Burn-In

by P. W. Singer

  “You know how this ends, don’t you? You’re not just responsible for the deaths of FBI agents, but you won’t even get to be a martyr. The release of this data will end that.” Keegan paused. “You’re dead either way. Unless . . .”

  Heath leaned back against the chair’s hard back with a look of feigned nonchalance, as if he were stretching after a long day at the office and wondering where he should go for happy hour. “Wyoming,” he said.

  What is he talking about? Keegan thought. “Wyoming, what?”

  “If I do witness protection, I want to go to Wyoming.”28

  That was a fast trade; Heath had apparently been working this out ever since he was captured. No, this came from well before then, thought Keegan. A guy with a tunneling safe room always had a plan to get out.

  “Talk,” Keegan growled, thinking about Heath’s likely ask. Maybe 20 or 30 acres, off the grid, but with wind and solar to avoid working too much. Not one of those tiny houses; he seemed more like a double-wide trailer kind of guy.

  As she thought about it, she could almost taste the sweet air of the Tetons, savoring the beauty on the hike she’d make in before she found a hide site, the deep breath in as she framed Heath’s head in the reticle of a long-range rifle scope. The only question was what beer would Keg bring along for the campfire that night?

  No, not beer. Whatever wine they had been growing. Noah would have laughed that dumb laugh of his at that.

  “There’s some things you need to understand,” Heath said. “This is much bigger than me or the NFF. You assume in your complacency that groups of different views can’t come together, but we can, as long as the foe is shared.”29

  “And who’s that?”

  “It’s not a ‘who’ but a what. Everything. Our cause brings together all who know that the world must change, that the status quo must not stand.”

  “Whatever. I’m sticking with ‘who.’ Who is coming together?” Keegan asked.

  “It is a movement that exists virtually, because it’s the only way we were willing to meet with groups we share so much with, but also so little. It’s both idea and network—a web. We only used virtual cutouts and—”

  “Who? Names. I’m not joining your little hate club, so just spit it out.”

  “You will want to target the leaders of inferior stock, first. Their mistake is one made often, thinking that I am just another redneck whose irrational anger comes from losing his place in this world. Wrong. Wrong! Born of the hearts of Aryan heroes, with the conviction for a strong nation led by the strongest, I know my place, my destiny, and that is the source of my rage.”

  “You’re better than them. I get it,” said Keegan placidly. “You just want me to roll up your partners in crime in exchange for a get-out-of-jail card. Who were they?”

  Heath smiled as if he were a kid caught cheating and he could now tell on his classmates. “The Brave and Strong, Nation’s Promise, the Freegan Collective, and . . .”

  As Heath rattled off the names of various extremist groups, from neo-Marxists to environmental terrorists, Keegan considered the significance of them coming together. They were ideological rivals, constantly battling not just online but in the streets. Then again, Stalin had once teamed with Hitler, and then with the free world against Hitler. Of course, it could all be bullshit, Heath trying to frame his own enemies.

  “These are the same assholes already on my watch lists,” Keegan said. “You want Wyoming? Ratting out a bunch of known names is not going to even get you a lifetime in solitary.”

  “But they were working with us. If we go down, they should too!”

  “Then maybe you shouldn’t have been so dumb as to get caught,” Keegan said. “Look, you just said it’s all virtual. Bet you’ve never shaken their hands, shared a beer, tattooed each other’s asses, or whatever it is you all do when a bunch of domestic terrorists are alone together. You got their names, locations?”

  Heath shook his head but smiled.

  “Not good enough then,” Keegan said. “Better give me something before the robot comes back.”

  “Lincoln.”

  “Nebraska? You bargaining down from Wyoming to Nebraska?” Keegan asked incredulously.

  “No, we all used avatars to cloud our identity, famous people from history. But that’s how I can give you the one name worth it. Moses revealed just enough to figure out who Lincoln really was.”

  “Huh?”

  “I want to go to Wyoming, far from anybody. That’s what I’m going to need if I tell you.”

  “It’s gotta be worth it. No deal till you show your cards. Let me be crystal clear with you: this is your only lifeline. Who is this ‘Lincoln’?”

  Heath looked down, as if measuring whether it was worth it.

  “He’s closer than you think. He’s here. In Washington.”

  Keegan got chills.

  “In the FBI?”

  Heath slowly shook his head and then he smiled. “Jacobs.”

  “I need the full name. There’re a lot of people named ‘Jacobs’ in the world.”

  Heath’s smile grew wider. “Only one is a United States senator.”

  FBI Domestic Special Detention Facility

  Reston, Virginia

  Keegan stood alone in the hallway outside the interrogation room trying to work out whether Heath was telling the truth. The HRT operators had cleared out, smartly realizing that Heath’s revelation could turn any agent near it into political collateral damage.

  Keegan had even sent TAMS off to go charge. The reason was twofold: if there was anything to the allegation, this was going to get complicated very quickly. She needed to know where things stood before she set TAMS loose, crawling the cloud’s corners for information on a US senator’s potential link to a crime, let alone one involving an unprecedented network of terrorist groups. The second was the ABC rule: Always Be Charging. As chaotic and consequential as everything had been until now, it was going to get a lot worse.

  She guessed it would take a minute, but Noritz showed up in the hallway within thirty seconds. He must have run all the way from his office.

  “Bosch wants to meet . . .” said Noritz, motioning to follow him. “Now.”

  Noritz stared at the ground the whole way. They headed to Noritz’s office, not toward the executive conference room and its automated meeting transcription recording devices. Noritz tried to hurry her there, moving at a pace almost like a speed walk, but Keegan deliberately held back, both to stretch out time to figure out how to handle this—nothing good ever came from a meeting like this—and because the exosuit had indeed tweaked her back, just like Noah had warned.

  Noticing himself out in front alone, Noritz slowed to match her pace. When they got to his office, Keegan saw Bosch, alone, sitting at Noritz’s desk. On the desk in front of him was a thin, gray metal box, with three parallel indentations running along the side—a personal jammer, designed to overwhelm the frequencies of any devices within 16 feet of the user.1

  So, Keegan thought, it’s going to be one of those conversations.

  “Shut the door,” he growled.

  Noritz stood to the side, as if to get out of the firing line.

  “I’ve just looked through your interrogation of Mr. Heath. An interrogation that, I understand, has pointed you toward a candidate for the office of the president of the United States, Senator Jacobs.”

  “That’s correct, sir,” Keegan said.

  “No, it is not,” Bosch said. He chopped at the air with his hand and twirled his AR glasses with the other. “This ends here.”

  “Sir?” said Keegan.

  “Every crime is political in this town,” said Bosch. “That goes without saying. But this is on a level that goes beyond any one agent, any one investigation. These kinds of pursuits quickly metastasize into cancers that threaten the Bureau’s survival.”

  “Cases make the Bureau,” said Keegan, repeating the line she’d been taught in the Academy, knowing Bosch and Noritz knew it too. />
  “No, that’s the saying for the masses. For the leadership, it is that certain cases break the Bureau,” said Bosch. “I’ve lived it. You know what the job of deputy director for the Bureau really is? It is not about keeping the trains running on time, like in other agencies. It is about ensuring the continuity of the finest law enforcement organization that any country has ever established. We’ve seen it pushed close before. Why do you think we’re out here in the ’burbs? Because we got tangled up with a presidential election, for some damned good reasons I might add.2 But it didn’t matter, we were the ones left holding the bag of shit.” Bosch narrowed his eyes. “At least the Russians aren’t involved in this. Or is there something else you’re not telling me?”

  “No Russians, sir,” Keegan said. “But if there is something more here and we don’t pull that thread, it’s the kind of thing that could harm the Bureau.”

  Bosch ground his teeth and his cheeks turned red. “Don’t you dare tell me about doing the right thing for the Bureau! That was your damn job, Agent Keegan! First, you took what should have been an easy assignment to ensure the TAMS program failed valiantly and instead you created some kind of robot superhero all over the news, and, even worse, all over my inbox with queries from the White House. How fucking dumb are you, Agent Keegan? I should have assigned it to the damn bot, as it’s clearly the smarter one between the two of you.”

  Well, thought Keegan, that answered the question of where Bosch really stood on the TAMS program.

  “And then,” Bosch kept screaming. “On top of that fuck-up, you turn that one simple job into an even bigger shitstorm. The last deputy director who touched something political like this didn’t just get fired, but lost their pension literally the day before their retirement.3 And that is not happening here, I can guaran-damn-tee you that.”

  Being screamed at was nothing new to Keegan, but this felt different. The Marines who had yelled at Keegan had power that only went as far as their squad or platoon, maybe a company. Bosch was one of the most powerful men in the country. Or maybe not, based on the way he was reacting to all this.

  “Yes, sir,” said Keegan. There was nothing else to say. What was going to happen was going to happen regardless of all the histrionics.

  “Neither of you are to approach Jacobs. Don’t let me hear about you even Googling him. In case either of you aren’t getting the message this time, Keegan’s off the case. So is the bot.”

  Bosch shifted his attention exclusively to Noritz, ignoring Keegan completely, as if he was done with her. “You screw this up, Noritz, and you’ll be lucky to end up working security for some automated distro warehouse in West Virginia.”4

  Noritz looked down at his shoes and nodded. When he looked up, Bosch had already barged out the door with a slam behind him. “Don’t fuck me on this, Keegan,” said Noritz, pointing her out the same door.

  Keegan headed to the bathroom. She needed somewhere alone to process this. She turned on the sink, cupping her hands beneath the faucet. For about thirty seconds, she just stared at the water dripping through her fingers, falling through the cracks no matter what she did.

  Then, she did what they taught her when faced with a problem: work it from another angle. She overlapped her fingers at a slant, making a design the water couldn’t escape. After the faucet filled the cup of her hands, she splashed it onto her face, as much to recharge as to remind herself that the last twenty-four hours had not been a dream.

  The face that looked back at her in the mirror was different from the one in her home. It was tired, haunted, and frankly just pissed off.

  As she dried her face with a hand towel, a message popped on her Watchlet. Willow Shaw. She should have expected it.

  I wanted to check on how you and our friend TAMS are doing.

  About to take some downtime, she responded.

  So I’ve heard.

  Another little hint that his eyes were everywhere.

  I’ve spoken with the president about the investigation and the need for you and TAMS to continue with this important work, now more than ever.

  Did Shaw tell the president, or did the president tell Shaw? Keegan wondered.

  My boss told me otherwise, she replied.

  If you can get the information you’re looking for, you’ll have support at the highest levels possible.

  More ambiguity. What was going on here? Couldn’t Shaw just get Bosch off her back with a single message? Probably, but that clearly wasn’t how it was going to work.

  OK.

  It was a passive aggressive answer, her own attempt at ambiguity, given she hadn’t yet worked out her next move.

  Then, a final note from Shaw:

  All understand the importance of what we’ve asked and the challenges you face. TAMS is an asset to our nation playing a valuable role in this time of peril. So are you, Agent Keegan. Do what you know is right and the system will take care of you.

  “System” as in the machine? Or “system” as in the real powers that be?

  She headed back to her cubicle, thinking about how she needed someone to talk this through with, someone like Noah whom she could trust with her life . . . And that decided it before she even made it down the hall.

  Keegan didn’t even bother to sit and instead just unhooked TAMS from its charging dock. The first thing she said to the robot was “Find me the location of Senator Harold Jacobs.”

  The National Mall and Memorial Parks

  Washington, DC

  Keegan stood on the roof of the FBI’s mobile command post, a converted tractor-trailer truck parked maybe 150 yards to the west of the base of the Lincoln Memorial. With one foot propped on a knee-high, mushroom-like antenna, she leaned into the breeze and surveyed the scene. She could have viewed it through video feeds, but she wanted to get the lay of the land.

  It was about as perfect a day as could be planned for a revolution. The weather had swung again, down from the low nineties to a pleasant and, most important to the cleanup, low-humidity 71 degrees. Under overcast skies, the slight breeze cut through the trees that surrounded the National Mall’s perimeter, feeling like soft, light touches to her skin.

  A voice buzzed in her earbud. “Hey, you can’t be up there!” One of the FBI support techs inside must have heard the footsteps on the roof.

  She ignored him and closed her eyes, going over what she had just seen. She wanted to imprint it all in her mind, something her old gunny sergeant had taught: a visualization insurance plan, in case the GPS went down mid-patrol.

  Just above the tree line, a flock of media drones danced up and down, their control algorithms positioning them for the best crowd shots, but also trying to block their robotic competitors’ line of sight. Flying above them was another layer of law enforcement surveillance drones from each of the agencies that had to play together for events like these. US Park Police had jurisdiction over the National Mall, but they were backed up by DC Metro, which owned the roads that ran through it, while Secret Service had the White House side, and US Capitol Police had the other end of the Mall. Hell, there was probably a drone from the Bureau of Engraving and Printing police somewhere up in there too, thought Keegan.5 A third layer, yet higher, was made up of air taxis, evidently diverting from their normal commutes so that passengers could post selfies of themselves above this historic gathering.

  Below the aerial scrum, a pair of movie screens framed the Lincoln Memorial. But there was no sign or banner draped overhead—in the augmented-reality feeds, each person would just project their own political slogan onto the screens and the building’s blank white marble. Everyone could then sell or see whatever message they wanted, contradictory beliefs occupying the same hallowed ground.

  A wooden speaker’s podium stood in the center of the stage, an old-model silver microphone set on it—an unmistakable link back to the past great leaders who had stood there. Whoever was advising Senator Jacobs knew their business.

  Before the memorial was an overwhelming crowd of peopl
e. For all the time she had lived in DC, Keegan had never seen a protest march this big in person. Yet this was different from the photos of the anti-war, civil rights, and women’s rights marches she had only seen pictures of. Or rather, it was the crowd that was different, because they all looked different.

  Usually protesters shared a common look or background. Mostly teens. Or mostly women. Or mostly pissed-off farmers. But here was a skinhead geared up in leather standing next to a thin, pale man in his fifties wearing a cheap gray suit, a Treasury Department lanyard around his neck. An elderly white woman in a shawl, carrying a sign that read “Income is a Human Right,” wedged herself next to a teen with beaded LED dreadlocks that blinked an image of the American flag. The two had locked arms and punched their fists into the air at the drones overhead, as if the power of their shared anger alone could rip them from the sky.

  Keegan snorted at the thought—not just the fantasy that you could will an algorithm to fail, but also because she’d seen an angry crowd in Riyadh do the very same thing right before they charged her checkpoint. She wanted to shout back down to this crowd: You still have it pretty damn good compared to the rest of the world.

  It didn’t matter; Jacobs offered something that had been missing for more than an entire generation: unity. The demonstrators were discovering what it was like to join together again with fellow Americans. Distinct in their own prior allegiances and affinities, together they were discovering how being angry could become its own identity. Angry at the changes they’d seen play out on the news and up close, from the color of the water that ran past their city to the historic flood that had taken a chunk out of it. Angry at what had happened to the banks, the food, and even the air itself. Angry at whatever catastrophe was next. But most of all, angry at all the algorithms and bots marching a few Americans into the future while leaving the rest of them behind. They no longer understood how the machines worked, but they understood they were changing everything. It was one massive crowd of a people who just wanted to get things back to the way they used to be.