Criminal Minds (Fox Meridian Book 4)

by Niall Teasdale

  ‘Who’d want to have their brain reduced to mush and coded into a computer?’

  ‘You’d be amazed, but it really is something people are considering. You’d never die. You’d be out there, swimming in the internet ocean.’

  Fox could see that Terri had considered the option more than a little seriously. ‘Until someone kicks the plug out.’

  ‘Huh. Hey, a thought comes to mind. There was a project up in Boston last year. Um… Criminal Minds, they called it. They were using AIs to explore the mental processes inherent in various criminals, serial murderers primarily. A couple of papers came out of it and then it was shut down last December.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Not sure. Funding was probably pulled. No commercial application or some such shit. Maybe they could shed some light on your killer.’

  Fox frowned. ‘If it was shut down…’

  ‘People are still around. And maybe they have more data you could use to add detail to your profile. Hell, if it’s promising, maybe Palladium could get the project running again and get more data.’

  ‘Okay. Fancy an outing to Boston?’

  Terri blinked. ‘Me?’

  ‘You speak psychologist and AI programmer, and I don’t.’

  Terri looked at the virtual displays hanging over the desk she was using. ‘I have to have this wrapped today, which is why I’m in here… I guess I’m free tomorrow. If you track down the people from the project, I can go with you. Might be fun to do some investigation. Fieldwork, I mean.’

  ‘Okay, good. Just don’t get too carried away. I have to brief NAPA first thing tomorrow. We can head out about midday.’

  ‘Looking forward to it.’

  Airborne, Northbound over the Atlantic, 11th October.

  ‘I have had some difficulty locating all the people involved with the project,’ Kit said, sounding apologetic and a little annoyed.

  ‘Kit,’ Fox said, ‘if you’re having trouble, I’d say it indicates they’re hard to find, not that you haven’t done your job.’ Fox was watching Terri pilot the vertol; Terri had insisted on flying the aircraft saying that Fox got to fly Pythia’s ship.

  ‘Thank you, Fox. I have located two of the senior members and arranged interviews with them this afternoon. I will continue to look for more of them, but we will not be able to talk to all of them.’

  ‘Why so?’

  ‘We would need a medium. Three of the team have died since the project was closed down. One committed suicide, two died of natural causes. I have considered the probabilities and this seems slightly excessive.’

  Fox nodded. ‘See if you can get details of the deaths.’

  ‘I will. Oh, a message from Captain Ungar came through just as we were taking off. They have started proceedings to move Silas Bent to Cold Harbour.’

  ‘Data came through?’

  ‘They located the machine Mister Bent was using to access the internet, and the guard who was supplying him with access to that machine. The guard is now awaiting trial and Captain Ungar now has a solid argument for shipping Mister Bent to a more secure facility.’

  ‘If your second killer is one of his disciples,’ Terri said, ‘that news might cause issues. He might step up the programme in revenge.’

  ‘Being callous about it, that might be a good thing. The one who hit the chapter house is cold, precise, and evil. The other one, I suspect, is a second-stringer. If he starts moving faster, he’ll screw up and that’s one off the streets. The only problem is that someone might have to die first.’

  ‘That’s a helluva problem. How did the briefing go with NAPA?’

  ‘About what you’d expect. Rutherford actually seemed glad I’d taken the chapter house. I’d imagine dealing with three dead Sisters while the rest glowered at her for not catching the guy yet would have been bad.’

  ‘Yeah. I’d imagine it would.’

  ‘Her captain was there, as well as Robbard from IA, both looking daggers at me.’

  ‘Water off a duck’s back?’

  ‘Don’t give a shit about either of them unless they get in the way. Seems like they’re staying out of it aside from watching.’

  ‘Let’s hope it stays that way.’

  New York Metro.

  Dillan was a little surprised when she was allowed through the police cordon to the crime scene, but Rutherford was looking like she needed all the help she could get. The detective was wearing an expression of profound annoyance as she stood a couple of metres back from the corpse, but there was an underlying, panicked energy about her, a fidgeting nervousness which she was failing to mask.

  ‘Where’s Meridian?’ Rutherford snapped as soon as she saw Dillan approaching.

  ‘Heading for Boston.’

  ‘Boston?!’

  ‘She wants to interview some academics she thinks might have some useful information,’ Dillan replied, shrugging, ‘and we didn’t know there was another body coming. I wasn’t expecting to be allowed up here.’

  They were in an alley in Jersey, with another mutilated corpse. Dillan’s local knowledge was a little light in this area, but a quick search on the way over had uncovered the fact that there was a plaza nearby which was frequented by slightly upper-end street girls. This one might have regretted her choice of venue if she had lived.

  ‘You’ll get my report by tomorrow morning. I figured you might as well see the scene first-hand.’

  ‘Well then, thanks. Do we know who she is?’

  ‘Claire Rawlins. She has one arrest for illegal prostitution. Went legit after that. She was twenty-two.’

  Dillan nodded. ‘Senseless waste of… This is the second one. The cuts are more proficient than last time, but he’s still far sloppier than the one who got into the chapter house.’

  Rutherford gave a grunt: possibly agreement, though it was hard to tell. ‘That had to smart. Him getting past your security and killing three.’

  ‘You saw the reports. He sealed himself in a crate for two days to get past our security. The guy is… He’s not human. Anyway, my job doesn’t start until they get at their victim. I need to stop him killing another, just like you.’

  Rutherford’s gaze was fixed on the body in front of her. ‘Doesn’t look like I’m doing a great job then, does it?’

  Boston Metro.

  Doctor Brandon Overman was a political sort of scientist. You could tell from the smile. Fox decided she disliked him almost immediately, but first impressions were not always a good indication of true character so she fixed a slight smile on her own face and let Terri handle the talking.

  ‘Doctor Overman,’ Terri said as she stepped up to the man’s desk and held out a hand, ‘I’m Teresa Martins, a–’

  ‘Of course, Doctor Martins,’ Overman said, cutting her off in his enthusiasm. ‘It’s a pleasure to meet you. I’ve read some of your papers on distributed AI systems. Most innovative.’

  Terri smiled. ‘Thank you. And this is Tara Meridian, the CIO of Palladium Security Solutions.’

  Overman was significantly less enthusiastic about shaking Fox’s hand, which she actually found rather amusing. ‘Of course I’ve heard of you, Miss Meridian.’ He put a very slight emphasis on the ‘Miss,’ as though he wanted to make it clear that there were two doctors in the room and Fox was clearly the inferior. His eyes shifted back to Terri. ‘You wanted to talk about Criminal Minds. You realise it was closed down almost a year ago?’

  ‘Yes,’ Fox said. ‘Why?’

  ‘Budget cuts.’ The man’s tone was sour. He took his seat again and left Fox and Terri to assume they could sit too. ‘We had funding for two years, but we were “not making sufficient progress” after eighteen months and they shut us down.’

  ‘I remember some of the papers you produced,’ Terri said. ‘I thought they showed a lot of promise. Could you explain the idea behind the project? For Tara’s benefit.’

  ‘Of course.’ The tone was indulgent as Overman prepared to dumb down his explanation for the layperson. Fox forced he
r jaw to unclench. ‘Essentially, we were creating… emulations of serial killers from history as AIs. The idea was to examine their thought processes in detail and produce memetic countermeasures designed to stop them wanting to kill people.’

  ‘Ambitious,’ Fox said. ‘I’m not so good on artificial intelligence, but my criminology is pretty good. You’d need multiple countermemes to work on all of them.’

  ‘Obviously. And multiple AIs representing the different motivational types.’

  ‘So you had a visionary?’

  ‘Harvey,’ Overman said, nodding. He seemed to be warming a little as Fox displayed at least some knowledge of the subject. ‘He was based on David Berkowitz, the “Son of Sam” killer who claimed to receive his orders from a demon in the shape of a dog.’

  Fox smiled. ‘Named Harvey. A thrill-killer… Hansen?’

  ‘Coral. Based on Carl “Coral” Watts. Lionel was based on Jeffrey Dahmer, his middle name. Teddy, the power and control killer, was based on Ted Bundy, of course. And there was Bent.’

  ‘Silas Bent. I met him recently.’

  ‘He was our media-influenced killer, emulating the Whitechapel murders.’

  Fox waited a second for him to continue and, when he said nothing, she asked, ‘You didn’t do a mission-based killer? Jack would be the obvious one, but the Zebra killers might have been a more useful example.’

  ‘We had plans to, but the axe fell first.’

  ‘Oh,’ Fox said. ‘That’s a shame.’ The man was lying. She was sure of it, but not of why.

  ‘It is a shame,’ Terri said. ‘As far as I could tell, you were having some significant success, at least in the analysis of aberrant mental states.’

  ‘We were expecting results of our work on countermemes,’ Overman said, ‘particularly with the Coral archetype. We felt we could make significant inroads into the enjoyment such people feel when killing.’

  ‘But the plug was pulled,’ Fox said. ‘Sad.’

  ‘Yes,’ Overman said, his teeth slightly gritted. And it was there again: not quite a lie this time, but he was hiding something.

  ‘We have considered funding a restart of the project through Palladium,’ Terri said. ‘The work was so promising that–’

  ‘It would be impossible, I’m afraid. We would need to restart everything from scratch and… Well, several members of the team are no longer with us.’

  ‘I heard. A suicide and two heart attacks.’

  ‘A little unusual, don’t you think?’ Fox added. ‘Within five months of the closure of your project, half your staff are dead. Three quarters of your female staff, actually. And the fourth is missing.’

  ‘It’s… statistically unlikely, I agree.’

  ‘You don’t know where Arabella Hive is, do you?’

  ‘Doctor Hive did not tell anyone where she was going.’

  Fox nodded. ‘And you’re quite sure that restarting the project is out of the question?’

  ‘I am.’

  ‘Thank you for your time, Doctor.’ Fox flashed the man a smile and got to her feet. ‘If you change your mind, or hear from Doctor Hive, I’d appreciate it if you contacted myself or Doctor Martins.’

  ~~~

  ‘I can see why you wanted me here,’ Terri said as they took the cab back to the MarTech tower in Boston. ‘Did you have to be so hostile to him?’

  ‘I don’t like status-conscious, pompous, arrogant pricks lying to me.’

  Terri gave a sniff. ‘Well, I know he was lying about the reason the project was shut down, but–’

  ‘He was lying about creating a Jack AI.’ Fox turned in her seat. ‘I didn’t catch the one about the shutdown.’

  ‘I didn’t catch the one about the AI. Uh, but he was lying at the end when he said they pulled the plug before they could make one, so I guess…’

  Fox grinned. ‘And that’s why it’s useful having you along.’

  ‘But why would he lie about that?’

  ‘Ah, the big question. “Why” is always the big question. That’s the one that usually cracks the case. But… If they did make a Jack clone and they’re hiding the reason for closedown…’

  ‘The two would be connected.’

  ‘Which means…’ Fox sagged. ‘But they were working as part of a university team. They’d be following those protocols you mentioned. I mean, the AIs would have to be built without the baseline limits, but they’d be using standalone boxes. No networking. No way one of the AIs could have escaped.’

  ‘Presumably.’

  Fox raised an eyebrow. ‘Presumably?’

  ‘Next appointment is tomorrow, right? I’ll go over the papers again. I’m sure there was one on their operating methodology. It would have to be explained in one of them. You just don’t publish scientific papers without writing down how you got the results. Maybe there was a flaw in their design.’

  ‘That sounds like a very productive use of your time. I was just going to suggest we get naked and frolic in the hot tub.’

  Terri’s mouth opened, her eyes widening, and then her mouth snapped shut and her eyes narrowed. ‘You are an incredibly mean woman, Fox Meridian. I may not speak to you again for weeks.’

  Fox grinned. ‘I give it five minutes.’

  New York Metro.

  Talking to Gilly was something of a surreal experience given that her bruised throat made speaking a chore, so she was getting around it with audio teleconferencing, even with those in the room with her. So you got the words, and even the expressions and gestures, but her lips did not move.

  ‘You’re feeling better though, right?’ Marie asked. ‘You look better than you did.’ Which was true, even if the novice still looked tired and a little drawn.

  There was a waggle of a hand. ‘So-so,’ Gilly’s voice said into Marie’s head. ‘I mean, yes, but my throat hurts like Hell and I’m weak as a baby.’ Gilly grinned. ‘And you’re being really flattering. I look like I’ve been through a war.’

  Marie grinned back. ‘Maybe a small one. You– Oh, hang on, I’ve got Fox requesting a connection.’ Marie switched to an internal conversation as Fox’s image appeared in her vision field. ‘Hey, Fox. I’m just visiting Gilly. She’s… better than she was.’

  ‘That was why I called,’ Fox replied. ‘I checked with Belle before calling you. If she’s up to it, we’ll widen this to telepresence. I’d like to talk to her.’

  ‘Hold on, I’ll check.’ And aloud, ‘Gilly, you up to talking to Fox?’ Gilly nodded, not bothering to say anything. ‘Okay, I’ll link us all in. Uh… There!’

  Fox and Terri appeared as virtual images, both standing beside the bed as far as Marie and Gilly were concerned. ‘Hello again, Gilly,’ Fox said. ‘I don’t think you’ve met Teresa Martins. She’s with me in Boston consulting on the case.’

  ‘Good afternoon, Miss Martins,’ Gilly said. ‘Sorry if this is a bit weird, but actually speaking still hurts.’

  ‘Quite all right, Gilly, and you can call me Teresa. Just think, before implants you’d have been writing everything down on notepads.’

  ‘And,’ Fox said, ‘just note that Terri doesn’t gripe when people don’t use her title.’

  Gilly frowned. ‘Sorry?’

  Terri was rolling her eyes. ‘Small argument over an academic. Technically, I’m Doctor Martins, but then it’s like, how do you distinguish between me and Poppa? Neither of us really pushes it unless we’re dealing with someone who cares.’

  ‘Technically,’ Fox said, ‘I still have the right to use Captain Meridian, but I actively discourage it. I left the UNTPP. Anyway, Gilly, I don’t want to press this too hard, but… What do you remember about the man who attacked you? You didn’t record him in implant memory did you?’

  ‘Sorry, no. I don’t run the record function routinely and I didn’t think to push it to my implant at the time…’

  ‘Well, no, you were busy falling unconscious from blood loss. Believe me, I don’t blame you for worrying more about your survival.’

  Gil
ly flashed a weak grin. ‘Thanks, but I still feel like I should have. If I’d died, maybe someone could have taken an image–’

  ‘Don’t think like that,’ Marie said.

  ‘And you didn’t die,’ Fox added. ‘Sister Anne saw to that.’

  ‘Just tell us your impressions,’ Terri said. ‘You saw him better than anyone else. Anyone who can talk about it. But, if it’s too stressful, you just relax and don’t worry about it.’

  ‘It’s more stressful to think he might be out there planning another murder right now. He was tall, um, and kind of thin. Pale. He had pale skin, pale eyes, maybe blue or green. Not sure about his hair because he had a hat on.’ Gilly frowned. ‘There was something weird about his face. There was blood on it. He hadn’t bothered wiping that off which is… weird and, uh, I’m trying really hard not to think where it came from.’

  ‘It’s all right. You can stop if you want.’

  ‘No. I need to do this. I need to help.’ Marie moved closer, taking Gilly’s hand, and got a smile for the gesture. ‘I’m not sure what was wrong with his face, but it wasn’t just the blood. Maybe that’s throwing me off. But I’d swear he had little blades sticking out his fingers. Right out of the ends of his fingers, a bit like claws.’

  ‘Like this?’ Fox asked, lifting her hand and popping the blade out.

  Gilly blinked at the demonstration. ‘Well, I guess, but four of them, like scalpel blades ‘coming out of each finger.’

  ‘Cybernetic hand then. Maybe ex-military. It’s not uncommon in serial killers. Maybe Army medic. But you can let me worry about that. You’ve done well, Gilly. I’d like to get you working with an AI Terri has been developing. Maybe it can tease a few more details out of you.’

  ‘Sure. Anything to help.’

  ‘It’s a fairly simple AI,’ Terri explained, ‘but it’s designed to help you through producing an image of someone, a photofit if you like, when there’s no recorded image. It’s still in development, but I’ll get one of my people to bring a copy over and help you use it. It’ll be a good test.’