Synapse

by Steven James

  The rotund man across the aisle to my right leaned toward me. “I was just wondering if you and your Artificial are flying to Seattle for business or for pleasure.”

  I looked at him curiously. “How do you know he’s an Artificial?”

  “I couldn’t help but overhear you two talking earlier. I put two and two together.” He extended a fleshy hand. “Angelo Natchez. Good to meet you.”

  “I’m Kestrel.” His hand was sweaty, his fingers sausage-like. “This is Jordan.”

  “So. A work trip or a vacation?” Though a large man, his shirt was too big for him. The armpits hung loose and yellow and damp. “I’m on business, myself. A correspondent for Hastings Broadcast News. Big announcement at four at Terabyne’s HQ. First flight I could catch. If I’m lucky I should make it there just in time. Lots riding on this one.”

  Trevor had let me know earlier about the press conference. I didn’t ask Angelo to clarify if he meant that a lot was riding on Terabyne’s announcement or on his report regarding it.

  “Okay,” I said, hoping to extricate myself from this conversation.

  “Terabyne’s not giving much away. Never do. But my source says it’s gonna be an upgrade—Artificial Super Intelligence. Finally.”

  “We’re visiting family,” Jordan said to him, getting back to Angelo’s original question regarding the purpose of our trip.

  Angelo looked from Jordan to me as if he were expecting a punchline. “Oh—right. His family or yours?” He gave a light chuckle. I couldn’t help but notice that he’d addressed his question to me rather than Jordan, who’d spoken to him. A definite snub. A sign of disrespect.

  Something a Purist might do.

  “Hers,” Jordan said with no malice in his voice. Maybe the slight hadn’t registered with him.

  “Anyhoo,” Angelo said. “Nice to meet you.”

  “You too.”

  I gave Angelo a parting nod and then excused myself to use the restroom.

  As I made my way up the aisle, I wished there was more I could do for Jordan.

  I still felt bad about being so abrupt with him earlier when he was asking me about the power of God and the spirits of the animals and I’d informed him in no uncertain terms that he couldn’t worship God.

  Honestly, who was I to say? If he had free will, why couldn’t he believe and then genuinely respond to that belief through worship or prayer? If he could feel awe looking at creation, why couldn’t he express that awe to its Creator?

  But I knew that it wasn’t just his questions about God and his search for forgiveness for letting his previous owner die that were on his mind—he was also troubled by the loss of his mother and his concern that she actually was living on in the CoRA.

  He’d clearly cared about her. And, although I knew his emotions differed fundamentally from mine, I couldn’t assume that simply because he was a machine the grief was less in magnitude. His feelings needed to be addressed just like mine did. His HuNA setting for emotion was a ten. I’d lost Naiobi. He’d lost his mother.

  Which might explain why he was so curious about how to “solve” sadness.

  Solving sadness—would that ever happen for me?

  For either of us?

  I wondered if it was the emotional settings I’d given him, or if his affection and devotion were things that’d been preprogrammed into him. But ultimately, what did it matter? His love for his mother was real. And so was his search for absolution.

  And if Jordan can love what is real, why can’t he love a real God? A God of love?

  But if God is so loving, an inner voice countered, reminding me of Trevor’s question to me, why is there so much pain and suffering in the world?

  Right now the answers I’d come up with regarding God’s sovereignty didn’t seem satisfactory to me.

  No answer did.

  As I returned to my seat after visiting the washroom, I tried to leave thoughts of God and sadness and suffering behind me. Instead, I turned my attention to the bombing and Nick’s investigation and the unknown person who’d ransacked my apartment.

  It seemed that Nick must have been right about the timing of that break-in when he observed that it wasn’t a coincidence.

  It might be nice to get both Jordan and me thinking about something other than our personal losses and the resultant grief.

  I felt uncomfortable with the idea that Angelo might still be listening in, so when I got to my seat I was glad to see that he’d put on a VR headset. Still, I lowered my voice as I turned to Jordan. “Using the Feeds here on the flight, is it possible for you to do some research for me?”

  Following suit, he spoke softly when he replied. “What would you like me to look into?”

  “Vehicles. Ones that were in the vicinity of my apartment during the time it was trashed. See if any of them were near the Terabyne facility when the bombing took place. Access video surveillance, security cameras, CCTV footage, whatever’s available on the Feeds.”

  “Of course. And you?”

  “The violin that was taken from my apartment. I’m going to see if I can find any for sale. If we can find out if someone is selling mine, it might lead us back to the people who took it.”

  * * *

  Cascade Falls, Washington

  As the chopper approached the campus, Nick took everything in.

  It was impossible not to be impressed by the Terabyne Designs World Headquarters.

  Each of the eight sprawling structures stood as an elegant architectural marvel nestled between the mountains of the majestic, snowcapped Cascades, the silver and glass buildings reflecting back the grandeur of the picturesque landscape.

  The welcome sunlight briefly gave way to swirls of mist that were descending from the nearby peaks. Then the sun returned again, bringing the campus into full view.

  From his research during the flight, Nick knew its layout and now instinctively eyed the two roads leading in from the highway, evaluating entrance and exit routes and the susceptibility to an attack similar to the one in Cincinnati.

  Because of the orientation of the campus’s roads to its buildings, the structures were much better shielded from attacks by car bombs than the Cincinnati plant had been.

  He took note of the location of the research and development superstructure, the marketing and public relations offices, the conference center, the administrative buildings, and, on the west side, the housing complex and power plant, noting their placement and the sidewalks weaving between them.

  All of the buildings were also connected by sublevel tunnels that provided access during inclement weather. The campus could be buried under a meter of snow and still function.

  The pilot circled in and landed on the helipad gracing the top of the admin building just southeast of the subterranean mainframe computers that helped sustain the Feeds.

  Both the Internet and the Deep Web—what some people used to refer to as the Dark Web—had been incorporated into the Feeds years ago in an attempt to make them more accessible in repressive countries that’d found ways to block or censure certain searches and sites, the slogan of the Feeds guiding everything: “All for free, and free for all.”

  At the time, Terabyne Designs had won the contract to house the mainframes that stored nearly twenty percent of the information on the Feeds. Since then, the percentage they hosted, and Terabyne’s global influence, had only continued to grow.

  As Nick exited the chopper, he zipped up his wind jacket to keep the chilled mountain air that was churned up by the rotors at bay.

  Trevor Hathaway was waiting for them on the helipad and gestured for the team to follow him.

  The pilot stayed with the chopper, but after the rest of them were inside the building where it was quieter, Nick greeted Trevor. “Good to see you again.”

  “You too.”

  Quick introductions all around, then after Commander Rodriguez had distributed radio patches to Nick and the team, Nick said to Trevor, “What do we know?”

  “The pr
ess conference starts in about three and a half hours. I have my people sweeping the auditorium where it’ll take place. We have bomb sniffing dogs, my team is securing sniper positions, and we’re operating at our highest security protocols. So far no red flags.”

  “I’d like you to give us a tour of the facility and the route the media and journalists will take from the parking area to the conference center.”

  “Certainly. Follow me.”

  * * *

  30 kilometers east of Seattle, Washington

  “That’s it.” Eckhart turned off the electric torch and removed his welding helmet. “We’re good. We’re through.”

  She watched as two other men stepped forward with crowbars and wrenched open the back of the armored car.

  “Be careful getting them out,” she cautioned them. “They’re fragile.”

  Gingerly, her men removed the crates and placed them on the ground in front of her. She indicated for them to continue, and they carefully unlatched the lids, eased them off, and set them aside.

  When Eckhart saw what was in the crates, he looked at her quizzically. “But I thought they were carrying Artificials.”

  She knelt and pressed the packing material to the side. Then, with tender care, she picked up one of the glass cubes containing a quarter-sized sensor suspended by tiny wires in the middle of the fifteen-centimeter-square box. There would be one hundred of the sensors in each of the crates.

  “No. Not Artificials,” she said. “Something much more dangerous.”

  Two hundred chips.

  Two hundred opportunities to transform the world.

  She stood. “Alright, let’s get to work unloading them. Use our crates and put the initiators at the bottom of them. Bury them beneath the chips. We need to get everything repacked and loaded up in the second car.”

  Eckhart gestured toward Lenny. “What about the driver?”

  “Leave him to me.”

  40

  En route

  3 hours left

  I found what I was looking for.

  A violin had been sold at a pawn shop on Cincinnati’s West Side and, based on the photographs of it and its description on the Feeds, it was mine. Though I wasn’t sure where Nick was or what he was working on today, I sent him a message about who had it. A name—Allison Franklin. It didn’t ring a bell to me.

  As I was finishing up, I glanced at Jordan, who’d pulled up the Feeds on the screen in front of him and was watching digitally enhanced, sped-up footage of the cars that were passing along the highway just before the bombing occurred, scrutinizing the images far faster than any Natural could have.

  * * *

  He processes what he’s searching for but cannot get Kestrel’s words from earlier out of his mind, and he wonders if this is the way it is for humans—working on one thing while distracted by thoughts of another.

  According to her, he cannot worship God.

  Cannot praise the Creator.

  And because of that, he will never find forgiveness for what he did to Sarah when he let her bleed to death in that bathtub. She’d slit her wrists because she couldn’t bear the thought of living unloved and he’d failed to take any steps to save her.

  And you loved her.

  Yes.

  And yet you let her die.

  Yes again.

  He’s no longer sure that he wants the CoRA to be real, to be waiting for him, since, if it is there—if he’ll live on indefinitely after his CaTE—it would be in perpetual unforgiveness. And what kind of existence would that be?

  It would be hell-like suffering.

  Hell for a machine.

  There. Now. On the screen, he sees it. The connection he’s been looking for.

  He pauses the footage.

  Drops back ten seconds.

  Studies it again.

  Compares the images.

  Two cars on two different days with the same plates.

  One, on the highway just one kilometer from where the terror attack happened on Wednesday. The other, parked a block from Kestrel’s apartment at the time it was ransacked.

  “I have something for you,” he tells her, “something you’re going to want to share with Agent Vernon.”

  * * *

  Cascade Falls, Washington

  While Nick was walking with Trevor and the Tac team down one of the gleaming ivory-colored corridors toward the conference center’s lobby, he received two messages from Kestrel.

  The first identified a woman who appeared to have purchased her violin. He dispatched two agents in Cincinnati to speak with her and to search for fingerprints or DNA on the instrument. At this point, the trace evidence would likely be contaminated, but it was still possible they could catch a break and that something would lead them back to the person who took it.

  Second, Jordan had found a set of plates whose owner might be involved.

  Impressed with their research, Nick ran the plates and established that they’d originally been purchased by Sienna Gaiman. He forwarded Jordan’s discovery to his unit, telling them to specifically search for any connection between Sienna and Dakota.

  Then he redirected his attention to what Trevor was saying as they passed through the lobby and came to a set of double doors at the far end. “And here’s the auditorium.”

  Trevor pressed open the doors and invited them inside.

  The theater-style assembly hall was filled with lush, comfortable seating.

  By glancing at the number of rows and the number of seats in each row, Nick did a quick calculation and realized that the auditorium could hold just over four hundred people.

  He studied the space, taking note of the scaffolding high overhead, the sound booth at the back, the location of the exit doors.

  If you were going to do something in here, what would you be looking for?

  “This might not be the site of the attack,” Nick said.

  “Where are you thinking?” Rodriguez inquired.

  “The Feeds. If the Purists are somehow able to infiltrate this campus, they might try to go after the storage for the Feeds—after all, this is one of the most vital routing stations in the world for them.”

  “And the most secure,” Trevor assured him.

  “Take me down there. I want to have a look around.” Then he turned to Rodriguez. “You and your men focus here, on setting up a perimeter around the auditorium. Eliminate access to the scaffolding. No one else gets up there. Report to me if you notice anything at all strange, and work with Trevor’s security personnel to start clearing members of the press to allow them into the building.”

  “Do we have any idea what we’re looking for?”

  “Not at this time. Our intel isn’t that specific. Do what you do best and see what you can find out.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Nick thought of the mole that the Purist had told him about in the interrogation room. Ripley? Dakota? Even though she was no longer with the Bureau, it might have been her.

  He sent a request through to Agent Fahlor to find out if Dakota had been working undercover for the NCB or consulting on any projects with them over this last year.

  Then, he followed Trevor to the elevators down to the sublevels that led to the underground storage facility for the mainframes that housed nearly a quarter of the information on the Feeds.

  * * *

  30 kilometers east of Seattle, Washington

  Lenny Crenshaw struggled to get free.

  The people who’d stolen the shipment had left him seated on the floor of the warehouse with his hands secured with plastic wrist restraints around a pipe.

  He’d already spent what he guessed to be twenty minutes trying to tug the pipe free, but although he’d managed to loosen it slightly, he didn’t expect that he would be able to wrench it from its fittings.

  He had to admit that the woman had imitated his voice impressively when she called in to Prestige’s dispatch center to let them know there’d been a delay, so they probably still didn’t
suspect that anything had gone wrong.

  From what he’d been able to overhear from her and her people, they were heading to Terabyne’s HQ and, with Aubrey driving and knowing the transfer verification codes, they just might be able to pull off getting through security there.

  But then what?

  Why had they removed and then repacked the products into those identical crates before loading them into the second car? He’d heard mention of initiators, which could be an element in a bomb. Were they planning to blow up the shipment? If so, then why treat the items inside with so much care?

  Whatever they had in mind, he needed to do what he could to stop them.

  Rather than continue trying to torque the pipe loose, he directed his efforts at rubbing the plastic restraints against the pipe’s rough, rusted surface.

  It was impossible to do without scraping his skin against the pipe as well, but it didn’t seem that he had any other choice.

  Steeling himself, Lenny set to work grinding the plastic restraints, and his wrists, across the gritty corroded pipe.

  * * *

  Cascade Falls, Washington

  Twenty-five minutes ago, she’d left Lenny restrained in the warehouse and climbed into the second armored car with Aubrey beside her. Now, Aubrey was at the wheel and Eckhart and two of their men, Willoughby and Julian, were in the back beside the crates—all of them wearing Prestige Armored Car Company security guard uniforms.

  Aubrey guided the vehicle past the protestors along the road just outside of Terabyne’s security checkpoint.

  A progression of media vans stood to the right, waiting to be checked by Terabyne’s security forces, but the officer in front of the armored car signaled for them to pull forward to his guard shack.

  While Aubrey gave him the transfer verification codes, his colleague, an Artificial working for the security forces, searched under the car with a mirror attached to the end of an adjustable metal pole.

  She waited while the guard beside the vehicle asked Aubrey about their cargo.

  “Two crates,” Aubrey said. “I can give you the shipment numbers?”