes at the hesitant sound of Keiji’s voice. He opened his arms and Keiji practically jumped into his lap. The warmth of Keiji’s body eased Rick’s muscles that practically vibrated with tension.

“I think so. God, I hope so. I really don’t think I have the capacity to deal with anything more.”

“We should get going. The president is expecting us. And those are five words I never thought I’d say in my lifetime.”

Rick chuckled and held Keiji closer. “In a minute.” He ran his fingers through Keiji’s dark hair then brought their lips together. One kiss led to another. Who knew breaking out of an NSA interrogation room would lead him to finding the love of his life.

Where his and Keiji’s life would take them only the stars knew, but Rick was okay with that. Life was an epic journey. They would fight their battles and celebrate their victories together. In time, many years from now, they’d look back on this experience and tell the story like a pair of grizzly old fishermen boasting of their greatest catch. Until that time, Rick planned on making love and living life with this man in his arms and by his side.

“If I could give you the world, I would.”

Keiji smiled back at him. “’You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love… I love… I love you.’”