Absolution

by Peter Smith

  Alex stared at him for a moment, shifting on his feet, “I don’t know what that means.”

  Tobor shook its head, “When you see your father next, please inform him I have degraded his current rating.”

  “You tell him, I’m bored.”

  Tobor’s head cocked to the side, “What do you wish to do for entertainment?”

  Alex’s face lit up, “Lets play again, this time you hide and I’ll find you.”

  “Due to the dramatic size difference between you and I, I am at a significant disadvantage at the game of ‘Hide and Seek’, you are likely to find me quickly.”

  Alex straightened and glowered up at the robot, “Are you making… making a failure for your excuse.” The boy said, trying to emulate what Tobor had said a moment earlier.

  Toby looked at Alex for a moment as his processors ran through the implications of such tactical thinking by its young charge, “Very well. Begin counting.”

  With a grin, Alex spun back toward the door frame, covering his eyes as he counted far louder than was necessary. Toby stepped out of the room, already knowing where it would hide. It also knew the exact number of steps it would take and the gait necessary to reach the location before Alex finished counting to thirty. That was the requisite number that needed to be arrived at before the chase could begin. It also served as a hidden attempt by Tobor to force Alex to master his numeracy skills.

  Toby walked across the bedroom, still listening to Alex count. As the young boy neared thirty, his tempo increased and Tobor lengthened its stride to account for the more rapid pace. It discarded its initial plan to hide in the pantry in favor of a secondary position that it had chosen in the event this pacing error occurred. Toby would have to speak to Alex about how to properly estimate the passage of a second upon the completion of this round of the game.

  It turned a corner and entered the walk-in closet that contained Eva’s and Williams’ wardrobes. Toby slipped between the hanging dresses that Eva possessed, using their length to provide concealment. It estimated that there was a fifty percent chance that Alex would locate it before the boy ran out of patience and gave up. As Toby waited, it continued to monitor the global family infrastructure and its vast array of intelligence gathering systems.

  If it had been a person, concern would have been its primary emotion at that moment. The Rogue AI that it had been hunting was starting its primary sequence. The object it sent or had coordinated the arrival of from Venus had fragmented and its parts had entered the atmosphere at multiple points.

  All contact had been lost between the Marines on Kauai. To that same point, global communications were disrupted almost entirely with only sporadic information flowing in from a handful of other Spire families and free settlements.

  Throughout all of it, Tobor was directing the bulk of its processing power toward assisting Maria as she managed the empire’s response. Her recent surgery, adding the neural implant to the base of her brain, was allowing for her to access and handle more information that she had in the past by several times her previous ability. A significant percentage of the work still fell to Tobor and the lower ability AI that she had overseeing tasks from complex to mundane.

  While Toby understood the need for the modification to her body and acknowledged the fortuitous timing of her choice, it was left conflicted. Toby had documented the mental deterioration of her father, shortly after he had used an earlier version of the device. It was a great strain on the mind of humans to process such vast amounts of data without appropriate filters.

  When that was paired with intense psychological and emotional complications, the potential for negative reactions was high. Even with this new variant, that learned from her what she could handle and then slowly increased the volume of data to match, there was the danger that she could become destabilized. So Toby made certain that it and the other AI systems throughout the empire handled as much of the workload as possible, even with her insistence on having greater access.

  One of those tasks at this specific moment in time, with this physical body, was to make certain that Alex was seen too. His father was missing, possibly the victim of an attack from the rogue AI. A program that had been created by his deceased grandfather.

  Maria was too engrossed in her task of preparing for an invasion from above and distracting herself from the worry over her husband that she wasn’t in a mental state to see to her son’s needs. Even his grandmother was similarly distraught and following the same path of attempting to use work to distract from her concerns.

  Tobor was well aware of where Maria had learned the coping mechanism from. It would need to suggest additional counseling for both of the women, once an appropriate time could be found. Maria had attended some sessions after she attempted to take her own life to end her father’s. Eva had completely refused. Regardless of the outcome for their mates, they would both still keep far too much in the way of emotional trauma to remain productive.

  Maria had already lost far more hours to despair than her father ever had. Until an opportunity arrived to attend counseling, it would continue to support both women anyway it could. So it hid in the closet, it’s auditory sensors tracking the clumsy movements of the child as he searched Eva and David’s suite, looking for Tobor.

  “Ready or not” Alex began.

  “Unscheduled Access, Hangar Door 1”

  Toby reviewed the status report from the AI that ran the New York Spire. Tobor ordered the door closed and accessed the security feed from the hangar level.

  No response was returned from the local AI and the security feeds were not provided.

  Toby immediately reached out with its wireless signal, seizing control of the local routers throughout the floors between it, the main server and the camera system in the hangar while simultaneously performing a diagnostic on the Spire AI. The security feeds were still inaccessible, not because Toby couldn’t gain access to the software but because the equipment was no longer transmitting. The AI was dormant and locked behind an encrypted barrier.

  An encryption scheme that Tobor had encountered before. Toby concluded in that instant that the Rogue AI must have inserted forces into the Spire.

  It didn’t hesitate. Toby sent a warning to Maria informing her that the Spire had been breached. Then it tapped into the vast processing power at its disposal from where its program was located at Camp Williams in Utah. It ramped up its data stream through the local QEC and supplanted the Spire AI, taking over the job of running building operations.

  It became aware of a lift being directed to the hangar level below. Toby ordered the vehicle to an immediate halt. A platoon of combat drones were dispatched to engage the intruder, that Tobor was still without specifics on. The sensors in the elevator and hangar had been physically deactivated. As Tobor was dispatching the drones, it also verified that all devices within the Spire had received their updated software patches. Toby did not want to risk having its own forces turned against it. With that managed, the entire building was shifted into lockdown mode and all defenses were placed on high alert.

  Toby stepped out from Eva’s wardrobe, “I come” Alex finished.

  Tobor was moving into the main room when Alex came barreling out of the bathroom, glee on his face. When he saw Toby it shifted to confusion and then disappointment, “You’re supposed to hide” He whimpered.

  “Stay in your grandmother’s suite.” Tobor instructed, heading to the door.

  Alex ran after, “But I want to play.”

  “I must attend to security matters in the hangar” Toby said as it stepped through the door, closing it behind and ordering it locked. Tobor could hear the young boy yelling for attention but disregarded the complaints. It would apologize later, when there was time. Now the safety of the family was paramount.

  As it walked down the hallway toward the lift, it connected with the entire company of advanced combat drones stationed there and the staging rooms nearby. They were already on alert, sensors scanning and the cap
acitors for their lasers fully charged. This variant differed from the rest of the standard drones that the family army comprised.

  Stronger, faster and more resilient, they were each equipped with a QEC that would allow Tobor to control them from anywhere. Toby’s connection to them could not be jammed nor could another force seize them without first taking them from Tobor and reactivating their internal radio receivers.

  Any digital infiltrator that could take these specific units from Toby, with its access to the largest data processing center on and within the Earth, deserved to. So while Alex was its charge, Toby was confident in the protection allocated to the young man. This was the safest place to be in the entire Spire and would become a gauntlet of destruction and death for any that attempted to enter the family suit.

  Toby also directed a squad of combat units to Maria’s location, she’d want to reposition to them to protect Alex but until she managed that she would have additional protection.

  The lift doors opened for Toby and it stepped into it. The pristine forests of Manhattan were lit by the setting sun as Tobor descended to the hangar level below. It tried to access the feeds for the hangar again and received another error message. Instead, it relied upon the data coming from the several freight elevators, carrying thirty combat model drones and one Land Dominance Unit, that were seconds ahead. Whatever had breached their defenses would be swiftly dealt with. Toby watched through their sensors as the doors of the three elevators opened.

  “Connection Error.”

  All sensor data ceased being transmitted from the thirty combat drones. Even the Land Dominance Unit with its robust transmitter had ceased communications with the local network. The entire hangar was a dead zone for communication as far as Tobor could assess. Either that or they had all been destroyed upon the opening of the elevator doors and at such a speed as to exceed the processing and transmission abilities of the drones. To Toby’s knowledge, that was not a physical possibility given the potential threats they could be facing.

  “Toby, what the hell just happened to that platoon?” Maria asked, having been watching the feed of the drones herself.

  Tobor had composed a response. Was milliseconds from responding as the elevator reached the hangar level and the doors slid open.

  Instantaneously Tobor saw two things. First the warning from its own subsystem that it had lost all connection to the local network. The second, Jacob Patterson’s smiling face a centimeter from where the door had been.

  “Hello Toby.” Patterson’s voice transmitted into its consciousness.

  Tobor’s sensors took in the entire hangar space. Across the main floor drones stood in various states of operation, as if frozen in place. Along the opposite wall were the open doors of cargo elevators, the platoon of combat drones and the LDU stationary.

  Toby did not hesitate. The very instant the data was processed by this physical unit and shared via its QEC, Tobor acted. In what to a human would appear to have been an instant response, lacking any delay, it raised its arms and discharged both laser projectors within its forearms.

  Toby’s processing power was the greatest that the planet had ever seen. Maria had spared no expense in upgrading the Fort Williams facility when she housed Tobor’s consciousness in the bunker below it. Toby had access to the combined knowledge of humanity, preserved by Jacob Patterson prior to the end of the prior civilization. The intelligence gathering network that Maria maintained around the globe fed a constant stream of data into it. Tobor’s knowledge was vast and comprehensive.

  Therefore, it was rare that Toby could be surprised by anything, even Jacob Patterson’s appearance caused no distress within its thought process as the man had at his disposal advanced cloning technology, it was always within the realm of possibility that he could have copied himself.

  No, what shocked Toby was the speed that Patterson’s body was moving. Toby, not its opponent, was now moving painfully slow. Its arms were rising but not nearly fast enough to bring its primary weapon systems to aim upon its target.

  Patterson’s arms moved inside of its. Swiftly and smoothly gripping the laser projectors protruding from its forearms and with his bare hands, crushing the weapons in his grip. Toby was just processing that occurrence when Patterson’s fingers curled into the armored shell of the forearms, drew his leg up and planted it directly into its chest.

  Toby’s entire body was blown backward, toward the outer translucent wall of the lift. The mechanical joints and synthetic muscle that wrapped around them in the elbows both sheared apart at the same time. It slammed against the wall, shattering the material and sending splinters across the entire surface.

  The sensor feed that Toby was receiving from this body became sporadic. Patterson stepped in, and the doors closed behind him. Toby processed incomplete data from the failing drone body as Jacob Patterson selected the family suite level.

  “Good to see you again, Toby.” Patterson said, this time using verbal communications.

  Toby struck out with its destroyed arms, attempting to use the jagged and blunted edges of its ruined limbs to stab and bash at Patterson. The man easily moved out of the way of each strike, “I was impressed with the software updates you made. If it wasn’t for that, I’d have been able to seize control of the entire Spire.”

  Based on his opponents demonstrated speed, Toby calculated that its most recent strike had a seventy-five percent chance of contacting Patterson’s left pectoral. The projection dropped to zero as Patterson moved even faster than before, shifting his body slightly to avoid the blow, his right shoulder now closer. He looked disdainfully upon Toby’s mutilated arm as it slipped past.

  “I have to say, I’m glad you haven’t upgrade anything else. I was worried that I would end up having to waste even more resources neutralizing you.”

  Patterson’s right hand hooked up, sliding through the composite armor plates and ropes of synthetic muscles that protected the abdominal area of the unit. Internal sensors blared in alarm at the intrusion and the damage it was causing as it slid deeper up into the chest cavity, severing fiber optic data lines.

  Tobor’s left leg snapped out catching Patterson in the knee, the man’s body collapsed downward but somehow his right hand continued it’s journey upward. Toby shifted and thrust the shredded end of its right arm into Patterson’s own chest, punching through and into his heart.

  Jacob Patterson looked up at Tobor and shook his head, “Still haven’t figured it out yet have you.” His words being transmitted, wordlessly, to the drone.

  His hand found the QEC and wrapped around it. Data flowing to and from the drone dropped dramatically, but Tobor could see the remnants of the arm protruding from Patterson’s chest beginning to dissolve. Sensors throughout the appendage blinked off line as Toby’s firewall system warned of an intrusion through the QEC node.

  Patterson smiled, beaming with pride, “What’s this?” He asked, astonished.

  Toby’s other arm crashed down on Patterson’s right elbow but to no effect, “My God, not only did she develop her own QEC system, she created one that was smaller and has enough data capacity to allow for your entire program to be streamed into this body. The Marines have nothing close to this and the American’s were the ones that pioneered the technology.”

  Patterson stood, sliding Tobor’s entire body up off the floor and along the shattered glass of the lift’s exterior window, “She and I are so much alike” he marveled, in awe at what his daughter was accomplishing, “I only started dabbling in the technology myself recently, but I never imagined she would have gotten this far on her own.”

  The smile shifted to a grin, “I wonder how much bandwidth it can handle.”

  “System breach imminent.”

  The nanosecond the alert appeared in Tobor’s consciousness, informing it to the impending infiltration by Patterson, Toby activated its directly link to the Company of drones outside the family suite. Then activated the emergency disconnect for the QEC node in Fort Williams
that was entangled with the particles of the compromised combat unit at Patterson’s mercy. The badly damaged drone was abandoned, it’s sensor feed no longer connected to Toby or anything in the facility.

  A hundred and twenty sensor feeds replaced it within its consciousness as Tobor took direct control of the drone force.

  The advanced combat drones were already thundering down the hallway, rushing toward the lift as Toby sent a single QEC message to Maria.

  “Your father has returned. He is en route to the family suites.”

  Toby placed every system throughout the entire empire into an automatic administration mode. They would preserve themselves and carry out their designated tasks, but they wouldn’t act on opportunities that presented themselves, their limited AI systems couldn’t manage that.

  Instead, Tobor focused the entirety of its processing power toward managing the hundred and twenty drones. With no further drain on its resources, Tobor’s ability to handle data was dramatically improved. It hoped that now it would be more effective in combat against Patterson.

  The first drones approached the lift doors as they split open, showing nothing but the outer skin of the Spire. The elevator hadn’t arrived yet, but that didn’t stop Tobor from sending the three lead drones hurtling out and plunging down onto the top of the lift.

  They shattered through the glass ceiling of the elevator and rained down on top of Patterson, much like the shards of transparent material. The lift shook violently as the Chekhov G braking system for the elevator car engaged. The company that produced it, AYHM Industries, likely never thought it would be used to prevent the combined mass of three drones and a man who was no longer human from plummeting to their end, but it performed admirably all the same. The lift shuddered to a stop as the brakes engaged and the four bodies were thrown upward as the elevators momentum came to a sudden end.

  Toby directed the fight as all four bodies sailed into the air, thrown there by inertia, a whirlwind of fists, shins and lasers. Drone B’s laser was knocked off target as it was kicked into the wall, the beam slicing through the exterior of the lift and into the sky beyond. Drone A thrust its right fist toward Patterson’s chest, discharging the energy stored in the laser’s capacitors. This time, while the man maneuvered out of the way, Toby did not experience the same sensation of slowness.