by Lance Erlick
“Detective Malloy spotted Luke driving the van. There’s no advantage in wasting time pretending he wasn’t here.” Synthia sprinted up the dirt road. The new knees, hydraulics, and power units allowed her to run swiftly over the soft, uneven ground. She cleared her mind of distractions and focused on avoiding injury while she considered how to keep Krista from interfering.
On network channels thirteen and nineteen, Synthia monitored Emily Zephirelli and Marcy Malloy. They were together when Malloy received the call from Hector Kramer, Madison’s chief of police.
“Got a couple of calls you might want to check out,” he said. “First came from a municipal dump site. They reported suspicious problems with their surveillance cameras.”
“How so?” Malloy asked.
“The images fuzzed up for twenty minutes, as if someone tampered with the equipment. The operator got suspicious when he spotted a van along the far side. It could be illegal dumping, but I thought you’d want to know.”
“Any plates on the vehicle?”
“Cameras weren’t working and too far to see,” Kramer said.
“You mentioned a couple of calls?”
“Yeah,” Kramer said. “A county patrol spotted a van driving away from the dump site. License plate matches the man you’re looking for. He’s driving.”
As she listened in, Synthia could attest that Luke wasn’t driving. However, this report meant the police had another sighting of the van, another chance to zero in on the cabin. Synthia wasn’t being as effective as she needed to be. She was making mistakes.
“Give us the coordinates,” Malloy said.
She repeated the conversation for Zephirelli, who called to pass along instructions to the FBI teams assembling in the Madison area.
“Get eyes in all directions,” Zephirelli said. “Nothing gets in or out.”
“It’s a heavily wooded area,” the FBI agent on the other end of the line said. “Wait—one of the drones we put up confirms the van’s license plate matches a vehicle driving off a county road and onto a dirt road.”
“Get teams out there to cover all roads in and out,” Zephirelli said. “We’ll meet you. We need to capture Luke and the woman he’s with, preferably alive and unharmed.” She didn’t add the bit about Synthia being an android for any agents not privileged to have that information.
To make matters worse for Synthia, network channel thirty-nine, which monitored John Smith and his newly acquired android, showed them heading up Interstate 90 in Synthia’s direction. That meant Anton Tolstoy and his friends had insight into FBI activities and were on Synthia’s trail.
While running uphill, Synthia contacted Wisconsin-clone.
The cabin had served its purpose of allowing her upgrades and providing time to study global android developments.
Halfway to the cabin, Synthia veered off the road to the left, toward the north, where she’d hidden an SUV. She’d acquired the vehicle five months earlier, using money she’d taken from Machten’s theft of his former company—he would have difficulty reporting her, since he’d created her and provided the programmed directives. He was liable for her actions. She’d hidden the vehicle for a day like this.
She leaped over a gully, grabbed hold of a tree branch, and launched herself ten feet across a stream. She landed on uneven ground, among sticks and newly-fallen leaves that could have twisted a human ankle. She continued running, thankful for her enhanced joints.
“Stop distracting me.”
Synthia jumped over fallen tree limbs and grabbed branches to steady her as she jumped over rocky ground. Before her stood a clearing she used on rare occasions. She dropped her backpack, located a particular tree hollow, and dug out a heavy plastic bag. She hefted the package up to the light and rolled out four sealed canning jars. To assure herself the contents hadn’t been disturbed, she held up one of the jars, using her high-pixel eyes to study the contents: Gold and silver coins she’d obtained from less-than-reputable coin dealers, plus rolls of used hundred-dollar bills; nonsequential ones she’d picked up from dozens of banks during their early days in Wisconsin.
She removed the jars and carried them to the SUV, still hidden beneath leaves and branches down the hill from the clearing. She sealed three of the jars in a compartment in the floor, added the fourth to her backpack, and tucked it beneath the backseat.
Without removing the camouflage, Synthia checked the Faraday cage she’d built into the SUV that included clear filament sheets over the windows to create a complete seal, like a microwave oven. She’d designed the shield so she could activate and deactivate it to conceal her electronic signature from prying eyes. She locked the SUV, made sure it wasn’t visible from the sky or from the road, and ran uphill toward the cabin.
“Perhaps you don’t,” Synthia said, disturbed that she couldn’t keep her plans hidden from Krista. “Luke has been very helpful and—”
“You’re not a very good humanizing element when you lie about Luke and want to abandon him.”
“Do you trust Luke to make every bit of evidence about me disappear?”
“Then stay focused.”
Krista said.
Neither did Synthia, recalling the times Machten had purged her mind of all memories so he could alter and control her. Recalling motivated her to never let anyone capture her and purge her mind again.
* * * *
Synthia ran through freshly-fallen leaves toward the cabin and used the time to check surveillance in the woods and elsewhere. Various network channels lit up with alerts. The snake-eye channel showed squads of FBI agents arriving at Machten’s locations simultaneously. They caught him leaving his bunker. He acted startled.
Victoria Thale marched across the parking garage and up to him, holding out a folded sheaf of paper. “Mr. Machten, good to see you busy at work. This is a warrant to search your entire premises. Please open up.”
She acted polite with a dozen uniforms scattered behind her holding guns. More surrounded the building and entered the upstairs building lobby in case there was another exit they hadn’t identified. Machten opened the lobby door to his underground facility, led them to a wall cabinet that hid access to his inner bunker, and opened that. This wasn’t his first search; the FBI knew about the concealed inner bunker.
“I have nothing to hide,” Machten announced. He glanced up at a camera with a worried expression, as if pleading with Synthia to put his mind at ease. Synthia checked with Wisconsin-clone.
“We don’t have five minutes,” Synthia said as she quickened her pace. “Block access to the server room until done.”
“We need it in five minutes.”
Synthia blinked the hallway lights six times and left the corridor in darkness.
“Is this intentional?” Special Agent Thale asked, fumbling for a light. “Where’s your backup generator?
”
“Blame the antiquated electrical system,” Machten said. “I’ll check the breakers.”
He felt his way along the wall, heading toward a room next to where he’d held Synthia captive for six months. Behind him three FBI agents turned on flashlights. All of the rooms off the corridor were electronic access and locked. In the reflected light, Machten checked his watch and strolled to the control room with Thale on his heels.
“Are you late for an appointment?” Thale asked, catching up. She used her phone to illuminate the way.
He turned to face the special agent and to stall for time. “Part of reconciliation with my wife was to be home for dinner unless I called with a good excuse. I don’t think she’d be impressed to learn the FBI is breathing down my neck again. Didn’t we take care of this last time you searched the place?”
“Your wife requires you home for dinner?”
Machten looked at his watch again. “As arranged.”
“Stop stalling and turn on the electricity.”
Machten nodded and placed his hand on the wall security panel to the utility room. Without electricity, it didn’t acknowledge his print. He pulled out a ring of physical keys and fumbled with them. He knew which one worked, yet tried them one at a time until the last one turned in the lock. So far the blackout had wasted four minutes. Wisconsin-clone confirmed a countdown of 120 seconds.
Thale pushed open the door and scanned a flashlight over the utility room. She located the electrical panel and pointed to the switch Synthia had overloaded to trip.
The purge wasn’t complete. Synthia didn’t want FBI agents seeing any activity when they entered the server room and certainly not a purge. That would stir them to dig deeper.
Machten reached up to reset the switch. Synthia hacked his electrical systems to induce static. A spark shocked him, sending him backward against the opposite wall. She’d wanted to do that for a long time. Alas, it provided her nonbiological self no satisfaction.
“Damn. What the—” Hands shaking, Machten steadied himself and stared at the switch.
Impatient, Thale flipped the switch and the lights came on. “Open the rooms so we can search,” she demanded.
Using eye, hand, and voice recognition, Machten opened each door, leaving the server room for last. Thale hurried inside as the last activity lights blinked out. There was no longer anything for the FBI to find. Unless Machten was hiding something from Synthia, her clone had removed all evidence from his home and company as well, except for the creation of the android the FBI saw in his company’s lab.
The FBI search of Machten’s underground facility was a minor risk compared to what Machten’s engineering chief did before the FBI arrived at the lab. To prevent them from capturing Margarite, the company robot with its mechanical face, the chief engineer applied a fixed human face mask and drove the android off campus. As if guided by the invisible hand of greed—more likely their spying on Machten’s facilities—Donald Zeller and Jim Black separately released their own androids, each with a human face. Including Vera and the android acquired by Tolstoy’s John Smith, there were at least five other androids on the loose.
Their human “masters” had no idea what they’d unleashed. Synthia’s circuits quivered at the thought. She had to stop to calm herself before she triggered an overload and a malfunction.
Chapter 11
Synthia reached the clearing behind the cabin and double-checked all of her local camera surveillance. She spotted the chimney billowing smoke up above the treetops, exposing their position.
She should have found another way to dispose of their cardboard and paper waste. Instead, she’d focused on disposing unneeded components from her upgrade while she gave Luke a reason to stay in the cabin. Multitasking was great, but Synthia’s internal temperature was rising with her juggling so many things. At least Luke was busy burning boxes and other evidence. The cabin’s internal cameras showed him down to the last few items.
The wood lounge chairs from the front porch were gone, used for firewood as she’d instructed. There were no other external objects of human or android manufacture. Inside cameras showed that Luke had cleared the entire cabin except a pile of bags by the front door. He was wearing gloves, scrubbing the tub, doing a thorough job.
The surveillance cameras in the woods showed no activity around the cabin. Where the dirt road rose up from the county road, a police car parked. Another drove up the path until it reached her van, which blocked the way. Synthia pulled an aerial drone from her nearby stash and flew it over the road. Four dark sedans approached. The second had Detective Marcy Malloy driving with Emily Zephirelli in the passenger seat. Synthia hacked their vehicle’s communication and GPS systems to get tighter surveillance on them. They looked grim, deep in thought, determined.
Synthia sprinted into the cabin and startled Luke, who was working on the sink. He jumped. “I didn’t hear the van.”
“I left it on the road to slow them down.”
“They’re coming?”
“They’ll be here in six minutes,” Synthia said. “Let’s go.” She tossed the last of the boxes onto the fire, grabbed Luke’s arm, and pulled him to the front door.
“I’m almost done,” he said, pointing to the kitchen.
“No time. Grab your bags.”
Not a multitasker, Luke fumbled with his bags. He was having trouble adjusting to the pace she needed to set.
Synthia handed Luke his backpack and two duffel bags. “Head north.”
“We’re walking out?”
Synthia pulled on a backpack, grabbed the remaining two duffel bags, and pushed him through the doorway. “Move unless you want to be interrogated.”
That rattled him. Perhaps she should have trained him better, but he got jittery every time she brought up the need for preparations.
Perhaps Krista was right, but Synthia wasn’t ready to give up on Luke. He’d been very helpful with the upgrade and his love for her made him a trusted companion—except in tense situations.
Luke hurried after her across the clearing and into the woods. She watched him through the tiny camera in the back of her neck.
Wireless cameras along the dirt road relayed how agents tried to push the van out of their way. Other agents hiked on foot past the blockage and headed uphill, followed by Zephirelli and Malloy.
“Tell me you have a car,” Luke said, huffing behind Synthia.
She slung one of her duffel bags over her shoulder, strapped it to her backpack to keep the weight from shifting, and took one of Luke’s bags. “Keep up. I have a plan.”
She leaped over piles of branches and leaves, watched Luke pick his way through thick underbrush to keep from falling, and kept going. She needed to get the SUV uncovered and the bags inside. She’d return for him if need be.
Wisconsin-clone interrupted the possible argument.
Synthia experienced twinges she identified as regret, similar to when she tossed her old parts. It was a human-type attachment
to living and continuing her existence in its many forms. She’d asked Wisconsin-clone to commit electronic suicide in order to protect her.
When she’d contemplated creating electronic clones, Synthia had hesitated. The more copies she created, the greater the chance the FBI or others might discover at least one, which would alert them to hunt for others until they purged every version of Synthia’s existence. Now that they were closing in on Wisconsin-clone, she wanted more copies to ensure at least one version of her survived “in the wild.” She wondered at her use of the term wild as an expression Krista would have used.
Cameras Synthia had spread around the perimeter of the forested retreat and those she’d hacked along nearby roads showed police and other FBI teams setting up roadblocks. They flew drones into the area to canvas any overland movement, fanning out from where the dirt road met the county road. Synthia counted thirty-two agents and police with more heading her way. There was no point sharing this with Luke. It wouldn’t motivate him to move faster. Instead, it would increase the probability that fear and panic would shut him down.
When she was out of the area, Synthia planned to abandon the frequencies and the encryption she’d used to wirelessly link with the cabin’s cameras. The FBI would be able to access the equipment, yet would have no recorded history or link to her unless she accessed the connections again.
Luke fell farther behind. Synthia didn’t slow down. Jumping over a ditch, she reached the SUV. She pulled branches away and cleared a path to a dirt road leading to a different county road than where the FBI congregated. Luke was still stumbling down the hill, taking his time around clumps of leaves and over rock clusters.
Synthia placed all of her bags in the SUV, stuffed the glass canning jars inside, and picked up a police uniform she’d stored there. She checked a baby’s car seat she’d placed in the middle row. The doll appeared realistic enough if no one got too close. Nevertheless, to minimize anyone seeing too much, she had the doll bundled up despite the warm noon sunshine.
As Luke made his way down from the last ledge to the SUV, Synthia placed a blanket in the third seat for him. Wearing her police uniform, she emerged into the clearing to urge him on. Luke froze. His face lost all of its color.