I walk over, unsure as to what’s going on. Hard thing, being so lost in sense and place. I can’t even tell if Mary is in a partnership with Behemoth, or if she’s above him. The way she talks, is so assured, makes me think that she is, in fact the one in charge.
“What?”
“Don’t be so testy,” Behemoth says from the kitchen. “One word from Mary and you’ll be pieces on the edges of this island.”
I pause, angry that the threat takes so much out of my bravado. “Resorting to medieval tactics, are we?”
“No, we’re looking for the cure to this republic, sweety,” Mary says, her eyes cutting so hard I realize that all her cutting stares and tones of disgust were nothing of the sort and were only her having to deal with someone so minuscule. Wealth. Power. I do remember hearing that Mary came from a very wealthy family. The kind that can just walk into Ivy League universities.
“By going against what it stands for.”
She looks me up and down, then turns to Behemoth. “Do we really need him. He seems to have a small mind.”
“He means well.” Behemoth winks at me.
For some reason that fills me with pride.
“Show me.”
Mary stares at me for a few seconds, then taps the screen of the tablet. A video pops up.
Slightly grainy, it takes me a second to realize that the walls, the masses of people shuffling around are all in the underground arena. This looks like part of what was once the lake area. It’s night, but there are shapes of hills in the distance, and lights reflect off the water. The camera turns to follow some people. Some are humans, their heads down. Others are the bionic people; they seem to be herding the humans. Then the camera moves to a stage. There, under a spotlight is Behemoth. He raises both hands, and the hum of people goes quiet. They all turn to observe him. He opens his mouth, and I sense a slight apprehension at what he’s about to do. I’m wondering if all the faith I placed in this machine is about to be destroyed.
“Fellow Americans. Fellow citizens of the world. There is little in this world that is required of us. There is little change we can affect. That.” He pauses, as a murmur rises up from the crowd, points up. I remember when he was completely stilted in his language. Has he grown this much? Come this far? And where have I been while this has happened? I am certain that I haven’t grown as much as he. “Is what they want you to think. They want you to feel small, to feel insignificant while they steal from your pockets and take their pound of flesh from your families... This is how they scare you, tell you to look away, and come in with all sorts of reasons why they’re robbing you.” Another pause, well timed, I must say, and the crowd seems to swell in these moments.
“Oh, my fellow citizens. But we are tired of them robbing us. That’s why we made sure they passed the No Soldier Act. So that we would not bleed for them anymore. But they’re still trying to steal from us again. And you know why? Because they fear us not.”
The crowd roars, steps forward again.
“But, we will make sure that they fear us. That they know who we are.” He hangs his head for a second. “Just today, these evil men and women sent their agents and tried to kill us. They almost got me, but I was brave and escaped unharmed. They have no chance against me. They have nothing against us!”
Another roar. I feel a tingling sensation in my legs. It travels up my body. I’m not sure if it’s fear or pride. I can feel Mary and Behemoth’s eyes burrowing into me.
“Many of our brothers died up there today. But we will be certain that it’s not in vain. That we are not going to go quietly into the night. No. We will fight back. Today, we will make sure that nothing they do goes unpunished.”
A roar. Turing smiles, in a somehow serious way. A bug, I’m sure, though the crowd doesn’t seem to care. He bows his head again. I think I see his cheeks glistening. Tears? I’m not sure. He seems young again, that much is sure.
“Were you there, my friends? I hope you were not. I watched as the mob they sent danced and burned the bodies of our friends.”
The crowd gasped. I see a few faces highlighted. Some of the homeless people whom I pulled from the streets. Some of them who had seemed the most dedicated.
“Yes. Our masters are growing bold. Those leaders of ours think that we will not pull them like the ticks that they are. Let me paint you a story: a little more than a hundred years ago, we had something of a similar situation. There was a great iniquity. And the likes of us. The likes of the poor were being crushed for no reasons at all. And all those above. All those ticks growing rich off it were happy and cared not a wit for suffering.
“But one day, fellow citizens, there was a reaction. There was a reaction that swept up those decadent murderers. And the day came when they had to pay the piper. It was as it is and as it will be. The world stared in horror, but those in charge knew that something had changed, that they could not go on stealing from the people who had made them who they were. And as that rich family was dragged from the basement, as they paid the final price, those who were in charge grew scared. And they started to give back to the people. They started to apologize even.
“And that is what we must do here today: we cannot let them go unpunished for all that they’ve done to us.”
The crowd picks up into a roar, and the camera shakes from the noise, then goes blank.
My earlier feelings, now a full on reaction with my heart pumping fast, are no longer ambivalent. I know that I am scared. And urine pushes forth, yet I cannot ask to go to the bathroom, can I? “When was this?”
“7 pm today,” Mary says.
“Are you convinced now?” asks Behemoth. “Are you willing to work for us?”
And whatever fear I had for the words, for what seemed to be some historical incomprehension on Turing’s part, diffuse and up comes the anger. I’m not sure what it is, perhaps I hate Behemoth for what he did to me, but anytime he asks me to be on his side, every cell in my body jumps up and screams no. “Work for you. Tell me what this video shows?”
Behemoth screws up his face. “He’s calling for a revolution,” he says, his voice growing louder. “He’s trying to overthrow the government. Are you aware of these plans?”
“No. I was not, and still am not. All I see is him ricin up a crowd. Is that against the law?” I say, even though I’m trying my hardest not to sound meek. Hard for me, a soldier, to think on the things needed for a usurping of the very government he was at some point—and does that ever leave one’s DNA?—dedicated to saving.
Behemoth scoffs. “You’re dumber than I thought. He just said that the murder of the Romonoff Royal family. The massacre. He just said that it was a good thing in history. Next thing you know, he’ll be praising Robespierre, and you,” he’s near yelling now, and points his finger at me, getting of his perch, “are going to say that all that he has done is speak. Well, let me tell you something, he’s not to be trusted, and free speech like that needs to be squelched when it can.”
“Behemoth,” Mary says, holding out a hand in the air, palm out, as if to calm him. “We’re doing this my way. George here only wants to see more evidence. What we’ve shown him, though worrying, is hardly anything conclusive.” She turns to me, all soft faced. All beautiful, really, and I remember having had something of a crush on her.
“He’s broken,” Behemoth says. “Only one thing to do with such people. Don’t even deserve the moniker of soldier.”
“Enough,” Mary says, and I know then who’s in charge. “Time will tell what he is.” She looks me over. “I’m sorry. But in a way he’s right. You’re standing at a crossroads in your life.” Such a soft voice. It floats into my ear and, having snuck into me, settles on my heart, like she’s an angel, here to lift all this weight off my shoulders. “We are willing to let everything you did before, everything that was close to sedition be erased. You were lost, and that’s fine. But now you have to choose. Are you going to keep going down the path that led your wife to leave you? Are you going t
o stay broken?”
She pauses to examine me, twirling her hair. For a second it flashes in the dull light. Gorgeous hair. For a second I think on pulling it, gently, then roughly... Something in me moves. Softens for her. She’s done this before, turning people. I wonder how many times. She does have that perfect face that makes me want to trust her, that makes me wonder what’s so wrong with me that I’m not willing to work with her, to make her life easier. Certainly there is something wrong with me? After all, what would make a man like me turn away from her, from the society she represents, if not something hidden, something dark and evil? I start to doubt myself. And she is perfect, isn’t she? Her intelligence, her looks. I am weak, am I not... She has done this before, turning people, she’s looking at me so patiently. I cannot falter. Sometimes the intelligence in us, our rational sides tend to betray us. Best to stick to my gut feeling and pray, yes pray, for the light to appear. I snort and half sneer at her and Behemoth. Her face darkens into disappointment as I don’t answer and merely stand there stiff. Not that I could react. I’m just playing the words that Turing said in that video and all the doubt I had about him swills about in my head.
“Let me show you some more evidence.” She slides the tablet about and pulls up what looks to be an intelligence report. “This wasn’t reported in the news. But we had several drones out over the Indian Ocean, off the coast of Africa. They were there on a simple patrol. You know, keeping the pirates off the waters. It was a joint exercise with several other Navies. The Chinese, Indians, and the Russians. Simple, and they too were testing some of their drone capabilities.”
“Though,” Behemoth says, “truth be known, they don’t have much. And theirs is still supplemented with many humans on board. Hardly an efficient AI.
Mary nods, patiently, like she has the weight of the world on her shoulders. “And suddenly, at 0800 yesterday we lose contact with the drones just as it was coming into contact with a whole fleet of possible pirates. We tell our partners in the ocean, of course, and we hear nothing. 0900 we get news that all the other fleets have been destroyed. No survivors. A follow up by remote drone shows that by some glitch, our fleet didn’t attack the pirates—they were salvaging the wreckage—but rather the other Navies.
“As you can imagine there was quite the outcry. We managed to assuage our friends, a nuclear holocaust averted, but we have reason to believe that this was more than some glitch.”
Behemoth, now standing behind Mary steps forward. “Turing’s company was in charge of the decision making parameters for the AI on that fleet. It was meant to be fast. Faster than a human can do since we knew that the Russians were already adding computer AI triggers to many of their weapons systems...” Behemoth smirks. “The one good thing is that the people on those other hapless fleets didn’t stand a chance and couldn’t come close to reacting in a timely manner. So we know that works well, and was one of the better decisions. But now, we have to find Turing and ask why that AI decided to attack who they attacked.”
“The fleet?” I ask, trying not to focus on what can only be my primitive mind trying to trip me up and focusing on the perfection of these two people in front of me. As if that means something is wrong with me and what I stand for. I hold on to my hate, even though I’m not certain why I hate so much.
“Gone,” Mary says. “Can’t be found. That’s the other thing. The last thing we need is for this fleet to go around setting off the triggers of all the other countries advanced enough to have such technology. Because they too learned a lesson here. Sources tell us that they’re all scrambling to add AI triggers to all their weapons systems.”
These words slice through me. What am I to make of all this? “Turing did that? Maybe it’s a glitch.”
“Then let’s bring him in and find out what the glitch was. Our enemies are learning fast too. We need to react, and fast.” Behemoth says, softening his voice.
I know when I’m being treated as if to be turned. “Uh-huh,” I say, rubbing my fingers together, and now thinking about how I can leave the building. I know there will be no sleep until they get what they want. She’s good, and so is Behemoth. I remember the woman, the torture, the pain. I remember what they’re capable of, and like that, the hard tug with which I was coming over to their side dissipates, and I smirk. “You want me to bring him in?” They both shift. They must hear or sense the growl in my voice. The stiffening of my spine. “Even if I could, there’s nothing here that tells me I should help him.”
Behemoth huffs. Mary’s face grows hard. But she’s studying me, so it probably means she’s got something else.
“You really don’t want to help?” She sighs, oh so disappointed. “Look at what’s happening to the country. It’s started to divide. More so than ever before. It’s because of Turing. Many of the cells that we can track are people we’ve tracked to Turing. People he’s certainly given that same speech to.” She points with a jerk of her head at the tablet.
“That’s because Turing,” I say, making certain to not say we, who knows if this is being recorded, “only deals with the downtrodden. The same people you’ve been beating over with a skull for more than a decade now. What do you expect? And somehow you still blame him for all that has gone wrong? He’s here to help. You’re just angry that you can’t fight wars as you please—“
“George,” Mary says holding up a hand and looking down at the ground in front of her.
“What did I tell you,” Behemoth says, crossing his arms over his chest, “he’s beyond re—“
“Behemoth.” Her voice is tough, cutting. Behemoth falls silent, nodding, as if he knows his sin and punishment. She returns her eyes to me. I have to stay strong. “I know that somewhere in you there is a man who still cares. For his country. For humanity. We are on the cusp of a war. I’m sure you can sense it. Are you sure you have the right side? I know, I know. This country has not always done the right thing, though it may have tried, it has been hijacked by certain types. We are not them. I believe in you, I know there is good in you... even if the war took away your ability to see it, to know what evil is when you are face to face with it.” She twirls her hair again, tilting her head ever so slightly.
“Think about the assassinations. Behemoth’s close friend was killed. We have good reason to believe that the cells which conducted these attacks were associated with Turing,” she says and turns to the tablet and shows me a series of transcripts that purport to show Turing talking to John Does about hitting people at the right time. “And here.” Pictures, these. Evidence that a rifle was set up and shot using a sophisticated AI for recognition. She waits, holding her breath. At least she’s nervous.
“If you don’t believe us, for whatever reason, then look at the reaction of even your friends. You don’t think that your friends starting militias to protect themselves, is reason enough to believe us? To know that Turing is on the wrong side?”
“You mean the attack on us? You’re telling me that wasn’t one of your minions?” I say, the memory of this bomb filling me with good, solid, hatred.
“We don’t use proxies on our own soil, George.”
“Right. No proof of that, now is there?”
“Not when a bomb like that helps to achieve what you want.”
“It was Dalcia. Kurt. Their group is now on a wanted list. But they’re doing it because of what I told you. They’re afraid, George. Very afraid. Why won’t you help them?”
“They’re afraid of something they don’t understand. And I’m sure that you will not try your hardest to track them down, as they’re doing what you need to have done.”
“George—“
“No. Listen to me now. Turing is doing good. All this evidence,” I say and point to the tablet. “I don’t believe. And even if Dalcia is wrong... that... that doesn’t mean anything.”
“So you’re against her? She helped you when you needed it the most, and you’re betraying her.”
“I’m not betraying her. I’m simply not going to
help her.”
Mary laughs, shaking her head. “Oh, George. You are truly lost.” She reaches out her hand. “Come back. Come back. I know you want to believe that you don’t have to pick a side. That you merely need to pick an action that means well. But guess what? Now you have to pick a side. All the friends you’ve ever had. Your fellow human. Or the machine that is possibly nothing more than a glitch.”
The honesty in her voice surprises me and for a second I wonder why I’m so wrong. But I remember that those who want you to pick sides. They are truly the ones with evil on their mind. My insides harden.
“You won’t get to sit on the sidelines, if that’s your plan,” she says, pulling her hand and laying it on her lap. “You’ll have to live knowing that Dalcia and Kurt’s blood will be on your hands. Oh yes you will. Because either you stop Turing or he comes for them. He’s going to find out who attacked him and he will retaliate. We don’t know everything about his AI, but that much is certain.”
My heart, bobbing up to my throat, keeps me from speaking. “You’re lying. I’ll figure out a way to speak to them.”
“No you won’t. Even you must know that it’s too messy for that. Their blood on your hands. Your country’s grave on your hands as well... Look at these other groups that are popping up. Ben is helping your friends fund their war. There’s a group of bionic veterans,” she says and looks at me as if I would know them, “who are against Turing and his laws... Look,” she says as she swipes through a few more pieces of evidence, “he’s even taken to subverting money with a series of loan sharks. Basically he’s forcing poor people into debt. And here... his proxies are handing out multiple false Qurans and Bibles, only to cause sedition...
“You don’t seem troubled by this.” A sigh. She looks down at her hands. “This is all a complete shock to us that you’re not reacting. Are you protecting him? He doesn’t have our best interests at hand... Look.” Another swipe at the tablet. “We believe that he even has emplaced a few of his people—“
The Labyrinth of Souls Page 44