Colossus (5 page)

There was quite a silence. Kyrovitch got in first.

“Does this mean that this thing, this Colossus”—he tried to sound contemptuous, but did not quite make it “works without human aid, and that you cannot stop it?”

“It does.”

Kyrovitch searched around for his voice, finally got it.

“You have in fact, delivered the destiny of the world—so far as the USNA can do that— into the hands of a machine?”

“Yes.”

It was like a pebble dropped down a well; there was a deep silence, then came the splash. All the correspondents spoke at once, even including Plantain. Once more the President held up an authoritative hand.

“Please. The best brains of this country available to me and my predecessor have considered this point at great length, and it comes to this. Don’t try to tamper with Colossus, and don’t try to attack us, and there is nothing to fear.”

“I am happy to accept the President’s assurances on this point,” said Plantain. The President did not look noticeably grateful. Plaintain went on, “But how do you cope with the madman problem? And may not the machine be deranged by fire or flood or earthquake? I am sure you have an answer, but it would be interesting to know what that answer is.”

“Forbin, go ahead,” the President spoke tersely. He was getting bored, it was like talking to a bunch of high-school kids.

“Before site work began, we considered the earthquake and flooding angles. The best Japanese brains were consulted—naturally, we did not disclose the exact nature of our requirements—and I can only say we are satisfied. We also chose a spot which has been free of all earth movement since the Rockies were formed around two hundred million years ago. As for flooding, a short answer. If Colossus were submerged—and it could stand that and go on working the rest of the USNA would have to be covered to an average depth of eighty-five feet by the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Climatic changes between fifty below to one fifty above centigrade can be tolerated. Madmen? Several large holes were made, of course, during the excavation and removal of rock. When all the equipment was in, the holes were sealed. All floors and walls now contain a net of wires which must be cut to get in, embedded in the cement for protection and concealment, and if these are tampered with—you would first have to get through an average of three feet of cement, concrete to you Europeans—then, you set Colossus off. There is only one entrance left open, and this is guarded by the U.S. Marine Corps. Their job is to keep people away from that entrance for their own good, for the entrance now acts as an air shaft, and its real defense is a zone of intense radioactivity. Anyone entering this zone would be killed instantly. The only adequate shielding would be a `suit’ of lead which would make the wearer nine feet wide. The entrance is three feet wide. Beyond this zone there are further defenses which would deal with any remote-controlled device sent in. One final point. If Colossus knows there is an attack on this country’s interest impending and that an attack is probable within the next eight hours, it automatically closes the entrance doors, which are steel, four feet thick, and issues an alert to all Civil Defense Zones. A Red warning would also be passed to all concerned when Colossus operated its weapons.”

“But surely, Professor, there is some way in which you, the creators of this thing, can get at it?”

The President intervened.

“No, there is not. As you know, it is an open secret that for years there have been nerve and psychological gases and drugs which are able to change the state of the human mind. If Forbin and his colleagues were subjected to this sort of treatment by hostile agents, they might well do as they were told, and with their knowledge, inactivate Colossus. No. There is no way in. No human being can touch Colossus.”

Chapter 4

The historic press conference was over. The reporters and TV men had gone, to be replaced by a selection of high Government officials. The Secretaries of State for Peace, International Affairs, and Finance were there, along with Forbin’s chief assistant, Dr. Fisher, and an assortment of aides. This party had watched the telecast elsewhere in the Precinct, and were now being entertained by the President, cheerfully holding court, beaming and handshaking amid the subdued chatter and clink of glass on bottle.

Forbin had withdrawn slightly, smiling mechanically at various compliments paid him. With the Project launched and irrevocably rolling, no longer a project but a fact, and with the excitement and tension of the telecast over, he felt drained, yet not empty. There was an increasingly strong feeling of foreboding taking over the space left by the completion of his work. He also felt hot, tired and depressed.

Fisher came over.

“So that is more or less that, Charles.”

“Yep,” said Forbin, nodding. “What did you think of the show?”

“I think it went very well, really.” Fisher did not sound overenthusiastic. His hand fluttered nervously to his tie.

“Go on,” said Forbin with sudden sharp interest, “what else?”

Fisher glanced round, gave his tie another tug, and lowered his voice as he moved closer. “To be honest, I rather wish these people weren’t so cocksure and happy. Perhaps it’s because we are practically out of a job, or it’s anticlimax—but I think I have allowed for all that. Yet I’m left with a nasty taste, and I can’t really say what it is.”

“Is it Colossus?”

“Yes, I guess it is,” Fisher gave a short false laugh. “Frankenstein should be banned reading for scientists.”

“I’d be more inclined to make it compulsory reading for nonscientists.” Forbin peered into his glass. “I wish to hell I could get out of this armor. This collar is killing me.”

Fisher ignored the last remark, stared thoughtfully at his chief. “You’ve got the same itch in the middle of the back.” It was a statement, not a question.

Forbin nodded. “Maybe it was always there, but it’s gotten more pronounced these last few weeks. Could be just nerves.” “If it is, then it’s catching,” said Fisher in a low voice. “I had a very curious conversation with Cleo yesterday—”

“Come on, boys, break it up!”

It was the President in his best convention mood. Face flushed, beads of perspiration on his forehead and nose, little drops glistening in the light.

“Forbin, Fisher, your glasses, come on, gas up and come over here, we’ll have a toast or two.” He gripped their arms, one on each side of him, and steered them towards his desk. An aide replenished their glasses. Both had been drinking Scotch, both now got martinis.

The President, now behind his desk once more, picked up his glass and looked expectantly at Prytzkammer. The PPA got the idea—that was why he was PPA—and raised his soft voice slightly.

“Gentlemen, the President wishes to give you a toast.”

The chatter subsided at once, there was a general turning towards the President. Looking at their bright, flushed and excited faces, Forbin felt his stomach turn slightly. Any moment now, he thought, they will burst into “Hail to the Chief.” He gazed with considerable repugnance into the martini. Someone knocked an ashtray over, there was the sound of breaking glass.

“OK, Hunston, don’t worry,” called the President, beaming. “We can charge all this fan-tan to Colossus, no one will spot the extra two dollars—except Benson, and I can fix him.”

There was a general polite laugh. Benson was the Secretary of State (Finance).

“Right, now,” said the President briskly. “I don’t aim to keep you fellows long from your drinks, but what I want to say is this—”

But whatever it is, it was never said. There had been one silent, nonsmoking, nondrinking guest in the sanctum, and he spoke first.

The teletype started chattering.

There was complete silence, apart from the teletype, for nearly five seconds; a long time in the circumstances.

Forbin felt a shock race outwards through his body to his extremities, a shock that left his skin cold and damp. He saw that Fisher’s face was pallid, his half-raised glass clutched in a frozen hand. The President’s face was blotchy, his mouth slightly open. Somewhere an aide laughed nervously, and the sound broke the spell. Forbin roughly pushed a Secretary of State aside and ran to the machine, followed by Fisher and some others. The President did not move.

Forbin bent over the machine, staring at the paper in disbelief. He tore the typed strip off the machine, still looking at it. The President found his voice first.

“What the goddam hell goes on?” He banged his glass down, and headed for the machine. “Well?”

Forbin turned as the President approached. His face was as pale as Fisher’s.

“I don’t know.” Forbin struggled to keep his voice level. “I think you should call the party off, and clear the room of all non-Colossus people.”

The President instantly swung round to face the majority of his guests. “You heard!” There was a faint hysterical edge to his voice. “Everybody who is not Colossus-cleared, out— now!”

The room cleared rapidly, and there was more than one nervous glance at Forbin as they left.

The President looked round the room sharply; there remained the two scientists, the Secretary of State for Peace and the Chief of Staff of Armed Forces. As the room emptied, the remaining guests drew closer to Forbin, who stood silent. Satisfied that all non-Colossus personnel had gone, the President wheeled on Forbin.

“Give!”

Without speaking or altering his blank stare into space, Forbin passed over the teletype slip. The President snatched the paper, and scanned it hastily, his face closely watched by the remainder of his guests with some anxiety. They got full value; the tension eased from his face, to be replaced by relief, then puzzlement, and finally anger. The color flooded back into his face, he was bright red, his eyes hard as stone as he faced Forbin.

“What is this crap! If this is some long-haired bastard on your staff being funny, Forbin, I’ll castrate him personally, I’ll—”

But Forbin was not listening. He brushed past the President to the direct-line communication set on the President’s desk, the direct line to the Secure Zone.

“Cleo? Forbin. Is the Colossus T/P link to you operating? What? Well, find out! Call back.” He replaced the handset, and spoke to the President. “We’ll soon know, though I would have said it was impossible—hell, it is impossible.”

He stared hard at the First Citizen. As on an earlier occasion, there had been a subtle change in his attitude. Forbin was talking to an equal.

The remainder of the party was, understandably, puzzled and anxious. The President’s demeanor had taken some of the tension out of their attitudes, but there was still enough to go round.

“Well, what does it say?” burst out Fisher. “For God’s sake, don’t keep us hanging by our ears!”

“Go on, Forbin, tell them.” The President thrust the paper back into Forbin’s hand. The look Forbin gave the President indicated clearly that he had every intention of doing so, anyway.

“All it says is this.” He held the slip so that all might see. There were just five words:

FLASH THERE IS ANOTHER MECHANISM

Puzzlement was now general, tension had largely gone. The Chief of Staff picked up his drink and frowned at the Secretary of State for Peace, who frowned back. Only the two scientists continued to look pale and haunted. Forbin spoke again.

“And it’s no good anyone asking what it means; you know as much as I do, so don’t—”

Fisher, following his own train of thought, cut in.

“I suppose,” he spoke slowly, formulating his ideas as he went along, “if a question had been fed in by some clown back in the Secure Zone, this might be the answer. But why wouldn’t the question show up on this machine? It is in parallel, and should—”

In turn, he was cut short by the soft ping of the direct line. Forbin answered.

“Yes, speaking. You’re sure, Cleo? Switch on the screen and show me the roll since we started. Yes, now.”

Without reference to the President, he reached over and flicked a switch on the desk’s control panel. Immediately the small screen in the base of the direct-line instrument came alive, and a few seconds later a roll of paper was presented to the scanner, held by a pair of obviously feminine hands which belonged to Cleo Markham, one of Forbin’s top cybernetic experts. He noted that her hands were shaking slightly.

“Yes, Cleo, I see it. Now, from the beginning, unroll slowly.” Cleo did as she was told. Apart from the time, printed down one side of the paper every fifteen minutes, there was a complete blank from ten o’clock until the first message: EXPLAIN LOVE.

There followed the rest of the exchange, ending with SHAKESPEARE SONNET CXVI, then nothing for forty-five minutes until FLASH THERE IS ANOTHER MECHANISM.

Forbin studied the picture carefully, then closely questioned Cleo and Blake, the duty scientist in the watch room. He checked all possibilities, including erasures on the roll, machine and line faults. Finally he ordered Cleo and Blake to keep quiet and to take the roll out of service for closer inspection later.

Forbin turned and looked grimly at the President.

“I’m satisfied that no question was fed in. That message came straight from, and was originated by, Colossus. I have a shrewd idea what it means—”

“Wait,” grated the President. The red light over the door was on, but it was not a steady light; it waxed and waned in intensity—the urgency signal. At the same moment the PPA’s voice broke in.

“Urgent message, sir!”

“Jesus, what now?” muttered the President; then in a louder voice, “Well?”

“Soviet Ambassador on the phone, sir. Insists on speaking to you most urgently.”

“Put him on.” The President might have a fading grip on Forbin, but it was still granite hard elsewhere. His hand resting on the phone, he looked round at his staff. “Stay.” Then he picked up the phone.

“Yes, speaking.” His eyes darted restlessly about, from the teletype to Forbin, to the Chief of Staff to Fisher—then quite suddenly they became still, his face impassive. “Yes, Ambassador, I heard. In view of the importance of your statement, I would be obliged if you would repeat it.” There was a tense silence, all eyes staring at the President as he listened intently.