Criminal Minds (Fox Meridian Book 4)

by Niall Teasdale

  ‘I’ve never heard of a Kildare android.’

  ‘That is not surprising. The concept was to produce a humanoid cyberframe which could handle all aspects of routine surgery, including the pre- and post-activities. It was equipped with built-in, retractable surgical blades in its fingertips, a self-sterilising system, high-quality fine-manipulation controls, and infrared and microscopic vision.’

  ‘Fingertip blades?’

  ‘Much as Sister Gilly described, yes. The model proved quite capable of the surgery, but the patient interaction idea failed. They gave it a class two AI and hoped that a highly sensitive olfactory system, capable of distinguishing a number of emotional response factors, would make up for the lack of emotional awareness.’

  ‘It didn’t?’

  ‘The “uncanny valley” effect hit the Kildare hard. It looked quite human, but its reactions were stilted or wrong. Patients described it as “too robotic,” “demonic,” and “more like a serial killer than a doctor.” The entire project was shelved, but a few of the series are still held in storage and one or two continue to operate in emergency rooms where delicate surgery is required. Those are in the protectorates where it is difficult to attract skilled physicians.’

  Fox frowned at the picture. It matched Gilly’s memory far too well for it to be a coincidence, and there was the built-in armament, and the self-sanitising system would reduce the chance of trace evidence being left behind. An android could have easily waited in a box for several days to get into the chapter house… ‘Could one of these things be run remotely?’

  ‘The model comes with standard high-bandwidth networking. Any cyberframe is capable of operating as a telepresence drone with the right software installed. The on-board computer was designed with an AI in mind, however.’

  ‘Yes, but Terri went over the project data from Criminal Minds. If she couldn’t see a problem, then the most obvious AI to be inhabiting one of these things isn’t an option. I’m still looking at a human being behind this.’

  Kit gave a shrug. ‘Ultimately, AIs are all subject to human control. There is always a human behind it somewhere.’

  Boston Metro, 18th October.

  ‘Okay, working theory.’ Fox was back in an autocab in Boston, and Terri was back there beside her.

  ‘Okay, give me what you’ve got and I’ll tell you how crazy it sounds.’

  ‘The Criminal Minds team did create a Whitechapel analogue AI.’

  Terri nodded. ‘I think that’s fairly likely.’

  ‘It can’t have escaped, but it could have influenced one of the team. Overman or Mortenson, probably. It wouldn’t be direct influence. They just started… empathising with their creation. They started thinking, “Well, maybe old Jack was right. I should continue his great work.”’

  ‘Not entirely crazy so far.’

  ‘Good to know. So, our would-be Jack uncovers a Kildare surgical robot in storage, replaces the AI with drone control software, and starts killing women.’

  ‘Doesn’t explain why the project was closed down, or why the female team members died, or why it’s happening in New York. I mean, why in our metro when there’s one right here?’

  ‘I did say it was a working theory.’

  ‘Hypothesis.’

  ‘I thought that was a longer word for the same thing?’

  ‘No. Look it up.’

  Fox glowered at her friend. ‘A working hypothesis, then. It has holes. Real life has holes, unlike academia.’

  ‘Touché,’ Terri replied, grinning.

  The cab pulled to a stop and Fox reached for the door. ‘What’s wrong with my butt?’

  ‘Touché, not tush, you ig– You were joking…’

  Fox gave Terri a smirk and stepped out of the car. ‘I’ve picked up a little French since I started going out with Jason. Admittedly it’s mostly exclamations made during sex, but I’ve learned a few things. Okay, so I’ll be the bad cop and you’ll be the good psychologist.’

  ‘That sounds like a novel approach, but we can try it.’

  ~~~

  ‘I was not expecting to see you again, Miss Meridian,’ Overman said, an edge of irritation colouring his voice.

  ‘Captain,’ Fox said, because she was getting annoyed with the man’s attitude.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s Captain Meridian if you’re going to insist on ramming titles down my throat. On Saturday afternoon, I had a really unpleasant time running forensics on the body of Doctor Arabella Hive, who I seriously doubt cares about the use of her title anymore.’

  The colour drained away from Overman’s face. ‘Arabella’s…’

  ‘Dead. She was murdered. Have you seen the reports from New York about the recent mutilation homicides of prostitutes? Same man killed Doctor Hive. Same method, though he just executed the gang she had hired to protect her.’

  ‘I saw the reports. The man has been caught.’

  ‘Just a copycat. A rather sloppy fool who was actually a disciple of Silas Bent. The real Ripper is still out there, and I think you know who it is.’

  Overman looked away from her and then he leaned forward, dropping his face into his hands. ‘I can’t believe… Arabella, too.’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s true, Doctor,’ Terri said. ‘Tara showed me the forensic reports and it’s quite apparent that the man they’ve caught was not responsible. The man who killed Doctor Hive is meticulous, skilled. He has a thorough knowledge of anatomy and probably of psychology. You have to admit that it seems strange that this man, who kills prostitutes, went out of his way to kill Doctor Hive.’

  ‘S-she was in the Sprawl. Perhaps she was a m-mistake.’

  ‘Now, see?’ Fox said. ‘There are two problems with that. The first is that our guy went through armed sprawlers, gang members prone to violence, to get to her. He normally takes his victims off the street. Surprises them, kills them before they know what’s happening. Most of them are probably dead long before he cuts them open and scoops their insides out. He made Hive bleed, slowly. She had to be screaming like a bitch when he was cutting her open.’

  Overman looked up, anger in his eyes. ‘You’ve no right to–’

  ‘And the second thing is that you said you didn’t know where she’d gone.’

  The man’s jaw worked for a second or two and then he said, ‘You can’t pin this on me. I haven’t been out of Boston any time in the last two months.’

  Fox smiled and turned to Terri. ‘Doctor Martins, would you say that sounded like a suggestion that Doctor Overman believes he needs an alibi?’

  Terri smiled back. ‘I would, Captain Meridian. Would you mind if I stopped being reasonable now? The prick lied to me too.’

  ‘No skin off my nose.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Terri turned an angry glare on Overman. ‘You lied! You built an AI known as Ripper based on the Whitechapel murders.’

  ‘You can’t prove–’ Overman began.

  ‘You lied! Why? What could you possibly gain from lying about that? What went wrong?!’

  ‘Mortenson. You have to ask Mortenson.’

  ‘We’re asking you. And don’t go saying you were here when the murders happened. We have sufficient evidence to confirm that the killings were carried out by a medical android. You could have done everything by remote from right here in Boston.’

  Fox was rather impressed. She had seen Terri pissed off at someone before, but Overman had really annoyed her and she was laying into him as well as any cop Fox had ever seen. Overman looked scared. Fox frowned: Overman looked terrified.

  ‘He’s got a body!’ The exclamation burst from Overman as a squeak of distress. ‘I… I need protection. You don’t understand what he’s capable of. If he’s got a body… Oh God!’

  ‘Who?’ Fox asked. ‘Mortenson? What are you talking about?’

  ‘Mortenson. You have to ask Mortenson. He’ll tell you. He’s mad! He’ll kill us.’

  ‘I think the pronouns are getting in the way here,’ Terri growled. ‘Doctor
? Doctor Overman, who is going to kill you?’

  Overman slumped in his seat. ‘Mortenson. You go and ask Mortenson.’

  ~~~

  Doctor Mortenson opened his door, took one look at Fox, and started to close it again. Fox’s brow wrinkled and she stepped forward, shoulder-barging the door right into Mortenson’s face. There was a combination of wince and barely suppressed giggle from behind her.

  ‘You can’t come in here like–’ Mortenson began from where he had sprawled in his front hall. Off to one side, through a large, open doorway, Fox could see a lounge with too much old, wooden furniture and a lot of big, fluffy cushions with flower-print fabric all over them. The man probably had not redecorated since his mother died.

  ‘Damn right I can’t, but if I have to come back later, I’ll be bringing a lot of cops with me and they’ll be tearing this place apart to find evidence of what you’ve been doing in New York.’

  Mortenson climbed to his feet. ‘I have no idea what you’re talking about. I haven’t been to New York Metro in over three years.’

  ‘We know about the Kildare-series, Doctor,’ Terri said. ‘We know the murders in New York were done by remote. Now Doctor Hive is dead, killed by the same means as seven prostitutes. That links your project with the serial killer in New York. We know you created a Ripper AI; Doctor Overman confirmed it. It’s better that you come clean now–’

  ‘You know nothing!’ Mortenson snapped.

  ‘We know enough,’ Fox said. ‘Overman rolled on you, Mortenson. He sent us here.’

  ‘But he was surprised about the android,’ Terri said, ‘and you weren’t. You knew.’

  Mortenson moved into the lounge, distancing himself, but he was not throwing them out. ‘I have not been killing people with an android. You’re insane.’

  Fox followed. The lounge was even more flowery and feminine when you were surrounded by it. The only masculine element was the huge portrait looming over the fireplace, and that was of a woman. Older, dressed in a lab coat, she stood in a posture normally seen in victorious generals posing for paintings. One hand was casually raised to indicate a chart which had been put in behind her: one of those slices through the brain with the parts and functions labelled.

  ‘Doctor Mortenson’s mother,’ Kit supplied. ‘She was a noted neuroscientist.’

  ‘You created a Ripper AI,’ Terri said, pressing onward. ‘You denied it. Why?’

  ‘There was no–’ Mortenson began.

  ‘You were the one who named it,’ Fox said. ‘You called it “Ripper” last time we were here and no one had mentioned the term before then. You created Ripper and Bent, but you’re hiding the existence of one of them. Only one. Why?’

  ‘Women never listen. There was no Ripper AI.’

  ‘You’re lying.’

  He turned, anger flashing in his eyes. ‘There was no need for one.’

  ‘But you made one,’ Terri said, ‘because… Because the Bent AI was designed to follow media reports. He was supposed to copy and elaborate. That was the design methodology. You wanted live data to work with and there’s too little detail in the existing Whitechapel reports for you to study the linkage accurately. You needed to work with both sides of the equation.’

  ‘Easy one to set up too,’ Fox said. ‘You just had to draw on your own feelings. I’d say it’s a classic love–hate relationship with your mother, but Teresa’s the psychologist. So, what happened? You began to think that maybe old Jack had it right? Did you blame the women in the team for the project’s shutdown? Is that why you killed them first?’

  ‘I didn’t kill anyone, you stupid–’ The roar was cut off abruptly, presumably because he had been about to give away exactly what he felt about women, but now he shrank back, edging toward the fireplace and the safety of his mother’s portrait. ‘You don’t understand. If he finds out, he’ll kill me too. You can’t stop him. Even you should have figured that out by now.’

  ‘I’ve worked out that you’ve got no spine, but I admit that doesn’t take much intelligence. Who the fuck are you talking about, Mortenson? It’s not Overman. He’s as scared as you are.’

  Mortenson stared at her for a second. ‘Ripper. It’s Ripper. He–’

  Terri cut him off by striding forward and grabbing the front of his shirt in both hands. ‘It can’t be the AI! I read the method statements. You had all the AIs isolated.’ Her eyes flicked between his as he tried to look away. ‘What did you do?’ Mortenson’s head turned away and Terri shook him. ‘What did you do?!’

  ‘When I set up Bent, I needed a feed of data between the two. I used manually transferred reports at first, faked media broadcasts Bent could see and react to. Then… Then I decided to automate the process.’

  ‘You connected the servers.’ Mortenson nodded in reply. ‘Against every protocol in the book.’

  ‘Those protocols were overkill. Linking two standalone servers was… efficient for the purpose.’

  ‘But you didn’t stop there, did you?’

  ‘I wanted to be able to observe them continuously. Their interaction was becoming… It was more than I could have hoped for.’ Fox could see the man becoming excited now. He jerked away from Terri and began to pace, each step making him more animated. ‘Bent functioned much as expected, though his escalation was more rapid and extreme with the live information than the real Silas Bent exhibited. Ripper was something else, a reaction I could not have expected. He seemed to be aware of his more modern contemporary. More, he began to show signs of true sentience! We based them all on class three AIs, you see, because the lowered emotional response was actually desirable in our tests.’

  ‘Ripper exhibited signs of emergence?’

  ‘Yes!’ Mortenson paused on the end of one of his loops, right beside Terri, and threw up his hands. ‘Don’t you see what this means?!’

  ‘Oh yes.’ Before he realised what was happening, Terri had slapped the man right across the face. ‘You’ve given all the AI conspiracy nuts exactly what they need to set back our research for decades! You stupid, arrogant, insufferable little… idiot!’

  ‘You can’t talk to me like that!’

  Terri ignored him, turning to Fox. ‘The moron networked into the joined servers just so he could watch in comfort, and then he let an emergent AI with no behavioural controls continue without safeguards.’

  ‘And it escaped the viron,’ Fox said, nodding. ‘That’s why they closed down the project and erased all the information about the Ripper AI.’

  ‘You’ve no proof of that,’ Mortenson said. ‘No proof! I’ll deny everything.’

  ‘NAPA will go through the project records with every forensic analysis tool they have,’ Fox said. ‘If they can’t find anything, Palladium will get involved, and Teresa and her father will figure it out. I don’t care how thoroughly you think you’ve covered your tracks, they’ll dig out enough proof to get you locked away until your teeth fall out. I’m pretty sure we can have you charged with multiple counts of negligent homicide. Ever been to the Moon, Doctor? Because I think you’re going to be spending a lot of time there in the future.’

  Airborne, Northbound over the Atlantic.

  ‘You really think they’ll put him in Cold Harbour?’ Terri asked. She was a little subdued and had been ever since they had handed Mortenson over to NAPA in Boston.

  ‘They’ll worry over exactly the same thing that you’re worrying about,’ Fox replied. ‘When this gets out, and it will, soon, people will freak about killer AIs roaming the internet. So they’ll emphasise his stupidity and make an example of him. Then they’ll tighten a few rules and hope it sounds like they’ve done something.’

  ‘Hmm. The memetics department is going to be working like crazed dogs to counter this one. It’s bad.’

  ‘No, it’s not. One idiot fucked up. The rules you have in place are perfectly good ones, if they’re followed. The perception of the problem could be bad.’

  ‘And it’s all about perception.’

  ‘So
? Get Kit on some talk shows or something. If anyone can believe class fours are evil after seeing Kit, they’re never going to think otherwise.’

  Kit appeared between the flight chairs, grinning. ‘Thank you, Fox.’

  ‘Actually, that might not be a bad idea,’ Terri mused. ‘I mean, very few people have actually met an AI of Kit’s class. She’s cute, and we could push the help she gives you on cases. That might help.’

  Kit’s expression shifted to one of slight worry, and she decided that a change of subject might be in order. ‘Oh, Marie asked if you would both like to attend a celebratory drink at the house tonight.’

  ‘Celebrating what?’ Fox asked.

  ‘While we were in Boston, IB-Nineteen announced a series based around her M. J. character.’

  ‘They went ahead with it then? Cool.’

  ‘You knew about this?’ Terri asked.

  ‘I made a joke when I was interviewing the writer and producer, and they swore me to secrecy because no one was supposed to know about it. I guess I knew before Marie did.’

  ‘Okay, I’ll drop by the house for that. Please let Marie know I’ll be there, Kit.’

  ‘And I’ll be there anyway.’

  Kit nodded. ‘I shall inform Belle.’

  ‘And maybe we could discuss your interview technique,’ Terri added, smirking, ‘since Marie has some experience in that area.’

  Kit sagged a little. ‘I’m sure that would be very… interesting.’

  New York Metro.

  ‘We’re doing a pilot,’ Marie said. ‘A new one to introduce the series and reintroduce the character. And we’re guaranteed another five episodes with a probable extension to thirteen and Nate is convinced we’ll get to do a full season.’

  Fox smiled: it was hard not to in the face of Marie’s enthusiasm. ‘What about your co-star from the movie?’

  ‘Ah… His character was killed in a shootout. It’s tragic. M. J. is mortified. Adrian says there’s a flashback scene to the funeral where I get to be all weepy.’

  ‘Hopefully you’ll have managed to stop grinning by then. Congratulations, Marie. I really hope this works out for you.’

  Marie beamed. ‘I think it will. I have good feelings about it. And I think it’s time to renegotiate my working arrangements, Sam. I get paid for this and I won’t have time to do the cleaning.’