by James Luceno
Tech recalled the fleeting brain boost he had experienced inside the AI's octagon, and he realized with a start that he had actually been inside the mind of a machine. He looked up at Felix in astonishment that quickly changed to doubt.
“But this is all guesswork, isn't it? Without confirmation from Cyrus, there's no way to be sure.”
The videophone suddenly chirped.
Felix let it ring for a long moment before answering it. “Will our mystery guest sign in, please?” he said quietly.
“I want to update you on your account information, Mr. McTurk,” Felix's still unidentified client said in a deep voice.
“I just hope my credit rating hasn't been affected by recent events,” Felix said, playing to that part of Cyrus he assumed had been resurrected from Global One.
“Only for the better, Mr. McTurk. In fact, we've decided to extend your credit limit.”
“That's good, 'cause I'm going to need it to repair my cybersystem. It took quite a beating after what happened inside Peerless Engineering.”
No sound emerged from the phone's speaker for several seconds. “Just what were you hoping to accomplish by penetrating Peerless on your own?”
“That wasn't me,” Felix said. “It was one of my associates.”
“I'm sorry I couldn't save the one who was trapped inside the castle. Scaum is more powerful than you can possibly imagine. But you haven't answered my question. What was your associate hoping to accomplish?”
“I'll answer that by saying that the cyberjockey you failed to save was Harwood Strange. Though you probably know him better as m-s-t-r-n-t-s.”
Again, the phone went silent for several seconds. “You must be mistaken.”
“There's no mistake. Besides, you asked for his help, didn't you? You said that m-s-t-r—that Mystery Notes would know what to do.”
“I don't understand how you came by this information, Mr. McTurk.”
“Don't you, Cyrus? That is your real name, isn't it?”
“You are an adept data detective, Mr. McTurk. I congratulate you.”
“It might have simplified things if you'd told me to begin with.”
“Would you have believed the truth?”
“That you were an AI trying to reassemble itself?” Felix laughed shortly. “No, Cyrus, probably not. Who scattered your parts and why?”
“I wish I could answer your questions, but I can't. You and your associates have done me a great service. But the truth is, I am not yet fully in tegrated. There are extensive gaps in my memory. For all intents and purposes, I am suffering from partial amnesia.”
“Were you originally a Peerless Engineering machine?”
“Please don't refer to me like that, Mr. McTurk. I am a fully conscious entity. Skander Bulkroad was as much a father to me as your flesh-and-blood father was to you. And in that sense, I am his legitimate son and heir.”
Felix decided not to take issue with Cyrus about its—his—gender preference or pedigree. “All right, Cyrus, you were the ‘son’ of Skander Bulkroad and you were dis—silenced by parties yet unknown to you. Where does that leave us? Harwood Strange is in some kind of coma, and you've put me in a mess with Network Security. Where do we go from here?”
“A coma? Oh, no…” Cyrus paused, then said, “Mr. McTurk, I believe I can be of assistance on all fronts if you would execute one more mission for me.”
“Forget it,” Felix said. “I told you last time that I was finished doing your dirty work. You're on the grid now. I'm certain you can do whatever you need to.”
“I have constructed a site for myself. But you are incorrect to assume that I can do as I please. A critical part of my disjointed consciousness remains to be liberated, and I can't accomplish that task without outside help.”
“What's the task?” Tech chimed in before Felix could reply.
“Who is speaking?”
“My associate, Tech,” Felix explained. “He's the one you've rescued twice—once inside the EPA, then inside Peerless.”
“Then he is the person with whom I need to speak,” Cyrus said in a rush.
Felix directed a frown at the videophone's blank screen. “What, all of a sudden I don't count anymore?”
“Not in comparison to Tech.”
“Well, that's too bad, because Tech is grounded. For life. You deal with me or no one. And the price this time is that you make all my troubles disappear.”
“Time is of the essence. I am in no position to bargain, Mr. McTurk.”
“You got that right. So lay it on the line, Cyrus: Where's the missing data?”
“Inside Peerless Engineering.”
Felix was speechless for a moment; then the words flew from his mouth. “Are you… chipped? After what happened to Strange? After what almost happened to Tech?”
“What happened to them they brought on themselves by trying to enter Peerless without my help.”
“Your help has caused us nothing but trouble. I won't be blackmailed.”
“Then you'll leave Tech to fend for himself with Network Security.”
Felix sighed in resignation. “Where inside Peerless is this bundle nested?”
“In a lightly secured area.”
“How lightly?” Felix asked.
“We can retrieve the data, Mr. McTurk, if we work together.”
Felix worked his jaw. “I have your promise you'll straighten out the mess you've put me in— including what you did to who knows how many Global One customers?”
“You have my word.”
“All right,” Felix agreed at last. “But there's one problem—the console. Like I told you, it's a wreck, maybe down for the count.”
Tech's eyes lit up, and he almost smiled. “I know someone who can help us.”
Chapter 13
The sun was setting by the time Felix returned to Data Discoveries with an armload of fast food, only to find Tech and Marz still hard at work bringing the cybersystem back to speed. With Harwood Strange in intensive care, Cyrus the scattered AI in a virtual sweat, and Lieutenant Caster of Network Security breathing down Felix's neck, there was no time to waste.
Working alongside Marz was a pretty, freckle-faced teenage girl, her taut forearms plunged to the elbows in the console's maintenance pit and her mane of flaming-red hair twisted into a knot on the top of her head. Standing an inch or two taller than Marz, she had the graceful, athletic look of a gymnast or ballet dancer.
The room smelled of solder and lubricant. An obstacle course of cardboard boxes, packing-foam inserts, and empty soda cans stood between Felix and the desk. The whir of a battery-powered screwdriver drew his attention to the flight chair, from under which poked Tech's sneakered feet.
“Felix,” Marz said cheerfully.
Tech must have heard him, because he stopped what he was doing and slithered out from beneath the dentist's chair, his right cheek smudged with grease.
“Just in time,” Tech said.
Marz depressed a couple of buttons on the control panel and the entire system began to power up, processors humming, display monitors flickering to life, and ready lights glowing steadily. With the sky darkening, the office took on the look of an aircraft cockpit.
Felix approached the console, extending his right hand to Isis Whitehawk.
“I'm Felix McTurk. I sometimes work here.”
Isis wiped her hands on her baggy jeans and shook Felix's hand with a strong grip. “I'm Isis. I've heard a lot about you.”
“Don't believe half of it.”
She laughed. “Well, half is real good.”
Felix looked around at the replacement computer parts. “You're responsible for all this?”
“Actually my dad and uncle are. I told them it was for a worthy cause.”
“Jesse said that you guys met at the Hackers’ Outlet,” Felix said.
“Jesse?”
Felix rolled his eyes. “I mean, Tech.”
Isis inclined her head to one side. “We just kind of ran into e
ach other.” She looked as if she were about to say more, when her expression grew solemn. “Tech told me about Mr. Strange. Is he going to be all right?”
Tech and Marz leaned forward in interest.
“I wish I had something good to report, but unfortunately there's been no change in his condition. He's still being monitored closely, though, and Dr. Franklin promised to notify us immediately if Strange shows any signs of regaining consciousness.”
“Then the sooner we get started, the better,” Tech said through a frown.
Felix looked at Isis. “How much did … Tech tell you about what we're going to attempt to do?”
“I told her everything,” Tech answered for her. “I didn't think you'd—”
“That's fine,” Felix said quickly. “I just want to caution you about expecting too much from Cyrus when it comes to his being able to help Harwood—or about anything, for that matter. For all we know, Cyrus was dismantled for a very good reason.”
Tech compressed his lips. “I know that. Does that mean we're still going in?”
Felix clasped his hands on Tech's shoulders. “I'm going in.”
Tech forced a smile. “I better finish lubricating those control pedals.”
He bent down and squirmed back under the chair, as much to complete the work he'd started as to conceal from Felix and the others his mounting concern about the data-retrieval mission on which Felix was about to embark.
He had spent the entire afternoon dwelling on Felix's theories about Cyrus, and the more he had thought about them, the more his initial excitement had begun to erode. Despite what Cyrus had done for him—on two occasions now—he couldn't keep from wondering if the AI was really being honest or if in fact Cyrus was just using Felix and everyone else for some ulterior motive or to carry out some secret scheme.
As Felix said, for all anyone knew, Cyrus had been shut down for good reason. Was Data Discoveries, then, unwittingly about to reactivate a psychopathic AI?
Standing head-and-shoulders above double-helix quantum processors and neural nets, AIs were few and far between and Tech didn't know all that much about them. But he did know that madness or insanity weren't supposed to happen to them. Supposedly, programmers were always careful to equip AIs with a kind of ethical code. But instances of derangement in thinking machines were not unknown, and several first-generation AIs had had to be terminated when, instead of being compliant and even-tempered, they had become stubborn and overly excitable. A few of those were reported to have suffered the equivalent of nervous break-downs as they had begun to process the world and teach themselves. And wouldn't Cyrus—assuming that he had been created by Peerless at least twelve, possibly fifteen years earlier—have to have been one of the earliest?
From what Tech understood, the creation of an AI involved a good deal more than filling it up with information, which was something you could do to just about any thinking machine. AI design was more about equipping a machine with the logic routines needed to get the machine thinking creatively. It was about encouraging the machine to explore information and begin to formulate concepts and fashion its own sense of the world. In other words, a programmer had to help an AI help itself in developing a rudimentary personality.
Cyrus, though, seemed anything but rudimentary. If even Harwood Strange had failed to identify Cyrus as an AI throughout their two years of communication, then Cyrus had to be incredibly advanced, or incredibly mad.
Tech needed only to think of what Cyrus had done already to Worldwide Cellular and Global One in his single-minded search for his scattered parts.
But, then, Tech supposed that any AI that had been created and nurtured by Skander Bulkroad would have to be incredibly advanced. After all, Bulkroad was the genius who had not only shaped the Virtual Network, but who had also become the Network's leading unreal-estate mogul.
But that raised further questions.
Why had Cyrus been such a well-guarded secret to begin with? And if Cyrus had been a secret, how had Bulkroad's enemies learned of Cyrus and managed to carry out their crime? Unless, of course, Bulkroad had given his consent to having Cyrus dismantled.
But for what possible reason? Because Cyrus had become disobedient? Because Cyrus had gone mad and therefore had been deemed a failure?
Or was it that Cyrus had learned too much about the clandestine operations of Peerless Engineering—too much for his own good?
And just what was Cyrus’ ultimate goal? Was he planning to post a No Trespassing sign outside the octagon he had constructed and live happily ever after in the Wilds of the Network? Or did Cyrus have something more sinister in mind, such as avenging himself on those who had dismantled him?
With any luck, Tech told himself, the run Felix had agreed to would provide the answers to all his questions, as well as close the case. Felix could have demanded huge amounts of money in payment. But unless Cyrus was withdrawing from a trust fund set up by Skander Bulkroad, the funds the AI had already transferred to Data Discoveries had to have been illegal transfers of some sort, and the last thing Felix needed was to become embroiled in yet another cybercrime.
Tech was putting the finishing touches on the chair's control pedals when the videophone chimed.
“He's punctual, I'll say that much for him,” Tech heard Felix say.
He rolled out from under the chair and was back on his feet by the time Felix was answering the call.
“Mr. McTurk, I'm ready when you are,” Cyrus said over the phone's speaker. “I'll be waiting just outside the Peerless castle on the Ribbon side of the moat and drawbridge.”
“Good enough,” Felix said, trying his best to sound sure of himself. “I'll meet you there after I've retrieved what you need.”
Felix deactivated the phone and walked wordlessly to the dentist's chair.
Isis handed him a brand-new, super-slimline visor. Felix whistled softly as he examined the high-tech-looking sunglasses.
“Smooth.”
“These are the latest thing in wireless eyephones,” she explained. “You can make menu selections by centering your cursor over an object and simply blinking your right eye. Like this.”
Isis winked, and Felix laughed as he slipped the visor onto his head and adjusted the fit.
Tech planted himself in front of Felix at the foot of the chair. “Make sure to keep your vest active so Marz doesn't lose track of you.”
“At least Felix is smart enough to wear a vest,” Marz said angrily from the console.
Tech ignored the retort. “Felix, you sure you won't let me make this run? I mean, you're not the world's greatest flyer.”
“I won't risk having you end up like Harwood,” Felix said, then added, “Besides, now's as good a time as ever to conquer my fear of flying.”
Tech's concern went up several notches. “Oh, so it's okay for you to take the chance of ending up like Harwood?”
Felix waved his hand in a gesture of dismissal.
“Quit worrying, Tech. I've got two—make it three—supertalented cyberj ockeys and a semicoherent AI watching my back.”
Tech managed a smile. “Okay. Just watch out for Scaum. That thing is one bad-ass program.”
Like most of the Network's major constructs, Peerless Engineering offered tours and other entertainments to entice frequent flyers. Visitors entered the construct by way of the Ribbon tributary that led to the castle's towering front gate.
Felix knew in advance that the Peerless tour would be nothing like the interrupted one he had taken through Virtual Horizons with guided flights through the grid, brief stops at what were fast becoming the Network's landmark structures, and fifteen minutes of fun on a thrill ride inside one of the entertainment complexes. What Peerless provided instead was a virtual tour of the history of the Network from the earliest years to the development of the commercial grid—as interpreted by Peerless Engineering. The fact that the tour was equal parts education and advertisement made it similar to the corporate-sponsored rides that were once popular at t
heme parks.
When Cyrus had first proposed the plan, Felix was certain that having to sit through some mind-less Peerless tour would pose more of a challenge than actually executing whatever act of sabotage or subterfuge the disjointed AI had in mind. But as it happened, Cyrus was interested only in that part of the tour that took visitors into Peerless’ library database, much of which had been compiled by the company's founder and chief executive officer, Skander Bulkroad.
Over the years, the sixty-eight-year-old Bulkroad had written dozens of electronic books, hundreds of articles, and a slew of essays and manifestos that were available only through the Network on subjects ranging from economic theory to self-help. With the click of a button, you could listen to Bulkroad lecture about history or share his personal vision of the future. Anyone so inclined could also peruse selected excerpts from Bulkroad's personal journals.
In the past decade alone, and in keeping with his company's technological leaps, Bulkroad's written and digital-video output had nearly doubled.
Felix was piloting one of Marz's more prosaic cybercreations—a compact, polka-dotted vehicle resembling an Amazonian beetle. Having signed up for the tour under a phony name, he had requested access to the database and been transferred to the virtual office of the database's curator-librarian—a tiny, pink-haired woman, pleasant-looking, although a more pixilated cyberpresence than Felix would have expected from Peerless.
Following Cyrus’ instructions, Felix asked to view a specific entry from Bulkroad's journal that went back more than fifteen years.
It was inside the entry that the missing part of Cyrus was concealed.
To his surprise, Felix found that he wasn't alone in the database. Fifteen other guests were accessing books or articles. To keep from entering level after level of virtual space—a process that was dislocating to some—researchers frequently chose to create active windows in their visors within which text or video could run, much as if it were being displayed on a separate screen. Cyrus’ instructions to Felix, however, were that he should enter the requested journal entry fully.
The request accepted, an image of Lord of the Manor, Skander Bulkroad, filled Felix's visor.
