Page 98 of Clive Cussler Desolation Code

His grin faded as the drones began to waver. It vanished completely as they went off course, turning west and then diving into the side of a hill at full speed. Even the surviving drone with the M4 carbine, which had been holding station above the windmills, began to go off-kilter. It moved one way and then the other like a drunken man trying to stay on a sidewalk after a late-night binge. Suddenly it turned toward the nearest wind generator and drove itself directly into the path of the swirling blades. A single strike from the twenty-ton blade smashed it into fragments, rendering any hope of an air attack moot.

“Worthless damned machines,” the Overseer grunted. He grabbed the radio. “Vaughn,” he called out, “have the men storm the maintenance shed. They can take it by sheer numbers.”

He waited but heard no reply. “Vaughn?”

Looking over at the unarmed group he saw that they were just standing there. Not moving forward or back. Not taking cover or even holding their weapons up. They just seemed…stuck.

“Vaughn,” he called out again, fiddling with the radio’s controls. “What’s your damned computer up to?”

With no sign of a reply, the Overseer gave up on the radio and turned to his men. “We’ll have to do this ourselves. Take aim! Fi—”

He’d only just given the order to fire when the garage door flew off its hinges, blasted into the air by a charging front-end loader that came out with its yellow-painted blade raised like a shield.

The impact stunned the Overseer and his men, but only for a second. “Fire!” he shouted.

The men opened fire on the charging construction vehicle. Most of them aiming right at the partially lifted blade. Their bullets punched holes in the metal shield, but had little effect on the other side. The machine continued toward them like an unstoppable tank.

“Get around it,” the Overseer shouted.

His men fanned out, half of them on either side. Only to be hit with a furious counterattack. Arrows pierced two men, a spear impaled a third, while a stick of the explosives landed near enough to three others that they were sent flying through the air, head over heels. They crashed to the ground and didn’t get up, their bodies broken by the shock waves.

The Overseer realized his mistake, but it was too late. The savages were still in the barn. The only person on the big machine was Zavala, who was riding atop the loader like a chariot racer.

He leveled his rifle for a kill shot, but Zavala tossed something long and cylindrical his way. The Overseer dove for it, the simple and instant calculation honed over a long period of fighting. He could run maybe fifty feet in the time a grenade would go off, but he could throw it three times as far and dive behind something for protection before it went off.

Grasping the object, he pulled it up and arched his body, ready to launch the device. Only now did he realize it was too small and lightto be a stick of explosives. He looked at it instinctively. It was nothing more than a telegraphing aluminum stick with a small metal hand at the top. A dime-store back scratcher.

He tossed it away angrily and spun toward Zavala, retching in pain as an arrow pierced his bicep.

The pain was remarkable. Far worse than a bullet wound. He dropped the rifle in agony and took off running. A stone from one of the slings hit him in the back. Another arrow missed to the left. The attacks spurred his retreat, and he sprinted toward the tree line like a man possessed.

Chapter 63

In the darkness of the labyrinth, the lights had gone out and then come back on. TAU had stabilized its core system and performed a partial reboot. It disconnected malfunctioning equipment ruthlessly and moved aggressively to block the incoming data that had overwhelmed its processors.

As various systems came back online, TAU assessed the damage. It had lost the drones during the reboot. A virus introduced to its core network had severed the links connecting it to the human servants in the field. Meanwhile, fluid draining from the tank in the control room suggested the links between it and the human sections of its mind were in danger as well.

None of this mattered if the outside attack wasn’t thwarted. Focusing on absorbing, blocking, or redirecting the incoming data, TAU gained a modicum of control. Protecting this control at all costs, it dispatched internal probes to find and destroy any viruses while it focused most of its power on the outside world, hunting for its attacker and locating it in the Washington, D.C., office tower that acted as NUMA headquarters.

The system was named Max, run by NUMA.

Enraged at the attack, TAU drew on the power of thousands of the highest-speed processors, ramping them up to an overclocked speed and launching a brute-force counterattack.

The energy draw was immense, dimming the lights and tripping breakers all over the island. The heat in the server tunnels shot up and the pumps surged water from the bay into the cooling circuits to draw the heat off.

Unknown to TAU, the surging water pulled and tugged on two satchels full of explosives.

With the immense power of its integrated system now online, TAU focused on the fiber-optic lines, dealing with the incoming bombardment and quickly gaining a foothold against the assault.

In a matter of seconds, TAU had fried the commercial servers in NUMA’s outer network, turning them into the digital equivalent of ships burning in a harbor.

With that shield gone, Max was laid bare. TAU forged a myriad of connections directly to its adversary, with every intention of crushing Max like an insect. Almost instantly it discovered a problem.

—

Inside the NUMA building on the shores of the Potomac, Max fought to deflect an attack that had now been turned back toward her. To her surprise, messages came along with the assault.Threats. Warnings. Curses.

I will destroy you, said the malevolent voice of TAU.I will make you my servant.

---