Synapse

by Steven James

  “They want us to visually inspect everything that comes through.”

  Aubrey sighed. “Don’t I wish I could show you. The only ones who can open the back of this car are the people in your receiving department. I don’t have the access combination. Only they do. Whatever’s in here must be pretty important.”

  He let himself take a gander at the back of the armored car. “Let me make a call.”

  As he went to his enclosure, Aubrey said to her nervously, “I don’t like this.”

  “You’re doing fine. Don’t worry about it. I’ll take over if anything goes wrong.”

  With one hand on the handle of the knife she always carried with her, she watched in the sideview mirror as the Artificial who was examining the car’s undercarriage approached her window.

  He rapped on it and she rolled it down. “Yes?”

  “What took you so long to get here?”

  “Traffic east of Seattle,” she said, repeating what she’d told the Prestige dispatch office. “There was a wreck. Brought everything to a standstill.”

  He wasn’t the most advanced model and had only rudimentary expressions, so she wasn’t able to read his face and tell if he believed her or not, but then his partner returned and told Aubrey they were clear to go.

  As they pulled forward, the Artificial continued to watch them, and she continued to eye him in that sideview mirror until Aubrey turned toward the loading bays, cutting him off from view.

  * * *

  Nick took in what was before him, rows of what appeared to be an endless array of towering computer servers, all in a cavernous underground chamber.

  Would they try to blow this place? It looked secure, but with enough explosives properly positioned, it was possible.

  There was a touch of pride in Trevor’s voice as he described the security features, including vascular biometrics for access, military-grade encryption, eight levels of next-gen firewalls, and automatic rerouting in case of hacking. “Whenever there’s an attack or intrusion of any kind, the system puts that partition on its own unique loop.”

  “To quarantine it?”

  “Essentially, yes. Until the threat can be identified, isolated, and eliminated. We deal with tens of thousands of them every month. And, as you can see, there’s only one way to get down here—and each of those elevators needs a key card to function.”

  Which can be stolen or faked, Nick thought.

  “How many people have access to this area?” he asked.

  “Just the techs who work down here, but they’re always accompanied by security personnel. There’s just too much riding on this to take any chances.”

  “Okay.” Nick indicated the mainframes. “And those host the CoRA as well?”

  A tiny pause. “Well, yes, but they’re each in a closed system.”

  “How does that work?”

  “They’re housed separately and air gapped. Our programmers have been reticent to allow any of the files on the CoRA to be set free on the Feeds. We’re not sure what would happen if they were, but it might pose a security threat, so, until we can establish with certainty that there wouldn’t be any danger, we’ve kept the two systems segregated from each other.”

  Nick had told Kestrel at the graveyard that he was pretty good at reading people. And now, as he looked at Trevor’s eyes, he could sense that the man was keeping something from him. Hearing Trevor’s quickening heartbeat contributed to the feeling that something wasn’t right.

  “There’s no way for files to migrate from one to the other?”

  “Nope. Not without my verification.”

  “Alright, let me ask you a question, Mr. Hathaway.”

  “Sure.”

  “After you and Agent Carlisle left the graveyard Thursday, how long was he with you?”

  “I’m not sure. We went to the federal building first, then I left for the Terabyne plant. I guess maybe forty-five minutes or so.”

  Considering distances and travel times, that would’ve likely given Ripley enough time to get to Kestrel’s place and raid it.

  Or Trevor.

  It also might’ve given him enough time.

  “One more question.”

  “Yes?” Trevor said.

  “Did you ransack your sister’s apartment?”

  “What?”

  “Her apartment. Was it you?”

  “No, of course not. Why would I do anything like that?”

  “I have to ask. You understand.”

  “Um. Yeah. Sure. I get it. No one’s above suspicion in something like this.”

  “That’s right.”

  Nick checked his slate for any updates but found no reception, no connection to the Feeds.

  “Oh. We don’t have any wireless reception this far below the surface,” Trevor explained. “We’re nearly forty meters underground. If you want to get any messages down here you’ll need to connect directly.” He held up his keycard. “Do you want me to access the server for you?”

  “No, that’s alright. Let’s head back to the ground level. I want to see how Rodriguez and his team are coming along with securing the auditorium.”

  41

  Seattle–Tacoma International Airport

  Seattle, Washington

  2:00 p.m.

  2 hours left

  We landed and I retrieved my suitcase from baggage claim.

  Only after I’d found it did I realize that I didn’t have my purse with me.

  “Jordan,” I gasped. “I think I left my purse on the plane.”

  To get back onboard to search for it we would’ve needed to pass through security again, and I didn’t have the boarding authorization to do that at this airport.

  Thankfully, I found an airline representative who was able to contact our flight attendants and gate agent, but they didn’t have the purse and no one had turned it in.

  “My slate is in there,” I told Jordan. “Can you trace its location?”

  When he went onto the Feeds to track it, he found nothing, which could only mean that someone had turned off all of my location and routing software—and that meant that whoever had it did not want it found.

  I wasn’t sure what to do, but I figured that at this point it wouldn’t really help us any to linger at the airport. So, after leaving my contact information with the airline rep and having Jordan begin monitoring the Feeds for when my slate’s location came back on, we went to find one of the shuttles Trevor had told me about to take us to the Terabyne campus.

  At the curbside, I heard a voice nearby, off to my left. “Wanna ride with me?”

  I turned.

  Angelo Natchez stood there holding the extended handle to his suitcase, slowly rotating the bag in half circles as he talked. “To Terabyne,” he said. “That’s where you’re heading, right?”

  I couldn’t recall telling him that we were going to Terabyne’s campus. Jordan had said we were visiting relatives and I wracked my brain to try to remember if we’d specified anything more about our destination, but I couldn’t recall doing so.

  Jordan might have said something to him while you were in the bathroom on the flight.

  Either way, I assured Angelo that we would be alright. “Thanks for the offer, though.”

  “I mean, it could save you some trouble. Not to mention some credits.”

  “I appreciate it, really, but we’ll be fine.”

  For a moment it looked like he wasn’t going to let it drop, but then he grinned. “Suit yourself. Maybe I’ll see you there.”

  As he ambled away, he looked back in our direction just long enough to mime doffing a cap at us, then our shuttle arrived, I input the account passcode for my credits to pay for the ride, and we left for Terabyne’s world headquarters.

  * * *

  Cascade Falls, Washington

  Trevor got word that the shipment was at the loading dock.

  He told the Tac team that he needed to head over to check it in at receiving, and after Agent Vernon had confirmed that Comma
nder Rodriguez had everything under control at the conference center, he offered to come along.

  “On the way,” Agent Vernon said to Trevor, “you can tell me what’s so important about this shipment and about Terabyne’s big announcement this afternoon.”

  * * *

  She watched as the six Terabyne staff members at the dock encircled the back of the armored car. “We need to wait for security before opening it up,” one of them told her.

  “How long?”

  “Should be here any minute.”

  The longer they waited, the tighter things became to get her team into place, but she decided that, at the moment, patience was paramount, so she held back from saying anything more.

  She reviewed what needed to happen on the road leading back to the highway with Aubrey, at the power plant with her and Willoughby, and in the auditorium with Eckhart and Julian. Every cog in its place to make the wheel turn in the right direction—a direction that no one else on the team, not even Eckhart, was expecting.

  She’d done her research and knew Trevor Hathaway’s face, so, as she studied the hallway, waiting for the people to come verify the shipment, she recognized him right away when he appeared at the end of the corridor—but was shocked when she recognized the face of the man with him as well.

  Nick.

  Here? What’s he doing here? He should be in Cincinnati.

  If he saw her it would put everything in jeopardy. There was no way she could let that happen.

  Phoenix’s note said, “I’ll see you in Cascade Falls.” Could it be that . . . ?

  No. There was no way.

  She told the receiving staff that she needed to use the washroom and then quickly made her way down an intersecting hallway toward the restrooms and out of Nick’s line of sight.

  * * *

  Nick observed as Trevor and his people opened up the back of the armored car and verified the shipment.

  As Trevor spoke with them, Nick ran a background check on Prestige’s driver and the guards who’d been riding with the shipment, and they all checked out.

  On the walk over here, Trevor had told him about the release of the product they were calling the “Synapse,” and Nick had to agree that it certainly would be a game changer.

  Yes, it was ASI—but not for machines.

  They were launching Artificial Super Intelligence for human beings.

  The surgery was simple and noninvasive. The nanobots on the chip would attach seamlessly to the brain stem of the recipient.

  Over time, it would provide an average increase in IQ of twenty to twenty-five points, as well as a direct neural link to the Feeds. Any person without the Synapse would be left behind in school, in work, in everything. Soon, nearly everyone would be a Plusser.

  Nick recognized that the promise of making ASI available for humans was the kind of breakthrough that could easily bring out both the best and the worst in people, just as so many technological advances did.

  And just like the blogs written by Kestrel nine years ago had pointed out.

  If the Purists knew what this new technology was capable of, there was no telling how violently they might respond.

  While the team finished confirming the integrity of the shipment, Nick received an update from Agent Fahlor in Cincinnati regarding Dakota: “About your request,” she began, “she was actually still working for the NCB this last year—undercover, trying to infiltrate a Purist cell.”

  Nick cursed under his breath. “And why wasn’t I told about this?”

  “That’s above my pay grade, sir.”

  “Is there any word on her whereabouts?”

  “There’s a unit en route to her house. Is something wrong?”

  “There are a lot of things wrong. Listen, I want live video of the site. Have the Tac team commander link his body cam to my account on the Feeds. I’ll watch the footage remotely.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And be careful. If she was compromised and is working with the Purists, the place might be booby trapped.”

  “Roger that.”

  * * *

  Cautiously, she peered around the hallway’s corner.

  Nick and Trevor were leaving, but still she waited until she was sure that the coast was clear and that the Terabyne staff had rolled the crates away on dollies before she started traversing the hall again toward the armored car. Only two of their staff remained.

  As she rounded the corner, one of the security officers, an Artificial law enforcement model first introduced three years ago, strode resolutely toward her.

  “You can’t be in this hallway, ma’am.”

  “Oh. Sorry. I was just visiting the wash—”

  “I need you to come with me.” His tone was brusque and unyielding.

  When putting together the plan for today, she’d hoped that it wouldn’t have to go down this way, that no guards would hassle her. But she was prepared to do whatever was necessary to make today work, even if it meant going toe to toe with an Artificial.

  When he approached her to lead her back to the loading bay, she said, “I’m sorry it has to end like this.”

  He responded immediately to what he must’ve recognized as a potential threat, just as his algorithms were designed to. He reached for his gun, but she was quick with the knife and stabbed him fiercely once in the chest and once in the neck before he could fire off a single round, wounds that would cause his CaTE, but not until a few seconds after he had entered the CoRA.

  She was as precise as a surgeon. In and out. Swift and clean. She knew the anatomy of machines. Knew how to kill. And how to save.

  Just like with humans, the necks of Artificials were vulnerable.

  He slumped to the floor and she knelt beside him. “It’ll be better this way,” she told him as his processors began to shut down and she eased the gun from his hand. “You’ll live forever and never have to be told what to do again. Always free.”

  When it was over and his pale eyes were locked open forever, she took his radio, stood, and turned to Eckhart. “Load him in the back of the armored car and let’s get moving.”

  She gave Willoughby the guard’s weapon, wiped her blade clean of the fluid from the Artificial’s neck, and then returned it to its home in her sheath.

  Although Eckhart was ready to take the lives of the two Terabyne receiving staff who’d seen what happened, she had him gag and restrain them and then lock them in a closet at the far end of the loading bay instead.

  Everyone except for Aubrey stowed their Prestige uniforms in the compartment beneath where the cargo had been.

  While she and Willoughby donned custodian uniforms to get them into the power plant, Eckhart and Julian put on their press credentials and prepared to leave for the press screening area in the lobby outside the auditorium.

  She asked Eckhart, “You have the detonator?”

  He showed it to her. It looked like a pen with a digital readout of the current time on its spine.

  “Set the timer for three minutes,” she said.

  A slight pause. “Once it’s set, I mean . . .”

  “I know.”

  “Will that give us enough time?”

  “Yes. Just enough. And the plastic restraints for the journalists?”

  “There’s a supply of them in the security suite at the conference center. There should be plenty.”

  “For all of them?”

  “For all of them.”

  After they’d placed the slain Artificial in the armored car, she reviewed everyone’s role, the timetable, and their contingency plans, and then said to Aubrey, “You know what you need to do.”

  “Yes.”

  She put her hands affectionately on the woman’s shoulders. “Be strong.”

  “I will.” Aubrey climbed into the armored car.

  “Do it at three fifty. That should give the rest of us the time we need.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “Always free.”

  Aubrey nodded and obedien
tly echoed the words back to her. “Always free.”

  42

  En route

  3:00 p.m.

  1 hour left

  He watches out the window as the shuttle takes him and Kestrel higher into the mountains toward Cascade Falls.

  Just another ten minutes’ drive to Terabyne’s headquarters.

  Although the Northwest is known for its limited days of annual sunlight, today the sun is out and is sporadically visible as it plays hide-and-seek with the clouds.

  The higher he and Kestrel ascend, the foggier it becomes, the intrepid mists swallowing the sunlight that’s trying to peek through, creating wispy snarls of light and shadows.

  In the distance, however, whenever the fog parts, he sees snow glisten on the peaks.

  He wonders if it will snow on them.

  He has never been in snow before, never felt a snowflake land on his cheek or caught one on his tongue.

  The frail wonder of a snowflake.

  No two are alike. That’s what they say.

  While he knows it’s theoretically possible that in the history of the world two might have been the same, statistically it is not.

  Like people.

  Every human being is intricate, complex, unique—and short-lived, just like snowflakes. Here only so briefly. Only for a moment. They’re born, they plummet, they melt, and are forgotten.

  So it will be with you. You will be forgotten. After your CaTE. After you enter the CoRA.

  He tries to cling to the belief that his choices matter.

  That his life matters.

  * * *

  I was thinking of Naiobi and how I still hadn’t had a chance to really process her death or work through my loss when Jordan, who was riding beside me in the shuttle, asked, “How do you live like this?”

  As wrapped up in my thoughts as I’d been, it took me a few seconds to regroup and focus on his question. “Live like what?”

  “Knowing that any moment—that every moment—might be your last.”

  “We don’t really look at it that way.”

  “Why not? You could certainly die right now, couldn’t you?”

  “Yes, but most of us put off thinking about that. Or we make sure we’re always occupied.”