The Turing Option

by Harry Harrison

  “You sound like you swallowed a dictionary,” she said.

  “I did. Many,” it answered. Was there a touch of humor there?

  “Possibly,” Brian said. “But if duplicity will get me out of here—just watch me dupliciate. Because there are a lot of soldiers standing guard, and only one of me. The only thing that I have going is the fact that they are protecting me from possible threat from the outside. They are not guarding me, I hope, with the thought that I will be cracking out from the inside.”

  “Have you come to any decisions about what you will do when you get out?”

  “Plenty. At first I thought of getting a hotel room and holding a press conference. Blow the whistle on General Schorcht and charge him with kidnaping and so forth. But I don’t think that would work. Too much of a chance of his calling me irresponsible, possibly insane, poor boy with that head wound. Back into the hospital and no way I could ever break out a second time. As far as the world is concerned I’m just going to drop from sight.”

  “In Mexico?”

  “Possibly. Do you really want to know?”

  “I do not. What I don’t know I cannot reveal. I’ll get you out of here, as I promised, and then you will be on your own.”

  “You’re a sweetie, Doc. And don’t worry, I know what I’m doing. I found something in my personal possessions when they were brought here. This plan is going to work because it really is Machiavellian.”

  As soon as she was gone they went back to work. Brian took the purple Irish passport from the safe and slipped it out of its plastic cover. A photo of himself as a nine-year-old stared back, wide-eyed and frightened. Brian Byrne, born 1999.

  “Two things to be done,” he said. “The photograph and the expiration date will have to be changed. The signature is all right. One thing the nuns taught me, with the lesson made memorable by the crack of a ruler across the knuckles, was good handwriting.”

  He opened it on the table and weighted the edges so it wouldn’t close. Sven bent over it and looked at it closely with one eye, then straightened up.

  “The manipulators have better optical resolution,” it said, pointing its right arm at the passport and looking at it with what appeared to be its fingertips. “There will be no problem making the alterations that you suggest.”

  Sven had taken a number of close-up photographs of Brian, then had made an enlarged, life-sized print.

  “Red hair,” Brian said, pointing. “It has to be black.”

  “Not a problem. These manipulators are effective at the forty-micron level. I have obtained satisfactory dye and now will color each hair in the photograph black.” It did—and quite speedily as well.

  The MI’s skills at forgery were equally impressive. The micromanipulators removed the original photograph by chipping away the glue that held it in place, one microscopic particle at a time. The retouched photograph was photographed again and a passport-sized print made. It was no better—or worse—than any other passport photograph. Before it was glued into place the embossed letters of the seal were carefully duplicated. Changing the dates of issue and expiration was equally as simple. Brian leafed through the altered passport—then put it back on the table.

  “These other dates will have to be changed too. The one that the customs officer stamped in when I left Ireland, and the other one put there when I arrived in the States.”

  The ping of the annunciator at the front entrance sounded. He gaped at the screen to see Shelly standing there.

  “Hi, Brian, I just got back. Open up, please, there are some things we have to talk about.”

  But she couldn’t come in. Impossible! How could he explain the altered Sven, take the time to hide the photographs, the money spread across the table, the passport? He couldn’t do it.

  “Welcome back—it’s nice to see you.” Yes, that was it. He would have to see her—just not in here. “I was just washing up, give me a moment. It’s been a long day. Can we talk over a drink in the club?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  He left Sven laboring away on his new criminal career and joined her outside, blinking in the sudden glare. “What’s up?” he asked.

  She frowned, pushed the hair out of her eyes as a dust devil swirled around them.

  “It’s complex. Let’s get that drink first.”

  “I hope it’s not bad news about your father. You said he was doing well last time we talked.”

  “He’s fine, much better. Complaining about the hospital food, which is a very good sign. In fact I could make the time to get down here to see you because he is so stable now. They’ll do a bypass soon. I’ll go home for that, but I wanted to talk to you first.”

  They had the club to themselves as they settled down over bowl-sized frozen margaritas. Nostalgia music played quietly in the background, ancient classics by the antique old-timers U2. She slurped and sighed, touched her lips with the napkin, then put her hand on his.

  “Brian, I don’t think that it’s fair, locking you up in this place. As soon as I heard about it I put in a formal report, lodged a complaint, all through the proper channels. Not that it will do much good. They didn’t even bother to answer me. You know that I have been transferred back to Boulder?”

  “No one told me that.” Her warm hand was still on his, the physical contact felt good; he did not pull away.

  “They wouldn’t, would they? That’s what bothers me, the high-handed way they simply transferred me out of here. No questions, no consultations. Just—bang, and that was it. But there is still so much work to do with AI. To me it is much more interesting, more exciting than writing dumb code for military programs. What it all adds up to is that I’m thinking of a career change, that’s what. I’m going to resign my commission and become a civilian again.”

  “Not because of me?” He pulled his fingers free of hers, clasped his hands together in his lap.

  “Partly, or mostly. I don’t want to be part of a military system that can treat someone so badly. And it is the work as well. I want to work on MI with you—if you will let me.”

  Shelly’s voice was low, serious. Her dark eyes were worried, looking into his, searching for help. Brian turned away, seized up his margarita and took a tooth-hurting gulp.

  “Shelly, listen. I can’t take the responsibility for your decisions. I’m having enough of a job taking care of myself—”

  “I’m not asking you to, Brian. You misunderstood. This is my own decision, my own doing, all the way. I know that things are a lot better with you now. But I also know what you have gone through. It shows at times. So please understand that I am resigning from the Air Corps no matter what you say. I’ve served two enlistments more than the agreed time, which means I have more than paid back anything I owe them for my education. And there’s a personal motive as well. I have been so wrapped up in my work that I haven’t noticed the years slipping by. Not that I’m an old hag yet!”

  She laughed and stretched, ran her fingers through her hair, the fullness of her figure clear even in the darkened room.

  “Shelly, you’re gorgeous. You always will be. But I am too mixed up now, too much on my mind to go into this.”

  “Hush,” she said, touching her finger to his lips. “I’m not asking you to do anything, say anything. I came here to tell you that I am through with the Air Force. I’ll drop you a note as soon as I am free of their clutches. With my background I can get work anywhere, double the salary I have been getting. Don’t worry about me. But if there is anything I can do to help with AI development—I want to do it. Be part of it. Okay?”

  “Okay. You do understand?”

  “More than you think, Brian …”

  His telephone bleeped. “Excuse me a second. Yes?”

  “Sven here. Sven-2 has made some significant and highly interesting discoveries. Would it be possible for you to return here?”

  “Yes, of course.” He slipped the phone back onto his belt, stood. “I have to get back to the lab—”

  S
he jumped to her feet, angry and hurt. “You’ve hired someone else to work with you while I was away? That’s what all this was about.”

  “Shelly—your paranoia is showing. That was Sven, remember, our AI. He’s running some programs and there are results he wants to ask about.”

  She laughed. “You’re right. Incipient paranoia. Too many years in uniform. I’ll just have to get out.”

  She took his hands in hers, stood up on tiptoe and kissed him warmly on the cheek, let go and turned toward the door. “You will call?”

  “A promise—and I mean it. When I start developing the AI applications I want you there. Good luck to your father.”

  He picked up his military guardians as he walked quickly back to the lab. He liked Shelly, liked to work with her—but did not want to think about that now. Later when and if everything cooled down. And what the blazes had Sven been talking about? No details on the phone of course because of security. But it had seemed insistent—and this was the very first time it had called like that.

  Sven was waiting at the door when he came in, led the way across the lab.

  “Sven-2 has been spending a long time on an analysis of the Bug-Off AI. The results are most interesting.”

  “I am sure you will find them so,” Sven-2 said, picking up the conversation when they approached. “I believe that your plan has been to visit the country of Rumania. To search for any traces or clues that might lead you to Dr. Bociort. Is that not correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “It will not be necessary. You must go to Switzerland. I have located this country in Europe—”

  “I know where Switzerland is. But why are you telling me this?”

  “Because of a most interesting anomaly I found in the software. It didn’t seem to make any sense and at first I thought it might be part of a computer virus. But when I examined it more closely I found that it was a loop of instructions buried in another sequence that was programmed to bypass the loop. It was then that I recognized it as a fragment of code written in the old computer language LAMA-3.”

  “But that’s impossible—almost impossible. There is only one person in the world who knows that language.”

  “Three, you might say. You, because you invented it for your own use, and …”

  “And you, because evidently you must have inherited a copy of that part of my brain! But who would be the third person you referred to? Bociort! Because he deciphered my notes. But this can only mean …”

  “ … that this was his message intended for you.”

  “Out with it! What did it say!”

  “Close examination of the fragment of unexecutable code revealed that it was a command that read … sequence terminated because of a type-2341 8255-8723 banjax.”

  “Banjax! That’s Irish slang, means sort of fouled up.”

  “I agree. I have heard you use the term upon occasion and a search of dictionary data bases determine its origin. Therefore I felt that this loop was put there to draw your attention. Which meant the numbers might have some significance. A brief cryptanalysis revealed the content.”

  “To you perhaps—but it just sounds like numbers to me.”

  “Not just numbers—but a message.”

  “Do you understand it?”

  “I believe I do. It starts with the numbers 2 and 3. If you take the letters of the alphabet the first two digits of the message then become ‘BC.’ Which could stand for Bociort.”

  “Isn’t that a little farfetched? It could also be the abbreviation for Before Christ or Baja California.”

  “Perhaps, but not if you know what you are looking for. The number 41 is the international dialing code for Switzerland, 82 the code for St. Moritz. The remaining six digits could be a phone number in that city.”

  Brian was stunned. It was almost too easy. But it was surely no accident. Had it been put in there on purpose—for him to find?

  “The solution of this problem seems to be to place a phone call to this number,” Sven said.

  “Agreed—but not from here or anywhere on this base. There is no way we can follow through with this until I am out of here and have access to a telephone that isn’t tapped. Sven, you remember the number until then. Meanwhile let’s put it on the long finger.”

  “I am not familiar with that term.”

  “I am,” Sven-2 said. Was there a hint of intellectual superiority in its words? “It is an Irish colloquialism equivalent to the American term ‘to spike,’ meaning to put aside for the moment, both terms derived from an outmoded office device consisting of a length of sharpened rod held vertical in a metal base …”

  “Enough!” Brian ordered. “That is a very academic lecture. You should be teaching school.”

  “Thank you for saying that; it is an option to consider.”

  Brian looked bemusedly at the rack of electronic equipment with the invisible and very humanlike brain inside. A bit of biblical quote sprang instantly to mind. What hath God wrought!

  No God here. What had he wrought!

  37

  December 16, 2024

  Erin Snaresbrook found the call waiting on her phone when she came out of surgery.

  “Hi, Doc, Brian here. Could you phone me when you get a minute?”

  She replaced the telephone and found that her heart was pumping a bit fast. She smiled wryly. Wonderful. Three hours of surgery to remove a tumor from that boy’s brain, and her pulse beat just plugged along normally all the time. Now one phone call and her body was getting ready to run a hundred meters in ten seconds. Even though she had been expecting this call. Not dreading it, just reluctantly expecting it.

  She made a double espresso before she even considered calling back, sipped most of it. It was six in the evening. He couldn’t possibly want to see her today? No, the agreement was for a few days’ lead time at least. The coffee finished, she hit the button to code in his number.

  “I got your message, Brian.”

  “Thanks for ringing back. Look, I think your suggestion was right that we ought to have a few more sessions with my CPU. And we’ll do it right here in the lab where we can use the MI as well.”

  “I’m glad you agree. Tomorrow?”

  “No, too soon. I have some work to finish first. What do you say to Thursday afternoon? Around three?”

  “That’s fine. See you there.”

  It wasn’t fine at all. She had to rearrange a half dozen appointments to make the time. Well, she had promised.

  She had driven this route so often that it was exactly three o’clock on Thursday afternoon when she drove through the Megalobe gate. There were two soldiers sitting on the clinic steps when she drew up.

  “Sick call, boys?” she asked as she got out.

  “No, ma’am, we’re volunteers. Brian said you had some equipment to move today and we volunteered. After he paid us for the drinks.”

  “You don’t have to do that, the machine’s not so heavy.”

  “Yes, ma’am. But there’s two of us and just one of you. And good old Billy here can do a hundred push-ups. You wouldn’t want all that red-meat muscle to go to waste?”

  “You’re right, I wouldn’t.” She unlocked the trunk. “If you’ll bring that box inside we’ll load it up.”

  She had some foam rubber, that she had used as padding when her connection machine had been brought here from the hospital, and she put that into the box. Under her instruction they loaded in the machine, then carried it out to the car.

  “I told you it wasn’t heavy,” she said.

  “No, ma’am. But we’ll take it out as well at the other end. We promised.”

  “Climb in. I’ll give you a lift.”

  “Sorry, but it’s the Major’s orders. No driving in vehicles on base and double-time between buildings.”

  They jogged off, were waiting when she got there since she had to go the longer way around by road. Brian opened the door and the two soldiers carried the box in while the guards at the door looked on. It was all
very simple.

  “My heart was in my throat the entire time,” she said after they were gone and the door closed.

  “Get the nerves over with now because the real fun is later.”

  “Fun! I prefer surgery anytime.”

  Dr. Snaresbrook’s connection machine was unloaded and carefully stowed away. Brian put a small bit in the chuck of the electric drill and made a hole in the lid of the reinforced metal box.

  “Sven didn’t like the idea of being locked away in the dark all the time.” He held up a metal button with a flexible lead running from it. “Got a sound and optic pickup here. Mount it behind the hole, plug it in—”

  “And you have a suitcase that watches you and listens to your conversations! This thing is getting crazier all the time.”

  Sven had been monitoring everything. As soon as Brian was finished the MI stepped into the box and plugged in the connections. The robot seemed to melt into the container as each of its myriad joints folded against the next one—like blades on a hundred-tool Swiss Army knife. Compacted even further until the treelike structure was an almost solid mass at the bottom of the box. The eyestalks retracted and swiveled to watch Brian as he packed the dummy head in next to its inert central torso cylinder, put in the hat as well, shoes, gloves and clothes, and on top of everything a carry-on airline bag.

  “Ready?”

  “You may seal me in now.”

  Brian closed and locked the box. “That’s step number one,” he said.

  “Are you having those two soldiers back to load it into the car?”

  “Never! They’ll be going on perimeter guard duty about now, that’s why I chose them. The box is a heck of a lot heavier than it was when they brought it in. They would be sure to notice that. But we’ll get the guards here to help us take it out. They never picked it up—so they won’t notice any change!”

  “You are turning into quite a conniver, Brian.”

  “Comes naturally. From leading a disreputable childhood. Come over here and I’ll introduce you to Sven-2. Identical with Sven in the box—at least identical at the time they separated. Except he is not yet mobile—his new body parts have yet to arrive.”