Freedom (TM)

He still remembered the musty smell of the La Paz hotel room. The bray of a two-stroke engine whining past outside while he stood with a bloody knife in his hand. The young trade unionist on the floor, her wide eyes staring at him as she clutched her throat, gurgling. Nothing stopped. The universe didn’t care. He might as well have been slicing bread.

And that began his awakening—his realization that the Western world was a bedtime story of comforting humanistic bullshit. Slavery existed everywhere—even in the United States. We were all slaves in one way or another. Slavery was just control, and control kept things ru

But now the problem he’d been waiting on suddenly appeared on screen. A bar graph labeled “Decline in U.S. Agricultural Subsidy Applications.” He turned away from the window and tuned in to the Pakistani MBA’s presentation.

“. . . in certain counties, we’re looking at a ninety percent drop—unprecedented in the history of modern American agriculture. Farmers in these counties have basically decided en masse to stop growing subsidized crops—even though there is no distribution system available for anything else. Something is causing this, and causing it all at once on a local basis in defiance of market conditions.”

The Major saw it. Nothing else had the scope to do this—and with such sudde

He spoke from the back of the room. “Why would farmers willingly turn down subsidies? With prices rising, why would they not grow corn or soybeans?

“Excuse me, you are . . . ?” The Pakistani was taken aback by this sudden question from a junior staffer in the back of the room.

The Major’s agronomist stepped in. “Yes, that’s a good question. Why isn’t the free market correcting this imbalance?”

The Pakistani turned back to the front row. “Uh, we haven’t been able to determine the cause. These numbers are for the coming year.”

The Major spoke up again. “And you have on-the-ground confirmation. This isn’t just a reporting glitch?”

“No, it’s not a glitch. Agribusiness and biotech firms have a comprehensive network of private investigators, researchers, and surveyors throughout the Midwestern United States to enforce their seed patents. They’ve documented population movements, unexplained capital inflows, and infrastructure investments in alternative energy technologies, high-tech equipment, heirloom seed stock, and—”

“I assume this isn’t confined to the United States.”

The two MBAs looked at each other with some dismay. The Pakistani nodded. “We were, in fact, going to cover that later in our presentation.” He started clicking through interminable bullet points and diagrams. “We also project reductions in export crops such as cotton in Asia and Russia. Security services in various countries are reporting labor unrest in both the agricultural and industrial sectors. The number of container ships being placed into warm and cold layup from lack of cargo is rising.”

It’s tearing apart the global supply chain.

Staring at the screen, The Major could visualize it like a full-scale nuclear attack. But one that the average person wouldn’t notice—until it was beyond the tipping point.

The British chap took over. “We project that if corn and soybean harvests drop another seven percent, raw material costs for almost all processed food products will skyrocket. Low-wage factory workers around the world could suffer food shortages, with attendant increase in social unrest. Factory production and transportation might be disrupted, with serious follow-on effects for the world economy.”

The Major had to hand it to Sobol. The dead bastard was clever. They’d been too focused on the digital threat to see it coming. By physically changing the economy of rural America, the Daemon could render their investment reallocation moot. They could no longer simply wait for a digital countermeasure to the Daemon. Sobol was forcing their hand, and The Major did not like the enemy dictating the tempo of battle. They needed to act. But quietly. Without anything that could be traced back to Daemon-infected companies.

The Major stood and looked out the window again, at the gleaming towers lining Sheikh Zayed Road. “Change is our enemy, gentlemen. Change means disruption. Disruption means crisis. And crisis means conflict.”

That was, after all, why the powers-that-be had called on The Major. Conflict was his specialty.

Part Two

March

Gold:$1.589USD/ozUnliaded Gasoline:$5.34USD/gallonUnemployment:23.3%USD/Darknet Credit:28.7

Chapter 9: // Seed Police

Darknet Top-rated Posts +293,794↑

Biotech companies spread patented genetic sequences via the natural ecosystem—much like a computer virus. Then they use the legal system to claim ownership of any organism their patented genetic sequences invade. They are raiding communal seed banks, obtaining patents for naturally occurring apples, sugar beets, corn, and a host of other plants and animals. They have immorally seized control of the food system and stand poised to claim ownership of life itself unless we take action.

Echelon_99****/ 1,173 22nd-level Geneticist

Hank Fossen endured the bone-rattling vibration of his 1981 International Harvestor as he turned at the edge of the field. Could he limp the tractor through another full season without a major overhaul? It had over ten thousand ru

He glanced back over his shoulder. The anhydrous ammonia applicator and the tank trailing behind were still in good order. He kept ru

And then he saw them.

Fossen hurriedly switched off the applicator and brought the tractor to a stop in the middle of his field.

There, by the county road, were two black SUVs parked on the shoulder. Three men with clipboards were walking and kneeling in his field.

“Goddamnit!” He killed the engine and grabbed an axe handle he kept in the cab for knocking mud off tires. In a few moments he’d jumped to the ground and was jogging the couple hundred yards toward the men across bare, loamy soil.

“Get the hell off my land!” he shouted.

The men didn’t budge. One of them took out a video camera and started filming him as he approached. Another was already on his cell phone.

So much for scaring them off. At forty-seven, Fossen didn’t have the ru

Fossen pointed the axe handle at the nearest of them. “You have no right to be here. I want you off my land. Now!”

The nearest one was taking close-up photos of the soil with a powerful-looking lens. “We’re investigators with Bosch and Miller, Mr. Fossen, here to confirm a potential patent infringement violation on behalf of Halperin Organix. We have a legal right to be here.”

“Bullshit! The judge ordered a stay on physical searches pending reasonable suspicion of infringement.”

The guy didn’t even look up. “Well, Halperin got a state judge to reinterpret the meaning of ‘reasonable.’ ”