“Thank God you‟re here!” Felix said as he greeted Xavier at the edge of the helipad.
“I‟ve been trying to raise Bonn on the line since I called you and they keep telling me to hold!”
“Are they still in their conference?” Xavier asked.
“Yes, and they refuse to be disturbed. This overseas business is heating up faster than anyone anticipated!”
The two men stepped inside the building and began making their way down the hall towards the main programming room where Felix‟s globocom terminal was set up. Xavier shook the rain from his jacket as they walked. The wind they had picked up had fast turned into a rainstorm. If not for the sophisticated technology of the chopper and the competence of their pilot, he was sure they would have crashed. As they walked, Felix told Xavier about everything he‟d heard in the last few hours.
“The situation is getting very grim, Xavier,” he said sadly. “The government in exile has appealed to the NWTO and the UN for aid, but they‟re locked in a standoff with the Eastern fleet. Anything they do now would be seen as a provocation.”
“What‟s the EB doing right now?” he asked, pulling his jacket off now that he was convinced it was dry enough to carry. “In your brief, you said they were sending more ships.
Anything changed since then?”
“They‟re hemmed in as much as we are,” Felix replied. “They made the mistake of declaring their support for the rebels a long time ago as a matter of principle. Now they‟re being held to their promise. To make matters worse, a few hours ago the rebel leader openly asked for Eastern support to end the blockade of their island.”
“Mother of God! Well, that‟s what they get for supporting those devils. If they‟d of thought who they were siding with, rather than just supporting whoever opposed us, we wouldn‟t be in this mess.”
“I‟m sure they‟re saying the same things over there. Under the circumstances, it would be nice to know what Central‟s thinking, but I can‟t get a word from the joint chiefs. I only hope you can help break the deadlock.”
The two passed through a series of checkpoints before they entered the programming room. Inside, there were dozens of deserted terminals that were usually occupied by busy code writers, but given the lateness of the hour, everybody was home. On one side of the room, overlooking the entire operation, was the massive globocom screen. From there, any authorized personnel could speak to anyone in the Smartbomb global defence network, and even to Central itself. At least, that was the way it worked before this crisis hit. Now it seemed the thing was only good for leaving messages.
Moving close to the screen with Xavier beside him, Felix placed his hand on the main terminal and inputted his access code. Soon, the screen came alive with a picture of the globe, and asked for a directory.
“NWTO headquarters, Bonn, Germany,” Felix replied. Quickly, the screen rotated to the proper part of the globe and highlighted the city on its grid. Zooming in to the city, the screen came to rest on an icon of the NWTO strategic defence building, and waited. The two men breathed uneasily as the com system hailed the reception on the other side. Eventually, the screen changed to show the face of some young person.
“Northwest –” he began to say as Felix cut him off.
“This is Doctor Felix Nerud of the strategic command. To whom am I speaking?”
“Uh,” the young officer paused, “Lieutenant Jacobson of the –”
“Never mind that! Is Captain Nagle there? I want to speak to him again.”
“Yes sir, but he is currently indisposed –”
“Will you please tell him Dr. Felix Nerud and Dr. Xavier Garcia are both requesting to speak to him immediately. And if he tries to say he‟s busy, remind him that he was the one who contacted me. And if that doesn‟t work, Captain, please tell him that I don‟t speak to him promptly, I will talk to some of his superiors over there and have him permanently reassigned to the Arctic Circle! Now find him!”
“Uh… yes, sir!” the Lieutenant said, and then hung up on the line. The screen went to standby while they waited.
“Very diplomatic,” Xavier said.
“You have to know how to talk to these people,” Felix replied proudly.
Within a few seconds, Felix‟s “diplomacy” was rewarded with the appearance of Capt.
Nagle on the other line. “This is Captain, Nagle,” he said hastily.
“Good!” Felix boomed. “Well then, Captain, perhaps you could tell me what is going on over there.”
“Over here, sir?” the Captain replied, looking more than a little confused.
“Yes! What‟s going on with Central and the global AI network?”
“We we‟re hoping you could tell us, sir,” the Captain answered. Now it was Felix‟s turn to look confused.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, sir, we‟ve been unable to access Central for several hours now. The joint chiefs asked us to provide them with an updated assessment based on the most recent developments in and around Java. Central replied that we were no longer authorized to access it.”
Felix‟s face went red and his eyes bulged out of his skull. He looked like he wanted to hurl profanities, to demand answers in the most colourful fashion. But he was completely dumbstruck by this latest bit of news. Xavier moved closer to the screen and started asking the obvious questions. One of them had to get the answers they needed.
“Are you saying Central forbade you from accessing it‟s information?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Did it tell you it was because its security protocols had been reclassified and you no longer had access?”
“Yes, sir. How did you know?”
“We were told the same thing,” he replied. “It seems we‟ve all been locked out of the network.”
There was silence as both Felix and the Captain struggled to make sense out of their mutual predicament. Only Xavier appeared to be capable of thinking clearly anymore, even though none what he was hearing made any sense at all. Central had gone ahead and reclassified all its information. In times of emergency, like if the enemy had penetrated the network, this was understandable. But from what they‟d seen, Central had decided to bar both the joint chiefs and its programmers from knowing what it knew. What in the world could justify that?
“So…” the Captain started up again. “Does this mean the two of you don‟t have an explanation for what‟s going on?”
Felix started shaking his head profusely. Xavier answered for them both.
“None whatsoever, Captain. I‟m afraid we‟re all out of the loop now.”
“Well, what should be we do, sirs?” the Captain asked fretfully.
“We need to come out there,” Felix concluded. “We need to get into Central‟s main terminal and access her functions manually.”
“Sir, we tried that, and nothing showed up,” the Captain reminded him.
“Then you didn‟t look hard enough!” Felix boomed. “We can‟t leave anything to chance. Doctor Garcia and I will do the job personally. You just make sure no one gets in our way.”
“What if we fail, sir? What if Central uses more of her security measures and locks us out even further?”
“Then we shut her down, forever,” Felix said firmly. “Goodbye Captain, see you soon!”
Felix shut the globocom down just as the Captain was about to say something more.
Xavier had to admit he was impressed. Felix had looked helpless there for a second, but now he was looking like his old dynamic self. The crisis was severe and it was demanding a solution, and suddenly he was ready to offer up himself to make that happen. Still, Xavier had to ask the obvious.
“What happens if we pull the plug just as the East starts firing its Smartbombs at us?”
Felix thought it over, and admitted flatly: “I don‟t know. But what choice do we have?”
Xavier nodded his agreement. It was a terrible risk, but whatever was going on could not be allowed to continue. Central was behaving in a way that they had never seen before. Under the circumstances, it would be more dangerous to trust her with the defence of the planet than to pull the plug and take their chances without her. But how would they be expected to defend themselves without her? It had been so long. Did their armies even remember how to fight without her protection?