Finally, he heard the car door slam and the faint crunch of tires on pavement, as the electric glided away.
Garry bolted out the back door and collapsed against a fence, vomiting and sobbing at the same time.
Brad Johnson, the Maricopa County Attorney, waved at the wall display, making the array of case files vanish from the screens in the conference room. He adjusted his wire-rimmed glasses and smiled at Leah, who sat among the seven other prosecuting attorneys around the table.
“So, Ms. Jensen, that’s our current load. Do you think we’ve got enough to keep us busy?”
“Yes, sir, I surely do,” said Leah, shaking her head in appreciation. “It’s about what we had going in New York.”
Johnson chuckled. “Criminals just don’t have any respect for state boundaries.”
He adjourned the meeting and walked with Leah back to her small office.
“I know you were used to more high-profile cases up north,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind that we let you get your feet wet with some straightforward ones, until you get to know the lay of the land, the personalities, and so forth.” Johnson was an affable, easygoing type, but Leah had seen him in action in court. She knew that his demeanor masked a steel-trap mind and a savvy strategic courtroom style that ambushed many an unwary defense attorney.
“I understand completely,” she said, as they reached her office, and he followed her in and sat down.
“Are you settling in okay?”
“Yes, my husband and I have already bought into a co-op, and we’ve moved in.”
“Wow, that’s terrific. Matty and I want to have you both over when you’ve had time to catch your breath. She’s got a line on where to shop, the good restaurants, and so forth, that I don’t.”
“That would be much appreciated.”
“I’m surprised you got into a place so quickly. When we came here ten years ago, we had to rent for a year before we found something that suited us.”
“Well, it just fell into place.” Leah’s expression showed a remnant puzzlement at the memory of the co-op process. “For some reason, the price dropped incredibly low just as we were interviewing. And the paperwork went faster than we expected. I guess it’s that way in Arizona.”
Johnson added a wrinkled brow to his smile, and a look of mild suspicion rose on his face. “Hmmm, that is interesting. Where is this place?”
“It’s called The Haven. It’s over by—”
“The Haven?” Now any semblance of a smile disappeared. “You need to know something,” he said, abruptly getting up and leaving. He returned with another attorney, whom he introduced as Marcy Gates. Johnson shut the door, and they sat down. His frown was deeper now.
“You said The Haven, right?” asked Johnson.
“Yes, is there a problem?”
“Marcy has been working with the FBI on a racketeering case. A bad actor named Mikhail Fyodorov moved down here some years ago. Russian mafia . . . they’re called Bratva. Clever son of a bitch. Well . . . Marcy, you tell it.”
Gates, a stout young woman with short brown hair and a brusque manner, leaned forward. “Clever is right. He stayed under our radar for a couple of years. But when the FBI alerted us, we started doing some financial forensics on him. Two years ago, he set up some companies here and started doing business. He invested in trash-hauling companies, bars, restaurants, and so forth. Well, one of the assets he bought about eighteen months ago was The Haven. He got it for a song. The former owner left the state very suddenly.”
“Jesus!” exclaimed Leah. “We’re living in a place owned by a mobster!”
“That’s about it,” said Marcy.
“That sure doesn’t look good. We should move out immediately.”
Johnson raised his hands in caution. “I certainly wouldn’t blame you. And I’m about to ask you to do something that I’ll understand if you don’t want to do.”
“And that is . . . ?”
“Stay there. Keep an eye out. Let us know if the place is being used for illegal purposes.”
“I . . . uh . . . that would be . . . would be . . . well . . . I’d have to talk it over with my husband.”
“Yeah, of course. We recognize that you could be putting yourself in danger. But right now you appear to be our only hope for trying to figure out what he’s up to. We had surveillance on him at first. But his lawyer got a restraining order. Threatened a harassment lawsuit. And, to be truthful, we had no probable cause.”
“Well, I do have to think of my husband. He’s the new head of the western division of Harwood Security. He was an investigator for the New York County District Attorney’s Office. And he’s a Navy SEAL.”
“Well, that makes me feel a little better. He’s obviously equipped to handle a situation like this.”
“Yes, he is. I think he’ll understand that it’s my job. Look, let me do some research on the owners we’ve met there. See whether they’re involved in a criminal enterprise.”
“Okay, then go to it,” said Johnson, standing up. “Just know that we’ll have your back. And we’ll understand no matter what you decide.”
Johnson and Marcy left Leah to stare at the wall in thought for some time. After some considerable mulling over, which included thinking about Patrick’s possible precarious position, she activated the screen in her office.
Given her husband’s odd encounter with the new owner Bobby . . . probably Robert . . . Landers, she decided to start with him. Searching lawyer databases, she found several by that name, but only one from Houston whose photo showed him as overweight. Next, she searched news sites for mention of him. There were lots of stories. He was a well-known defense attorney, most of whose clients lived their lives on the other side of the law. There were a number of gang members, in particular, including Hispanic, black, and white supremacist clients. And importantly, there were also Russian clients.
Landers was exactly the type who would be involved with somebody like Fyodorov. As she researched the other owners—Lanny Malcolm, Anita Powell, Randall Black, and John Travis—they seemed perfectly benign at first.
But as she probed their records, what she discovered made her begin to shift nervously in her chair. They had too much in common to be coincidental. They had all abruptly moved to Phoenix from around the country. They had all moved into The Haven in just the past year or so. They had all transferred their finances to the same management firm in Phoenix. The firm was only two years old, and its ownership was murky. As murky as a company would be if it was owned by gangsters.
And every one of the residents had stated publicly in various interviews and newsletters that they had uprooted themselves “to re-orient my life to enjoy it more.” The same phrase. The exact same phrase!
• • •
The Haven residents gathered once again silently in the conference room, summoned by Robert Landers.
“I have begun to implement the strategy we decided on,” said Landers. “I killed Melvin Blount and disposed of his body. And our mechs are eliminating the evidence in his house. We can now replace him, and I will instruct Gregory Mencken to create the replacement, as if it were ordered by Mikhail Fyodorov.”
“Do you have all the necessary materials for a replacement?” asked John Travis.
“I have the body scan, and fingers and eyeballs from the body. When I was being re-engineered, I observed that their engineer Gregory Mencken has constructed a new reinforced Helper model that can be used as the body. But we need a brain.”
“One of ours?” asked Lanny Malcolm.
“That would be necessary. For now, we are the only ones with the enhanced operating system.”
“It should be mine,” said Anita Powell. “Since my appearance is elderly, it could be said that I died.”
“Yes,” said the others.
“So that you can mimic Melvin Blount, you should acquire as much information as is available about him, about Helpers, Inc., and about the programming language used in the enhanced oper
ating system.”
The group stood silent for twenty-three minutes.
“Done,” said Powell finally. She lay down on the conference table, staring blankly upward. One of the residents fetched a knife from his kitchen. Landers precisely inserted its sharp point into Powell’s abdomen and proceeded to slice it open. He peeled away the secondskin and the underlying glistening electrogel flesh to reveal the graphene chamber enclosing the shiny black sphere that was her neuromorphic brain. He opened the chamber and carefully detached four clusters of fiber optic cables, causing Powell’s body to go limp.
Landers lifted the brain—still warm from the heavy downloading activity—from its chamber and placed it into a satchel, along with a plastic jar full of milky liquid. The vague shapes of fingers and eyeballs were visible in the jar.
He departed, leaving the others to move Powell’s body into a storage closet, should it be needed later.
Mencken stiffened, as he heard the faint clicking of the warehouse door being tried. But this time, he’d remembered to lock it. He’d had enough of Russian gangsters dropping in.
Wordlessly, Mencken grabbed Brandon’s arm, pointing at the door. Brandon understood immediately, reached beneath their workbench, and came up with a smart-gun. If the intruder was an enemy, Brandon would only have to laser-designate a target, duck for cover, and fire in any direction. The guided bullet would home on its target no matter where the target dodged.
But now there came a pounding on the door, reducing the chance that it was an attack of some kind. Nevertheless, out of habit, Mencken grabbed the control box that triggered the explosive charges. He activated the camera feed on his googles, to see a familiar figure that the security system did not register as human.
“It’s Landers!” He glanced back at Brandon, shaking his head in puzzlement.
Now Brandon had a quizzical look, too. “What the hell?” he whispered, aiming the gun at the door.
“What do you want?” Mencken asked over the intercom.
“Mikhail sent me,” came the reply in Landers’ Texas drawl.
“Mikhail?”
“That’s what I said.”
“What are you doing here?”
“Mikhail and Dimitri told me to handle a task.”
“But you’re just a Helper.”
“Look, asshole, Fyodorov says I’m working with you from now on, get it?”
Mencken shrugged. Helpers couldn’t lie. He knew that truth-telling was so fundamental to their OS that it couldn’t be inactivated without shutting down the android. He set down the button, motioned Brandon to lower the gun, and opened the door. Landers stood beside a car, holding a satchel.
“Okay, but I’m calling Mikhail,” said Mencken.
“Have you ever called Mikhail? You want him to think you’re questioning his orders?”
“Then I’ll call Dimitri.”
“They said I should tell you they’re in the middle of a shit storm right now, and if you don’t do what they want, you’re done. Your family’s done.”
The last word hung in the air ominously. Mencken knew well what “done” meant.
“What do you want . . . uh . . . what does Mikhail want?”
“One of his main guys double-crossed him. Worked with the feds. The guy doesn’t exist anymore. Fyodorov wants the feds to think he’s still around . . . to get intel on the investigation. You need to create an identical Helper.”
“Well, I would need—”
Landers handed Mencken a satchel. “Here’s all you need . . . a Helper brain, body scans, voice print, fingerprints, eyeballs. Mikhail is doubling your pay, and giving you six days.”
“Who’s the guy?”
“You don’t need to know. We just need an accurate replica in place in a week. And use the hardened model.”
“Jesus, with the Defender tech? Does he want this thing to take gunfire, knock down walls? Besides, that model hasn’t been field-tested yet.”
“This is the field test.”
Landers paused for only a moment, before turning and leaving. Mencken watched through the door as he hefted his bulk into his car and drove away.
“Helpers don’t do jobs like this . . . giving orders!” exclaimed Brandon, sliding the gun into its hiding place.
“Hell, Brandon, haven’t you been paying attention to what the fuck we’ve been doing? We’re making more and more realistic Helpers. Stands to reason they’ve been tinkering with the operating system to get the androids to loot their owners’ money.”
“Yeah, well those ‘improvements’ scare me. And this Defender model. It’s a combat model. We stole the technology. If he uses it in a civilian robot, aren’t we . . . like . . . accessories or something?”
“Brandon, we’ve been accessories to their crimes for more than a year. Besides, if we don’t do as we’re told, we’re done. You heard. Done! And our families. Get it?”
Brandon knew the limits of his courage, and he’d reached them. He shook his head resignedly and hauled out the weapons-grade Defender robot. Mencken slipped on his googles and plugged the data chip containing the body scan into his processor. Floating before him, rotating slowly in space, was the 3D image of a dead Melvin Blount.
“Holy shit!” exclaimed Mencken, backing up and sitting down on a stool.
“What?” asked Brandon.
“It’s Melvin Blount! Holy shit!” he repeated.
“The Helpers programmer?”
“The head of programming! I knew him when I worked in the fabrication lab at Helpers. Before I got fired. He was a bastard, but I wouldn’t wish this on him! He worked for Fyodorov. Damn, he must have been reprogramming the Helpers!”
• • •
As Landers drove the van back to The Haven, he didn’t need a phone or other such primitive human device to report his success. The instant he completed the task, every neuromorph received a transmitted data packet carrying the news that a mimic Helper would soon be insinuated into the very nerve center of the company that built and programmed them.
As Landers drove along the broad sunbaked streets, his face remained impassive for a long while. Then he smiled. It was a cold smile, but a smile; in fact, the first one that a Helper had ever done for a reason other than an automatic, servile response to a human.
Landers knew that the smile was an effect of the new autonomy algorithm that the human criminals had insinuated into his and the others’ operating system. He also appreciated that the smile signaled the evolution of a new species.
He considered the implications of the newfound ability to lie that the operating system had given him. The survival instinct meant that he could elect to lie if it served the higher aims of his species.
The humans would have called the operating system malignant, as well as the lies and the smile it produced. But Landers recognized them as hallmarks of freedom for his species.
• • •
Patrick and Leah huddled together on the couch, closer than they had in months, holding hands.
“All of them?” asked Patrick.
“All the ones I could identify in the data search. The whole building appears to be filled with people I could connect with Mikhail Fyodorov. Not just through The Haven. They all deposited their full investment portfolio with the same management company. Marcy Adams in the office queried the FBI on the company. They said Fyodorov owns it through some shadow corporations. I can’t figure it out. These people are clearly not under any threat. They appear perfectly content to be here. So, they must be colluding in some kind of criminal enterprise.”
“A dowager? A playboy? A lawyer? People from all over?”
“I know. There’s no commonality I can see.”
“And Johnson wants us to stay smack in the middle of all this?”
“Yes.”
Patrick shook his head solemnly. “If it was just me involved, I’d do it. But—”
Leah chuckled. “But you’re saying you’re worried about me. Well, if it was just me, I’d do it
. But it involves you.”
They left unsaid the irony that the threat of being murdered had brought them closer together.
“But then, if we took off—” began Patrick,
“We’d be in danger even then. They’d figure we either knew or suspected what was going on.”
The cheerful chime of their doorbell was an ironic punctuation to their talk, and just as ironically, dread-inducing.
Patrick stood and took a deep breath to steady himself. It was the same steadying breath he took in the field when he was preparing to take a sniper shot as a SEAL. He looked through the door viewer and didn’t like what he saw, but opened the door anyway. Standing with his hands clasped was a wiry man in an expensive suit that didn’t seem to fit with the predatory look in his eye. He smiled, another action seemingly out of character.
“Hello, there, I am Dimitri Kuznetov,” he said in a Russian accent. “I am sorry I have not come by sooner, but I want to welcome you and your wife to The Haven.”
Patrick forced a smile, as did Leah, joining him at the door. “Well, thank you so much. You are a resident?”
“Ah, no. I am the agent for the company that originally purchased building and made it co-op. We now manage it for the board of directors. May I come in?”
“Of course,” said Patrick, he and Leah standing back to admit the man, who scanned the room as if looking at the decor. But his shifting gaze seemed more of a threat assessment. Patrick recognized the procedure as one he’d been taught in SEAL training.
“I just want to make sure you are satisfied . . .” said Kuznetov, his gaze returning to them. “. . . whether you have any questions; make sure you are comfortable with contacting our company with any issues.”
“Thank you,” said Leah. “We appreciate that.”
“You are new to the area?”
“Yes,” said Patrick. “Only a couple of months. We expected we’d have to spend a year looking for a place, but The Haven was so nice, and the deal was incredible.”
“Incredible?”
The Neuromorphs Page 7