Gene Mapper (17 page)

“Unbelievable. It’s like digital communication. But are you sure about this?”

“No problem. If wind patterns affect the distribution, all we need is for one grasshopper to get—”

“That’s not what I mean. Do you really want to show this animal to the world?” The constant flashing of the grasshoppers signaling each other overlapped her avatar. “If I saw this on the news, the first thing I’d do is try to recreate it.”

The thought had crossed my mind, but I’d been holding it at bay while I worked on my immediate problem.

“I mean, listening to your explanation, and reading this manual … I feel so inspired. If plants can communicate and designed animals can be sent into the fields to perform tasks, we can do almost anything, not just with agriculture. We could design insects with RealVu to image places that humans and robots can’t. Soil restoration, energy production, terraforming … Imagination is the limit. If I saw one of these grasshoppers, I’d want to go right back to the lab and design something like it.

“But can anyone be trusted with organisms like this? DARPA’s engineers did a fantastic job, but think about it. Even L&B—if their engineers see designed animals interacting with crops, do you think they’ll be as careful with their fail-safe features as DARPA was?”

That didn’t take much thought. “I don’t see how they would.”

I looked at the model. My mission was still in progress. Thep stood up and watched it pensively.

“So this is what you want to do before we exterminate?”

“I wrote the code while I was working my way through the tutorial. It’s a rough first pass. I want to transmit it tomorrow for at least the few minutes when the satellite is overhead. We can exterminate afterward. I don’t want to be the guy who just carries out their plan for them.”

“I like the idea, but we should ask Kurokawa-san how he feels about showing the world these designed animals before we—”

“Sorry. I don’t want to do that.”

“Why not?”

I wasn’t sure how much I should reveal to Thep. My suspicion that Kurokawa was involved with Guardians of the Land was just that, suspicion. Maybe Enrico was trying to screw up our investigation. The disappearing grasshopper sample might have been programmed suicide. There was no proof that the “Japanese guy” McCauley mentioned was Kurokawa. My guess that Kurokawa might want to eliminate evidence of an artificial origin for the mutation could be based on faulty reasoning. Maybe he just wanted to eliminate a potentially disastrous biohazard along with the grasshoppers that were spreading it.

But I couldn’t forget the bar code on his shoulder and the wounds from his frenzied attempts to rip it off.

“All right, I understand.”

“What?” I looked up. Thep was standing next to me.

“You disabled Behavior Correction, didn’t you? I still think we should tell Kurokawa-san, but I can see you’re conflicted about it. The grasshoppers slow down after sunset. I think we have a reprieve until morning. I’ll think things over too. If it looks like we’re running out of time, we can activate the suicide program. Agreed?” She took the folder with the suicide program off my desk and put it in a pocket of her cargo pants.

“Thanks, Shue.”

“That’s quite a face you’re wearing. You haven’t finished coding. You need to figure out the details of your mission too. Better get started.”

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“Blow my socks off.” She gave me two thumbs up.

*   *   *

I’d ordered a whole pot of coffee. Now it was empty. It was almost the same as the drip brew I drank every day in Tokyo, but after the sweet taste of Vietnamese coffee, regular coffee left a bitter aftertaste.

It was four-thirty a.m. The horizon outside my window was starting to lighten.

I turned away from the window and watched the latest simulation unfold. Once again, the grasshoppers began to execute the mission I had designed for them.

I had finished the coding about an hour earlier using a
HELLO WORLD!
template and run the simulation using one of DARPA’s testing tools. The code included the termination commands McCauley hadn’t figured out. Even if Thep didn’t launch the suicide program, the grasshoppers would all be reduced to dried soil before sundown tomorrow.

Now all I had to do was hand the code off to Thep. Mother Mekong’s message towers would send it to the bugs, and the mission would go off just as I’d simulated it in my room.

Still, I was wavering. I’d spent the last hour running simulations. If the mission was a success—the digital message transmitted, brute-force decoded, and executed by the designed animals—engineers everywhere would be inspired to design their own organisms. They would see what was possible, not from an academic paper or a commercial concept model, but unfolding in reality before their eyes.

Any engineer worth his salt would salivate at the chance to be involved in something like this. Venture funds would bankroll any number of startups to develop “Mother Mekong-type” designed animals. The greatest risk of all—the question of whether or not designed animals of such complexity could actually be developed—would have been eliminated. They would know it was possible.

The outcome of all this would be a flood of designed animals of uneven quality and ultimately biohazards that would be impossible to cope with, unlike DARPA’s grasshoppers.

I ran the simulation again. Everything went exactly as it had many times before. Once again, I was astounded at what I could do after only a few hours of familiarization. I couldn’t buy into the concept of weaponized organisms, but as an engineer, I felt almost reverent toward the talent and concern for safety of the nameless men and women who had created this technology.

What if I
didn’t
carry out the mission? The US would deploy the grasshoppers eventually. The user manual indicated that the Marines would be first to get them. What would happen then? Engineers working to create knockoff designs would have no way of knowing the lengths DARPA had gone to to make the weapon fail-safe.

Suddenly I had an idea.

It would work. It was the only way.

I called Thep.

*   *   *

“You finished the mission.”

Thep was intently watching the simulation unfold across Mother Mekong.

“Yes. It’s ready.” I handed her the mission code and the chemical messenger release routine for the towers.

“What happens when the world finds out about the grasshoppers?”

I explained my idea. If I succeeded, banishment from the industry might be the least of my problems. I might have to go underground for the rest of my life.

“That’s a coincidence. I was thinking about going underground myself.” Her avatar gave me a beautiful, natural smile. “I turned off Behavior Correction. The tension feels good, doesn’t it?”

I woke to Nguyen’s voice ordering coffee. The morning sun bouncing off the stucco ceiling made me blink.

I’d made it to the office at eight to brief Yagodo and Kurokawa on Guardians of the Land’s plans and the code Thep would transmit to trigger grasshopper suicide. I kept the rest to myself. After filling them in, I lay down on the sofa and fell asleep.

Nguyen hadn’t been there when I arrived. How long had I been asleep?

I’d had another AR meeting with Thep at sunrise. I thought I’d just be handing her the code for my mission, but we ended up tweaking it together. With her stronger technical background and just a read-through of the user manual, she had pretty much figured out how to code a mission. It was after seven by the time we were through. I’d tried to get some sleep, but my mind was so focused on the coming operation that I had to give up.

I opened my workspace in my palm. It was nine. I’d only been asleep for half an hour.

“Hayashida-san, you can rest a bit longer. We’re going to write up our report on the terrorists and the extermination of the grasshoppers later.”

Kurokawa was sitting on the opposite sofa with several workspaces open and floating above the table. He must have been up all night dealing with L&B, but as his fingers flew over his virtual keyboard, he seemed fresh and rested.

“What are you working on so hard?” Yagodo got up from his desk to peer over Kurokawa’s shoulder.

“Barnhard’s presentation. He has to rebut that World Reporting teaser with a statement. I have to get this out right away.”

“A presentation for the veep? Shouldn’t his own people handle that?”

“Should, but can’t. Anyway, he asked me to do it. World Reporting’s preview already has him in hot water with the media. He has to say something, and we can’t ask Mamoru to go on camera.”

“The VP’s ghost writer? There’s a leash I wouldn’t want to be at the end of,” said Yagodo.

“Those two teasers have paralyzed L&B. All they have time for is damage control. We’re on the front line, we know what’s going on. I’m logically the one to handle this.”

Kurokawa had turned his head to speak to Yagodo even as his fingers kept flying over the keyboard. He must have been using both of his avatars.

“Thanks to both of you, we know the identity of the intruder. We know that the grasshoppers are a designed bioweapon and that environmental activists are behind this attack. Our trip to the site gave us all the video we need. I don’t think Barnhard will have any problem answering his critics.”

I hadn’t told Kurokawa everything about the grasshoppers. I couldn’t shake my suspicion that he was carrying water for Guardians of the Land. I’d told him only that the goal was to undermine people’s trust in distilled crops. I didn’t mention Guardians of the Land, Operation Mother Mary, or McCauley’s video message. When I told him that exterminating the grasshoppers was the final objective of the terrorists, all he’d said in response was, “Then our interests are aligned. I think we have more than enough evidence to prove this is terrorism. We don’t need more.”

This had convinced me that Kurokawa didn’t want the TerraVu images to show the grasshoppers at all. At least I was certain that Thep hadn’t told him about my little addition to the playbook.

“You’ve been pretty busy yourself,” Yagodo said to me.

“Thanks for lighting a fire under Kaneda. I never dreamed we’d be dealing with a designed insect, but we can use Mother Mekong’s infrastructure to wipe them out.”

I was still stretched out on my back. Yagodo brandished a document in my face as he took his usual place on the sofa.

“I found something myself—where Purple Dusk comes from. You want to see this.”

I put a hand on the table and levered myself into an upright position.

“I was filtering a list of Purple Dusk growers. Turns out this particular cultivar is associated with some very interesting people—a Japanese collective of rice farmers called The Hermitage.” He waved a finger and an old-fashioned website popped in over the table.

“I ran across a site backup that was originally on someone’s PC. Classic design, isn’t it? Very nostalgic.”

The web page showed a kindly looking older man cradling a bundle of harvested rice plants. Behind him spread a few acres of paddies hemmed in by mountains. “The Hermitage” was written in calligraphy along the left margin of the page. The photo was framed with slogans in fancy script: “Organically Grown,” “Locally Grown and Consumed,” “GM Free,” and “Pest and Weed Control with Ducks.” Maybe this sort of thing was interesting for people twenty years ago, but a lot of it went over my head. With only one harvest a year, it didn’t look like they could’ve harvested much from such a small acreage.

“The collective had to disband when red rust broke out. Later the land was bought by a corporation that grows L&B seedlings. It seems there was some sort of disagreement over the terms of payment. The owner probably hated the spread of genetically modified rice, but there was no future for Purple Dusk.”

“He must’ve held a grudge.”

“If he did, it was a waste of energy. Import tariffs on rice were abolished in 2015. Small farmers just couldn’t compete. Red rust isn’t the only thing that killed The Hermitage.”

Yagodo touched a link to a blog. “Here’s the interesting part.” He pointed to the last post, dated July 2016. It was in English: “Natural Farming Methods Know No Borders.” There was a shot of the farmer surrounded by a group of young men and women, Europeans or North Americans. Two of them flanked him with their arms over his shoulders.

“That’s Enrico!”

“Enrico? The missing project manager?” Yagodo seemed puzzled.

“Sure. Right here.” I pointed to the man on the right. He was wearing a blue T-shirt stenciled with “natural” in white Japanese script. There was no mistaking the straw-colored hair and the eyes with their drooping corners. He looked relaxed and happy. There was no trace of the dark aura I saw in the cathedral.

“Enrico? Harvesting Purple Dusk? That’s absurd,” said Kurokawa. He kept typing away without even looking at the photo. “Enrico’s twenty-eight, the same age as Thep. He was eight years old in 2016.”

Yagodo nodded. “Mamoru, this is Gough Robertson. He’s a veteran activist. His specialty is coordinating protests between green groups. He spent six years or so at The Hermitage and made it a magnet for foreign activists. His love and respect for the man who owned this place is clear from the blog—”

“Gough? Guardians of the Land Gough?”

Yagodo raised an eyebrow. “You do get around. He hasn’t been a member of that group for very long either. Where did you hear about him?”

“His name was buried in the grasshopper genome.”

“Then it’s him for sure. He must be leading this operation. Just so you know, the man on the other side is Darrel MacCarthy. He was discharged from the Marines just last week—”

“Isamu, wait a minute. The day before we left for Cambodia, I met this guy calling himself Enrico.”

“What? Where did you meet him? What did you talk about?” Yagodo lowered his eyebrows and leaned forward.

“In the cathedral. He was complaining about things at L&B …” I wasn’t sure how much I could say. “He showed me old news footage about Takashi. World Reporting videoed me sitting there after he left.”

“It looks like Guardians of the Land and World Reporting are plotting to frame—”

“No! It’s not a frame-up!” Nguyen’s voice was shrill. “We’d never stoop so low. You don’t know anything about us!”

“Nguyen?” For a moment I wasn’t sure it was the same woman. She was wearing a khaki field vest and her hair was pinned up. She stared daggers at Yagodo.

“People all over the world will finally see natural rice fighting back against your horrible distilled crops. Operation Mother Mary—”

“Where did you hear that name?” I stood up and took a step toward her. My blood was boiling.

“Duck, Mamoru!” I heard Yagodo shout, but something soft was already striking me in the face. I reflexively arched backward to avoid the blow. Something caught my heels and I lost my balance. I tripped over the table and fell flat on my back. The base of my spine felt numb.

“Did I hurt you?”

I looked up at Nguyen. She was blurred and surrounded by artifacts, then suddenly she was squatting next to me.

“Physical Mixed Activity. Aikido? No, Sanda. Where did you learn that? Mamoru, are you all right?” Yagodo peered at me with concern.

Nguyen’s avatar had remained motionless while the real Nguyen faked a blow to my face and swept my feet out from under me when I flinched.

“Sit down. Next to Yagodo. I’m with Guardians of the Land. World Reporting will be here soon. They need footage of all you distilled crop people in one room.

“Today, TerraVu will photograph Mother Mekong in daylight. Glowing crops and disintegrating logos at night have impact, but it’s not enough. High-def daytime images of Operation Mother Mary will shock the world. Everyone will see natural plants beating back that stupid L&B logo and advancing against distilled crops.”

Nguyen held her cupped hands out in the same gesture McCauley used in his video.

“It’s time for humanity to get back to safe, natural food, the kind that was good enough for our ancestors. You’ll watch as it happens, and the world will be watching you, courtesy of World Reporting.”

I stared at her in a daze. Everything was coming together.

“Images have such power. I’m sorry I had to trick you, Mamoru, but that footage of you in the cathedral was just one scene from our little movie. And if it makes any difference to you, which I guess it won’t, I tried to stop them. But the director from World Reporting wouldn’t budge. She said it would make great footage.”

Someone knocked on the door and called out, “Master!” Were we going to sit around drinking coffee?

Nguyen stepped over me on her way to the door. “One more thing. I’m the one who named this operation.” She took off her AR glasses and tossed them in Yagodo’s lap. “I won’t need these anymore,” she said. I heard English.

For a second her avatar blurred, then disappeared. The real Nguyen opened the door.

“Hey guys! Nice to meet you!”

It was the skinhead again, wearing the same sunglasses. She gave us a stylish wave and walked to the table, stiletto heels clicking across the floor. Her shoes, expensive-looking beige jacket, and black slacks were a strange contrast to her shaved head and heavy sunglasses.

“Nice to see you again, Isamu.”

Yagodo snorted dismissively. I felt suddenly disoriented. Did they know one another?

Two men followed her through the door. One was fat with long hair and carried a multi-camera array on a belt-mounted stabilizer. The face of the second man was concealed behind a mask and goggles. He carried an AK-74.

The cameraman stepped across me and waddled over to Yagodo’s desk where he could cover the whole room with his array. He chose his position, brushed the hair out of his eyes, and unfolded a monopod to take the camera’s weight.

The gunman shut the door and stood next to it, feet slightly wider than shoulder width, shoulders relaxed and loose. He kept the muzzle of his weapon trained on Yagodo. With his tinted goggles and the mask covering the lower half of his face, he was a sphinx, but his posture was that of a seasoned professional.

“Take it easy, everyone.” The woman pointed to the gunman. “I like to travel with security. Jean over there is my c-man.” She looked at Yagodo, put a hand on her hip, and cocked her head. “He needs to port in to your stage.”

With the gun pointed at him, Yagodo wordlessly made the invitation gesture with an upright index finger against the corner of his eye. The three newcomers blurred and were replaced by avatars. The woman and the gunman hardly changed, but the cameraman’s avatar was a complete makeover—slim and trim.

“As I said, nice to see you, Isamu,” she said in Japanese this time. Yagodo frowned and squinted at her warily.

“I thought I’d see you again, but not in the flesh.
This
is unpleasant. You’re welcome to turn tail and get out of here.”

“My my. For someone so richly paid, you don’t seem very grateful. You were worth it, you know. That old Internet footage of the Linux developers made for a great program.”

“Yeah, except I didn’t know you planned to use it that way. Anyway, I gave you back your damn money.”

“You mean your donation? It’s helping to pay for this report.”

“You guys must be running out of dirt to dig. Then again, why report the news when you can make it up?”

“That’s not nice, Isamu. We mostly tell the truth. Everyone knows genetic engineering and engineers are a danger to society, and dangers to society are what everyone wants to hear about. Don’t you get it?”

“You’re all bottom feeders.”

“I wonder.” She put her sunglasses on her head. Her eyes were ice blue. The pupils were like the vacuum of space. I watched as the red bob cut filled itself in under her sunglasses.

“People can’t get enough of ‘Sascha Leifens Reports: Engineers Gone Wild.’ ”

Sascha was in news program mode. She crossed one ankle lightly over the other and drew her shoulders back. “Do you know how many people saw our teaser? A hundred million!”

I forgot the numbness in my spine at the thought of so many people hearing my name.

“You’re Mamoru Hayashida, aren’t you? Could you sit on the couch? We can’t shoot you lying on the floor.” Sascha pointed to the sofa next to Yagodo. He moved over to make room for me.

I looked toward the door. The muzzle was pointed at me now. The masked man pointed to the sofa with his jaw. I sat down next to Yagodo.

“Wait, someone’s missing. Nguyen, can’t we rely on you for anything at all?” Sascha stamped with irritation and punched a hole in the parquet with a stiletto heel. Nguyen bit her lip and hung her head.

“I’m through asking you to do things. Which one of you is going to call our missing guest from Mother Mekong?”

Kurokawa said nothing but lifted his left hand in the telephone receiver gesture.

“You must be Takashi Kurokawa. Could you resize yourself? Otherwise there won’t be as much impact.” Sascha peered at Kurokawa through a thumb and forefinger frame. Kurokawa nodded. A second later, his legs were too short to reach the floor.