The Genie and the Engineer 3: Ravages of War (18 page)

“Seven weeks,” she gasped, laughing at his antics.

“Oh, Happy Day!” Paul sang.

“She’s going to have a baby, Dad?” Daneel 1 apprehensively
asked.

Paul turned to the Scottie. “Yes, Daneel, Mom is pregnant.
This will be her first human child and we are quite excited about it.”

“Oh,” the cube replied dourly.

Paul sensed a certain degree of disappointment, perhaps even
sadness.

“Daneel, don’t worry. Mom does not love you or any of the
other Scotties any less. This human baby is not going to replace you in her
heart. Nor in my heart either. Trust me, it just makes our family that much
larger, that’s all.”

Capie reached out to stroke the side of his cube. “That’s
right, Daneel. All of you have a special place in my heart. A human child will
not replace that.”

“Okay, Dad, Mom. Thanks. I guess that I just never thought
about Mom having human babies. It does seem appropriate, now that I think about
it.”

Paul walked over and patted the side of his cube too. “You
will see. It won’t make any difference in how we feel about you or any other
Scottie,” he declared.

Ω

They were back in the Situation Room on the 12th floor,
monitoring the maps. At least twenty Scotties were floating around the room,
some of them engaged in various monitoring or communication tasks, others
waiting for Paul and Capie’s arrival.

“So, what do we do now?” asked Norby 1, as several Scotties
gathered around him. “I mean since Bushwhack failed.”

“We have to go to a fall-back plan,” Paul announced to the
group as he studied their holographic faces. “There is very little that the
wizards of
Errabêlu
care about. They are in love with themselves, of
course, but not with much else, including property, which is easily replaced.
And they are too self-centered to care about each other. But there is one other
thing they
do
care about. Something they’ve spent many man-years
investing in.”

“The governments they control,” Capie said confidently with
a nod. “Of course.”

“So it’s Operation Stalking Horse?” Daneel 1 asked.

“Yes, Operation Stalking Horse,” replied Paul with a slight
chuckle. “I want to start with Beijing, Tokyo, and Canberra, Australia. We will
see how well those work before launching operations in other countries. Daneel
1, put together the teams and send them out as soon as they are ready. We will
monitor operations here via microportals.”

Daneel 1 laughed as he headed toward the map on the north
wall. “With pleasure, Dad.”

Ω

The east wall of the conference room held several displays,
one of them displaying the image of David 707 (from
A.I., Artificial
Intelligence, 2001
) and his battalion (I Corps, 1st Division, 4th Brigade,
5th Battalion) of over 600 Scotties as they approached their LZ. This was
located in a small uninhabited mountain ravine south of Mount Qingshui not very
far west of Beijing, the capital city of China.

Daneel 1 nodded at the map. “Naturally, we can’t just march
in and demand that they surrender. According to our intelligence data, there
are two wizards that reside in Beijing. If we show up in strength, those
wizards will flee, just like they did for Operation Bushwhack. So we have to be
sneaky about this.”

Paul nodded thoughtfully as he considered the options.
“Daneel 1, tell David 707 to use Deception 12.”

The Scotties in the room all chuckled. Daneel 1 cheerfully acknowledged.
“Orders transmitted. David 707 is taking his battalion of Scotties and circling
around 30 miles south of the city to avoid detection and maintain as low a
magical profile as possible. He intends to position most of the brigade on the
rooftops of the Ningbo Bank and the Bank of Beijing and other large adjacent buildings
to the east on Jianguomen Inner Street, east of city center. Once they are in
place, they will go to silent running conditions and await the arrival of a
Chinese wizard.”

“A bank robbery,” Norby 1 observed with a knowing smile.
“Yes, that will make a nice diversion!”

Paul nodded in approval. “At a minimum, several Oni should
show up. If we are lucky, we might bag a wizard as well. David 707 and his
Scotties will throw up a bubble around each one of them, blocking any opportunity
for them to portal out. Daneel 1, please remind David 707 not to hurt them but only
render them unconscious. Now, who is David assigning for the deception team?”

“Rann 727,” he said, identifying the Scottie named after
Arcturus Rann of the Marvel Comics’
Micronauts
. “They will use a page
from Napoleon Bonaparte’s playbook,” Daneel 1 explained. “Rann 727 will take
his 4th Platoon of Company D and will stage a fake robbery at the front
entrance of the Agricultural Bank of China, one block west of Ningbo Bank. They
will throw around a lot of magic while they are doing so, physically disguised
as humans. They will take their time with the robbery, fire off a lot of
ammunition and magical spells and make a ton of noise. All of China will hear
about the robbery. They are instructed to temporarily take hostages but not to
threaten them, and certainly not to actually hurt anybody.”

Paul took a deep calming breath. “It sounds like a lot of
fun, but there are so many things that could go wrong. Perhaps it would be a
good idea if I popped over and lent a hand—”

One of the other Scotties in the room, Gort 737 (1951 film
The
Day the Earth Stood Still
) displayed the face of a young freckle faced
redheaded man on top of his cube. “Dad, they will be fine. They don’t need you
there, risking yourself.”

“I agree with Gort 737,” spoke Daneel 1. “There is no need
to risk you, sir.”

Paul shook his head. “Yes, we’ve had this conversation
before. And probably will again.” He sighed. “Alright, you win. This time.”

All the Scotties smiled.

Daneel 1 added. “Sir, I know what you want done. If a
Chinese wizard and/or Oni shows up, Rann 727 will retreat eastward where David
707 is waiting. The trick here is not for Rann 727 to wait too late and get his
platoon trapped in the bank building. I have recommended to David 707 to place
sentries in hiding on the rooftops of the surrounding buildings, to warn when
Chinese wizards and Oni show up. They’ll likely be coming from the Zhongnanhai
complex, to the west of the Forbidden City. I don’t know if they will fly in or
portal in. My guess is that they will portal in someplace close by, perhaps the
alley behind the bank itself, so I’ve told David 707 to place a sentry or two
to watch that approach. We don’t want anyone to get hurt, especially not a
Scottie or any Normals.”

“I concur,” Paul said, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Oh, one more thing. If the Chinese wizards have any special weapons, or
talismans that are more potent than ours, then I want all the Scotties to clear
out immediately. Come straight back here. Got it?”

“Loud and clear,” Daneel 1 replied optimistically. “I’ve
passed along those instructions.” He paused a moment, then said, “They are on
their way!”

Paul dropped heavily into a seat at the conference room
table. “Daneel 1, assign Robby 747 and his battalion of Scotties to keep the
police away from the operations at the banks. Flood their phone lines with fake
calls, jam their communications and trigger a few dozen fake alarms. If
necessary, disable the electrical systems on their vehicles. We don’t want any
Normals getting in the middle of this operation. Got it?’

“Orders transmitted,” Daneel 1 replied. “Robbie 747
estimates ten minutes to arrival on site.”

Paul rubbed his hands together. “Daneel, while we are
waiting, go ahead and set up Operation Stalking Horse for Canberra, Australia
using Deception 21. Then in Tokyo, using Deception 7, and in Tehran using
Deception 3. And then we wait.”

“Acknowledged,” Daneel 1 replied with muffled laughter.

The wait was agonizing.

An hour crawled by. Capie showed up to provide moral
support, patiently sitting at one end of the conference table.

Paul glanced over at her. “It’s time for the Scotties to
make their big entrance. Are you ready?”

She gnawed her lower lip. “‘I suppose there’ll be a war now,
hmm? All that running around and shooting one another. You’d think that sooner
or later, it would go out of fashion.’”

“Londo Mollari,
Babylon 5
,” Paul stated with a
chuckle. He hadn’t known she was that big a fan of
Babylon 5
. “I suppose
there could be shooting.”

“Will the Scotties be safe?” Capie asked, biting at her
lower lip.

“I guarantee it,” Daneel 1 promised them.

“Daneel 1, let’s see if we can watch some of the action,”
Paul suggested. “A microportal, please, at 100 miles over the city. Use it as a
spy-eye and magnify the image and display it here on the wall.”

A bird’s-eye image of Beijing appeared on their viewscreen.
The display funneled downward as the magnification increased. Soon they were
watching vehicles move around and even tiny human figures walking the streets.

The Agricultural Bank of China’s multi-story building
appeared near the top of the screen. Beneath it, on the street, they could see
ball lightning shooting upward into the sky, holograms of two large
fire-breathing dragons in pitched battle, one of them clinging to the side of
the bank building itself and the other one making short loops back and forth,
strafing the one on the bank building with fire on every pass. Below, at street
level, a dozen Qin warriors in terracotta uniforms brandished long metal tipped
wood-shafted spears, battling in the streets.

Paul was impressed with the theatrics.

Suddenly, at street level, a dozen figures fled through the
large glass front doors of the bank building, plasma fire following in their
wake. Those fleeing dodged and weaved as another group of figures emerged from
the doors and then too from alleys on both sides of the building. Even from
this truncated view, the newcomers could be seen as mostly Oni, though one of
the figures was smaller and behaved differently.

“The plan is working,” Daneel 1 observed, encouraged.

But Rann 727 and his troops seemed to be having a difficult
time, the Oni pursuing aggressively on their heels. Twice Paul watched plasma
blasts intersect the personal shields of his Scotties. Though they stumbled,
still they fled eastward.

Time seemed to slow but in reality, the pitched battle
lasted for less than a minute, until Rann 727 took a left beyond the Bank of
Beijing, his troops right behind him. The wizard and Oni, still in hot pursuit,
drew even with the front of the bank when David 707 sprung his trap.

Without warning, fire rained down from above and from every
nook and corner on the street. The
Errabêlu
wizard and Oni were caught
by complete surprise. They fought tenaciously but were quickly isolated and
encapsulated in magical force-fields.

A Scottie appeared in the briefing room. Rann 727.

“Mission accomplished, Dad,” he reported. “No injuries.
David 707 is mopping things up and will report shortly.”

“Excellent work, Rann 727,” Paul complimented him as he
sighed in relief. “For you and your team. Please let David 707 know that I want
to interview the captured wizard. How many did we bag in total?”

“One wizard and twenty-five Oni, sir,” Paul was informed.

“Move all the prisoners to Azkaban, Daneel, as soon as
possible. Have all of them put into stasis, except for the wizard. I want him
interrogated first. Then put him in stasis with his Oni.”

“My pleasure, Dad.”

“Oh, and Daneel? I want you to go back through the videos of
the bank robbery,” Paul told him. “From my viewpoint, I saw no evidence of
special weapons or any super-powered spells at all. I want you to check the
footage and interview the Scotties involved. See if they saw anything out of
the ordinary.”

Capie chuckled. “Anything out of the ordinary, he says.
Other than the flying dragons and the Qin warriors. Right.”

“Okay, Dad,” Daneel 1 confirmed. “Though I admit the Oni
were more aggressive than I anticipated, I didn’t see anything that suggested
super spells or super talismans. On the other hand, I noted that the Oni fought
more like warriors than soldiers, even more so than our simulated war-games
suggested.”

Paul nodded. The part about the Oni as warriors and not
soldiers made sense. Throughout most of human history, warriors, as
individuals, were typically stronger, faster and all-around better fighters and
killers than were soldiers, and the Oni were by no means an exception to that
rule. On the other hand, warriors acted as individuals and rarely as a team.
Soldiers were trained to fight in concert. Many an army of soldiers had
defeated an army of warriors because team efforts simply accomplished more on a
battlefield.

“We should crank that information into future operations,”
Paul recommended to Daneel 1.

The lack of super-weapons or super-powers puzzled him. Where
was the evidence of the arms-buildup? Where were the talismans that supposedly
rivaled his own in power? Yes, the twenty-five Oni that David 707 had just
captured could be a part of that buildup. A year ago, there probably weren’t
that many in Beijing. But still, it wasn’t quite what Paul anticipated and it
just didn’t seem to make much sense.

Capie gave her husband a suspicious look.

“Okay, I admit it. Back on Mars, I was pretty busy with my
operations planning for helping the poor and needy. I didn’t read all the
strategy and tactical reports you kept sending out. So, tell me, are you
planning to run other deceptions in other cities, like with the dragons?”

Paul gave her his best naughty grin. “Yes, we are. Oh, just
a few things we dreamed up. In Canberra, Australia, the Scotties will project
images of bunyips flying across the sky. Those are mythical Aboriginal monsters
that lurk in swamps, billabongs, and waterholes. Sort of like our Swamp
Creature. For the Japanese, we figure on using Deception 7. That will consist
of a huge battle fought in Tokyo Bay between Mothra and Godzilla—”