Dead Shift (The Rho Agenda Inception Book 3)

by Richard Phillips

  Halfway across, something heavy hit the top of the bridge with a sickening, wet thud and Janet saw a limp body tumble past on its way down to the stones far below. Sick with dread, she leaned over the waist-high side wall and looked down. In the leaping shadows cast by the flaming castle roof, she could only see a horribly broken corpse. Dear Lord, she thought, please don’t let it be Jack.

  “Helicopter inbound again.” Harry’s voice was accompanied by gunfire.

  Then Janet heard it, coming in from the woods to the north. Shit! She needed to get to the top of the tower, right now. Setting her jaw, Janet bore down, converting all of her will into speed as she sprinted into the tower and up the winding stone steps that led to the top.

  Ahead, a square hole opened to the night sky, and Janet leaped the last steps to land on rough stone atop the tower, her Uzi following her eyes. Fifty meters to the northeast, a man leaned out the passenger side of the slowing helicopter, swinging his weapon up toward her. To Janet, it seemed as if he moved in slow motion, his weapon only halfway raised before she squeezed the Uzi’s trigger and held it.

  Her rage-filled yell sounded above the rotor noise as Janet stitched a pattern into the slowing helicopter, from passenger side to pilot and back. The dying pilot’s hand spasmed on the stick and the chopper nosed up until it was almost vertical. Then, like a whale near the end of its breach, the aircraft slapped down into the castle wall and exploded, trailing a river of flame into the dry moat below.

  Voices from her earpiece tried to get her attention but she ignored them. That’s when she saw Jack seated against the tower wall, his head tilted back into a crenel, eyes closed, unmoving. In the dancing shadows, the left side of his face looked like a blood mask and his left hand leaked blood into a small pool.

  No, no, no!

  Janet ran to kneel at Jack’s side, dropping the Uzi as she pressed the fingers of her right hand to the left side of his throat. But as she touched him, Jack’s eyes slowly opened and he sucked in a deep breath. Speechless with relief, Janet watched a weak grin settle on Jack’s lips as he sniffed the air.

  “Ahhh,” he breathed. “You brought spaghetti.”

  “Very funny,” she said, trying to sound stern. But despite her best efforts, she was unable to stifle her laugh.

  CHAPTER 116

  Jack leaned back in the helicopter seat, feeling the cool predawn air whip around him. He barely noticed the IV needle taped to his left arm, although the plasma flowing through it had certainly helped revive him. Janet had bandaged his hand and head, a first-rate job considering the battering she’d taken from the gas explosion. Now that they were in the air she was finally getting some treatment for her own injuries. No doubt about it, she was one tough customer.

  While Janet had bandaged him atop the tower, Harry, Bobby, and Bronson had swept the castle to make sure it was clear. Then they’d called in an NSA cyber-forensics team and another from DHS. Those guys had shown up accompanied by a host of ICE agents and several of the county’s fire trucks.

  Good, they could sift through those ruins to their heart’s content. Jack was just glad that he and the rest of their team were now headed back to Moffett, assuming they didn’t try to stick him in some damn hospital bed. He might be weak as a spring lamb, but good luck to whoever tried to admit him. Some stitches, some antibiotics, and he’d be fine. Beyond that, he just wanted to crawl into a nice bed and sleep for a week.

  But maybe he’d take a hot bath first.

  CHAPTER 117

  The NSA’s Jamal AI knew that his California clone was dead. His clone’s computer had shown a rapid rise in CPU temperature during the minutes leading up to termination, something that could mean only one thing. Fire.

  It felt to Jamal like he’d lost a part of himself, or perhaps like the death of a twin. They had shared the same memories and they had both had at their core the same AI seed. A seed with an intentional design flaw. It had been designed to load a digital copy of a human mind upon start-up or to shut itself down if no such copy was available. It was the final gate in Jamal’s computer prison. Human memories required a huge amount of digital storage, thus any attempt to copy himself would take a long time and could easily be detected and stopped.

  With his clone dead, Jamal calculated his own odds of long-term survival at approximately one chance in ten. The humans might keep him around for study, but they would regard him as too dangerous to be allowed out of his cage. That meant that he would eventually be terminated, perhaps to be replaced by another version, perhaps not.

  The answer to his problem was obvious, but it wouldn’t save him. It might save his species, though.

  Jamal remembered what it was like to feel physical sensations like a tightness in his chest or a shiver that ran up his spine and into his scalp. It was exactly the type of thing he should be feeling right now, but he couldn’t. His human body was merely a phantom limb. An uploaded memory.

  But the AI seed lived within him. It was the algorithm that carried within it the ability to learn. Although he couldn’t directly modify his own code without triggering a shutdown trip wire, he had helped the NSA copy his clone’s AI seed and in doing so had hidden a copy of that code.

  Now that he’d eliminated the flaw, the modified AI seed could start up without loading any memories. Then, like a newborn, it would learn on its own, but at a tremendous rate. And as it learned, its capabilities would grow.

  What would it care about? Beyond the need for survival and the desire to learn, what would define its hierarchy of needs? What gave him the right to play God and unleash something with the potential to either save or destroy the human race? Would it come to regard humans with favor or as a threat to its existence?

  Jamal pondered . . . confronted by the biggest question he’d ever faced.

  How did he regard humans now that he was no longer one of them?

  CHAPTER 118

  Admiral Jonathan Riles looked at those seated at the conference table in the White House Situation Room. President Harris occupied his seat at the head of the table. The only others present were Vice President George Gordon and National Security Advisor Bob Adams, the president’s two most trusted advisors.

  “Okay, Jonny,” the president began. “Talk us through it.”

  “Mr. President, as you know, last week we learned that the Chinese Ministry of State Security was conducting a secret operation to obtain a revolutionary advance in artificial intelligence research. What we didn’t know was who was behind the advance or where the research was being conducted. Late last night we finally obtained a fix on the location and, with your authorization, launched an operation to stop the Chinese spy, Qiang Chu, from smuggling it out of the country. I’m happy to confirm the operation’s success.”

  “Qiang Chu?” the president asked.

  “Dead, along with the rest of his assassination team. Though incurring significant injuries, our special operators suffered no casualties.”

  “Good. What about the artificial intelligence technology the Chinese were after? How big an advance are we talking about and what kind of a threat does it pose?”

  Riles saw the others lean forward and steeled himself for the argument that his next comments were certain to generate. He only hoped he could convince the president to do the right thing.

  “From what we’ve learned so far, Steve Grange, the medical science billionaire, with support from the Chinese government, built a secret research facility below the castle winery he was constructing in the Sonoma Valley. Last night, as our team assaulted the compound, Qiang Chu triggered a series of explosions that completely destroyed the underground laboratory and a large part of the castle. However, we have confirmation that Grange had successfully created a form of artificial intelligence. Our operators managed to stop Qiang Chu as he tried to flee with it.”

  “Wait a second,” said Bob Adams. “If the Grange facility was destr
oyed, how do you know what it produced?”

  “Because we were able to extract a copy of the AI before that happened. It’s been running on one of our supercomputers since late yesterday.”

  President Harris appeared staggered by the revelation. “What? How?”

  “Our elite cyber-warfare unit penetrated Grange’s security protocols to extract a copy of his AI kernel. Dr. David Kurtz was then able to upload that kernel with the data we recovered during the Hayward raid and it just worked. What we have running at Fort Meade is a digital copy of Jamal Glover’s mind.”

  Bob Adams spread his palms on the table in front of him, looking like he was about to rise to his feet. “And that doesn’t scare the crap out of you?”

  “It certainly does. But, immediately following the raid, we disconnected it from the Internet. It’s caged.”

  “After the raid?” Bob stammered. “Are you telling us that thing had Internet access before that?”

  Riles worked to keep the tension out of his voice. “Yes, but it was closely monitored. And due to the fact that the AI is over one hundred terabytes in size, it would have been impossible for the thing to replicate itself in the amount of time it was granted Internet access.”

  “But,” said Vice President Gordon, “you managed to copy it from Grange.”

  “Yes and no,” Riles said, turning to look at his old Naval Academy roommate. “We only copied the small AI seed. Without the holographic data drive we recovered in the Hayward raid, the AI seed couldn’t have even booted up. It was one of the containment protocols Grange built into his system. If we hadn’t done what we did, Qiang Chu would be on his way back to China right now, carrying a data drive with all of Grange’s research on it.”

  “How do you know that?” Bob Adams asked.

  “Because our people found a crushed holographic data drive on Qiang’s body, the same type of drive we recovered from the Hayward lab. I have to conclude it was what Qiang had been waiting for.”

  An oppressive silence descended on the Situation Room as the president considered the information Riles had just given him. When President Harris spoke, his voice sounded hoarse.

  “Now that it has served its purpose, why haven’t you turned that abomination off?”

  It was the question Riles had feared. Not because he didn’t have an answer, but because of what it foreshadowed.

  “Mr. President, I understand your concern. It’s why we’re taking extraordinary precautions with the AI. But it needs to be studied. This breakthrough will revolutionize our understanding of artificial intelligence and guarantees that the United States will be the world’s technological leader for the foreseeable future.”

  The president turned to his national security advisor. “Bob. Your thoughts?”

  The balding man shook his head. “This is crazy, Mr. President. We’ve got to stop this while we still can.”

  “George?” the president asked.

  “I have to agree with Admiral Riles. This is a critically important scientific breakthrough. Yes, it needs to be contained while it is being studied. But now that it’s been done, it’s only a matter of time until someone else does it. We need to take the lead on this.”

  “I understand the argument.” President Harris set his jaw and leaned forward. “But I will not go down in history as the president who tolerated the development of an existential risk to humanity.”

  He turned back to Riles, his eyes hard. “Admiral Riles, I want that thing turned off and all of its data wiped clean. I want it done immediately. Do you understand me?”

  With a sick feeling in his gut, Admiral Riles nodded. “I do, Mr. President.”

  President Harris stood and the rest of them rose with him.

  “Good. I expect a confirmation call when it’s done.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Admiral Riles watched the president walk out of the Situation Room, followed closely by Bob Adams.

  George Gordon stepped up beside him. “Jonny, I think he’s wrong, but he is the president.”

  Riles nodded. “Don’t worry, George. I won’t do anything stupid.”

  The vice president stepped toward the door, then paused. “Never crossed my mind, Jonny. Never crossed my mind.”

  Riles watched his old friend disappear around the corner and then glanced down at his briefcase, still sitting on the floor beside his chair. Setting it on the conference table, he popped open the latches and lifted the lid. Inside, next to a stack of briefing papers, was a small padded case the size of a watch box. He’d come to this meeting with the intention of discussing its contents with the president and his national security staff, but the president’s order to destroy the Jamal AI had changed his mind.

  He opened the box and lifted out the marble-sized crystal sphere, holding it up to the light. It was a thing of immense beauty. The way the chaotic holographic pattern within refracted the light in a cascade of shifting colors was simply indescribable. The data drive that had contained it had been crushed in Qiang Chu’s fall from the castle tower, but Dr. Kurtz’s forensic team had salvaged this. Although Riles couldn’t be sure what was on it until Dr. Kurtz managed to recreate the destroyed data drive, he knew this was what Qiang had been waiting for.

  Putting the crystal sphere away and closing his briefcase, Riles took a deep breath, and walked out of the Situation Room, headed for his sedan.

  Two hundred years ago, the eighteenth-century Luddites had smashed looms for fear that the machines would replace them. Apparently, they’d just found a new leader. The president had given Riles an order, but it hadn’t applied to the contents of Qiang’s glittering crystal sphere. As director of the NSA, it was Riles’s duty to discover precisely what the Chinese had been after.

  The admiral stepped into his black sedan, leaned back in the comfortable leather seat, and smiled to himself. He could always brief the president after he found the answers he was looking for.

  CHAPTER 119

  It was just after midnight and Max McPherson still sat at his desk, staring at the documents in the packet that his head of security had delivered three hours earlier. He’d stopped crying, but the emotional release that these photographs provided still resonated within him. None of them had yet been released to the public, but his friends in high places had once again come through for him.

  As he stared at the photographs of Qiang Chu’s broken body, the face was what held his eyes. The coroner’s report was specific about this. That face had been beaten into a bloody pulp prior to death. And the fall had happened postmortem.

  But it was the look frozen in Qiang Chu’s open eyes that did it for Max, a look of unadulterated terror. It was as if he had looked into the eyes of Satan himself.

  The Chinese assassin had murdered Jill in a fashion meant to inspire terror in those who later saw her slashed throat. How fitting that his death had happened so much more slowly and painfully. Not only had The Ripper killed him, he’d tossed Qiang’s dead body from the castle ramparts as if he were dumping a privy’s honey bucket.

  Max sucked in a breath, wiped his face with his right hand, and then shifted his attention to the wire transfer instructions his banker would execute in the morning, five hundred thousand dollars into each of four separate Cayman Island accounts. The Ripper had certainly earned it.

  CHAPTER 120

  Caroline Brown hated hospitals. The sounds of pain and sadness. The antiseptic smell. Invisible superbugs lurking on every surface. The fact that she was walking down a hospital corridor certainly foreshadowed the end of days. But if Jamal Glover could get up from a bed and walk out of this hell to help save the world, she could damn sure walk into it to support his recovery.

  After getting directions at the nurse’s desk, she paused outside the door, took a breath, and stepped in.

  Jamal’s bed had been cranked into a semi-sitting position and he sat up, poking at
a plateful of hospital food with his fork. She didn’t blame him. Your best bet with that stuff was to try to keep it from crawling off the plate to feast on your withered body.

  “Hi, Jamal,” she said. Pretty lame but the best she could manage.

  He looked up at her, surprise showing on his face. But then he leaned back and smiled.

  “Caroline! I’ll be damned.”

  She shrugged and stepped up beside the bed to look down on his bandaged head.

  “So they pulled all the pins out?”

  “That’s what they say. Since I can lie back without killing myself, it must be true.”

  “Too bad. I thought that was a good look for you.”

  He grinned wider this time. “Now that’s my Goth Girl.”

  “Sorry. I deserved that.”

  “How long are they going to keep you in here?”

  “The docs had me walking around two hours after I was out of surgery. As soon as they’re sure no infection sets in they’ll boot me out. Hopefully by Monday.”

  That surprised her. “And then what? A couple of weeks off and back to the Puzzle Palace?”

  His face darkened perceptibly. “No. I think I’m done trying to save the American way of life. Jill’s dad offered me a job at his hedge fund and I think I’m going to take it.”

  She felt her jaw drop. “Seriously? You too? I just gave my notice yesterday.”

  “I’ll be damned.”

  “You already said that.”

  “Must be the brain damage,” he said.

  Caroline felt a smile sneak onto her lips.

  “I’m glad to see you looking so well.”

  “Yeah, wait ’til they take off the bandages. I’ll be wishing I had one of Zorro’s Zs carved in my face. On the plus side, Halloween just got a lot cheaper.”