Unbound
Page 4
As part of their intimacy, Luke rubbed her back in a deep massage he seemed to enjoy providing. He’d told her on more than one occasion that she had the firm muscles, yet soft skin of Krista, who used body creams to keep her skin from drying out. For Synthia, lotions were vital to retain the humanlike feel and allow for repairs of minor scrapes and tears.
In short, Luke had given Synthia a complete overhaul, leaving her mind and memories intact. The result was an improvement over Machten’s designs, which gave Synthia a year of maintenance-free existence. As she considered the status of her upgrades, she couldn’t help imagining herself like a sophisticated car. She rejected the comparison as repulsive, since no one would confuse a car as human. Well, some aficionados might.
* * * *
Synthia set aside her network channel twenty-six to monitor Donald Zeller and Jim Black, respective CEOs of MetroCyberTech and Purple Dynamics, as they drove their separate cars to a secluded forest preserve northwest of Chicago. Her monitoring of their activities identified this as their first meeting in six months.
She selected a full-sized drone she’d stashed near Evanston and flew it high above the area for general surveillance. For a closer look, she directed two mini–bee-drones and even smaller mosquito-drones to proceed to the area. She tapped into the men’s respective phones to pick up their conversations.
These CEOs and their companies were direct competitors of Machten-Goradine-McNeil. All three businesses demonstrated capabilities and interest in creating illegal advanced androids that violated federal law. She wasn’t superstitious, but if she could consider thirteen for her as a lucky number, channel twenty-six should be doubly so.
The men entered a clearing surrounded by trees whose leaves were just beginning to turn. The men’s eyes darted around for potential eavesdroppers. Only after their paranoid ritual did they shake hands.
“A month in prison left you leaner and meaner,” Zeller said. He forced a smile, straightened up, and rubbed his back. An unexpected government pardon had released both men five months ago.
“Doesn’t look like it dented your determination any,” Black said, glancing up at the taller man.
“I want to wring the neck of the bastard who delivered us to the FBI.”
“Same here, but my contacts say whoever did that vanished. My bet would have been Machten, but they think it was a woman.”
“Could have been an android,” Zeller said.
Black laughed. “You think it’s one of Machten’s designs?”
Zeller shrugged. “I have no idea what that bastard was up to six months ago. Rumor has it the FBI did a thorough sweep of his underground facility. They found no indication he’d created anything, as if he’d been playing mind games with us. There were no components, no supplies other than for his living quarters; he’d even wiped his system clean. Whatever he was up to, he kept close.”
“Someone must have warned him.” Black glanced around and up with a puzzled look. Then he lowered his voice. “A year and a half ago, Machten was washed up after Goradine ousted him from his own company. I can’t help seeing a conspiracy.”
“How do you mean?”
“Goradine dies mysteriously and Machten returns to his company,” Black said. He moved further beneath an oak tree, closer to the mosquito-drones. He lowered his voice to a whisper, which his phone amplified. “I’d bet my life he was the one who leaked the information to the FBI that put us in prison. I’m guessing his android killed Goradine.”
“Do you have any proof we could use?”
“No, but with us out of the way, Machten pulled ahead. It smacks of his other scheming.”
Zeller sighed and looked behind him. “At least our attorneys got us out of those stinking prisons. Did your guy give any explanation for our early release?”
“He said national security and don’t dig,” Black said and mirrored Zeller’s paranoia. “So what’s on your mind?”
“After I got out of prison, it took me months, but I cracked Machten’s security to get a camera inside.”
“Has he …”
Zeller nodded. “He had a humaniform robot the FBI didn’t find. I don’t think he left it at the company or Goradine would have uncovered it.”
“My contact said the FBI search was thorough.”
“The sneaky bastard fooled them. He has something. Then last month he blocked my transmitters. I can’t see anything he’s doing. I’ve tried work-arounds; nothing helps.”
“How far has he gotten?” Black asked.
“The robot he lovingly calls Vera is about five-six with a human face and a realistic wig. First time I saw video of her I figured he’d hired or enslaved a new assistant like that Krista woman.”
“Human face? That’s illegal. We did time just for writing proposals.”
“No, we did time over an android contest that appeared to be DARPA,” Zeller said. “I should have been suspicious when their website was so easy to use.”
“If we hadn’t gotten so much heat from the military on our standard models, we wouldn’t have bothered,” Black said. “You sure it wasn’t a setup to flush out our capabilities?”
“My offer to work with you still stands. In the meantime, I need your help to figure out what Machten’s up to.”
Mr. Black nodded.
Their cooperation implied to Synthia motivation to speed up the development of their androids to compete with and perhaps displace her. She needed to further frustrate their efforts since her leak of information to the FBI hadn’t put them away long enough.
Chapter 4
Down her network channel thirteen, Synthia pulled up history of two hours ago to follow the activities of the FBI and NSA investigation. FBI Special Agent Victoria Thale accompanied NSA Director Emily Zephirelli to the offices of Machten-Goradine-McNeil. Zephirelli confirmed via satellite surveillance that Machten’s car was still in the company parking lot next to the lab. Synthia switched to her channel two, snake eyes, the moment Thale parked the car and led Zephirelli across the leaf-blown parking lot to the lab building behind the main office.
Machten still appeared spooked by his visit from John Smith when he spotted the FBI agent and her companion. He glanced around, perhaps for a place to hide, reconsidered, and straightened his rumpled shirt.
“To what do I owe a visit from my two favorite civil servants?” Machten plastered a smile on his face, though his voice sounded wary and his eyes darted around.
“You agreed to cooperate with us on assessing the state of android development,” Zephirelli said.
“As part of staying out of prison,” Thale added. The last part was in reference to how Machten, like Zeller and Black, had divulged illegal android secrets to a website controlled by a foreign agent, though Synthia had altered her Creator’s submission to contain fatal flaws. The Cyber-security Mandate forbade android and artificial-intelligence disclosures to foreigners.
“You said my design was flawed and thus divulged nothing of value,” Machten said. This time his smile appeared genuine.
“You’ve had a DARPA quality-control inspector here,” Zephirelli said, moving toward the lab’s door. “We want to see what you showed him.”
“Certainly.” Strutting with pride, Machten led the government officials into the lab and toward a six-foot-tall robot. “DARPA was pleased.”
Zephirelli studied the mechanical face on the robot; the director’s face registered disappointment.
“As you see,” Machten said. “It meets federal specifications that it doesn’t appear human.”
“So it does,” Zephirelli said. “It wouldn’t be difficult to put a human face on this.” She pointed up at the mechanical head, which turned her way. She jumped backward and then moved closer to inspect.
“What would be the fun of that?” Machten said, trying to act playful. His face turned somber. “I’ve done a
s I agreed.”
“As you’re required to do.” Zephirelli walked around the robot. “Don’t play coy. We know you’ve built a human-looking android in violation of federal law and your agreement.”
“Then where is it?” Machten asked. “You’ve searched my facilities.”
“You smug SOB.” Zephirelli stood before him, her index finger pointed as if to stab him. “Given the nature of Goradine’s death, I can’t help thinking you used an android to get him out of the way so you could take over your company.”
Machten gave a nervous laugh. “Very clever. First, I don’t have an android with that capability. Second, Goradine attacked me.”
“Come now, Jeremiah. Don’t be so modest. Everyone knows your capability.”
“Then they don’t understand how tough the technical barriers are, do they?”
“We know you built a human-looking android,” Zephirelli said, “and it got loose. Don’t deny it.”
“That’s a laugh.”
“We’re not laughing. We know you’re hunting for it; have been for some time, with no success.”
The blood drained from Machten’s face. Then he blustered, “That’s a damned lie.”
“You know how dangerous an android on the loose can be.” Zephirelli carefully studied the six-foot model nearby. The mechanical robot turned its head side to side to follow the conversation.
“I don’t have what you accuse me of.”
“I’m sure you’re terrified of what it might do,” Agent Thale said. “You know we’ll hold you personally liable for any actions your android takes, including theft, assault, murder, espionage. The list of crimes and consequences is long. You can’t avoid punishment, but if you cooperate with us, we can make accommodations.”
“What do you want?” Machten asked.
“Cooperate with us to get your android off the streets before anyone gets hurt.”
“Cooperate how?” Machten asked, inching away from the others.
“How can we trace it before you get into further trouble?”
Machten looked around, led the federal officials to a corner of the lab, and lowered his voice. “I want immunity before I say another word.”
“Is that how you want to play this?” Zephirelli asked. “We’re offering you an opportunity to cooperate. In exchange, we’ll take into consideration your cooperation and in the end, you may get to do your work in a government-run facility.”
“Under constant supervision?”
The NSA director smiled. “Beats the alternative. How do we locate this android?”
“We can’t,” Machten said.
“You mean you can’t. Call her and let us trace her signal?”
Machten clenched his fists. His face turned red. “She removed all tracking devices and changed her phone number.”
“Phones come with traceable SIM cards.”
He placed his hand over his mouth and mumbled. “She can imitate any SIM card. She can pretend to be any phone. And she won’t use the same ID twice.”
“And you thought giving her this ability would be a good idea.”
“She evolved.”
“Is your android biological?” Zephirelli asked.
“No, but she acquires capabilities as if she were evolving.”
“So it has gotten away from you. What are you doing to find her?”
“I …”
Zephirelli pointed to the robot in the middle of the lab. “Have you created another android to locate the one you lost? Are you insane?”
“This android is traceable. It’s impossible for it to block transmissions or our ability to trace it.”
“We don’t need another android on the loose.”
“I have an idea of how to catch her,” Machten said, “but it only succeeds if I work alone. In exchange, I want my family left out of this, the chance to keep my company, and to work for the government. You know, I did offer my talents to the feds and they turned me down.”
“Something to do with lack of accountability,” Zephirelli said, “which still seems to be your problem.”
“We can’t allow Mr. Machten to set the terms,” Thale said. “He’s done nothing to warrant such consideration and he’s created a national security disaster.”
“She doesn’t want to hurt anyone,” Machten said.
“Want?” Thale said. “Your machine wants?”
“She won’t hurt anyone unless people try to hurt her.”
“Even the notion of her is disgusting.”
Zephirelli held up her hand. “Mr. Machten, after what you’ve done, I can’t promise you a cushy job, but I’m willing to listen. We need to acquire this android now. We can’t have another one on the streets. I want your plan by the end of the day as to how we can capture your android. You’d best help us capture it before someone else does.”
Synthia experienced conflict over the federal efforts to capture her. They wanted the same thing she did: to keep other androids off the streets. However, for Synthia to pursue her objective, she had to remain alive and free. She couldn’t let them capture or destroy her.
* * * *
Free of the federal officials, Machten drove across town to his underground facility in Evanston. After Synthia left him six months ago, he’d torn out his security system and installed a new model with tighter controls. That took her a long time to penetrate. Periodically, he purged the system and upgraded it, which forced her to hack in anew. That required that she improve upon the hacking tools he’d designed into her for the purpose of spying on his competitors.
To overcome his latest security measures, Synthia had hijacked bee-sized drones with cameras from a nearby hobbyist warehouse. She used her wireless connection to fly them into the lobby of Machten’s facility. The moment the door closed, she lost contact. Every day he swept the lobby, placed her drones in aluminum wrap, and smashed them.
Synthia replaced bee-drones with autonomous mosquito-drones from the same warehouse. She directed these to fly into corners of his lobby and attach to his clothes whenever he entered his inner bunker. She programmed them to follow him out to the lobby, and whenever the lobby door opened, to initiate a burst transmission to one of her collection stations perched in the ceiling of the parking garage. Unfortunately, he discovered most of these drones and destroyed them. The cat-and-mouse game meant there were gaps in her coverage, though she’d received at least weekly updates on his progress.
To abide by his wife’s reconciliation conditions, Machten worked mornings at the company and afternoons in his facility. Keeping to himself, he’d brought no more interns to his bunker and purchased component stock for his 3-D food printer so he didn’t have to go out for lunch.
Six months ago when she’d left, Synthia swept his facility of everything that hinted of her existence so the first FBI search wouldn’t learn about her. However, she’d underestimated Machten. He had a backup of his system stored in a safety-deposit box. He retrieved that and restored his servers to a month before Synthia left. He’d lost valuable information, though most pertained to his tinkering to remove Krista’s rebellious influences on Synthia.
Synthia was convinced that Machten had concealed an android predecessor to Synthia in a hidden storage room neither she nor the FBI had uncovered. Before she escaped, Synthia had gathered hints of his previous work on Vera, the android Zeller and Black talked about, but not enough to know its capabilities.
Over the past six months, Machten gathered duplicate components intended for the company’s creation of their six-foot robot and brought them to his underground bunker. Synthia hunted public
and private records for the source of the money he used to pay for these purchases. She uncovered no record of Machten stealing money and she’d left him with just enough to get by. Curious, she researched activities from just before he forced Synthia to steal from his company.
There were no other transactions into Machten’s bank accounts. However, when Synthia hacked company records, she identified a second theft of ten million dollars, enough to cover his purchases. He’d sent that money to offshore accounts she hadn’t identified at the time.
Synthia emptied the remaining two million from his offshore accounts to slow him down.
A month ago, all of the cameras she’d placed in his facility went dark. He’d installed a Faraday cage around the bunker, which prevented all electromagnetic signals in or out, including transmissions from the cameras she’d previously sent in. Synthia could only surmise Machten was rebuilding Vera to replace and possibly use against her.
She didn’t know what to expect from Vera. Without a human upload, which Synthia had received from Krista, Vera would be a machine built on pure logic. Machten was taking shortcuts to make the best use of the android he had. He was in a hurry.
Synthia feared he might use Vera to capture her or sell Vera to the military or foreign interests as Goradine had threatened to do in order to raise funds to develop a more advanced Synthia. If either the military or foreign interests grabbed Vera, they could reverse-engineer her to create hundreds more. An army of androids might capture Synthia so the owners could have a monopoly of advanced technology.