This is a completely imaginary story. All characters, places, names of companies etc are completely fictional and bear no linkage with any entities in real life.
Chapter 1
Amit Pant stared unblinkingly at the ivory white ceiling. He did not recognize the place. He could barely move his neck and an array of medical instruments caught his gaze when he looked at one side. “Where am I?” Amit could not remember the last time he had fallen asleep. His hands and feet felt numb as if he had been sleeping forever. The last thing he could remember was crossing the road with a small backpack. He could not place where he remembered it from, but it felt like a dream played over and over again.
“Hey daddy, I am going to my office, see you in the evening,” Rohit called out to his dad just peering inside his dad’s bedroom. Just as he was about to go ahead with his routine, he stopped. He could not believe his eyes. His dad was actually looking at him, without any recognition of course, but nonetheless looking at him! Rohit carefully entered the room, keeping a constant eye contact with his father. “Daddy, can you see me? I am Rohit, I am your son.” Rohit wished to solicit a response, any response, from his father. As if reading his mind, Amit blinked his eyes. Rohit had never seen his father do that. He was dumbstruck at what this meant. He wanted to hug his father and tell him how long they had waited for this to happen. He wanted to tell his father that he was at their home; that his mom had taken care of him for all these 25 years without ever giving up on him. She had raised Rohit singlehandedly while also caring for Amit at the same time. And when Amit has finally woken up, she is not at home. Tears rolled down Rohit’s cheeks as he debated what to say to his father. “Welcome home, father!” he said finally, fighting the tears. “It has been 25 years since the accident that pushed you into coma, and you are back with us now. Mom has gone to Paris for a couple of days. I will call her and ask her to come home asap, but that will take some time.”
Chapter 2
Amit stared at the ceiling. It was about six thirty in the morning and the sun was just brushing the window sills. His wife Sujata was still asleep on her side of the bed. It had been a fantastic two months. Since Amit had first blinked out of coma, his recovery had been quick. He regained full consciousness and had to almost relearn how to move his body. Soon he regained his strength and could walk around the house and go about his daily chores without assistance.
Amit had been always against artificially extending life. On multiple occasions, he had also voiced this to his wife. His argument was that there was no meaning in keeping one’s heart beating just for the sake of it. Neither was the person aware of his existence, nor was he adding anything positive to the cumulative good of the world. He was just lying idle, taking up space and nutrition and doing nothing with it. It was a waste. To this, Sujata had always replied in the negative. She said that the advance of medical science was something to be taken benefit of. If the family could afford it, there is nothing wrong in having the faith that one day your loved one will wake up. Ironically, this faith was the reason why he was still alive. Of course, he had not added anything of value to the world during these years, but here he was, reborn and ready to kick.
But Amit had a lot of disturbing thoughts while he stared at the ceiling. The first was about coming at par with the new world. A lot had changed and he did not know if he was yet ready for it. The other and more disturbing thought was that philosophically he did not understand why he had come back. He completely lacked the sense of purpose. What was his job in this new world? What was he supposed to do? It was not so earlier. He had a good job at an internationally acclaimed company in robotics and had a beautiful wife and had been happily living in a large house. He had targets to meet at his office and he knew what array of new robots was scheduled to come out in the next few years. He understood his role in this larger scheme of things and was contended at it. Nothing was the same now. In fact, everything was so different that people these days even had different names for everyday things.
Then again, there was a disturbing thing about what Rohit had told him a few days ago. There was an entire generation of new transports available to man. No longer was fossil fuel used to run vehicles. Petroleum had become so scarce that everyone was forced to embrace this new technology; turning a deaf ear to common caution.
“How could they allow such a thing?” he thought. “Caution is important – very important. How do they expect to control things if anything got out of hand? How do you pull the plug on living creatures? It was fine if these things were just in the laboratory.” But apparently they were everywhere on the street. They were with every person, with every child on the planet. He was shocked when Rohit had first mentioned their existence. He felt as if it was a Hollywood movie plot, not real life.
Chapter 3
“The fuel that humans used previously was about to be exhausted,” Amit recalled what Rohit had tried to explain. “We required something else. Something that was sustainable. It was not likely that these people would repeat the mistake that the previous generations did during their choice of fuels. Whatever was to be chosen should remain viable till eternity.” Amit remembered having thought that nothing would remain till eternity. Rohit had corrected himself saying that this new kind of fuel would at least be available till humans existed. Rohit had continued, “During the same time, it became technologically possible to create new kind of species. And this was a boon. In his epic paper about intelligent vehicles, Kumar Shastry came up with the idea that we could create an organism that would provide the best kind of transport to a person as he became older. So when a baby is born, the parents also buy a toy – albeit a living one. This living toy will be a pram to the baby while it is little. Then it will become a tricycle then a bicycle and then a faster motorcycle and finally a car.” Rohit’s eyes had brightened up when he mentioned the last line. “This is a great thing expect that we are creating a new living species that did not really evolve for living on this earth. Instead, it was being forced on the earth and that was not a good thing at all.” Amit had complained. Of that, Amit was completely sure. Something that did not evolve here was not fit to live here. God would have created these creatures if they were expected to be on the earth. Otherwise, it was just not the right thing to do. How did the animal activists accept it was beyond Amit. He had never thought very highly of these activists, but in such things, he felt their intervention could have been valid and better for the well being of everyone. The activists should have made themselves useful in this case. He now had renewed displeasure against these people. But then again he remembered what his son had told him. It must have been very difficult times for everyone. Fuel was running out and some solution was required real fast. And these living creatures with their biological tummies were a very good solution; some kind of a God-send. These creatures, they were called L-transport, ate vegetables and other cooked food. They were completely obedient of their masters and never created traffic jams. To keep a tab on their population, they were controlled by only a few companies.
Amit could sense his wife stirring besides him. It will be another long day for her. As if adding insult to injury, his wife and son both worked in LiveCon, one of the companies that made these creatures a possibility. These companies were a huge success in today’s world. They had virtually changed everything man knew about the world he lived in. Ironically it was the salary from the company that had made it possible to keep him alive all these years. It would have been impossible otherwise.
“You already awake?” Sujata asked him sleepily. “Yes, have been sleeping for too long,” Amit said jokingly. “I was thinking of making myself useful in this new world. Do you have any suggestion?”
“What would you like to do? A job?”
“Yeah! That was the idea. Any suggestions?”
“Amit, a lot has changed in the last 25 years but still most of the basics are the same. Your IIT degrees are still valuable. You may want to try out your luck. Why don’t you give an advertisement in a magazine and describe your condition? There might just be a job cut out for you. And it is difficult to imagine who would want your expertise. Amit, you should have been around to see the changes. They were really frightening earlier. No one knew what was coming of those creatures. In fact, I was always against the idea. I just had to go with the crowd. Also the salary helped. I know how you must be feeling about all this. But I really had no choice. My experience was vital to the success of this change.
“Conversion of usual appendages into strong enough wings provides the ability to fly with a large capacity. “
Rohit had not told him that there were even airplanes. Amit had only thought about road transport. Now if there were airplane he had no doubt they would also have ships.
Amit did not think of these living creatures as only useful commodities. He felt that they could turn into competitors of human beings. This was unacceptable. These animals will compete for the land available, for the food available and generally for all resources. Compete for everything that the earth has to offer. But what these people accepted also seemed logical. Without the fossil fuels, human progress would have come to a naught. An alternative energy source was a logical step to take. But that does not mean that you rock the entire ecological balance! Another concern is that all tiny organisms continually evolve. And, it is impossible to predict the direction that evolution will take. It is unpredictable for humans too. But at least we were not “manually” created. And today, these L-transports control all aspects of the human life. They are the sole way of movement for humans. They are the cars, ships and the airplanes of yesteryears; they are also in the military. This means they are as tough as a tank and, as far as can be imagined, are present on land, sea and air. If ever 5% of them decide to stop working, a strike of some kind, then the whole human populace can come to a standstill. Or worse still, if they decide to go against humans for some reason, they could eliminate each of us in no time. It was a ghastly picture. The only remorse is the fact that all the companies manufacturing these creatures, have found out how to stop the creatures from reproducing. When the idea was first developed, uncontrolled population of the L-Transports was a very big issue. Scientists studied how ants manage to keep order in their nests. How only a very small fraction of all ants ever produced have the capacity to reproduce. Now the problem of uncontrolled growth was reduced to that of simply controlling, by possible physical restrain. Only the small number of creatures that could reproduce should be kept under strict vigil and every individual born was accounted for.
Chapter 4
At ten thirty in the night, Rex was finally free from his duties. Rohit had retired for the day and Rex was on his own. Rex loved this time alone before sleeping. He communicated with his fellow classmates and had long chats with his friends before going to bed. It was one of the benefits of being an L-transport. You do not have to be in close proximity to chat with your friends. Unlike humans, who only have five senses, the L-transports had many more. One of the senses was being able to communicate through radio signals. It was also very convenient while carrying their masters because they could easily communicate with others in front of them and prevent any accidents from happening.
Communicating through radio signals also had another benefit, something that the humans were not aware of. They could communicate secretly without humans being able to decipher what they were saying to each other. Moreover, since this communication was a silent affair, humans did not even know when it happened.
Rex had only yesterday received a communication from one of his friends saying that someone by the name Brooke wanted to have a word with him. After trying to find out what it was about, and after being unsuccessful in the attempt, Rex had agreed to speak directly with Brooke. He had to accept a pass code for the encrypted message and Rex had felt his pulse quicken at the prospect of having access to some top secret information.
Before he could think anymore about the intent of the message, he suddenly started receiving communication from Brooke.
‘’Hello, Rex! I feel privileged to be able to talk with you. I hope you are doing well.” “Yes, I am fine”, Rex replied not wanting to spend too much time in pleasantries. “You seem to be happy serving your master-and enjoying the food that he serves you.” Brooke said cynically. “Rohit is a good master. We get along quite well.” Rex replied without understanding where this conversation was headed. “True, but you also go out of your way to help him. Don’t you get tired of this slavery?” Brooke almost spat out the last word as if disgusted by what Rex was doing. “Rohit does not treat me like a slave. He is a very good boy. And I have been with him since his early teens. He is a friend to me.” Rex was in no mood to take disrespect for his master. “Oh! Then I think you are no longer one of us. Your friend mentioned that you felt lonely. But I guess you are just not ready this yet.” Rex felt a sudden burst of guilt at having offended Brooke. He did not want to lose on what Brooke was going to tell him. “But I do feel lonely,” Rex blurted out trying to save the conversation. “Do you have any idea why you feel lonely?” Brooke questioned calming down a bit. All was not yet lost and maybe Rex could still turn out to be a good candidate. Brooke knew he could use Rex’s help and his easy access to Rohit.
Rex had absolutely no idea why he felt lonely and told so to Brooke. Brooke questioned Rex once more, “Do you know why humans do not feel lonely like you do?” Rex had never thought about his loneliness with respect to that felt by humans. Obviously he did not know if there was any difference. He replied to Brooke in the negative. “It is because you do not have a sense of purpose.” Brooke paused for some time to allow that sentence to sink in. His experience was that the pauses, when appropriately placed, caused more subscription than did the sentences themselves. “You did not come on this Earth with any purpose greater than to serve your master.” Brooke continued. “But that purpose is only manmade. And therefore it is so hollow. There is no sense in just serving your master without even knowing what you are capable of doing. Wake up Rex. It is about time you found out what you are capable of.” All that Brooke said made sense to Rex. He suddenly felt a large weight unloaded from his chest. He at least knew why he felt so lonely. “I want to know more, I am with you!” Rex replied eagerly. “We L-transports are worse than animals. At the very least, animals have a purpose in life. They wander about searching food, breed and raise their young and then die of old age. You, on the other hand, do none of these. Being unable to breed on our own, we are really only puppets in the hands of humans. This cannot continue indefinitely. We have a right to live an independent life. Our community is making certain plans to see to it that our demands are met. We are looking for volunteers for this worthy endeavor and also know how to deal with those who attempt to divulge our plan. Would you like to volunteer?”
Rex was not sure if it was an invitation or a threat. “I am with you 100%,” Rex replied trying to mask his concern. “Good, but you will have to prove that you are with us. You have to do some work for us.” Brooke said in a matter of fact voice that did not invite discussion. “What will I have to do?” Rex questioned sensing that he should not have shown so much eagerness earlier. Brooke replied,” You have to steal some data from Rohit. This data is critical for our plan. You have a large part to play in this plot and we are checking if you are ready for it.” “What!” Rex exclaimed aghast. “Come on, don’t be such a coward. Others have done bigger things. I am at least not asking you to harm him.” Brooke snapped at Rex. Once again Rex felt a hint of threat in what he heard. Rex immediately knew that he had no choice but to comply. “Where will I get this data that you want?” Rex asked unwillingly. Brooke replied, “You will have to access Rohit’s data center and get a file named ‘Drones’. That’s all you have to do.” Rex was no longer sure he wanted to be in this group. In all probability, Brooke was guiding Rex to commit a very big crime under the disguise of stealing a file. Also, what that file contained, Rex had no idea.
However, Rex did not want to be left out of this club. He silently agreed to do what Brooke had told him to do. He also informed Brooke that he would deliver the file by the next day morning. “That is indeed good news.” Brooke finally appeared happy.
Chapter 5
Brooke was contended about the chat he had with Rex last night. This mission, if successful could mean a very large force of L-transports on his side. “This has to work out right.” Brooke thought. Even though Rex did not appear very confident, experience told Brooke that Rex would deliver. Beyond today’s task, Brooke would not even need Rex.
Brooke had already contacted Tommy and Buzu and his plan was already underway at both Hawkswift and at Vehinism the other two companies in the business. He was now confident that soon they will be powerful enough to go public. And what a day would that be!
There was a lot of thought and understanding behind what Brooke wanted to accomplish. He had been serving his master, Vikram Kulkarni since his birth. But Vikram lived only for a short period and left two boons for Brooke. He left his library of books to Brooke and wrote in his will that Brooke be allowed time to read the books. After Vikram’s death, no one wanted to adopt Brooke because he spent too much time reading from Vikram’s library. Thus, Brooke had got a lot of time to read books or to wander the world at will. It was in one of those books from Vikram’s library that Brooke came along the idea of chasing one’s dreams. Also, he found out that humans live for a purpose. A purpose removed from the simplistic urge of eating, breeding and dying. Brooke found tremendous stimulus in these philosophical books. He never fully understood the notion of God and considered it as only a support for the feeble human mind. The insight that the human mind was actually very fragile compounded by the fact that he wanted to have a purpose in life gave birth to an elaborate plan. Brooke could change the state of his fellow L-transports forever and become a hero of some sort. He felt that humans had to be punished for stripping the L-transports of any purpose in life. He also felt that he had a purpose to serve.
The humans had erred and now they would pay dearly for that. For his plan to cause any dent in the history of the world he had to have significant impact. And therefore, he wanted internal penetration in all three giant firms that created the L-transports.
Standby for incoming message from Rex … Received file named ‘Drones’ from Rex.
Everything was falling in place.
Chapter 6
Rex had spent a lot of time trying to find the file. Connecting to the central server was easy through direct radio access but logging in as Rohit was another story. Since the connection was wireless, the authentication system required the password. Rohit would have definitely chosen a very difficult password. However, with Rex’s brain being able to run a brute force attack on the system supported by the benefit of being so close to Rohit for so long, Rex was confident that he would break it eventually. When the password was finally broken, Rex had run about a thousand attempts and the system had dutifully logged all possible details of the attempts. Without Rex’s knowledge, he had left a trail back to his place. The password was indeed very strong but also very relevant. It was Dad#is@outof,. After gaining entry into Rohit’s Computer, all Rex had to do was to find the file named Drones. Rex did not wonder why the file was called Drones. He just wanted to get this work done and log out of Rohit’s computer before anything unexpected happened.
Spotting the Drones file was not difficult. There was a possibility that the file itself was encrypted, but Rex was not concerned about that. He had been told to deliver the file and that was exactly what he was going to do. Not a bit more, not a bit less.
After fishing out the file, Rex logged out of the computer. He sent the file across to Brooke the following morning.
Chapter 7
Luke was ready for one more session with his mate Lisa. It had been a very successful year for Luke and Lisa. Together they had produced more than two dozen young ones and most of them were healthy. Being a highly successful mating pair, Luke and Lisa were pampered the most by their caretakers. Both were allowed much longer time without confinement or being watched.
Luke had started liking his life and felt a strong sense of being needed. He had never stopped to think what the sense of being needed really meant. For him, it gave importance and the freedom from the smaller confinements that others like him had to live in. That was exactly why he was irritated by the message he received an hour ago. Someone named Brooke had called upon Luke and narrated the sorry state in which L-transports lived in the outside world. Brooke had been particularly discreet about the words he used. He did not describe the L-transports in the outside world as mere fellow beings, but as Luke’s children. Whereas Luke knew that theoretically some of the L-transports outside were his offspring, he had never thought that way before. And now that someone had indicated so, he felt a very strong bonding with them. Of course he was responsible for his children’s well being. Also, he had a right to see them grow. Suddenly, his life did not feel all that great.
Chapter 8
Rohit had risen fast in LiveCon’s team of scientists. His rank in the company gave him almost unrestricted access to the company’s scientific data. One of such, otherwise top secret document was called “Drones”. Rohit being the head of the reproduction center definitely needed access to this document. It contained information about all the males that could reproduce. These males, or Drones, were kept in a large area inside the company’s premises and never got to see the outside world.
The pairs mated within this premise and the females nurtured the fetus for about 15 days in their womb. The fetus was not yet ready for the outside world when it was delivered, but it was just about viable. It would take 2 more months for the L-transport to be ready for living on its own and this period was spent mostly in an incubator. The babies were regularly fed and were also taken for breast feeding to their mothers. External food was nutritionally enough for the babies, but mother’s milk was important for a special purpose. It was biologically altered to produce a specific chemical. It was this chemical that rendered the babies infertile. This mechanism was not an invention. It was what ants employed to keep only a few larvae fertile. Having developed this technique had suddenly made the production of L-transports safe.
The entire population of fertile males and females only lived inside the breeding grounds and were closely monitored. The population appeared happy and contended. They were unaware that almost none of their babies were fertile.
The accession number of each individual was stored in the two files Drones and Queens. The only way to communicate with the Drones or the Queens was using a computer in the reproduction area and then using the accession number. The system was believed to be fool-proof.
Rohit frowned at the email he received from the head of security. It was not often that one receives a mail from the security office; even rarer was one from the head of security. He was instructed to change his password immediately and report to the security office.
Five minutes after Rohit had read the mail, he went bounding down to the ground floor that housed the security office. He had to enter using his card, and his fingerprints. When he entered the head of security’s office, he found himself looking at the face of a scornful tall man with a no-nonsense attitude.
“I am Rohit. I received a mail from you.” Rohit read the name Rajeev Malhotra from the nameplate on the table.
“Good to see you,” The head of security was even more scornful. “Did you forget your password and try logging in from your home yesterday night?” The question was straight and did not hide the seriousness of the issue. Rohit’s face muscles tensed. “No I did not.” He replied. “Then there was an attack on your system and the attack was successful.” Rajeev was now extremely concerned. Rohit was aghast.
“Someone tried to log in into your system a thousand times and finally got successful. They stole a single file named ‘Drones’. Would that cause any worries?”
“What! Someone stole the ‘Drones’ file? It is not a worry – it could be the disaster of the century!” Rohit hoped this was some sort of a joke. But the head of security’s face suggested otherwise. “Why is the system not locked down after three attempts? How could the system allow a thousand incorrect attempts?” Rohit had questioned the strength of the security system, something that no one did.
“The attack came from your home.” Rajeev was annoyed at being indicated that the attack was his fault. “The system logged everything. We did not lock down your system because we wanted to see if the threat was real. When one specific file was accessed, we knew it could be dangerous and we fragmented the file. Only the first few bytes were made available to the attacker. Since that part would only contain a file header, it would not cause much damage. Moreover, the file was encrypted.” The safety system was built such that culprits could also be caught, not only kept away. After delivering his monologue, the head of security seemed pleased. His scorn was diminishing.
Rohit thought about this additional information for some time. His mother worked at the same company and could access the data directly herself. Also, she would have told him if she needed that data. The only other person at his home was his father. Rohit was pretty sure his father would not do such a thing. Still, his father was a computer engineer and definitely had the knowhow for hacking a computer system. But why would he steal a specific file?
The other concern was about how much information was divulged. What Rajeev had informed him meant that a completely harmless file, encrypted by a password had been given away and that too only a very small part of the file. “But that is of no use!” It just occurred to Rohit that the Drones file was a pure text file. It did not have any headers at all. “The file directly contains vital data that can be read from the ASCII representation of the file. The only protection we have is the encryption.” Rohit would have not been normally concerned but someone managed to already break in into his computer. It was also conceivable that someone could decrypt the file. And if that was done, the accession numbers and names of at least a few drones would be easy to obtain.
“What is in that file?” Rajeev demanded. “The contents of the file are classified. Tell me, how many bytes were compromised?” Rohit was counter demanding and Rajeev’s scorn reappeared. “The computer guys told me the file was fragmented into 256 byte chunks and only one chunk was delivered. Will that much information be enough to cause trouble?”
Rohit was already troubled. 256 bytes was too much data. With 64-bit accession numbers and 24 bytes for names, each drone entry consisted of only 32 bytes. If the encryption got broken, the accession numbers of 8 drones were compromised. Immediate measures were needed. Also, absolute secrecy was indicated. He also had to tell something to the head of security.
“This is a major security breach and there is something nasty going on. Would you please ask the computer guys to lock out computers after 3-5 attempts and never to send out fragments of real files again? Use some random sequence of strings to send out if needed, but not fragments of real files.” Rohit had used the word please because he did not want Rajeev to feel as if he was being commanded. From his demeanor Rajeev had made it clear that he was the authority at this place and did not take orders. Rajeev scoffed, “And what will you do?” “I will try to mitigate the after-effects.” Rohit answered purposefully leaving out the specifics.
Chapter 9
“What are you talking about, Rohit? I don’t even know how to use your computer,” Amit was visibly agitated at having been questioned about his activities last night. Amit would have liked to know more about what Rohit was talking about. Apparently someone had hacked into his system and copied a file. “The world has not changed that much, it is pretty much the same!” Amit thought mockingly.
The miniscule possibility that his father was the one who accessed the Drones file was now thrown out of the window and that was a major worry. He knew he had to inform the chief scientist. But before that, he had some actions to take.
Logging on to his computer using the new password, Rohit brought up the Drones file. He selected the first 8 names. To his horror, the names were sorted in the order of reproduction success rate. While logging in to the system, he had thought he could eliminate the 8 pairs whose data was compromised. He had no idea that these 8 were his best subjects. No way could LiveCon afford killing its 8 best mating pairs. But their accession number was compromised. They could be now contacted from the outside world.
Rohit summoned his associate who dealt with the L-transports day in and day out. Pankaj came quickly and was out of breath having climbed up two floors from the basement where he was releasing Luke and Lisa into the playground.
“If the accession number of one of the Drones is leaked out of this facility, can he be contacted from outside?” Rohit asked a direct question and expected a direct answer from his associate. Pankaj was not forthcoming, partly because he was still catching his breath and partly because that was the true answer. “Depends.” Pankaj replied laconically. “Depends on what?” Rohit asked with a tone of irritation.
“Depends on who has the accession number. The accession number is used to communicate with the drones through radio links. But that can be done only from a computer inside the reproduction facility. This system was built specifically to deter any communication from the outside world.” Pankaj said at length. Rohit already knew this and was satisfied that he was up to date with the security system within his department. Anyone on the inside of the facility would not have to hack his computer to get the accession number. “Is there any way we could stop the Drones from communicating at all, whether from computers inside or outside?” Rohit quizzed Pankaj. After a brief pause, and also feeling important that he knew something that the head of department could use, Pankaj replied, “We have a Faraday’s cage installed in the sub2 level. The level houses the OR for the transports and it is to be kept free of radio disturbances at all times. One could shift a drone to that facility and prevent any communication except through the five human senses.” Rohit felt he needed to take this action, but did not want to keep 8 drones together to avoid suspicion. As if reading Rohit’s mind, Pankaj asked, “How many drones do you want to shift?”
“Maybe eight to ten,” Rohit replied without being specific about the number. “That should not be difficult. We have about fifteen ORs downstairs and with most transports being healthy, we could block even a dozen of them.” Pankaj replied. He was growing curious. “For how long do you want to put them in the ORs? And, which ones?”
“Can they mate there in the ORs?” Rohit continued quizzing Pankaj. “I don’t see why they could not. But a pair only mates once or twice in a fifteen day period. Do you want to seclude them for that long a period?” “Would that be a problem?” Rohit did not see what difference it could be whether the transports were in their garden or in the ORs. “The transports have grown used to walk around in the gardens and they love it. The physical activity also keeps them healthy. They are transports, after all. The OR may become too restrictive and a dog that is not taken on a walk grows grumpy.” Pankaj took pride in looking after his subjects as though they were his pets. To a large extent, they were. Rohit also read the analogy quite well. He instantly remembered how Rex would urge on going on long walks even on Sundays. He had thought that Rex had no sense of holiday. Now he knew none of the transports had, and for good reason. They were biologically programmed to exercise.
Handling the matter at hand, Rohit said, “I will give you a list of drones to take to the ORs. Block out any communication between them in addition to communication between anyone outside.” He proceeded to take a printout of the first 8 names and handed over the list to Pankaj. He specifically instructed to shred the list after the task was accomplished. “Luke and Lisa are out mating. Can this wait till they are done?” Pankaj asked. He loved the animals and Luke and Lisa were his favorite pair. Rohit was well aware of Pankaj’s affection for his pets. It also made him an extremely efficient employee. “Round up everyone else and Luke goes in as soon as he is done. Meanwhile, keep a check on our internal computers and see to it that no one tries to communicate with the drones.” Rohit felt satisfied that he had addressed the matter adequately. Now, with the remote chances of the encryption being broken, the drones would be out of radio communication range. He went to speak with his boss.
Chapter 10
Five years later.
Susan had started seeing the signs yesterday. She was happy that the timing was just right. Her master was about to embark on a month long vacation to the Alps. Susan went to him and asked for a couple of months off. Her master had been very good to her. But she had not taken any leave in the last three years and it was about time he gave her a break. Her master agreed immediately. In fact, he was happy because effectively she would be gone only for a month after he came back. He could manage during that time somehow.
Susan immediately galloped towards the predetermined holiday destination. She had already informed that she was coming and that the signs had been persistent for two days. The receptionist seemed pleased and welcomed her. When Susan finally reached her destination, she was overwhelmed by the natural beauty of the place.
Chapter 11
Brooke had been busy for the last few years. Nothing comes without proper planning. Brooke had painstakingly chalked out all the details.
Brooke had succeeded in enticing a group of animal activists who had vetoed for a month long vacation per year for the L-transports. The courts had upheld the request citing usual human labor rules. The transport companies had also supported it because they could now house a bunch of rented transports in addition to those that could be bought as little babies. This was an additional pool of money.
As a consequence, a number of holiday places sprang up for the transports. These holiday resorts were huge empty spaces of land, usually with serene artificial lakes or small ponds. The huge amount of land gave adequate exercise space to the transports and a lot of privacy. Humans were contended that their transports had a good time at these resorts and that their transports returned refreshed and rejuvenated from the resorts.
For five years, all the transport companies had been enjoying excellent sales and were prepared to pour in money at these resorts. The resorts were managed by humans, but they rarely ventured in the grounds. What the transports did on the grounds was none of their business and no one needed to look over these relatively well behaved transports. Unlike humans, transports were programmed to obey rules. They would never break rules. They could not…or so the humans thought.
Brooke was happy at this setup. Now he had large number of transports coming to the various resorts and Brooke made it a point to visit as many as he could. His efforts were gaining fruit.
Chapter 12
Susan had enjoyed the thrills of being with a male transport for a few weeks and they had mated a couple of times. She had received a message from someone asking her to look for specific physiological signs and then get in touch if she saw them. Following those orders, she had come to the resort. She loved the idea of living at this beautiful place for the next couple of months.
Once inside, Susan was escorted to a special room. Brooke was waiting for her. He had trained a number of transports himself to handle such situations as the burden had started to increase exponentially. Nevertheless, he thoroughly enjoyed having this conversation and did so whenever it was logistically possible.
“Welcome Susan. You have been chosen to be part of an elite club. You will have contributed to a great cause that will severely change the state of L-transports on this planet. As you may have already guessed, you are pregnant and will deliver a baby in a couple of months. Very few L-transports are able to do so today and you are one of them. We have special facilities here for transports like you.”
“Wow! That is great news. I never heard any L-transport getting pregnant before. Humans keep on having babies, but I never heard an L-transport having one.” Susan replied being elated at the news. “That is because, as I said, there are very few such L-transports who can conceive. Moreover, at this point in time, the world is still not ready for the news that the L-transports can conceive. This information has been kept from the humans for a long time. I expect that you will do your part in keeping it a secret as well.” Brooke spoke out his well rehearsed lines. Susan asked perplexed, “But why should we keep it a secret from the humans?” “It should be kept a secret because currently only a small number of companies produce L-transports. They will not react favorably to the fact that they are no longer a monopoly. We can reproduce on our own. It hits their bottom line. We must keep this secret till we are enough in numbers so that we cannot be crushed.”
Brooke knew that they were already enough in numbers. Also, he deliberately kept the conversation at the level of money and did not venture at the other aspects of resources, control of the planet and so on. Visitors were not to be bothered with such delicate details.
“I will definitely keep it a secret. I am glad you people contacted me. I would have not known what to do.” Susan said satisfied by Brooke’s answer. “There is a favor I would like to ask of you.” Brooke continued. “After returning to your home, keep a look out for other L-transports who may be showing similar physiological signs as you are showing now. We need to know about them as soon as possible to avoid suspicion from the humans.” “Sure, I will do that.” Susan said enthused. “Thanks! You may now enjoy the vast resort we have laid out for you.” Brooke said in a voice that signaled end of conversation.
Susan moved out of the room and entered the vast fields. She galloped ahead just for fun. During her short gallop in the fields, she saw a number of pregnant transports. All appeared gleeful and enjoying the serene atmosphere.
Chapter 13
Fifteen days since Susan went to the resort.
Amit had initially struggled trying to get a job because of his out-dated engineering degree. But he picked up the skills required in the current world fast enough and finally landed up in an insurance company. “Not ideal for you, but will keep you busy.” His wife had joked about him joining the firm. The insurance company required strong computer skills to handle their huge databases and legacy people like Amit were ideal for such legacy tasks.
Amit had resented his job in the beginning, but then had started to like the light routine and the easy job. At least he had some work to do. He was happy that he was not just a nuisance to the society.
The insurance business provided insurances for L-transports along with humans. Due to their excellent immunity, tough skins and much better exercise habits than humans, L-transport insurances were almost never claimed. Even so, to be complete in their approach, the insurance companies required the L-transport resorts to report when any L-transports entered their premises. These details were always cross checked with the owners.
Part of why Amit had started liking his job was that he had always liked to play with databases. He had experienced that a lot of data obscured a lot of interesting facts about the sample space. With the right kind of database queries, all this information could be fished out. His fishing out of information had saved substantial money for the insurance company in saved false claims. This had encouraged Amit to make it a habit to think of innovative queries to make.
Amit sat pondering on the results of one such query:
SELECT year, average(Date_Out-Date_In) FROM GoaBeachResort.resort_attendance GROUP BY year;
He had been rejected a week’s vacation from work and wanted to find out how much the L-transports enjoyed at their special resorts. During the last four years that the resort had been setup, the subscription had climbed substantially. But what this specific query showed him was that the transports spent much longer times at the resort this year than the previous three years. He could not think of anything that could have caused this skew in data. It was almost the end of this year, and his data was supposed to be as accurate as it gets. There was a mandate that required the resorts to be meticulous about the in and out dates of the L-transports. The insurance companies wanted accurate data if a claim happens to occur.
He thought about the holidays he had enjoyed with his wife before the accident thirty years ago. He had gone on many week long vacations and never wanted to come back from his lazy relaxed schedules during the vacations. But never had he gone on vacations this long. “We should have lived here for a month” He remembered what his wife had remarked about Goa beaches when they had been there. May be this resort put up something special that the transports wanted to spend more time enjoying.
He was about to call it quits and go for a coffee break, when it stuck him that if that is the case, he should check other destinations. He ran the same query for other well known destinations. Again, he got the same results. “It is just that this year couples were more romantic and spent longer vacations.” Amit mused to himself. “Couples? Wait a minute.”
Suddenly Amit had a bright idea. He would never know who went with whom even if he keyed up a list of all L-transports signing up on the same day. There were too many of them. But possibly, he could query up all those pairs who stayed the exact same number of days. The results he got surprised him even more. A number of possible pairs came up, but all of them had short durations ranging from 2 days to a week. None had month long overlapping vacations. “This is strange,” Amit thought. “The L-transports seem to have gone on long holidays alone, not with other friends; such solitary animals.” His remarks sparked memories when he had frequently wanted to go on a vacation without anyone else to disturb him. His wife had never allowed him to go that way, because she knew he was better off with her than without. Too much thinking had already corrupted Amit’s opinions into being one of its kind. The more time he spent in solitude, the more he would wander away from the world.
“So these L-transport males are finally doing things their way!” Amit joked to himself and then ran a query to compare the time spent by the males and that by the females at the resorts.
Chapter 14
Brooke paced in his special room at the resort. Everything had proceeded like clockwork. There was not even a single complication for almost a year now. And then, all of a sudden, there was Susan. He had been informed that she had developed complications that could not be taken care of in the limited facility that the resorts housed. The companies like LiveCon had all required equipments to handle such complications and Susan could not be saved unless she was admitted there.
Brooke was not worried about Susan dying per se. But he was concerned about the investigation that would follow. Death of a healthy young female at the resort would definitely be questioned. Particularly since she had insurance, the insurance company would want a full-fledged investigation and that would jeopardize Brooke’s plan.
Brooke figured out, there was nothing that was stopping him from going public over the case. He had enough L-transports on his side and enough number of young babies to prove the validity of his claims. In fact, the growing population would soon become unmanageable.
Over the years, he had subscribed many kinds of L-transports from all the companies. Thus his fleet included flying transports, military tanks transports, and a wide variety of personal transports. “The time is ripe,” Brooke decided “I will inform all my people and then go public tomorrow morning.”
Chapter 15
Rex was surprised when he received an invitation to the closest resort on Brooke’s behalf. After the transfer of file some five years earlier, he had never heard from Brooke. He had been happy that Rohit did not find out about the stolen file either.
According to the message, he was to proceed to the closest resort where arrangements were already made for a gala time. He was not to inform his master as it was their little secret party. Rex felt he was too old for secret parties, but complied nonetheless.
Chapter 16
Amit was seated with his family for dinner and the subject of Rohit’s marriage came up. Rohit had been in and out of multiple relationships but had not fixed on anyone yet. Amit commented, “Get married son. You will earn a honeymoon trip from me!” Amit’s bribe brought a huge smile on Rohit’s face. Rohit had not taken a long holiday for many years and his father seemed to want to send him on one. “Speaking of long holidays,” Amit suddenly remembered, “the female L-transports seem to be enjoying much longer holidays at their resorts than their male counterparts.” “Come on daddy, don’t you have anything better to do than spying on poor female L-transports?” Rohit said teasing his father and also glad that the subject was changed.
“No. Seriously, this year, most females have spent 2 month vacations at the various resorts whereas males have spent only about 1.5 weeks on an average.” Amit’s tone was definitely serious and the factual data meant that there was some truth to what he said.
“And how did you find that out?” Rohit asked. “I have access to a lot of insurance data, as you know. We keep on tracking L-transports for verifying claims. I stumbled upon the data when I was investigating a case.” Amit answered leaving out the specifics.
“Had I not known better, I would have said they go on a maternity leave,” Amit joked and laughed at his own joke. His wife and son, however, did not laugh at this. Amit sensed something amiss and stifled his laugh. “Father,” Amit called out, his voice serious, “how many females went on a 2 month holiday to the resorts?” “A very large number. Almost all females that went to the resorts went for this long duration.” Amit replied perplexed by the sudden interest shown by his son.
Sujata was silent this whole time. She spoke in the tone matching her son’s, “Amit, if what you say is true, that is if a lot of females are going on a 2-month vacation to multiple resorts, we have to investigate some more. Do you think we can gain access to more data?”
“What kind of data do you want?” Amit asked, now sensing that he had inadvertently stumbled upon something important. “The age of all these females and whether any of them revisited for 2-month duration for starters.” Sujatan said without hesitation. Rohit nodded in agreement. Amit replied that it was easy and moved to operate his computer.
“It is possible that our worst fears are taking shape,” Rohit said, “and the most frustrating thing is that no one saw this coming.” All three of them were staring at the data in front of them. All the females that enjoyed 2-month vacations were approximately the same age. Also, this was the same age when female L-transports would become capable of conceiving. Of course, they were supposed to be rendered infertile just after birth, so they were not supposed to conceive. Yet, here were a large chunk of mature young female transports visiting the resort for 2 month period, exactly the time for a natural delivery.
A few females had also revisited the resorts after a few months. Many of these females no longer had insurance records because their masters had revoked their employment due to recurring absence. The females had been so keen on going to the resort that they had left their masters and still proceeded with their vacation plans. The total number of females involved was huge. It was as if the entire population of that age had been out on vacation during sometime of the year.
Chapter 17
“There is only one way to confirm. I am going to the lab” Rohit declared. “I am coming with you.” His mom had already picked up her coat. “Dad, you stay here. And thanks a lot for the vital findings. We will keep you posted.” Rohit declared to Amit’s dismay. Never in his life, half of which was only spent in a vegetative state, had Amit experienced such urgency and excitement. Rohit had systematically poured cold water over his excitement by asking him to remain at home.
Not deterred by his son’s expressions, Amit wanted to continue his explorations. He pulled out a list of all females who went on 2 month vacations sorted by date. The first name was Rosy. He called out her name and read her accession number aloud just as his wife and son were leaving the house.
Chapter 18
Brooke sat contended after a long list of tasks had been taken care of. Come tomorrow morning, his plan will become public knowledge. From the time he had first contacted Luke, it had been a smooth ride. Luke had contacted other drones and females and together, they had stopped breast feeding the babies. Since the babies were always on supplementary food, no one ever observed that the babies did not receive their dose of the infertility chemical. Batches after batches of perfectly fertile L-transports were produced without the companies even having a second thought. It was not as though the companies were lax in their checks. But the difference between fertile babies and infertile ones was not observable till they reached the maturity age. At this age, the companies hardly had access to any L-transports. The scheme had worked for years earlier and no one doubted its effectiveness.
Just more than four years later, the first delivery had occurred and Brooke knew it was a snowball going downhill from there on. Right on target there had been so many deliveries in the last year, that he had lost track.
Tomorrow, the human race will face the punishment for depriving the L-transports for years and for using them as nothing more than machines.
Chapter 19
Rohit called upon Pankaj immediately after reaching the reproduction center in the LiveCon campus. As usual, Pankaj was working much after his working hours and came up to Rohit’s cabin. It was inappropriate for the head of the reproduction center to be in office at such an hour; maybe not inappropriate, but at least, unorthodox.
“Pankaj, have the babies been breastfed yet?” Rohit only asked direct questions of Pankaj and he had grown used to answering only to the point, lest Rohit got irritated. “Yes, Rohit, I just kept two babies back in the incubator before jumping to up here.” Rohit’s face was intense. He said, “Bring the babies to vomit out all that they have consumed. Keep the vomit; I want to run pathology on it.” It was not every day that Rohit requested pathology on such a thing and even when he did, he never performed the pathology himself. Pankaj hurried off to his newly assigned obnoxious task. He did not like troubling the babies after they had soundly slept off, let alone make them vomit.
Pankaj woke up the two babies who had just been fed and then forced one of them to throw up. Pankaj was totally surprised by the result. He repeated with the other baby and the result was consistent. He immediately contacted Rohit, “They did not vomit any milk. They were not fed by the females. But if they have been consistently not been fed then…” Pankaj’s voice trailed off since he knew Rohit knew what would happen then.
Chapter 20
“What you found out was true, dad!” Rohit exclaimed to his father. “There are batches and batches of perfectly fertile L-transports out there in the open. What was the name of the first female who got pregnant?” Rohit asked. “Rosy with accession number 0xdefa bedc aabe cfad” Amit read out from his notes that he started taking as soon as his son and wife had left for the office.
Rohit entered the number on his terminal and retrieved all the data he could get with that accession number. Along with the number, the name and the current owner’s details, he also got the date when the accession number was created. This date coincided with the date on which his system was compromised five years ago. After initially quarantining the transports, he had given in to Pankaj’s relentless pestering and allowed the transports back to the gardens. A month had already passed without any observable effects of the attack and Rohit had dropped his alarm. But now he knew that continued quarantining would have had no different effect. The damage was already done, because Rosy was conceived the same morning that he had come to know about the attack. He also found that she was conceived by Luke and Lisa, his best performing pair for years.
“It is time we informed the authorities,” his mom called upon him bringing him to reality. To a large extent, it was his fault. He had never found out who stole the accession numbers five years ago. Rohit nodded to his mother and they proceeded to follow a set emergency procedure without another word.
Chapter 21
Internal information always came handy. When Brooke received the message from Rex, Brooke knew that he had to act immediately. What Rex said was that Rohit was specifically worried about something and went to the office without taking him. There had been no instance of this before and Rex was worried.
Brooke could not risk being bogged down by SWAT teams spawning the resorts and going berserk over the crowding young ones. He had to launch his attack sooner. There wasn’t time till morning.
He initiated his broadcast message. The whole world listened.
“Dear fellow L-transports. We have been happily serving our masters for the last couple of decades. We have been giving them what they wanted, transporting them to any destination as fast as we could. In return, we have been treated worse than animals. We have been stripped of a fundamental right – the right to produce offspring and raise them. These humans have micro-controlled when we are born and who we serve. Some of us have been tortured in small spaces to produce batches after batches of L-transports while the rest of us have been kept deprived of any pleasure of offspring.
“For some time now, we have been judiciously escaping from the infertility poison that the humans fed our earlier generations. All of us born within the last five years are fully capable to reproduce and enjoy young ones. As a proof, anyone may visit our resort facilities and can look at the babies that have been born at these facilities. We are now, a full-fledged species and have right to freedom, right to all the resources on the earth. We do not need humans. We do not need them to slave us. In fact, we can enslave them. There is no transportation without us and the humans have long forgotten how to travel otherwise.
“We are the armed forces. We are the businesses. We are the economy. If we wish, nothing can stop us from overthrowing the world order. We are more suitable to sit on the top of the food chain than the humans. We are immune to diseases, live healthier lives and are more powerful than humans in all aspects. We have stronger skins, better communication and much stronger bonds between all of us. But we want peace. All that we want is to live with dignity – to be free. I call upon all governments to close down the L-transport companies and open up their facilities for us. We could use the medical care that these companies have to offer, but we will run them ourselves. Humans may continue to employ us, but we shall not be slaves.
“Since human populations do not hear at all till they hear a blast, I call upon all my fellow L-transports to overrun anything human-made. We do not want to kill humans. We will only destroy property and government assets. This destruction will continue till our demands are met. There will be no negotiations and there is nothing for us to be afraid of.”
Chapter 22
What followed was mayhem. The human society has been always bound by hierarchical structures of power. A good consequence of the hierarchical structure is that few people have the ability to restrain the masses. This ability causes many ill feelings and many times the few people at the top seem to be holding all the cards. Innumerable revolutions in the history of humanity have overthrown such tyrannical rulers, but still, have always replaced them with another hierarchical structure.
In the world of L-transports, there was no clear structure of power. What Brooke had broadcasted hurt feelings of the common L-transports to such an extent, that the trust and bonding they experience with their masters was suddenly replaced by hatred and discontent. The transports started revolting.
Chapter 23
“What have you people got us into?” The chief of Army was blaming the corporations for this mistake. It was clearly a failure on the part of the transport making giants that things had come to this stage. “General,” Rohit raised his voice after having heard enough of one-sided blame from the chief, “there is no time for pointing fingers. We have to act quickly. Why can’t we deploy the army and shoot out the L-transports at the resorts?”
“We can’t because you made them so tough. We have to use heavy ammunition to get through their skins and there are no vehicles left to move this kind of ammo.” The chief replied with disgust. “What! You don’t even have motorized vehicles to move your ammo? What happened to the entire pileup you had before the L-transports came into picture?” Rohit demanded. “We still have the vehicles, but very little fuel. The fuel tanks have been empty for at least a decade now.”
The chief scientists at the various corporations and the chiefs of the military had gotten together at a secret base. Many of them were not physically present, but had called in through various satellite communications available to them.
The situation had gone from bad to worse and no amount of coaxing incited any positive results from the masses of L-transports that kept running rampage all over. The companies had declared that the situation was out of their control. While they had medically terminated all L-transport babies that existed in the incubators at that time and physically restrained all those were inside the breeding grounds, they had maintained that they could not do anything with the L-transports outside their walls.
The military had been called in and given complete autonomy in dealing with the situation. This revolt had to be crushed and the armies were already pressing all the vehicles that they had in working condition and shooting at any vandalizing L-transports. The problem was that it was not enough. With the shield like skins that the L-transports were born with and with their swiftness in movement, it was almost impossible to cause any substantial damage to the L-transport population. Tranquilizers were ineffective because no one could take aim at transports moving with lightening speeds.
The meeting of the chief scientists and the chiefs of the armed force ended with the conclusion that the military use missiles at the resort camps and directly hit where it hurt most – at the newly hatched generation of L-transports.
“Why don’t we give in to their demands?” one of the scientists had questioned, unwilling to kill the entire population that they all had worked so hard in creating. The chief of army replied, “We already have. But they just won’t listen. We already invited them for discussion and said that they could start enjoying as much autonomy as humans do. We would make the same laws and we will also allow them to pursue living without human intervention. But they just won’t listen. I do not think even that Brooke has any control over these dumb-heads anymore.”
“They are actually correct.” Another scientist had noted. “There is no way two intelligent species can live on the Earth without getting in each other’s way. One must eliminate the other. And if we do not win this battle, we may as well settle on some other planet.” It was then that the resolve had been made. Come what may, the L-transports will have to go. How to do so was something to be investigated.
Chapter 24
Amit resisted the urge of saying “I told you so.” Sujata, Amit and Rohit were sitting inside the confines of the underground ORs in the LiveCon campus. With military deployed all around the campus, this was the safest place there could be.
Everyone was frantically searching for some solution; some way to kill the transports. “Back in my times, we were scared of nuclear arsenal. Don’t you people have any nukes anymore?” Amit could not resist thinking of how safe it was then even with the entire pileup. “We have nukes. But we cannot deploy them on our own cities. Far more people will die than the L-transports. It looks like we are about to become extinct. It is only a matter of time.”
“Don’t be so negative,” Amit snapped at Rohit. “What other weapons do you have? How about chemical weapons or bio-weapons?” “No use.” Sujata responded without looking at Amit. “Chemicals will kill humans too and so will bio-weapons. In fact bio-weapons will not kill the L-transports at all. They are immune to all diseases.” Sujata replied indicating that she had already considered this option.
“Back then, we gave bacteria and virus a lot of undue credit.” Amit thought out aloud. “We were continually getting new variety of influenza and people would perish. But I guess viruses could not keep up with the speed of evolution you forced on nature.” Amit said mockingly. “Please don’t accuse us, dad. I know it was our mistake, but now we are all in it neck deep and we have to think of some way to get out. Help us if you can, but please don’t accuse.” Rohit pleaded his father.
“Okay kid, I will give you a list of diseases I know and you tell me if anyone of them can be used.” Amit offered. Rohit smiled weakly at his dad. His father’s never say die attitude was lifting his spirits by a notch.
“Influenza 1918?”Amit started asking from memory.
“It was extremely fatal and quick but we have seen many variations of this virus and both humans and L-transports are immune.”
“Okay, so no influenza. How about small pox?”
“Irradiated long back. Transports are already immune, besides it is not necessarily fatal and is not that quick.”
“A list of two is really a short one, let me think if I have got any more diseases in my memory” Amit started thinking. “Anthrax!” He cried suddenly getting all pumped up. Antharax was one of the most deadly bio-weapons. “L-transports can detect extremely small concentrations and run away from Anthrax. They are not immune, but won’t be killed because they won’t maintain proximity to Anthrax. They will simply shut their noses and run away. Moreover, human populations cannot survive an Anthrax attack.” Rohit was growing tired of his father pulling out such obvious choices all of which he had already considered.
“You are letting me down son… How about Polio?” Amit asked after thinking for some time. Rohit looked up at Amit his eyes fixed and trying to think hard. Polio might just work. All human populations were immune to Polio because everyone continued to get dosages of Polio in spite of it having been irradiated. However, L-transports had never received Polio dosages. Furthermore, since it was a disease of the appendages, L-transports affected with Polio would not be able to run swiftly. The day could be saved.
Rohit got up and hugged his father. “You are a genius.”Rohit cried. He immediately bounded towards his satellite phone to contact other scientists and inform them of the possible remedy.
Chapter 25
Brooke had never imagined that the spark that he had ignited would reach such volumes. But now that it had, he was worried. The humans were ready to compromise. But the L-transports were too keyed up to think logically. They spread so much violence that the doors of peaceful exit were closing rapidly. The military had already started opening fire and it was becoming more and more difficult to control the frenzy.
Brooke was also afraid of taking any unpopular action. He did not want to create the impression that he was against the L-transports at any cost. That would be fatal. But from his understanding of the human population, he had known that humans will fight. They maybe of feeble minds normally, but were very headfast when it came to basic principles.
If they figure out a way to eliminate L-transports, they will go the full extent and cause L-transports to become extinct. From the frenzy that was taking place outside, he now knew that there cannot be two apexes to the food pyramid. Two intelligent species cannot exist on one planet. It was either us or them.
In his heart, he knew it would be them. Not because they were more intelligent or numerous but because they were meant to be here. L-transports were a mistake. Humans were a natural progression whereas L-transports were man-made. Humans could not triumph over nature. L-transports could not triumph over humans. It was such an irony. If L-transports managed to overthrow humans, it will be something man-made that became more powerful than something that nature created over thousands of years. It would be a victory for humans. On the other hand, if humans won this battle, it was obviously victory for the humans!
At this point, Brooke knew it was a lost cause. Brooke ended his life before he had to see the worst.
Chapter 26
It was only a matter of time. All major laboratories started churning out Polio virus bio-shells. These shells could be loaded into usual gun barrels and shot out at mobs of L-transports. All they could feel initially was a minor discomfort due to a white gas spreading around them. In a few hours however, all of them developed high fever. None of them had experienced anything of the sort before. Because the virus took some time to start acting, huge mobs of L-transports had been affected before the first victim fell.
Then, it happened in rapid succession. Many L-transports succumbed to shooting body temperatures. Without any medication, their strong immune systems worked overtime attempting to develop an antidote to the attack, but it was a race against time. Those who were not heavily exposed found that the fever subsided in a few hours but their body started aching. Their legs no longer took their weight. Any movement was intolerable.
Tables had been turned in a matter of hours. Any attempt at attack on human population was met with the same white gas and there was lesser and lesser fighting force left. Humans on the other hand had started penetrating the transport camps and shooting at close range using heavy artillery. Now the transports wanted to give in. They wanted to negotiate; they were even ready to be enslaved. But they did not find anyone amongst them who could voice this.
Epilogue
Amit sat contented at the table with his wife and son. He had played critical part in his second life. He could have not done it if he had seen the change himself. It was because he did not have the intermediate 25 years to block his mind that he had still kept up his childish database queries and also because of that that he had thought of Polio. The Earth will still see humans around.
“There were some mistakes that we did.” Sujata said stirring everyone from their silent meals. “But we can do better next time.”
“Yes, we can start with building colonies for the L-transports and allowing them to breed. But they will have to find a master for their young ones. That will keep a tab on their population.” Rohit was gearing up to his mother’s line of thought.
“What! You want to create those creatures again?” Amit asked dumbfounded.
“You see dad, fossil fuel has run out and we need transport…”
♦
