Voelker sighed and sat on a nearby stool.
Khan pointed at the screen. “What is that?”
McCruder pointed, too. “This is serious shit, Kurt.”
Voelker kept his eyes on the floor. “It’s just after-market customization.”
McCruder laughed. “No kidding. That’s not what I mean.”
Khan was nodding. “He’s right, Kurt. This is designed for one thing, and one thing only: killing people.”
They contemplated this silently. This raised the stakes. They were now clearly producing weaponry. The pleasant fiction was over.
Khan added, “I mean, it’s cool-looking and all, but this is real life—not a fucking computer game.”
“What do we do?”
Voelker tapped his fingers on the workbench, thinking. “I’ve almost got the current order filled. While I finish that we can decide the best course of action.”
McCruder threw up his hands. “Like we have any choice, Kurt? If we don’t make these things, our own toys are going to come back to kill us.”
“All right, calm down.”
Khan gripped his own head. “I should have known this was going to happen. It was too perfect.”
McCruder waved it aside. “Let’s stop kidding ourselves. We all know we’re going to build these things—so why go through the theatrics of feeling bad about it?” McCruder grabbed a grease pencil and turned to a whiteboard. He started drawing a casualty list with little human stick figures. “If we don’t make them, someone else will and people will die—along with us. That’s X number of people plus three. If we do make them, then people will die, but not us. That’s X number of people plus zero.” He looked up, vindicated by mathematics. “So we take the course that harms the least number of people.”
Voelker threw a glove at him. “That’s fucking convenient.”
McCruder held up his hands. “Don’t blame me. We all got into this, and I don’t feel like finding out what happens if we quit. Big things are changing in the world—things we can’t stop. We’re just cogs in the machine, and if we malfunction, we’ll be replaced. We owe it to ourselves to survive. Shit, we owe it to ourselves to thrive. That’s what our ancestors did, and that’s what we’re gonna do. It’s our natural fucking purpose.”
Everyone was quiet as they sat listening to the grinding sound coming from the Haas.
Eventually Voelker nodded. “I know you’re right. I just didn’t think I’d ever be playing this role. I wanted to design consumer electronics.”
Khan leaned against the workbench. “I wanted to build suspension bridges. News flash: nobody gives a fuck what we want.”
McCruder rapped his knuckles on the countertop. “So how does the board of Autocracy, Inc., vote? Do we elect to continue in our present endeavor?”
They glanced at each other, then all raised their hands. “Aye.”
McCruder nodded. “The ayes have it. This will make a massively parallel cybernetic organism very happy.” He pointed to the busy Haas. “When are these pieces due?”
Voelker thought for a moment. “They need to be placed at the waypoints by tomorrow, noon.”
McCruder was back to examining the computer screen. “We’ll need time to study these schematics. They look involved.” He peered closely at the screen. “This is serious engineering—look at that flywheel housing—and those hydraulics.”
Voelker nodded. “Graphite-epoxy flywheel spinning at seventy thousand rpm in a vacuum. Floating on a bed of magnetism.”
Khan was pointing at the screen again. “You gotta admit, that’s some cool shit. It even looks nasty. We should render it to see what it looks like in color.”
McCruder ignored him. “When does the first stock unit arrive?”
Voelker grabbed the mouse and navigated to the header of the message. He read for a moment. “Friday.”
McCruder pointed at the Haas. “You need help to finish these pieces on time?”
“No. They’ll be done.”
McCruder started back toward the Mustang. “Then I suggest we study those plans and make sure we’re the best damned cogs the Daemon has.”
Chapter 38:// Assembly
He was a poster child for overdesigned American culture. His square-toed dress shoes had the soles of hiking boots, as though intended to navigate an urban cliff face. His draping dress pants concealed six pockets pleated into its folds, each one with a trademarked name (e.g., E-Pouch), giving him the cargo capacity of a World War I infantryman. Yellow-tint sunglasses wrapped his face, unaccountably designed to withstand the impact of a small-caliber rifle bullet while filtering out UV rays and maximizing visual contrast in a wide range of indoor and outdoor lighting conditions.
In all, his outfit required nearly two thousand man-years of research and development, eight barrels of oil, and sixteen patent and trademark infringement lawsuits. All so he could possess casual style. A style that, in logistical requirements, was comparable to fielding a nineteenth-century military brigade.
But he looked good. Casual.
He walked along the city streets, passing coffee bars and cafés so packed with people that it seemed as if no one had homes to go to. He passed dogs with backpacks and kids wearing Rollerblade sneakers. Everybody with casual style.
It felt good to be among them again. His depression had almost swallowed him whole when his first job was sent offshore. Then his second job. Then his third. Not much call for project managers in the States anymore.
But now he understood again. The world made sense again—and he was still all for progress. Disruptive innovation, they called it. Change was good. Painful, but good. It made you stronger. When you stopped changing, you started dying.
For the first time in years, he knew his situation was secure. He knew he could afford rent—even in his price-inflated neighborhood. That he could dress and live in a style befitting a man of his intelligence and education. He no longer compared unfavorably with people in magazine articles. He was back on track.
He had a purpose. And right now that purpose was to proceed to a specific GPS waypoint and await further instructions from The Voice.
The Voice’s feminine synthetic words came over his wireless earpiece: “Cross the street.”
He obeyed and found himself moving into a crowded retail plaza ringed with national chain stores. The carnival atmosphere was augmented by street performers wearing photo IDs—proof that their family-friendly, drug-tested talents were on an officially sanctioned list in the management office.
The plaza was packed with consumers.
The Voice spoke again. “Waypoint nine attained. Stand by…stand by. Vector 271. Proceed.”
He turned in place, looking closely at a handheld GPS screen until he was facing 271 degrees. Then he proceeded at a normal walking pace as people jostled past him.
“Report ready status of assembly.”
The Daemon’s workshop was open for business. He slipped one hand into his E-Pouch and removed a grooved steel machine part, six inches long. He wrapped his hand around it and kept walking vector 271. “Assembly ready.”
“Prepare to tender.”
He could see the target approaching through the crowd—a twenty-something white kid in parachute pants and a sweatshirt bearing a university acronym. He had the calm, composed look of a Daemon courier. They were on a collision course as people swirled around them like random electrons. The kid extended his right hand as he came forward. They were just feet away.