Boom. Just like that.
I could only imagine the processing power required for the nanites to sort through a million internets worth of garbled, Rosetta Stone information, fish out relevant knowledge, and serve it up to my mind in a form I could comprehend. Not just comprehend, but in a way that allowed me to know the information, not as though I was reading a lengthy dissertation, but as if I had always known it.
The nanites had outdone themselves. The knowledge they had suddenly provided confirmed that the Swarm could implant nightmares into sleeping minds, and had created fake abductions to frame the Grays, just as Nari had said.
But what Nari didn’t know was that they were also able to read a sleeping mind completely, and then create vivid, lasting memories in this mind far purer than the ones they created for fake abduction victims. Fortunately, this procedure required such immense focus that they only did it on extremely rare occasions.
While minor mental tampering left a readily detectable signature, this more intense mind-reading activity, and what they had done to me and the commander, did not. It could only be detected at the start, when a mind was first penetrated, and only by quantum sensors rather than nanites. Which is why the SAPS personnel and others couldn’t be touched, because they were always being monitored by these sensors.
But I was special, as had so often been explained to me. I was not being continuously monitored.
So once the Swarm had read my mind, implanted memories, and then taken over completely, their tampering would be undetectable. This, along with a protected status that would allow me to access the quantum computer in San Diego, made me the perfect candidate for them to infiltrate.
Still, there was another wrinkle that made turning a human being into a puppet problematic. They needed the target mind to be receptive to their initial penetration. They couldn’t crack open the protections surrounding a consciousness unless the consciousness allowed it. They couldn’t force their way into an unwilling mind.
Not if they wanted full control. Not at this distance.
So they had been forced to soften me up first. Forced to get me to believe in the course of action they wanted me to pursue with a fervor so great that I’d invite them in. And while the Swarm was busy taking control, I’d only need a gentle nudge to take the initial steps they wanted taken, completely unaware that they were pushing the buttons.
Which is exactly what had happened. They had found a way to soften me up, to convince me that the Zeta-led Federation was evil, even without any mental control. So much so that I had been willing to give my life to hack Brad’s Federation-supplied quantum computer, if that’s what it took. And the Swarm had only needed a slight nudge to convince me of the wisdom of killing Tessa Barrett.
The idea that the person being possessed had to agree to the possession was eerily similar to certain myths about Satan. In some versions of mythology, the devil could only possess someone who invited him in.
Which is exactly what I had done in my sleep the night before. The hive-mind had asked for total cooperation in its booming mental voice, and I had pledged my fealty, insisted I’d do anything required, throwing the door wide open for easy entrance.
The lengths they had gone to in order to get me into this receptive position had been as effective as they were extraordinary. There were layers and layers of nuance in their plan.
The Michelle incident in the woods of Australia had been entirely faked, everything about it carefully staged. The Swarm had played the role of the Michelle hologram and had hired mercs as unwitting actors, with strict orders not to hurt us.
The Swarm had then used its extensive knowledge of the Federation’s inner workings, gleaned from decades of painstaking intelligence activities, to have the Michelle hologram convince me that a rogue Federation faction wanted me dead. Tessa and I had put up much more of a fight than the Swarm had bargained for, but it had worked out just as planned in the end.
When Nick had saved my life—which hadn’t been in jeopardy in the first place—it also started me down the path of trusting the Sentinel organization, and Nick was able to plant additional seeds of doubt in my mind. Taken in its entirety, this incident succeeded in getting me suspicious of Nari and Tessa both. With a further benefit of sowing discord in the Federation ranks once it was reported, and fostering paranoia and infighting.
And the call between the American tourist at the Roo View Lodge and his girlfriend in The States, during which he had reported on the altercation in the nearby woods, had also been staged. The Swarm had wanted Brad’s AI to pick up on this call and alert the cavalry. They had wanted me rescued and briefly returned to the Federation fold, so I could confront Nari and he could confess to his lies, softening me up further.
Step two had taken place soon thereafter, when the Swarm had used their pawn, Kenneth Kussmann, to send multiple zip-craft to Brad’s island to knock out its protective dome and all personnel, knowing I’d believe the fictional Michelle was responsible.
They had gassed me so they’d have a window to enter my subconscious mind and insert a fictional discussion with Tessa in a bunker, and a fictional battle. It had been a brilliant ploy in so many ways.
Michelle hadn’t mentioned the Swarm during our first encounter, or tried to debunk them, wanting me to believe every word Nari told me about them, ensuring I’d be outraged when imaginary Tessa revealed that the Swarm was the biggest lie of all.
The entire implanted incident had cemented in my mind that Tessa and the Zetas were villains, and the Swarm didn’t exist. And that I had experienced the ultimate betrayal from the woman I loved.