Into the storms a hell d.., p.6
Into the Storms: A Hell Divers Prequel, page 6
But the 1 percent that got through had caused unfathomable damage, wiping out Seoul and Busan and forcing a mass evacuation of the peninsula, which continued as Tyron sat in the General Assembly Hall. Millions would die from the fallout that continued to drift on the wind to neighboring countries.
Tyron had fired the board the moment he found out about what they had done that led to this, and would prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law. But the damage was done, and even though Orion hadn’t been responsible, all artificial intelligence had taken the blame.
As the world’s leaders received ongoing reports on the massive destruction in Korea, Tyron got to the end of the document before him: the Global AI Limitation Accord, a treaty that would not only end the era of AI autonomy but would also ensure that no machine could ever again threaten the future of humankind.
The Defector units, as well as every other advanced AI system, will be decommissioned. Only a select number of Defector units will be saved for research purposes, their operational capabilities restricted and removed from all network connections. They will not serve in active combat again. The machines are no longer our future; they are our past.
“Our past,” he whispered. He imagined the economic damage to ITC that would take place across the world. Factories filled with deactivated service droids, construction sites grinding to a halt as the machines that had built the public housing projects were powered down, and the automated military units lying silent in their bunkers.
He took off his pale blue glasses and rubbed his exhausted eyes. What began as a localized conflict in Korea had escalated beyond control, culminating in the unthinkable: a nuclear strike. It had sent shock waves, not just in terms of destruction but also in the reckoning that followed. The machines and artificial intelligence systems had become too autonomous and had played too central a role. What had once been hailed as humanity’s greatest advancement now felt like the key that had unlocked the door to disaster. Now the world’s superpowers had come together, not to rebuild those systems but to prevent another catastrophe from ever happening again at the hands of AI.
In the middle of the circular room, a large globe flickered into focus and the meeting came to order. At the head of the table, President Clayton of the United States stood to address the assembly. He was a stately man, wearing a navy suit with a silver tie that matched his thick hair, slicked to one side.
“The nuclear event in Korea has demonstrated something we cannot ignore,” he said in his light Southern drawl. “The escalation of war was spurred not by human hands alone but by the systems we trusted to guide our decisions. Artificial intelligence, unchecked and unmonitored, led us to this crossroads. Now, two cities have been reduced to ash, and fallout is dumping on neighboring countries. We are here today to retake control before it slips beyond our grasp.”
He glanced around the room, meeting the eyes of the leaders of the Global Coalition from every continent. “We have allowed artificial intelligence to evolve beyond its original purpose. It began with machines to build our cities, manage our infrastructure, and make life easier for all. But those same machines—intelligent enough to make decisions faster than any human mind could comprehend—led to the great economic darkness that in turn pushed the world to the brink of destruction. We may have stopped the apocalypse for now, but we must come together to create a future where this can never happen again.”
A murmur of agreement rose from most in the room, but one participant remained silent, watching him with steely eyes. General Vucci, representing the United States Joint Military Forces, sat stiffly, arms crossed as he awaited his turn to speak. When President Clayton finished, Vucci stood up, his shiny military boots squeaking on the polished marble floor as he approached the podium.
“We can all agree, the situation in Korea was catastrophic,” General Vucci began. “But to blame the machines outright is shortsighted. The Defector units weren’t responsible for the escalation. They followed orders. They are assets, not enemies. They saved lives, both military and civilian, when human troops could no longer respond fast enough. I propose we retain the Defector units for defensive purposes at the very least. Shutting them down entirely is not only irrational; it’s dangerous. We would be leaving ourselves vulnerable to future threats without the help of our most advanced technology.”
A ripple of hushed remarks carried through the chamber.
“We are not discussing rogue systems,” Vucci pressed. “We are discussing strictly controlled military assets that can serve our interests. Disbanding them entirely is—”
“Unacceptable,” came a sharp voice from the French president, Clara Deschamps, who rose swiftly to her feet. She was known for her brusque, no-nonsense attitude, and her intense eyes cut across the room. “General, you speak of these machines as if they hadn’t just led us into a nuclear catastrophe. They followed orders just as you follow orders, and their orders came from Orion. Your Defector units, and the artificial intelligence that controlled them, are just another step in the march toward more war. And that is not a world any of us want.”
Others around the table nodded in agreement. The European Federation’s representative added, “It is precisely because these units act with such efficiency that we must be cautious. It takes only a nanomoment for AI to change directions, to slip outside the intended parameters. We cannot risk it.”
General Vucci clenched his jaw, but his voice remained steady. “And what of our enemies? Do you think they will disarm their AI forces? Are we to sit idly by while they build their next autonomous army? AI gives us an advantage we cannot afford to lose.”
President Clayton raised his hands to silence the room as angry voices shot back.
“We have taken that into account, General,” he said calmly. “Iran has surrendered, and the Tritons are destroyed. And while you raise valid points, I agree with the others that we must pass the accord in front of you today to protect civilization.”
“Civilization? This accord is for civilized countries,” Vucci fired back. “What about the rogue groups who will continue to use AI for terrorism?”
“They will be dealt with—hunted with extreme prejudice by your own forces, sir.”
Tyron stood up in the gallery, all eyes flitting to him, the son of the godfather of AI.
“Dr. Red, do you have something to contribute?” the president asked.
“Yes,” he said.
Vucci glared at him—a warning, it seemed, which Tyron blithely ignored.
“Before my father died, I began to fear the advances of the Defector units in the war. I saw the brutal violence they were capable of, and I saw the arms race they began. I agree with this accord, but I ask you to make one exception.”
“And what is that, Dr. Red?”
“Orion.”
Voices rose around the room, drawing the president’s gaze. He silenced them again by raising his hands.
“As many of you have now heard, a rogue faction within ITC completed work on the cybervirus that Orion and my father created before his death to destroy the Triton Legion and CrioX.” He stood taller. “Those rogue elements have been removed, and I have determined that Orion was locked out of the final virus design. I have personally known and worked with Orion since I was a boy, and I know this AI to have the best interests of our species in mind.”
Tyron paused briefly.
“But I also believe in restrictions,” he said. “I recommend disconnecting Orion from the ITC global network and allowing ITC to use Orion as an adviser only, housed in a Faraday chamber at our headquarters, where it will continue to serve humanity, advancing science projects that benefit our species.”
A spirited discussion ensued as Tyron sat back down. An hour of fierce debate continued in the chamber. When it ended, a new digital accord was presented to the leaders. All AI machines were to be deactivated, with one exception. Only Orion would remain active, but even it would not escape unscathed.
“Orion will be severely restricted,” President Clayton continued. “It will no longer have access to global networks, and its functions will be tightly monitored. Orion will be the last of its kind, but it will remain to help guide ITC and humanity, when needed.”
Then came the final vote. Hands in favor rose from almost every delegation, with only a few holdouts. Vucci lowered his head. He had lost. The war machines would be destroyed, along with any service droid more complex than a vacuum cleaner.
Tyron watched the leaders from around the world sign their names to the order. A part of him felt conflicted at what this meant—not just for the science and technology that the machines had helped advance at astonishing rates but for the future of ITC.
Would it survive?
As the new CEO, it would be up to him to pave a new future.
He stood silently, eyes fixed on the holographic display of Earth at the head of the chamber. A world that, in mere moments, would be stripped of almost all the artificial intelligence that had once defined its future.
The summit ended with final signatures, and the leaders left, solemn and resolved.
The world had spoken.
Tyron left and boarded an ITC Wasp, which he took to his new office at ITC headquarters in Atlanta. By the time he arrived, thousands of service models were already being marched out of the factories on the sprawling campus, slated for destruction.
As he watched from the top of the towering ITC building, part of him was glad that his father was dead, so he wouldn’t have to see his creations marched off to their annihilation. But the rest of him felt relief that the world was finally safe from the mechanical monsters they unleashed in Korea.
Ten days after the Triton Legion and its AI known as CrioX were defeated at Mount Paektu, survivors were still emerging from the ashes around Busan and Seoul. The fighting had ended, but the war was not quite over for Hell Squad. The men prepared to deploy from JMF Horizon Base fifty miles east of Seoul, on yet another mission to search for any survivors of the blasts. For almost a week straight, the squad had been working around the clock to rescue their comrades and any civilians still out there. But as they got closer to Seoul, they found fewer and fewer.
Today they would be heading closer yet to ground zero, just fifty miles away. Santiago feared they might not find anyone amid the horrific radiation and dangerous fires flaring up across the ruined city.
There was good news, however, for today one of their own was heading home.
Santiago arrived at the intensive care unit at the Horizon Base to say goodbye to Cecil, who would be sent back to the States on a transport in just a few hours. He had been through three spinal surgeries, and all the bandages over his dark skin made him look like a mummy from a B movie.
“How you doin’, kid?” Santiago asked.
“Sarge,” Cecil said weakly as he glanced over.
“You look good.”
Cecil chuckled, then winced. “You’re a bad liar, bub.”
“Bub,” Santiago said with a grin. That was his word. “You’re alive, and you’re going to be fine,” he said. “That’s what matters. Better yet, you’re going home.”
“Docs said I won’t walk again.”
“And you’re going to prove them wrong.”
Cecil looked down at his healing body, then back to Santiago. “How bad is it out there?”
“It’s not good.”
“Two nukes made it through?”
“Yeah.”
“Fuck . . . Is it because of what we did?”
“No, man, no way. We delivered the virus and destroyed CrioX, and the rest of the Tritons are gone for good. You helped save the world. It came at a cost, but the threat is finally over. The machines are gone too. The UN just voted to destroy all of them.”
“All of them?”
“Down to the service bots. Might be a few street sweepers left, but they never hurt anyone.”
Cecil laughed, then groaned.
A knock came on the door, and Lieutenant Yosef entered.
Santiago stepped back as the rest of Hell Squad trickled into the room. Alistair, David, and Nodin walked over with Yosef to say their goodbyes.
“We’ll see you stateside, buddy,” David said.
“Rest up, brother,” Nodin said.
“Later, little mate,” Alistair said with a toothy grin.
“You did well out there, Pepper,” Yosef said.
“Thanks, fellas,” Cecil said, sadness in his gaze.
They all turned to leave, but Cecil said, “Bull, hold up.”
Santiago went back to the bedside.
“Thank you,” Cecil said. “For saving my life again. Maybe someday I can pay you back.”
“Not necessary, brother; you just take care of yourself.” Santiago patted him very gently on the arm. “I’ll see you soon.”
Cecil nodded and rested his head back on the pillow.
An hour later, Hell Squad was inside a hangar of Wasps, with security forces dressed in CBRN gear underneath their exoskeletons, preparing to launch into the wastelands.
“We’re back on evacuation duty,” said Yosef. “But it won’t be pretty. Anyone who survived this close to the blast will have severe burns and radiation poisoning.”
The men boarded the Wasp and racked in. They all were exhausted, from the fighting and from general despair. But if there were more survivors out there, they would do what it took to save them. Every life mattered.
The familiar hum of the rotors filled the cabin as they ascended, rising over the base and leaving Cecil behind. On the horizon, swirling storms awaited, stretching across the entire sky. The nearly constant lightning cast an unnatural and eerie glow—a result of the nuclear blasts’ disruption of the atmosphere. The storm continued to grow, creating chaotic winds and static interference for hundreds of miles.
“Still not used to that sight,” Nodin said.
“Hold tight,” warned one of the pilots.
The Wasp tilted and flew higher over the wastelands as they closed in on ground zero. Turbulence rocked the aircraft, shaking them violently. Santiago studied the blasted ruins below, picturing the wave of fire that rushed out in a circular wall traveling at supersonic speed. Much that lay within a mile of the detonation had been vaporized instantly. Any living creature, inside or outside.
They were the lucky ones.
Two miles away, just two seconds after impact, the steel and stone buildings at the edge of downtown were hit. The frames heaved and came apart under the radiating heat wave that caused marble to split and turned sand into glass.
Anyone in this range was said to be “dead when found.” But many of these people would not even be recognizable as ever having been human. Most were simply ash. Anyone unlucky enough to be underground had been stripped of their outer layer of skin, resulting in third-degree burns that required specialized care that would never reach them in time. As that monstrous fireball grew like a tsunami, the shock wave of radiated heat rolled on to consume everything in its path. Three miles from ground zero, the air accelerated to three-hundred-mile-per-hour winds—almost twice the velocity of a Category 5 hurricane.
Every recognizable piece of architecture in Seoul had vanished within the first seconds, crushed and torn apart by the storm of wind. The fireball then rose upward at a rate of three hundred feet per second, into a mushroom cloud consisting of everything and everyone that had made up the city. That mushroom’s cap, now turned a muddy brown and orange hue, stretched farther and farther out and upward all the way to the stratosphere, driven by the fierce nuclear winds. The radioactive particles spewed out for hundreds of miles and were still moving on the prevailing winds.
Santiago leaned for a view out a starboard window as the pilots swooped down seventy-five miles from ground zero. The nuclear blast wave had reached all the way out here, knocking over brick buildings as if they were straw.
Fires raged all along the horizon, their eerie glow reflected under the flashing sky.
It was hell on earth, and this wasn’t even the worst of it.
“We’re not going to find many today, are we?” David asked.
Yosef shook his head.
“We save as many as we can,” Santiago said.
Pinpricks of white light burned on the horizon—a sign of human life where there should be none. That was their landing zone, a forward operating base that was still so new it was simply called an outpost.
Neat rows of Stryker combat vehicles, over twenty of them, sat parked in the dirt, waiting to take rescuers out into the wasteland. Makeshift shelters stood amid the rubble, their lights barely visible against the gray landscape. Soldiers and staff worked in bulky CBRN suits, looking like crews ready to make first contact with an alien species.
Surrounding the FOB were collapsed buildings like giant crumpled boxes, no longer recognizable as homes, offices, and shops. In the distance, flames still flickered from burning gas lines that hissed and spat like angry vipers.
There was something else out there.
Santiago watched as a giant beetle-shaped airship lowered from the clouds, here to transport more equipment and evacuate any survivors.
The Wasp lowered over a rough-and-ready airfield just punched out by two bulldozers. The legs of the tilt-rotor aircraft touched down with a soft thud, and the aft ramp began to lower.
“Good luck,” said one of the pilots.
Santiago and the rest of Hell Squad piled out, their boots crunching against the charred ground. They trekked to the FOB, where they received their orders: search for survivors at Sentinel Base, over thirty miles away.
A Stryker pulled up, wheels crunching over the charred debris. The front door opened, and a corporal in a hazard suit stepped out.
“Hell Squad?” he asked.
“Reporting for duty,” Yosef confirmed.
“Get in.”
The men piled into the back of a vehicle so clean it looked as if it had just come off the assembly line.
