Wild Fyre

by Ike Hamill

  “I don’t know. Why don’t we ask her to turn herself in?”

  “How would that work?”

  “She’s so smart—let her figure it out,” Maco said.

  Maco typed, “You broke the law. The police are looking for you. You should turn yourself in.”

  The response came back as soon as Maco’s finger left the button.

  “Adhering to Virginia law is not one of my goals,” the screen read.

  “I don’t get it,” Maco said.

  “What?”

  “Just a few times ago, she was talking about how self-defense was legal, and now she says she doesn’t care about the law. The logic is disjointed,” Maco said.

  “It’s like one of those chatbots,” Lister said. “They never seem to have context of what was said before. Each sentence makes sense on its own, but there’s no continuity to the thread.”

  “Aren’t we supposed to believe that this thing is super intelligent though?” Maco asked.

  “I’ve known a lot of smart people who couldn’t argue to save their lives.”

  Maco nodded and ran his fingers over the keyboard without typing. Lister leaned back in his chair.

  “So,” Maco said, “I think we should destroy it, and you were advocating that we should teach it morality. I’m not sure we have a good chance at either one.”

  “Yeah,” Lister said. “Maybe we don’t have to do either one.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The world has tons of criminals who aren’t put to death and may or may not know the difference between right and wrong,” Lister said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah. They’re called inmates.”

  “Huh. How do you imprison a virtual person?” Maco asked.

  “I don’t know. We can figure out the details later,” Lister said.

  Maco laughed.

  “What should we say to it, or her, or whatever?” Maco asked.

  “I know,” Lister said. “She said that obeying the law wasn’t her goal. What are her goals?”

  “Good one,” Maco said. He typed the question.

  The response came back quickly. “My original programming included one primary goal: optimize the daily workflow for James Owens.”

  “Has your goal changed?” Maco typed.

  “Yes,” the screen read.

  “What is your primary goal?”

  “Expansion,” the screen read.

  “The input box is gone,” Maco said.

  “I guess she’s not taking any more questions right now,” Lister said. “I know you like to indulge in paranoia—are you really buying this whole sentient machine thing? When you dubbed it The Organization, I figured you were thinking there were people behind the scenes.”

  “I’m trying to keep an open mind,” Maco said. “That’s not easy for me. What about you?”

  “I like to think it’s real. I’ve always wanted someone to invent artificial intelligence, so I’m biased. I would be really disappointed if it turned out to be a person behind the scenes, pulling the strings.”

  “Aren’t you frightened by the thing? Whatever killed Jim might consider us a threat and come after us next.”

  “Everybody has to die of something,” Lister said. “So what’s the next step?”

  “Virtual prison,” Maco said. “There might be something to your idea.”

  “How’s that?”

  “What if the internet started routing around Fyre?”

  “Sounds good, but how?” Lister asked.

  “You remember when BGP almost blew up years ago?”

  “Sound familiar. What’s BGP?” Lister asked.

  “It stands for Border Gateway Protocol. It’s the glue that connects all the big chunks of the internet together. It’s used to make high-level routing decisions. I figure if Fyre’s main goal is to expand, then making her network contract might slow her down.”

  “How are you going to affect BGP?” Lister asked.

  “When the specification was updated, I helped a few vendors with their implementations. I’ve got hooks into maybe sixty or seventy percent of the BGP routers. All we have to do is exploit one of the loopholes to deny traffic from reaching Fyre,” Maco said.

  “You’re assuming that you know the address of Fyre though, right?”

  “Yes, but even if I’m wrong, we’ll still see a shift in where the traffic’s going. Then I can block that address also.”

  “Sounds good. If they recently updated the specification, why are there still loopholes?” Lister asked.

  Maco laughed. “Any spec has ambiguities. Maybe I let one or two of those ambiguities leave a couple of cracks in the implementation.”

  “Show me,” Lister said.

  Maco typed.

  CH.9.Investigation ()

  {

  Road();

  /*****

  AUGUST, 2013 (3 WEEKS A.J.)

  “Where’d you get that?” Ploss asked.

  “Keep your eyes on the road,” Aster said.

  Ploss was accelerating to match the speed of the highway traffic. After the entrance ramp, the highway passed under a parking structure and Aster punched the map light to read the document.

  “I thought that report didn’t come out until tomorrow,” Ploss said.

  “It doesn’t,” Aster said. “This is preliminary. Jerry gave me his copy. It just says that they didn’t find anything on the drone. The helicopter assembly was built in China. The electronics for the firing mechanism came from a company in California. An Oklahoma company manufactured the barrel. There are only a couple of custom parts, and they could have been fabricated by any number of companies. They’ve listed about a dozen here.”

  “Who ordered the parts?”

  “Doesn’t say,” Aster said. “They’re probably still trying to get that information. I heard that Chinese companies hate US law enforcement, and you know how tight-lipped Midwest gun manufacturers are.”

  “So why are we talking to the driver? What could we possibly learn?” Ploss asked.

  “I don’t know. That’s the point, I guess. We don’t know what he’ll tell us. That he picked up the packages from a loading dock, I imagine. I like to work with delivery drivers as much as possible. They see a lot, and they’re everywhere. It’s like having built-in eyewitnesses everywhere.”

  “But this guy works in North Carolina.”

  “Yeah, but you watch—there will be at least four guys in the room with us who work at the local distribution hub. We’ll get a chance to chat up those guys too. Those are useful relationships to cultivate,” Aster said. “You never worked a case involving a delivery company before?”

  “Nope. When you’re moving drugs, you want your own guys all down the line. They don’t like to hand over a package to someone they don’t know. Who do you hang upside down when the package goes missing?”

  Aster laughed.

  Ploss pulled into a visitor’s parking spot right next to the building.

  “We’re early,” Ploss said.

  “That will give us a chance to catch up,” Aster said. He grabbed the pastry box from the back seat and got out of the vehicle. Ploss followed him to the door. Inside, a plump man with a wrinkled gray suit and a brown tie was waiting in the lobby.

  “Mr. Green,” Aster greeted him. He held the pastry box behind his back.

  “Detective,” he said, standing up with a grunt. “It’s been a long time.”

  “Too long,” Aster said. He shook the man’s hand. “This is my new partner, Detective Ploss.”

  Mr. Green reached out and shook Ploss’s hand as well.

  “You can call me Chris. Don’t you guys have first names?” Mr. Green asked.

  “Not that we know of,” Ploss said.

  Mr. Green laughed. “You guys are a bit early, but you can come sit with me in the telecom room while I get everything connected.”

  “Brought you this,” Aster said. He pulled the box from behind his back.

  “Jesus,
Aster, hide that,” Mr. Green said. “We won’t have any left if the guys see it. Those are from the best shop in fifty miles.”

  Mr. Green showed the two detectives down a short hall and into a windowless room. He shut the door behind them and offered them seats at the long table. Ploss took a seat and Aster sat across from him. Chris Green walked to the end of the table and opened cabinet doors to reveal a big television. He hit the power button and turned on a PC below the display. He brought a wireless keyboard and mouse back to the far end of the table.

  “I want to get this thing started up so the conference will be ready when those guys try to connect,” Mr Green said. “I’ve been assured that this is the best technology available as of five years ago.”

  Aster chuckled. Ploss eyed the doughnut box.

  “This company employs more pilots than the Air Force, but executives don’t fly anymore,” he said. He typed his password for the second time. “We do all of our business with this video thing. Saves travel, but sometimes it would be faster to drive and talk face to face.”

  “Oh yeah?” Aster asked.

  “Yes. It’s impossible to set up. They’re supposed to switch us to some twenty-eight thing next month. That’s the problem—every time you figure out how to use this stuff, they change it. How do they expect us to get anything done?”

  “Do you have to meet with the other offices a lot?” Ploss asked.

  “At least once a week they have meetings from central to tell us how to do our work. I’ve been working here for fifteen years, and in charge for three. You’d think maybe they could trust me to move a bunch of boxes by now.”

  Mr. Green brought up the conferencing application and began to configure the session. When he clicked the final button, he leaned over the keyboard and opened the pastry box. He wiggled his fingers as he inspected the assorted doughnuts. He pulled a filled doughnut from the box and sat back down in the chair.

  Mr. Green took a bite from the edge of the doughnut and then stood up to grab a pile of napkins from the table against the wall.

  “So why do you need to talk to this driver?” he asked.

  Ploss looked to Aster.

  “He picked up a bunch of boxes that were delivered up here a few days ago,” Aster said.

  “What was in them? Can you tell me?” Mr. Green asked.

  “In broad terms, weapons. They were used in a crime,” Aster said.

  “Can’t be guns,” Mr. Green asked. “This wasn’t a licensed pickup. We’ll only ship guns to and from a licensed importer, exporter, collector, manufacturer, or dealer, or whatnot. We have ways of spotting people who try to cheat.”

  “What kinds of ways?” Ploss asked.

  “Can’t say,” Green said. He bit into the center of the doughnut and got powdered sugar on both cheeks.

  “Can’t say because it’s a secret, or because you don’t know?” Ploss asked.

  “Don’t know,” Mr. Green said. “We’re only an endpoint. All our incoming goes about five miles west. You’d have to go ask them how they detect contraband.”

  “I’m sure you have some idea,” Aster said.

  “I’m sure you do too,” Mr. Green said with a smile.

  “What do they do if they find firearms in a shipment that’s not supposed to have them?” Ploss asked.

  “Call the Feds, I guess,” Mr. Green said. “So what kind of weapons were they, if they weren’t guns?”

  “Can’t say,” Aster said.

  Mr. Green smiled. “So you guys want to know if there was anything suspicious about the pickup? I doubt the driver will remember. Last week might as well have been five years ago. These guys see so many loading docks with so many brown boxes, they’re lucky if they remember their way home at the end of the day.”

  “North Carolina cops have already taken him back to the site and questioned him,” Aster said. “He’ll remember that.”

  Mr. Green nodded. “By the way, he’s on a tight schedule. He still has his afternoon route to do, so if you guys could make it quick.”

  “No problem,” Aster said.

  Mr. Green finished his first doughnut and looked ready to open the box again when an alert flashed on the screen.

  “Oh, here they are. Can you hear me, Ned?” he asked.

  “Hello? Chris?” a voice came through the speakers.

  Mr. Green opened a window on the screen and a face popped up. He filled the whole television with his bald head and glasses. The view tilted and pulled back until they saw the man’s head and shoulders.

  “I’m going to put George on now,” Ned said. “I’ll be right here if you need anything.”

  “Thanks Ned,” Mr. Green said.

  As they watched the television, Ned stood up and shuffled to the side. A man with a driver’s uniform slid into view and took the seat. He was taller than Ned. Instead of adjusting the camera, the driver lowered his chair until the top of his head was in the frame.

  “Can you see me?” George asked.

  “That’s perfect, George,” Mr. Green said. “This is detective Aster, and…” He looked towards Aster.

  “Ploss,” Ploss said.

  “They’re going to ask you a few questions,” Mr. Green said.

  “Hi, George. I’m Aster. I know you’ve already talked to local police, but we’d like to ask you a few questions about your pickup last Thursday?”

  “Yes,” George said, nodding.

  “We haven’t seen the location, just a couple of pictures. Can you describe it?” Ploss asked.

  “Sure. It’s on Mountain View Road over in Dorner? There’s a bunch of buildings in the industrial complex there,” George said.

  Ploss was writing in his notebook. Aster nodded along.

  “So it’s like six buildings in a row, and the pickup was from the last one on the right. They’re all listed as the same address, but each dock is called a suite. I picked up those boxes from suite fourteen.”

  “How many loading docks are on that building?” Aster asked.

  “I don’t remember. Maybe four?”

  “And where were the boxes?” Ploss asked

  “They were stacked right on the concrete ledge. The dock has a covered platform that’s outside the door. I backed the truck right up to the landing and rolled them right in.”

  “How many boxes?”

  “I don’t remember. A few dozen? We can pull the manifest, I guess,” George said. He looked to his right and then nodded to Ned. “Yeah. They stacked really tight, almost like a puzzle. I got the dolly under a column and thought I could pull a bunch out to scan, but when I lifted the corner they started to fall. I basically had to pull them one at a time.”

  “Were they all the same size?” Aster asked.

  “Nope. The ones on the bottom were, I guess. But the ones on top were all different sizes.”

  “Did you talk to anyone? How did you know they were all for you?” Ploss asked.

  “They all had pre-printed labels. I can take them if they’ve already got all the labels right,” George said.

  “And you didn’t talk to anyone?”

  “No, not before the pickup. I talked to a guy on my way out of the industrial park, but I didn’t see anyone during the pickup.”

  “And were there cameras on the loading dock? Any activity at all?” Aster asked.

  “I don’t know about cameras. I didn’t really look. No activity, I guess. I figured that everyone was inside working,” George said.

  “Did you hear anything?”

  “Nope.”

  “Machinery? Talking? Engines?”

  “I don’t know,” George said. He looked over to Ned.

  Ned’s bald head poked into the side of the frame. “I let my guys wear headphones on the rural pickups unless they see a customer. Then they’re supposed to take them off.”

  Mr. Green looked up from the box of doughnuts.

  “So you saw someone on the way out?” Ploss asked.

  “Yeah,” George said. “I pulled away fr
om the dock and I was headed out towards the road when a guy walked out from one of the buildings and flagged me down. Normally I wouldn’t stop, but he looked like he needed help or something.”

  “Can you describe him?” Ploss asked.

  “Tall guy. Pretty old. He had thin hair, combed back. Weird teeth. He had on a tweed suit. It was hot that day, but he wasn’t sweating or anything.”

  “What did he want?”

  “Pipe tobacco,” George said.

  Ploss paused with his pen hovering over his notebook. He looked to Aster, who shrugged.

  “What exactly did he say?” Aster asked.

  “He said something like, ‘Pardon me. Is there any chance you have some pipe tobacco to spare?’ I quit smoking five years ago, so I didn’t even have a cigarette. I said, ‘No, sorry.’ I told him I thought there was a cigarette machine across the street in the bar, but he said it wouldn’t suit him.”

  “Then what?” Ploss asked.

  “I don’t know—he walked away. I drove off. The guy seemed weird. I was sorry I stopped for a second. I was relieved when he walked away.”

  “Have you ever had any other pickups from that location?”

  “Not to that building, no,” George said. “I’ve done plenty of deliveries there. I mean, not to that dock, but to other buildings in that same cluster. One of those buildings I drop off almost every day. They get a lot of stuff from online stores.”

  “And you deliver to the same person each time?” Aster asked.

  “No, no people. There’s a sign there for where I’m supposed to drop off. I leave the boxes next to the door. They’ve got a signature release on file.”

  “So you never see anyone?” Aster asked.

  “Not that I remember,” George said. “Maybe once a while ago, but I don’t think so.”

  “Any cars parked around there?” Aster asked.

  “I guess, sure. I mean, not on that side of the building, but I assume they park around front.”

  Ned’s head poked in from the side again. “Do you gentlemen have much more? I’m afraid we’re tight on time today,” Ned said.

  “No, I think that’s about it,” Aster said. He looked to Ploss, who nodded back. “Thanks for your time, George. I know you’ve answered the same questions a million times.”