The Swarm (104 page)

‘Supposing they've responded point by point,' said Shankar. ‘Could the lines represent their shape?'

Crowe pursed her lips. ‘They don't have one - I mean, it hardly characterises them. They've got more of a definable shape when they're a collective, but that makes it even harder to pin them down: yrr-jelly has thousand of shapes, and none to call its own.'

‘So shape's out. What other pieces of information might be of interest. Size of population?'

‘Murray! There'd be so many zeros behind that number you could scrawl it all over this ship and still run out of space. Besides, they're continually dividing or dying…I bet even
they
don't know how many of them there are.' Crowe waggled the cigarette between her teeth. ‘Individual amoebas don't matter. What counts is the whole. The idea of the yrr, if you like. The essence of yrr. The yrr genome.'

Shankar peered at her over the rim of his glasses. ‘We only told them that our biochemistry was based on DNA. You'd expect them to tell us, “Ours too”. Surely they wouldn't have sequenced their genome for us?'

‘They might have done.'

‘But why?'

‘Because it's pretty much the only defining statement they could
make. DNA and aggregation are at the heart of their existence. Everything else is based round that.'

‘Fine, but how could they describe it, if it's constantly changing?'

Crowe was back to staring helplessly at the lines. ‘What about the map idea again, then?'

‘A map of what?'

‘Who knows?' She sighed. ‘Let's take it from the beginning again. H
₂
O. We live in water…'

Behind Closed Doors

Li had set the treadmill to maximum speed. Under normal circumstances she would have done her bit for team spirit and worked out in the gym. On this occasion, though, she didn't want to be disturbed. It was time for her daily satellite consultation with Offutt Air Force Base.

‘How's morale, then, Jude?'

‘Excellent, sir. The attack was a serious blow, but we're in control of the situation.'

‘And everyone's still motivated?'

‘More than ever before.'

‘Well, I'm concerned.' The President was sitting all on his own in the war room at the air-force base. ‘Boston's been fully evacuated. We've had to write off New York and Washington. And there's a new wave of horror stories from Philadelphia and Norfolk.'

‘I know.'

‘This country's going to hell, Jude. There isn't a single person in the world who doesn't seem to know about the creatures in the sea. Someone couldn't keep their mouth shut, and I'd like to know who.'

‘What does it matter, sir?'

‘What does it matter?' The President slammed his hand on the desk. ‘The United States of America has agreed to lead this operation. I'm not about to tolerate some asshole from the UN taking matters into his own hands. They're all so busy trying to push their ridiculous little countries to the forefront. Have you seen what's going on out there? Things are escalating beyond our control.'

‘I know exactly what's going on.'

‘It could be that one of your guys has talked.'

‘With all due respect, sir, there's no reason why other people shouldn't have arrived at the yrr hypothesis on their own. Besides, from what I've heard, the bulk of speculation still centres around natural disasters and international terrorism. Only this morning some scientist from Pyon-gyang said—'

‘I know what he said.' The President brushed aside her point. ‘He said
we
were the bad guys. Apparently we're skulking round in silent submarines attacking our own cities so we can pin it on the Commies.' He leaned forward. ‘Well, they can say what they like. I don't give a damn about being popular. I just want to see this problem solved. I need some options, Jude. There isn't a single country left with the strength to help anyone else. Even the United States of America has been forced to beg for aid. We're being invaded and poisoned. The population is fleeing inland. I'm having to shelter in this goddamn security bunker like some kind of mole. We've got anarchy and looting on the streets, the military and security forces are hopelessly overstretched, and all we can offer our citizens is contaminated food supplies and drugs that don't work.'

‘Sir…'

‘God's still holding his protective hand over the West, but if you stick your feet in the water you're bound to lose your toes. The worm colonies off the coasts of America and Asia are growing, and La Palma's on the point of collapse. Regimes are crumbling. Heaven knows who's going to inherit their armaments. We're not in a position to intervene.'

‘In your last speech, sir—'

‘Don't get me started. I spend all my waking hours coming up with impassioned statements. But do you think the speechwriters use them? I don't believe they even understand what I'm trying to communicate to this country and to the rest of the world. Make the people feel confident, I keep telling them. The American people need to see the determination of their leader, to know he'll do whatever it takes to win this war, no matter how many faces the devil might show. I want the world to take heart. I'm not saying we should give them false hope - we have to prepare for the worst - but people should know that
we're going to get through this
. I keep explaining that to the speechwriters, but when they try to sound reassuring it comes across as insincere and overblown. You can even
hear
that they're afraid. Do any of them listen to me?'

‘The people are listening,' Li said firmly. ‘The world's stopped listening to everyone else. It's just you and the Germans.'

‘Which reminds me, the Germans…' The President's eyes narrowed. ‘Is it true what I'm hearing, that the Germans have their own mission planned?'

Li almost fell off the treadmill. That was ridiculous. ‘Of course not. We're in charge. The UN has handed us the reins. Sure, the Germans are co-ordinating the European effort, but we're working together. Take La Palma.'

‘So why's the CIA been telling me this stuff?'

‘Because Vanderbilt's been peddling lies.'

‘Come on, Jude.'

‘He's a game player, always has been.'

‘My dear Jude, when the time comes for you to take your rightful place, Vanderbilt won't be anywhere in sight.'

Li exhaled slowly. She'd allowed herself to get emotional. For a moment her guard had slipped and she'd given too much away. That wasn't good. In future she'd have to watch herself. She couldn't afford to be drawn.

‘Although,' she said, with a smile, ‘I don't really see Jack as a problem. He's a partner.'

The President nodded. ‘The Russians have sent us a team. They've been helping the CIA with detailed information from the Black Sea region. We're in close contact with the Chinese, and the stuff about Germany is probably nothing. I don't get the impression that they're trying to go it alone, but you know how rumours start at times like this. We should be thankful, really. It's a wonderful thing to see so many people from different nations uniting in God to drive the devil from the sea.' He passed his hands over his eyes. ‘So how are we
really
doing, Jude? I didn't want to ask you in front of the others in case you had to put a gloss on things. I wanted to spare you that embarrassment. I need you to be frank with me.
How much longer?

‘Not long. We're on the verge of a breakthrough.'

‘How long is not long?'

‘Rubin says that if all goes to plan, he can be ready in a day or two. We got lucky in the lab. The yrr are using a pheromone to communicate. We already know how to synthesise it and we—'

‘Skip the details. So, Rubin says he can handle it?'

‘He's certain of it, sir,' said Li. ‘And so am I.'

The President pursed his lips. ‘I'm relying on you, Jude. Any problems with your scientists?'

‘No,' she lied. ‘Things couldn't be better.'

Why all the questions? Had Vanderbilt…

Get a grip, she told herself. He was only enquiring. It wasn't in Vanderbilt's interest to tell tales. The fat bastard had a malicious tongue, but he'd never say anything to make himself look bad. ‘I can assure you, sir,' she said, ‘that we're making good progress. I gave you my word that I'd settle this problem in all our interests, and I'm going to do just that. The United States will save the world.
You
will save the world.'

‘Just like in the movies, huh?'

‘Better than that.'

The President nodded bleakly. Then he flashed her a smile. It wasn't the broad grin of old, but there was still a hint of his indomitable spirit, for which she admired him. ‘God be with you, Jude,' he said.

He hung up. Li stayed on her treadmill. All of a sudden she doubted that she could pull it off.

Combat Information Center

Whatever the message had to say about the creatures in the sea, Shankar's stomach was communicating his need of food so loudly that Crowe couldn't bear to listen to the rumbling any longer. She sent him to get something to eat.

‘But I'm fine,' he insisted.

‘You'll be doing me a favour,' said Crowe.

‘We don't have time to eat.'

‘I know. But a couple of skeletons aren't going to solve the problem. At least I've got my Lucky Strikes to keep me going. Go on, Murray. Come back fortified and see if you can belch out a few good ideas.'

Shankar left, and she was alone.

A bit of space was what she needed. It was nothing against Shankar - he was a brilliant scientist and a great help - but he specialised in acoustics. Second-guessing non-human thought patterns didn't come
easily to him and, anyway, Crowe always had her best ideas when she was surrounded by nothing but smoke.

She lit a cigarette, and went through the problem again. H
₂
O. We live in water.

The message looked like a woven design on a rug. A repeating pattern of H
₂
O. The same motif again and again, yet each molecule of H
₂
O was linked to an ancillary piece of data. Millions of pairs of data, one after the next. In graphic form, they appeared as lines. The obvious assumption was that the ancillary data described a characteristic of water or of something that lived in the water.

What would a yrr have to say about itself?

Water. But what else?

Crowe turned it over in her mind. Suddenly she thought of an analogy. Two statements. First statement:
this is a bucket
. Second statement:
this is water
. When you add them together:
this is a bucket of water
. The water molecules would all look identical, but the same wasn't true of the data on the bucket. The data describing the bucket would differ according to its form, texture and markings. A description of a bucket, broken down into thousands of individual statements, would be anything but uniform. Stating that the bucket was full of water would be easy. You just took each of the individual bucket statements and attached an ancillary statement:
water
.

Or, to put it another way, the statement
H
₂
O
could be coupled with data describing something with no intrinsic connection to water. Like a bucket, for instance.

We live in water.

But where in the water? How could you describe the location of something that was devoid of fixed shape?

By describing what delimited it.

Coastlines and seabeds.

The empty spaces were the continents, bordered by coastlines.

Crowe's cigarette almost fell to the floor. She started punching commands into the keyboard. Suddenly she knew why the lines didn't make a picture: they weren't describing two dimensions, but three. You had to bend them to make them fit. Bend them until they turned into something three-dimensional.

A globe.

Planet Earth.

Lab

Johanson was still working on the tissue samples they'd taken from the yrr. After twelve hours of intensive work Oliviera had given up - she couldn't keep her eyes open, let alone look down a microscope. Over the past few nights she'd only had a few hours' sleep. Slowly but surely the mission was taking its toll. Their work was advancing in leaps and bounds, but the pressure was getting to them. Everyone responded differently. Greywolf had retreated to the well deck, where he took care of the three remaining dolphins, monitored the data from their sensors and kept himself to himself Some of the team were visibly tetchy, while others reacted more stoically. In Rubin's case, the stress seemed to take the form of migraines - which meant that once Oliviera had withdrawn for some hard-earned sleep, Johanson was left on his own in the half-light of the lab.

He'd switched off the main lights, leaving just the desk lamps and computer screens to brighten the gloom. The chamber hummed softly, generating a barely perceptible blue glow. The layer of jelly lay motionless at the bottom. The organism looked dead, but Johanson knew better.

If the jelly was glowing, the yrr were alive.

Footsteps rang out on the ramp. Anawak poked his head round the door. Johanson looked up from his work. ‘Leon, good to see you.'

Anawak pulled up a chair, and sat down on it back to front. He rested his arms on the top. ‘It's three in the morning,' he said. ‘What the hell are you doing?'

‘Working. You?'

‘Can't sleep.'

‘I think we've earned ourselves a drink. A glass of Bordeaux?'

‘Oh, um…' Anawak looked embarrassed. ‘Thanks for offering, but I don't touch alcohol.'

‘Never?'

‘Never.'

‘That's funny.' Johanson frowned. ‘I usually notice stuff like that. I guess we're all pretty distracted at the moment.'