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Metzger’s eyes narrowed. “Why do you think that?”

“No concrete evidence. Just intuition. David’s been acting funny toward me. It’s subtle, but I’m picking it up. And he’s the last person we should ever underestimate. So send me a scrambled text when you want to have a face to face, and I’ll contact you. No use tempting fate.”

“You’ve been very careful, Kira. You’re probably just imagining things.”

“Could be,” said Kira. “But let’s not take that chance.”

And with that, the connection ended.

51

The story of the alien nanites spread around a horrified globe in hours. Every man, woman, and child was stunned to their cores. What did this mean? Would the nanites emerge as a powerful force for good, improving the human condition? Or were they a harbinger of doom? Was the end of the world only days or hours away?

Representatives of the
Copernicus
, still the most respected global authority on all things alien, held press conferences, and individual nations did the same. Scientific and governmental authorities everywhere tried to calm nerves and avert panic. Each described experiments showing the nanites were harmless—that a person could ingest them all day, could
bathe
in them, without any adverse effects—and insisted that that they would reach a population equilibrium as did all organisms. They called on microbiologists to hit the airwaves, reminding people that humanity had always shared the planet with microbes, which were the dominant form of life on Earth in terms of biomass, and had been for ages, despite being invisible. That harmless microbes populated human bodies by the trillions and were breathed in with every lungful of air ever taken, yet were almost universally ignored. Scientists were quick to point out that if the aliens wished humanity ill, they could have programmed the nanites to digest human flesh as efficiently as they were able to digest metal and rock.

These efforts succeeded in steadying nerves to some degree, and raw, mindless panic was largely averted—at least for a while. But this panic wouldn’t be contained for long.

The study of the alien nanites went on around the world and around the clock. And in contrast to the study of the alien ship and ZPE drive, rapid progress was made in understanding the construction and reproductive strategies of the nanites. But this was a far cry from understanding their purpose or finding a way to stop their spread. Encyclopedias could be filled with what scientists had learned about the rhinovirus, which caused the common cold, but mankind was still helpless to prevent this ancient scourge.

Software was the key. Sentient beings had programmed the nanites for some purpose, and there were only two ways to learn what this purpose was. Wait until whatever was going to happen happened. Or find a way to get a peak at the instruction manual.

Because of the high visibility of the U.N. effort, the work of the
Copernicus Nanite Team
became more closely watched than any national or individual effort, although the identities of the scientists involved were carefully guarded. It was not only the most important team on the
Copernicus
, it was likely to be the most important team ever assembled on the planet. And Matt Griffin was at its helm.

And he was hard to miss.

Jake had worked through the American Nobelists to arrange for a contest to be set up almost exactly as he and Griffin had discussed. Thirty software experts, who were engaged in their own nation’s programs and weren’t eligible for the
Copernicus
effort, had each compiled a puzzle, a computer problem that was diabolically difficult but solvable in a reasonably short period of time by someone with the proper genius and experience. About four hundred experts, two nominated by each government, participated in the hour-long contest. The winner would lead the
Copernicus
team, and would be able to organize the other four hundred participants in any way he or she wished, and call on any of them as needed.

Fully fifteen percent of the entrants didn’t solve a single puzzle in the time allotted. Seven contestants solved four puzzles, and one solved five. Matt Griffin solved fourteen. He could have solved every one of them within the hour, but fourteen would already raise enough suspicions.

Even at fourteen, the other contestants cried foul. Solving five or six was at least
conceivable
—but what Griffin had accomplished was not. He must have found a way to cheat somehow. So immediately after boarding the ship, Griffin held an hour-long meeting inside the ship’s central park, which was open to the sky and bordered on all sides by five stories of rooms, like a football-field-sized atrium in a Las Vegas resort. During this meeting, in the presence of hundreds of members of his team, Griffin fielded additional software challenges from the top five runners-up, his computer monitor tied into a fifteen-foot-high screen behind him. He solved problems in ways that hadn’t even occurred to their designers, and with such speed and elegance that not a single member of the crowd saw his abilities as anything short of miraculous.

At the end of his first day leading the
Copernicus Nanite Team
he was legendary. For his brilliance, yes, but also for his erratic personality. One minute he was arrogant and caustic. He was demanding, rude, and insulting. He seemed to take a perverse pleasure in humiliating the geniuses around him. The next minute he was gregarious, yet discouragingly unhelpful, claiming to be too busy to solve problems easier than those he had previously solved in an instant.

And as near as anyone could figure out, the only time he stopped eating—
ever
—was when he was talking. Yes, he was big man, but his appetite seemed unquenchable.

Where had this guy been? Most decided he was working with the U.S. government on cyberterror, cyber war, and intelligence gathering. Intelligence agencies across the world were called on the carpet for not knowing of the existence of this bearded phenom. Nations realized in an instant that systems they had thought were impenetrable were as flimsy as tissue paper where this Matt character was concerned. He could hack their computers and lay bare their most guarded secrets whenever he wanted.

The members of Griffin’s team couldn’t begin to understand his intuitive leaps—but his ideas never failed to work as promised. And while he drove his subordinates to exhaustion, none could say he spared himself this same outcome.

But he was still required to report back to his U.S. backers, so as exhausted as he was, he found himself slumped against a bed in a luxurious but tight stateroom facing a wall-to-ceiling window that overlooked the South Atlantic. His view was currently being blocked, however, by Major John Kolke, Colonel Morriss Jacobson, Andrew Dutton, and his friend and acting chaperone, David Desh.

Desh had joined Griffin only six hours after the hacker’s arrival, not having to take a sojourn in South Africa to win a software contest. One gellcap later, Desh was healing beautifully, although it would take weeks for him to fully return to normal.

At least normal physically. Emotionally, he was a train wreck. And for good reason. He had repeatedly made costly mistakes. His close friend was dead. The Icarus project continued to take body-blow after body-blow, and his vision of creating a better future was getting more and more unlikely to come to pass. And worst of all, the woman he loved and respected, instead of being a trusted emotional anchor, had become unpredictable, and possibly treacherous.

All of this was enough to test the emotional balance of the strongest psyche, but the list didn’t stop there. He was injured, an alien plague had been discovered, which had him on edge along with everyone else in existence, and he was forced to interact with Colonel “Jake” Jacobson, the man responsible for killing Jim Connelly. Worse, he found himself
liking
him. Not really surprising, but very disconcerting, and another blow to his emotional stability. Jake and he spoke the same language, possessed the same skills, had had many of the same experiences, and even the same goals. He had heard more than one tale of old-time cold-warriors from Russia and America, who had spent their careers as adversaries, becoming fast friends once detente had hit due to the undeniable connection they shared.

Desh couldn’t have felt the loss of Jim Connelly more profoundly. And he hated himself for not hating Jake more. At the same time, he hated himself for not loving Kira Miller
less
.

In short, Desh knew he was a giant fucking mess, although he suspected a psychologist might use a slightly different term for his condition.

 
Desh was here as an observer, so he had tried to keep as low a profile as possible, pretending to be a fly on the wall. Dutton cleared his throat and Desh knew the meeting was about to begin.

“We’ll try to keep this brief,” began Jake’s civilian boss, staring at Matt Griffin. “But we need to know where you are. And if you’re getting anywhere. We’d also like to request that you try to tone yourself down when you’re enhanced. To put it bluntly, you’re considered the most vile asshole who ever lived around here.”

Griffin swallowed a chocolate chip muffin and reached for another from a bag Desh always managed to keep filled. He winced. “I’m doing the best I can,” he said miserably. “I’m just glad my alter ego hasn’t killed anyone—or worse. I’m managing to control him, but only a little. And then only because this problem is one of the few he’s encountered in a long time that is truly challenging.”

Dutton sighed and decided to move on. “You’ve had two days now,” he said. “I know you’ve been making progress, but where are we?”

“I’ve been splitting my time between two initiatives,” reported Griffin. “The first is learning what our nanite friends are programmed to do. And the second is discovering a way to broadcast a self-destruct command.”

“You think these things have a self destruct switch?” asked Kolke.

Griffin nodded. “I’m nearly certain they do. But it doesn’t matter. If they don’t, I’ll find a way to design one myself.” He paused. “As to learning what these bugs do directly, that’s not going to happen. These are alien devices with alien logic and alien programming.”

“Yet I’m told you’ve made great strides in
unpacking
the software,” said Jake. “Is that the right word?”

Griffin nodded and tore the cap off another muffin.

“Your team is the only one making any progress from among the thousands around the world,” said Dutton. “It’s gotten to the point where all other teams are basically waiting to see what you’ll come up with next. You tell them to do something, and it works—it moves the ball forward. But no one on any team, including your own, has been able to figure out
why
it works, which is driving them crazy. They expect not to understand the alien instructions. But they expect to understand what
you’re
doing. They ask you how you knew to take the approach you did, and you basically tell them to fuck off.”

Griffin sighed. “I tell them that because I have no clue myself. You’ve never been enhanced, but the gulf between me and my alter ego—call him Super-Matt,” he added with a grin, “is like that between a bird and a human. I’ll be honest with you, what we’re trying to do should be flat out impossible. Yet my alter ego is getting very close to breakthroughs on both fronts. If I could explain why what I’m doing works, I would. ”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Jake. “If everyone is frustrated because they have no clue what you’re doing, that’s too damn bad.” He paused and gestured toward Griffin. “So please continue. Where are we? You said you couldn’t learn directly what these nanites are up to. Does that mean you have a plan to learn
indirectly
?”

“Very good,” said Griffin. “Yes. You can think of these nanites as computer worms, in a way. A worm burrows into your computer software and multiplies and spreads. But the most malicious ones have time clocks. They spread for weeks or months beneath the radar, not causing any problems, until they’ve invaded millions of computers. And then, at a certain date and time, they mount a coordinated attack. They carry out programmed instructions, or access certain websites to get instructions from their masters, who can use them to take over huge networks of computers for nefarious ends.” He shoved a muffin into his mouth as the others in the tiny cabin considered his words.

“Did you just use the word
nefarious
?” said Kolke with a crooked smile.

Desh grinned. Matt Griffin’s word choices often brought smiles to people’s faces.

Griffin swallowed another huge chunk of muffin and ignored the major’s comment. “So when you find a worm that is multiplying but otherwise not doing anything,” he continued, “a common trick is to speed up time. Accelerate your computer clock. Make computer time run a thousand-fold faster than real time. If the worm and its brethren have been programmed to lay dormant until March 5th, you make them think its March 5th, and you see what happens. This won’t tell you how to stop it from happening. But at least you’ll know what’s coming without having to wait until D-Day, when it’s too late.”

Jake scratched his head. “But how would you do that with the nanites?”

“Again, I have only the faintest idea. But my alter ego seems to think it’s doable. With the help of the team, he’s discovered a way to tie into the nanite’s sensory systems. The Europeans spent almost a billion dollars recently building a computer model of the entire world. It’s been nicknamed the Matrix, for obvious reasons.”

“We’re familiar with it,” said Dutton. “We have one also, but we don’t advertise it.”

“Good,” said Griffin. “So basically we would tie a nanite into it, so it thinks this simulation is the real world. Then we set its clock back to just after arrival here. Then we speed up the simulation a thousand fold and watch the nanite replicate, spread—basically do its thing. We’ll see its programming play out, and we’ll track its brethren. When we’ve reached our current point in time, we should see the same density of nanites in the virtual world as we do in the real. Then we accelerate forward from there and see what they do. Do they just keep dividing until they run out of raw material? Do all the nanites form letters as high as skyscrapers saying,
freaked you out, didn’t we, dumb Earthlings
? Do they phone home? What?”