Читать книгу Reborn - Lance Erlick - Страница 10

Chapter 5

Synthia’s citywide tracking located Machten driving his SUV toward the facility’s underground garage. She backtracked through traffic cameras to an office in an abandoned warehouse recently refurbished into small offices upstairs and an open makers-prototyping facility below. Since Machten had his own 3-D printing and prototyping, she couldn’t pinpoint the purpose of his visit. She discovered no Wi-Fi cameras to access inside for a closer look.

The street camera showed a man in causal business attire leaving the building a few minutes before Machten did. She ran his image against facial recognition software and identified him as an investment banker with Technicorp Banking. Evidently, her Creator was raising money, likely to make more of her. That didn’t bode well.

Synthia accessed the facility security cameras covering the underground garage. Machten parked his SUV in his usual spot in the lower level and glanced around. When he climbed out, a tall man with stooped posture stepped from behind a pillar and greeted him. From facial expressions and an awkward greeting, it appeared that Machten knew the man, yet wasn’t happy to see him. Synthia hunted for a way to listen in. There was only video with the garage cameras and Machten had his phone off. He wasn’t accepting calls and clearly didn’t want anyone tracking him.

Synthia resorted to reading lips.

“I need to speak with you,” the other man said.

He straightened up and glanced behind him. Synthia didn’t see anyone else in the garage in natural light or on a separate infrared camera aimed at the garage.

Machten motioned for the other man to enter the back lobby entrance of the underground facility.

Synthia scanned Machten’s system and internet databases for information on the visitor. The man was not one of the partners in the company that fired Machten. Warren Rutherford was, however, a colleague from those days, a technical engineer Machten had hired. Warren still worked for the company.

“What’s this all about?” Machten asked after they entered the back lobby. There was no receptionist, though there was an empty desk where one might have sat. It faced a back door into the underground garage where a single vehicle parked. Next to the desk was a door governed by triple security: eye, voice, and thumbprint.

Synthia turned up the volume to the lobby microphone and recorded.

Rutherford nervously looked around and tucked his shirt collar up until it concealed his neck. “I’m sorry we have to meet like this. You know how it is.”

“What’s on your mind, Warren? Have my former friends and partners made a breakthrough?”

“Ralph wants to meet with you on a proposition. Ralph McNeil.”

“I know who Ralph is. He held the knife that plunged into my back.”

“I don’t know anything about the politics,” Rutherford said, glancing over his shoulder. “I’m a grunt engineer.”

“One of the best. What’s old Ralph want?” Machten stepped back as if ready to offer his guest one of two seats along the wall and then thought better of it. He seemed not to want Rutherford to stay.

“He said to ask for a meeting.”

“That’s it?” Machten said. “He could have called.”

“He said you’ve refused his calls.”

“He’s probably right. Have you guys made a breakthrough?”

“You know I can’t talk about—”

“Then tell Ralph to pound sand,” Machten said. “I’m busy.” He opened the door to let Rutherford out.

“Wait. All I can tell you is the government is putting out feelers for a big prize for developing a fully functioning android with advanced artificial intelligence.”

“Military?”

“He didn’t say.” Rutherford’s hands betrayed slight tremors. Sweat formed on his cheeks and his glasses steamed.

“Your backstabber friends are having problems. Margarite has limited mechanical and AI capabilities.”

Rutherford squirmed. “After you left, they couldn’t find the quantum brains. They blame you. They say you stole the components.”

“That’s what backstabbers do,” Machten said.

If Machten had taken the quantum brains, that meant Synthia might be carrying the stolen goods, which could explain Machten confining her to this dungeon.

“They obtained new materials.” Rutherford hung his head. “We can’t get the software to work. They’ve fired six teams for failing. Look, I don’t know what Ralph wants to talk to you about. That’s all I’ve got.”

“Fine. When does he want to meet?”

“He’s in the car. He said it won’t take long.”

Machten nodded. “Get your lord and master in here.”

* * * *

Over the facility’s security cameras, Synthia watched a compact man enter the lobby. Ralph McNeil had a kindly face with weary eyes. She based that on her social-psychology module and comparison to millions of other human faces. He was chief of engineering for Machten-Goradine-McNeil and one of Machten’s former partners. He was from the company where the entire concept of Synthia had emerged.

Rutherford nodded and left.

Synthia pulled up public history on McNeil. He was married. He and his socialite wife lived in an expensive home on the North Shore. He worked eighty hours a week. Apparently, he didn’t know his wife was having an affair. The last was an assumption based on street camera footage capturing the wife with a particular neighbor man all around town. McNeil was married to his job and that didn’t seem to be going well, based on the proliferation of wrinkles and gray hairs that had aged him ten years in the past twelve months.

McNeil had been with Machten prior to forming their company, when they developed revolutionary hardware and software for artificial intelligence—for her. They’d made millions when they sold off some of their rights so they could start a new company geared toward creating androids. However, after they formed their partnership, Machten and Hank Goradine couldn’t get along. Conflict grew worse when Goradine arranged financing, which gave him the upper hand.

During the long hours Machten and McNeil devoted to coming up with new designs, Goradine engineered a coup, kicking Machten out. No doubt he believed the company had enough designs to complete the project. Either they didn’t or Machten had walked out with them.

Synthia scanned Machten’s Server Two and uncovered logs of his failed earlier prototypes that were disappointing both as companions and as artificial intelligence, according to his notes. She was his first success. Machten encouraged her to keep learning and favorably surprising him. Then he wiped her mind, indicating that he saw himself the engineer of her improvements. She considered telling him how she learned by recovering memories as examples of what worked and didn’t, but then he would find a way to wipe those as well.

Synthia turned up the volume.

“You stab me in the back and now come hat in hand,” Machten said. “Things must have gone south since I left.”

“I swear I didn’t know until you did. It was all behind the scenes. He arranged the refinancing. He leaked information to your wife.”

“Fabricated, more like.”

“I wanted to speak up,” McNeil said, “but he has dirt on me too. I needed the job.”

“And now?”

The blood drained from McNeil’s face. “We’ve been contacted about a government prize for robotics and artificial intelligence,” McNeil whispered. “If Hank knew I was sharing this with you, he’d oust me as well.”

“Is this another DARPA award?” Machten asked, referring to the Defense Department research program.

“Bigger, but you have to be vetted before we can read you in.”

“Read me in? You … he can’t get the software to work, can he?”

McNeil shook his head. “You’re the best. Deep down, he knows that.”

“That’s why he kicked me out?”

“He wanted control and you were heading down your own path. Look, I don’t want to rehash the nasty business. This is a chance to come back. We know you’re broke. You’ve dumped all your resources into whatever you have hidden down here. Hank can get you the money, but we do things his way.”

“He wants to hire me for an hourly wage?” Machten laughed. “He put you up to this, didn’t he?”

“No. He doesn’t know I’m here, but several board members do. They want to join forces. You get ten percent for your contribution.”

“That’s a joke.”

“Let me explain,” McNeil said. “He raised all the money. He’s taking all the risk.”

“He pushed you onto the sidelines?”

McNeil nodded. “Hank calls all the shots. The deal is that you work under my guidance so you two never have to meet.”

“Thirty-three percent or he can stick it,” Machten said. “He owes me that after what he did.”

“Twenty percent is as high as I can go. It’s a good deal.”

“No deal with that skunk is good. You should have come to work with me.”

“You’re broke,” McNeil said. “I have kids in high school and college.”

“If I know Hank, he has a list of conditions longer than the IRS code.”

The color returned to McNeil’s face, and with it sweat beaded on his forehead. He was on a mission of desperation. “I’m here as a friend and colleague. I had nothing to do with kicking you out.”

“Spill on the terms.” Machten moved closer. His eyes narrowed into slits and his brow furrowed. His blood pressure had to be spiking. Synthia didn’t want him to have a heart attack, which would leave her stranded here, dependent on whoever took over the building after Machten was gone.

“Hank wants all rights to what we develop. You get twenty percent of the profits on this project.”

Machten shook his head. “First of all, it’s thirty-three percent or it’s not worth discussing. Even so, I know how Hank does accounting. He’ll put all of your business costs against this project. I’ll get thirty-three percent of nothing and he’ll get the patents and all the profits. No dice.”

“We’ll spin this off as a separate business and take no fees or income for him, me, or the corporate staff. We’ll put that in writing.”

“Where’s the catch? Why did he send you to do his bidding?”

“Look, Jerry,” McNeil said, “Hank knows you’ve been hacking into our security.”

“He’s paranoid. I don’t have time for this.” Machten opened the door from the lobby to the underground parking garage and waved his hand for McNeil to leave.

“Wait. I trust you, but you know how he is. He insisted that I tell you we’ve upped security to track intruders. He said if you try another stunt, he’ll catch and destroy you and what’s left of your new company. His words.”

“Thanks for admitting this was his idea and acting as a messenger,” Machten said, letting the door swing closed. “Let me think on this.”

“He insisted on one thing.”

Machten turned with hands on his hips. “There always is with that greedy bastard.”

McNeil straightened up, yet was still shorter than Machten. “The board members insist that you give me a tour of your facility so I can see for myself that you don’t have our technology.”

Synthia considered all potential hiding places inside her suite, and settled on the top of the closet. She cleared part of the top shelf and wondered if she would be better off letting McNeil find her. His knowing of her confinement might help her escape this bunker, but McNeil would tell Goradine, who would fight to control her and the stolen quantum brains. That wouldn’t improve her situation. She couldn’t trust Machten, but Goradine didn’t sound any better.

“I hold the patents and copyrights on my discoveries,” Machten said.

“Technically, those belong to the company. Whenever you take anything public, the company will challenge you. The board said the tour was not negotiable.”

“They’re right about that,” Machten said. He stared up at a camera, at Synthia. “No way will I let him or one of his spies in here.”

Since letting McNeil find her violated Directive Two, Synthia climbed to the top of her closet and stuffed herself beside a duffel bag. She covered herself in blankets and used her network channels to search the facility. The bunker split into two parts. The outer layer contained the reception lobby, where Machten spoke with McNeil, a few offices, and a bedroom suite, complete with kitchen. The inner layer, where Synthia was confined, held her suite, the servers, storage, and equipment Machten had used in creating her.

“I told them you’d refuse,” McNeil said. “Listen, please, this is a great deal for all of us. We have a chance to win a government contest that could lead to significant business, but only if we work together. Give me a short tour so I can tell them I saw stuff.”

Machten went to a wall video screen and pulled up the image of a lab with a dozen software development hubs. It was a composite of a room that didn’t appear on the bunker’s inner or outer floor plan, which meant it was a prop for anyone who demanded to know what was going on here.

“This is the most exciting part of the facility,” Machten said. “The rest is storage and living quarters.”

“Let me see.” McNeil moved toward the facility’s entrance.

“I can’t take the chance Hank is using you to plant bugging devices. This is it.”

“What about Vera?” McNeil asked.

“She was a failure, a dead end. She suffered a serious mechanical malfunction. Her brain worked as an artificial intelligence game, but it didn’t integrate well enough with the body. She often fell, and each time she did, it destroyed valuable components.”

“I never told Hank that you took company resources to build Vera.”

“Are you recording this conversation?” Machten said. “Trying to get me to confess to something I didn’t do?”

“No! I’m just saying that the last time I saw Vera you were trying to make her too lifelike. Except for the seams around her face and wrists, she could have passed for human. She freaked me out, and I’m not easily spooked.”

Synthia disagreed with McNeil’s self-assessment. Video clips of him over the past twelve months showed that he’d adopted a nervous facial tic. His visit implied that his company’s prototypes were failing, which meant whatever was troubling McNeil was preventing him from being an effective engineer.

“Vera was a test of concept,” Machten said. “I learned a few things from her, that’s all.”

“You can’t make androids so humanlike. People can’t handle it. You scared Hank with your proposal. I think that was when he decided to remove you. He didn’t want to waste company resources on a freak show.”

“It’s a moot point now that government regulations forbid humaniform robots. Besides, Vera was not a freak.”

Synthia uncovered files on Machten’s Server Two with information and video on Vera. The android looked like a fashion-store mannequin with seams, though her facial expressions were well-developed. So there was another model.

“It’s bad enough that technology has progressed to the point it can replace ninety percent of all jobs,” McNeil said. “You don’t want to make people think that androids can replace humans, do you? That would spark a backlash and destroy all that you’ve worked for.”

“You’re talking singularity,” Machten said. “That’s a long way off.”

“What am I supposed to do when AIs can do my job?”

“Whatever you’d like. Relax on a beach. Write your life history. Now, return to your lord and master. Tell him I’ll consider a deal at thirty-three percent with only direct, out-of-pocket costs deducted from any revenue. I get my own audit. If he doesn’t accept that, then to hell with him.”

Machten nudged McNeil out and locked the door. Synthia climbed down from the closet, stood next to the air-conditioning vent to cool down, and prepared to receive her Creator. She could tell from the satisfied look on his face that he had no intention of sharing her or his talents with his nemesis. His stride down the corridor told her he would have a new mission for her.