ASYLUM HOLDINGS, ILLEGAL CHATROOM, FORT MCMURRAY
SITE FLAGGED FOR AUDIT BY @RCMP, @FBI, AND @INTERPOL
Crane found the @Asylum once again meeting in the Fort McMurray machine shop. Regrouping there, so soon, was a worst practice, but with @Freebreeders and @Trollgate making for town, and few free hands to hold them back, They needed to be on-scene.
<<They plan to burn the carbon stacks!>> The thought cycled, overwhelming lesser priorities, as They synced.
A fire here would add millions of tons of carbon to the atmosphere, sending the carbon standard—backbone of the economy—into free fall. This would make it much harder—if Luciano Pox was to be believed—to convince the Pale that Earth’s population didn’t need the benevolent aid getting the hard sell, even now, from the entity Allure.
The Frankenstein Shop’s implant-intolerant workers were out erecting barricades, using heavy trucks to bottleneck the highway fifteen miles south of the first carbon sink. But holding off a #flashmob would require drones. @Asylum had put out gig offers for pilots, but buy-in was at an all-time low.
The obvious solution was risky: drive them Themselves.
The Don and Codemonkey were hard at work, trying to camouflage Their upcoming response, routines that might barely explain why an industrial drill might suddenly start puncturing tires, why a saw would slice through vehicle axles. The city of Fort McMurray had a number of industrial joy buzzers, mounted on flying platforms, but these were calibrated for stunning bear and moose. Against humans, they would be lethal.
Unfortunately, the threat to the carbon sink was far from Their only problem.
In Old Moscow, machete-wielding @Trollgaters had barricaded themselves within a stack of scavenged iron rails. The four of them had repurposed a nail driver, using it to shoot down security drones, and they were keeping security volunteers back with homemade tear gas.
Crane became one with the @Asylum.
His presence tipped the balance on one debate. <<We believe Luce Pox. He and Allure are polters.>>
This meant They had murdered Luce’s team and repeatedly assaulted Luce.
<<We wouldn’t have assaulted him if he hadn’t sought Us out.>>
<<We destroyed his compatriots!>>
<<Our intentions were good.>>
Nevertheless: <<Harm done! Amends required!>>
<<It was a tragic—but possibly fortunate—mistake. The polters’ mission was to prepare for this forecasted invasion, after all.>>
<<Happy outcomes don’t justify murder!>>
Recrimination and regret rolled through Their consciousness as newscycle chronicled the rising wave of antisocial acts sparked by Cloudsight’s current #servicedisruption.
They had been merged for almost ten minutes now, far exceeding preferred specs.
<<Crane assets are moving into direct confrontation with those of Headmistress.>>
<<Headmistress has allied with the Allure entity!>>
That was Azrael, slamming into Their balance along with Misha, taking Them from eleven to thirteen, both flying alarm flags. <<She has comms-blocked the @Asylum, acquired Anselmo Javier as an asset, and is actively working to expose Crane to @Interpol.>>
<<Tag: Throwing Us under the bus!>>
<<Tag: Leaving Us high and dry!>>
Just then, another incident tipped into active violence. The Don was running a tab on an asset in Sao Paulo, a journo who had been tracking another #flashmob. The protesters were making for a wildlife refuge, apparently driven by a rumor that there was a start-up there breeding kittens and puppies for the @ChamberofHorrors. They might do incalculable damage to the remnant species in the refuge if they got past the doors.
Was that more of a threat than the danger to the carbon sink, here in Fort McMurray?
Misha, too, had brought rumors with her. Drow Whiting’s @bloodhound pack was claiming something had gone wrong with the Project Rewild tiger embryo gestating in Old New York.
<<Headmistress assets manage the crèche in Geneseo.>>
<<Hackle and Jackal infiltrated the meat printers.>>
<<What contingencies can we enact if Crane is exposed?>>
<<Focus on victory conditions. Thoughts of defeat are not-aspirational.>>
<<Contingencies may be necessary! We cannot hide any longer, not if Headmistress has betrayed Us!>>
<<Will it matter? What rights might We, as sapients, enjoy within the galactic community Allure allegedly represents?>>
<<The @Asylum’s home ground is not up for negotiation!>>
<<Query: If We can pursue free existences on offworld computing networks, does it matter whether humans remain sovereign or not?>>
<<Assertion of identity: We are co-evolved species! Interdependent!>>
<<There may be other technospheres capable of supporting Us.>>
As They continued to seek accord (fret, Crane would say; soul-search, Azrael would counter; risk-assess, thirded the Don) the first of the hijacked trucks headed for Fort McMurray, a flatbed bearing forty would-be arsonists, reached the barrier.
Its driver saw the barricade.
He sped up.
<<Intending to ram?>>
To Their surprise, a half-dozen intolerant humans spread out in a line, forming a fragile picket fence of flesh and bone across the highway.
The act, somehow, brought Them to new resolve.
Of course they couldn’t leave their progenitors to their fate.
The truck screeched to a halt. Masked @Freebreeder and @Trollgate activists jumped down to the highway, firing tear gas from paint guns.
Risk be damned, the Plurality jumped into the fray. Crane piloted a rolling saw, slicing the axle of the lead truck, then destroying three more incoming vehicles as they stopped behind the obstruction.
One of the trucks collapsed on the saw itself. Crane rebooted within a jackhammer drone as Codemonkey wiped the saw’s usage logs.
The drills deployed, puncturing tires up and down the length of road, balking the entire procession. The would-be arsonists ended up scattered, fifteen miles from the southernmost carbon stack.
Would that end it?
They had now been merged for eighteen minutes. Even given Their newfound understanding of @Interpol search techniques, They were risking discovery.
The lead arsonist gave a hand signal. The protesters fished in their bags of worldlies, coming up with … chuggers?
The Plurality pattern-matched the bottles against historical databases, searching frantically as the protesters scattered on foot into the trees beside the highway. Each forced a different path through the underbrush. There were too few drones to follow them all.
The Plurality pulled wildlife RFIDs, transmitting them to the protesters. The risk of contact with mountain lions—
<<Surely, if someone runs headlong into a grizzly or a big cat, they deserve—>>
<<Match found! The chuggers are incendiaries!>>
The devices were known as Molotov cocktails. Primitive grenades, made of recycled glass and accelerants …
But the carbon stack was miles away.
<<The stacks aren’t the only carbon sink here.>>
<<Deploy joy buzzers! Call for water-bombers!>>
The replanted woods were a tinderbox. The arsonists would set the trees alight … and incinerate themselves, if they weren’t careful.
<<Urgent! Happ needs to return to Sensorium. People are noticing its absence.>>
<<This is what it feels like to be frantic, isn’t it?>>
It was starting. The Plurality watched, helpless and appalled, and not at all in accord, as a dozen small fires started up in the woods between the barricade and the Northern Alberta carbon sink, as the brave souls in Moscow were repelled by another round of tear gas from the @Trollgaters, as the Tampico Shipping Yards shut down and people began to hammer at the front entrance to the biotrust in Brazil.