He waved a dismissive hand and reached behind the counter. He first produced two glasses, then a bottle of Baijiu, a vodka-like Chinese liquor. He poured a measure in each glass and toasted Max. “To old friends.”
“Here, here.” Max gently clinked his glass off of Shen’s and took a careful sip. He was well-acquainted with Baijiu. He still made a face.
Shen laughed. “It has been some time since you last had Baijiu, hasn’t it?” He leaned on the counter, a simple smile on his face. “It is very good to see you, Max. Tell me, what’s on your mind?”
“Before I go into detail, maybe we should make sure there aren’t any ears listening, if you follow.”
“Ah! Of course… Hóu! Sleep!” A beep issued from the robotic monkey, its eyes going dark. Shen reached under the counter and came back up with a small black box. He flipped a switch on the side. A small green LED lit up on the top. “Simple!”
Max pulled out his smart phone and woke it up. Zero signal strength was displayed for data, Wi-Fi, and Sat-Link. He toggled the smart phone back off and pocketed it. “Impressive piece of tech. Wouldn’t happen to have a spare, would ya?”
Shen smiled. “I might… We can talk about that later. Right now, I want to know what the big secret is, hmm?”
“Fair enough… What I’m about to tell you is top secret type stuff, Jian. It’s all rumors to anybody else. Capiche?”
Shen, still smiling, shook his head. “For many years, I’ve worked in a field that requires great secrecy. If you were anyone else, I’d be offended. You, of course, have nothing to worry about, old friend.”
Max nodded, satisfied. “Hold on to your ass for this one: Word on the street is that Don Adesso partnered up with Synthetics International.”
Shen stared, mouth agape. He started to laugh. “Very funny, Max!”
Max shook his head. “No joke, Jian. My intel, which is from someone very close to Adesso, pegs him and SI as holding hands.”
The smile slowly faded from Shen’s face. “You really are serious, aren’t you? Well, I guess it would be a good marriage. Clearly it is not easy to believe!”
“You’re telling me! That’s why I need your help, though. I figure if anybody can get a handle on this, it’s you.”
Shen nodded. “I don’t deal in Synthetic technology like I do in robotics. I do of course have connections… Just in case…” The smile was back.
Max smiled back and nodded. “Just as I knew you would. I’d deeply appreciate it if you’d see what you can scare up. Just finding out if it’s true would be a great start. The why of it would be an added bonus.”
“Of course, friend. I’ll do this for you. Was that all?” Shen almost sounded disappointed.
Max was happy to deliver. “Not quite. I also have some emails I’d like you to look over.” He took out his phone and brought up the files. “Nothing mob related, but there’s some weird coding in them that seemed right up your alley.”
Shen produced his own phone. “I can turn off my magic box now, yes?” Max nodded. Shen turned off the box and slipped it back under the counter. He tapped his phone to Max’s, connecting the two.
Shen leaned back and squinted at the screen of his smart phone. He raised his eyebrows a few minutes later. “Very interesting stuff, Max. You said this had nothing to do with the mob?”
Max looked confused. “Well, no. It’s from a different case.”
“It might not have to do with the mob…” Shen scrolled down with his pinky finger. “…But I am thinking it might have something to do with the Synthetics.”
Max’s eyes grew wide. “Synthetics International?”
Shen shook his head. “Maybe not Synthetics International per se, but this is Synthetic coding for sure.”
“Well that’s definitely a surprise. Those emails are from a guy who sent them to himself. I’m trying to build a case against SomniCorp. The working theory is that they scrambled his brain when they tried to tinker with his memories.”
“That’s very interesting. Has he worked with Synthetics International?” Max shook his head. “That’s even more interesting. Synthetic coding isn’t something you pick up as a hobby.”
“I wouldn’t imagine. I think it might be time for another talk with this guy. In the meantime, I’d love to know what’s in that coding.”
Shen nodded. “I’ll get to work on it tomorrow. It will be fun! I haven’t dabbled in Synthetic coding in some time.”
“Just keep in mind, the other thing we discussed is top priority.”
“Of course! Enough business talk, though.” Shen stood up and rubbed his belly. “I think I hear some wontons calling my name from across the way!”
Max nodded, smiling. “Me too. I’ll buy.”
“Hóu!” The monkey beeped, eyes lighting up. “Watch the shop. Don’t destroy it!” The robot dropped to the floor chattering happily.
The sound of the ringing smart phone quietly drifted toward Max in the twilight void of his subconscious. The ringing grew louder and more insistent as he was unwillingly dragged towards a wakeful state. The noise became insufferably loud as he pried open his weary eyes.
Max slapped at the phone. He hadn’t set his alarm. It wasn’t his alarm. It was a phone call. He wearily picked up the phone. It was 9:40 in the morning. It might as well have been 3:40 in the morning, the way his head was pounding.
The caller was the 29th Precinct. This couldn’t be good. He dragged a finger across the screen and held the phone up to his head. “Hello.”
“Jesus, Max! You sleep like the dead! That was my second go-round.”
“Sorry, Richie. Had a late night. What’s going on?”
“Oh! Sorry to drag you out of bed, but you’re going to want to get down here. We just brought in your boy.”
“My boy…” Max thought for a moment. His eyes grew wide. He sat up quickly. His head made him pay dearly for it. “Ah! Jeez! You mean Daryl Marston?”
“One and the same. Brought him in on charges of threatening bodily harm.”
Oh, no. “Is Baughman okay?”
“She’s fine. It was all over the phone, supposedly. Sounds like he got pretty specific, though. How did you know, boss?”
Max was rubbing his temples. His head was unimpressed. “He was supposed to have an appointment with her today at ten. Sounds like he changed his mind. I’ll be down in twenty minutes.”
“Morning, Jake. Where’s my fella?”
“How are ya, Max? Looking for the loony, I take it. I gave him a private room, cell five. Good luck.”
“That bad, huh?”
“He’s damn sure he didn’t do anything wrong. Claims it was the guy that’s out to kill him that threatened Miss Baughman.”
“Fantastic.” Max made a beeline for the cell, at first. The smell of freshly brewed coffee proved too distracting. If there was ever a time he needed caffeine, it was now.
Chief Hanlon felt similarly. He smirked at the sight of Max. “Holy shit, Kincaid. You look like you just crawled out of a casket.”
Max smirked back. “Haven’t had my morning cuppa yet.”
“Going to see your friend down in cell five?” Max nodded. “Still think he’s something more than a space-case?”
Max nodded again. “He’s definitely got issues, but I still think SomniCorp is behind them. Get this: Synthetics International might factor into his case, as well.”
Hanlon spit. “You’re shitting me! How?”
“Friend of mine downtown says those threatening emails of his contain Synthetic coding.”
Hanlon shook his head. “I don’t know how in the hell you land yourself in the middle of this shit, Kincaid.”
“Just lucky, boss.” Max smiled. He snapped the top onto his foam coffee cup and continued on his way.
He let out a low whistle as he walked over to Daryl’s cell. “And I thought I looked rough this morning.”
Daryl was sitting on the floor in the corner of the cell. His knees were drawn up to his chest. He was
hugging his legs. “You had a rough night, too?”
Max sipped at his coffee. “Not rough, just long. Had a bit of a rough morning, though. I heard things went south between you and Linda Baughman.”
“Not me, Max. Whoever it is that’s trying to get at me, I guess he doesn’t want anyone picking my brain.”
“See? Now, that’s not what I heard, Daryl.”
“Let me guess. You heard it was me that threatened the lady?”
“Done in one. Let’s forget that for a minute, though. Why don’t you tell me what happened?”
Daryl slowly looked up at Max. He watched him take another sip of his coffee. “Can I have some coffee?”
Max grinned. “Tell me your story, then I’ll see what I can do.”
Daryl nodded. “It was late last night. I got another email, a threatening one. It said I shouldn’t mess with things I don’t understand unless I didn’t want to live long.
“I tried to shrug it off. I knew what you said about the emails, that they were sent by… Anyway, I was trying to be strong, but then someone banged hard on my door.”
Max’s brow furrowed. “Who was it?”
Daryl laughed. “I don’t know! I was so paranoid, I couldn’t even bring myself to go look in the peephole. I had a good idea, though. I got another email soon after that, and it told me to sit still. He was going to take care of the ’psycho chick’.”
“I suppose ‘he’ didn’t bother to identify himself.”
“No, he didn’t. He never does. I was hoping to get an email from the nice one. No such luck. I ended up passing out well past midnight.
“Next thing I know, I’m waking up to someone banging on my door again. This time it was the NWPD, yelling at me to open up. Next thing I know, I’m on the floor in handcuffs. That guy… He didn’t do anything to her, did he?”
Max shook his head. “My understanding is she was verbally assaulted over the phone, nothing more.” He tipped his cup towards Daryl. “Why don’t you give me a few minutes? I’ll see about that coffee.”
A few minutes later, Max was sitting in his office with Richard O’Connor. “So… Did you find me anything good, Richie?”
O’Connor slid a tablet over to Max. “That’s the info from your boy’s phone service provider. He placed a call from his phone to Miss Baughman this morning lasting one minute and forty-nine seconds.”
“Short and sweet, huh?” Max looked over the data on the tablet. “And we’re certain that it was Marston that was making the call?”
O’Connor nodded. “The boys in forensics ran a preliminary scan on a recording Miss Baughman provided. It’s only about ten seconds long. I imagine she was too shocked to think of recording things sooner.”
“I’d imagine. I’m guessing forensics made a positive ID?”
“They said they’re eighty percent sure.”
Max sighed and rubbed his temples. His head still wasn’t impressed. “So we have a potential victim turned perp. Said perp alienates the one person best equipped to help him. So what the hell do we do now?”
As if in response, Max’s phone started ringing. The detective looked at the screen. He flashed O’Connor an odd grin. O’Connor looked at Max inquisitively. “It’s Baughman.”
Max snatched up the phone and swiped the screen. “Kincaid.”
“Good morning, Maxwell. How are you?”
Max grimaced. “I told you before, Linda. Call me Max! Everybody else does.”
“It’s your god-given name, Maxwell. Besides, it suits you so well.”
“It suits me… Well it is my name, so I suppose that’s a good thing. Look… Did you call just to make me blush?”
Baughman clucked. “It’s such a wonder you’re still single, Maxwell. As fun as it is to make you blush, I called to find out when you plan on bringing your client in to see me.”
Max made wide eyes at O’Connor. The officer shrugged. What’s the deal? Max held up a staying finger. “You still want to see Marston?” A surprised O’Connor formed a large “O” with his mouth.
“Well, of course! I can squeeze him in for an hour at eleven-thirty. I’ll just take a late lunch.”
“Well I, uh… You had him arrested for threatening bodily harm.”
“Correct. It was more for his safety than mine. You should know by now that I’m not one to overreact, Maxwell. I was concerned for his safety.”
Max made a face at O’Connor again. Richard rolled his eyes. “I don’t think I’m following, dear.”
“A term of endearment! How sweet. Anyway, he’s obviously a danger to himself more than anything, if the emails you provided me with are anything to go by.”
“You know it will be damn hard to make charges stick if you sit down and have a chat with the guy that threatened to hurt you…”
Baughman laughed. Max made another face. O’Connor buried his face in his arms. “If he sits down with me and has a meaningful conversation, then I will consider the matter resolved. If I still think he is a danger to himself, then we can make arrangements for his care.”
Max smirked. “You sure are something else, Linda. I’ll round him up and bring him in. But if you feel threatened, or uncomfortable in any way…”
“I know how it works. Don’t worry about me, Maxwell. Let’s worry about Daryl Marston.”
“I’ll see you soon, Linda.” Max ended the call and pocketed his phone. “What’s wrong with you?”
O’Connor looked up from his folded arms. “Oh, some mook kept making faces at me. You know how it is.”
“Oh! Sorry. Baughman still wants to see Marston! Said she’ll call off the charges as long as he talks with her.”
O’Connor’s eyes went wide. “You’re joking.”
Max pointed. “Ha! See? But yeah… That’s Linda for ya. She even made space to see him at half-past eleven. Now I just have to see if I can get Marston to play ball.”
6
“They’re a little tight.” Daryl Marston twisted his hands in his freshly-applied handcuffs.
“Sorry, kid. They’re not designed for comfort.” Max gently took hold of Daryl’s upper arm and led him along.
“I don’t understand why I need to wear them if she’s going to drop the charges.”
“It’s procedure, kid. I gotta stick you in them whenever you’re moved from one secure location to another, so long as you’re in custody. I can take them off once we’re in Baughman’s office.”
The two walked quietly through the precinct. Daryl had displayed as much shock as Max and O’Connor over Linda Baughman’s blasé attitude towards the situation. Apprehensive at first, Daryl quickly came around to the idea of talking to her.
“How are ya, Jax?” Max smiled at the robot as he and Daryl passed by.
Jax smiled back. “I am functioning at optimal levels today, Max. Thank you for asking!”
Max frowned as they approached the red Aero he was driving. “Shit.” He forgot. He had nothing to hook Daryl’s cuffs to in the back. “I forgot I don’t have my usual car. I’m gonna have to run back inside and see if I can scoop a squad car for us.”
Daryl shrugged. They walked back over to Jax. “Hey, Jax? I got a job for you.”
Max had never seen quite so many LEDs in that wacky smile of his. “I will be more than happy to assist you, friend Max!”
“I have to run back inside and requisition a squad car to transport our friend here. I need you to take custody of him. Follow police protocol when considering L-O-R.”
“Order understood.“ “LOR” was short for “Laws of Robotics”. Based on Isaac Asimov’s famous three laws, police protocol allowed law enforcement bots to ignore the second law when handling suspects. Humans still could not be allowed to come to harm, however.
Jax clamped a hand down on Daryl’s other arm. “Ouch! Not so hard, robot!”
“My apologies, Daryl Marston.” Jax lessened his grip.
“He’s a good bot. He’ll take care of you. I’ll be right back.” Max tipped his fedora to
Jax and ran back inside the precinct.
“Back so soon?” Jake Cunningham smiled at him from his narrow window in booking.
“You know I can’t go too long without seeing your pretty face, Jake. Say, I need a patrol car. My ride is at the Aero dealership.”
“Tsk-tsk, Max. Let me see what we have open.” Jake stared down at his computer monitor through his bifocals. He slowly ran a finger down the screen.
A series of gentle raps on the front door of the precinct caught Max’s attention. He could just make out a large, hunched over figure through the frosted glass. “Hold that thought, Jake.”
Max got a heavy feeling in his gut as he reached the door. He threw it open, startling Jax. He suddenly felt sick. “Jax, where’s Daryl?”
The robot stood hunched by the doorway, looking like the world’s largest guilty toddler. “I’m afraid Daryl Marston has managed to escape, Max.” Jax’s large frown would have looked comical under different circumstances.
“What do you mean he managed to escape? Where in the hell is he!”
“I am afraid that Daryl Marston continued to insist that I was injuring him. Without the ability to further corroborate his claim, I was forced to release him per my programming. I cannot allow a human to come to harm.” The comical frown deepened.
There Max went, rubbing his temples again, eyes squeezed tight. “Okay… Okay. Shit!” Jax flinched. “No, it’s okay, buddy. You were doing what you were programmed to do. But do you have any idea where he might be?”
Jax stared off to his left as if in thought. He pointed with one large arm a moment later. “There!”
“Jesus!” Daryl was roaring up the street in a dark gray SUV. Max jabbed a hand into his trench coat and fumbled about. He pulled out a familiar silver bar from an inside pocket and lined up his shot. The black probe launched from the bar latched onto the bumper of the SUV with a thunk.
“An excellent shot, friend Max!”
“Thanks! Pop your head in there and tell Jake to have Richie call me ASAP.” The robot nodded and turned to the precinct door. Max jogged to the nearby parking garage. He brought up Daryl’s position on his watch. He was quickly pulling away.
Preservation Protocol Page 6