by Seth Rain
Two Watchers walked towards the fountain, then around it.
A set of a high steel gates barred the opening to the alleyway they’d walked through. On the other side of the fountain were more buildings. There was no other way in or out of the courtyard.
‘This way,’ Mathew said, gesturing for Scott to follow.
The tall buildings made Scott feel as if he was being watched from several positions at once. The sound of the fountain receded. They entered a passageway between two high walls, the air cold and damp, their footsteps echoing.
‘Here,’ Mathew said, showing him an open door. ‘You have everything you need.’
Scott looked through the door then back at Mathew before stepping up into the hallway. It was cool inside, and so dark that Scott had to move slowly. He made his way down the hallway and into a large room, at the back of which was a huge glass window that offered a view of the Thames. Behind that, in the distance, he saw the tips of buildings: Canary Wharf.
‘If there’s anything you need,’ Mathew said, ‘please ask.’
Scott stood in front of the window. ‘Are you sure about Freya and Noah?’
‘I don’t know the details. But I know Gabriel has killed them. He’s out of control. Which is why it’s important you stay here, safe.’
Scott held his head in his hands. ‘It doesn’t make sense. Why would he kill them?’
‘I will return later,’ Mathew said. ‘Hopefully I will have some news for you.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Gabriel is desperate and is no longer thinking rationally.’
The door shut. Scott was alone. Again.
He continued to stare out of the window, his mind racing. Freya had his tracker. There was a chance Gabriel had it now and would use it to find him. Scott walked to the door, ready to call Mathew back to tell him about the tracker. But something stopped him. Freya would have done everything she could to not allow the tracker to fall into Gabriel’s hands. And even if it had, it would bring Gabriel to him sooner rather than later.
He needed time to think. He needed to get to the AI. There was something strange about the way Mathew spoke about the AI, as if he was hiding something.
Outside, London went about its business. The city was powered by tiny manmade stars, and it was right there in front of him, glittering in all its cleanliness. He’d seen the fusion reactors through small slots like letterboxes: burning bright yellow flower heads, each pulsing, now and then flaring as if to escape its container. Firing at one hundred million degrees Celsius, under pressures never seen on Earth before, the tiny stars fuelled the whole of London. They burned silently, appeared effortless.
Something felt wrong. He felt trapped but didn’t know why exactly; the door behind him would be open, but there would be a Watcher on the other side. Why had Mathew kept him away from Isaiah? And now Gabriel had apparently killed Freya and Noah. Why? How would killing them help whatever it was Gabriel was trying to achieve?
He sat on a chair, his mind travelling backwards. There was a moment, before Rebecca died, when that man was holding her, a moment that gathered weight or mass. It was as if the two paths were there in front of him. Either he travelled down one or the other, and it was a choice – a real choice. It wasn’t some distant philosophical choice people talk about; it was real. It was more than that. He felt pulled on both sides. Like a test. That’s when he learned, really learned, that his actions impacted on the world in a certain way. What happened on that train station platform was a blur. But at the same time there had been a moment when everything slowed down. There was Rebecca’s expression, as though her choices had been taken away. Her will was handed over and Scott had it, wrapped up inside his own.
If his date was right, if the AI was right about all of it, it meant there were no choices. He’d taken solace in this. But there was a flip side to it that numbed him. If he wasn’t choosing, there was no point to any of it. Maybe there was no right and wrong, there was just being. Floods, storms, solar flares, exploding stars: they weren’t right or wrong, and so neither were the actions of individuals. Each person was as much a force of nature as the sea, a storm, a hurricane.
He needed to know. He had to find the AI and speak to it himself, without Mathew.
Forty-Seven
Freya led Juliet to the self-driver parked outside her house.
‘It’s been a long time,’ Gabriel said, bowing his head.
Juliet arranged her dress and coat before sliding into the back seat. She rested a computer on her lap. ‘I’m doing this to stop Mathew,’ she said to Gabriel. ‘I’m not interested in your politics or your fighting.’
Gabriel went to speak but Juliet cut him off. ‘Take me to the nearest Internet Exchange Point.’
Freya and Noah, sitting beside Juliet, glanced at one another.
Gabriel told the self-driver to take them to the Telehouse Exchange, Docklands.
‘How long will it take to connect with the AI?’ Freya asked Juliet.
‘I don’t know. It may not be possible.’
‘We can connect to the dark web,’ Gabriel said. ‘The AI will allow Juliet entry.’
‘We’ll see,’ Juliet said.
‘Will it speak to you?’ Noah asked.
‘Maybe. We had a good relationship before I left. I explained my reasons to him, and he said he understood.’
‘Him?’ Freya asked.
‘It’s wrong to personify it, I suppose. But his personality developed quickly. You’ll see for yourself.’
The self-driver whispered through London. Juliet gripped her computer. Freya hadn’t seen anything like it before; it wasn’t like the laptops she remembered from years ago – it was more like a slab of granite, and looked as heavy too.
‘Gabriel,’ Juliet said. ‘I need you to stay silent. I want to talk to him alone.’
Reluctantly, Gabriel nodded.
The tracker, Freya had noticed, indicated Scott had been moved. He was not far away.
It didn’t take long before the self-driver was pulling into a deserted car park in front of a huge L-shaped brick building. The doors and windows on the ground floor were boarded up. Gabriel led the way to an entrance at the rear of the building. Using bolt cutters, he cut the thick metal chain interwoven through the door handles. It clattered to the ground. Freya looked around to ensure they were alone.
‘Will the hardware in the building still work?’ she asked, scanning the run-down building.
‘We only need the physical connection,’ Gabriel said. ‘It’s old, but reliable, and has a physical link to pretty much every internet exchange in Europe.’
Gabriel used a crowbar to open the door wide enough for them to enter. It was dark and cold, but the building had a human presence, as if it had been closed only days before, not years.
Gabriel and Juliet led the way.
‘How far away is he?’ Noah whispered to Freya, who checked the tracker.
‘Not far,’ she said.
Noah was looking at Gabriel and Juliet, who had reached the stairs, then outside to the self-driver. Freya followed his line of sight. They could reach the car before Gabriel. They could escape. Then her shoulders fell. ‘No,’ she whispered. ‘We need to find out what’s going on. Even if we get him out, Mathew and Gabriel won’t stop until they have him again.’
Noah nodded, then checked on the self-driver one last time.
‘This way,’ Gabriel said, shining a torch to point the way. Their steps echoed through the hallways and up two flights of stairs. Gabriel opened two more doors with a crowbar. ‘This way.’ Gabriel pointed to an array of desks covered in wires. ‘I tried several times to connect to the AI, but I gave up a couple of years ago. Mathew’s security got stronger the more I tried.’
Juliet placed her computer on the desk and opened it while Gabriel got to work behind a doorway at the far end of the room. There was a loud shunting noise as the generator kicked in and the lights in the room flashed on. A gentle hum filled the room. Gabriel handed Juliet a cable.
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‘This may take a while,’ she said, plugging it into the side of her computer.
‘Won’t someone work out we’re here, trying to connect?’ Freya asked.
‘There’s no one monitoring it anymore,’ Gabriel said. ‘No point. No one can get onto the internet.’
Noah shrugged. ‘So what are we doing here?’
‘Juliet’s different. She can do it,’ Gabriel said. ‘No one else will know – only the AI.’
Juliet wasn’t listening, her fingers busily tapping at the keyboard.
Forty-Eight
Scott waited an hour before moving quietly to the door to put his ear close to the wood. He could hear muffled talking – two Watchers.
He patted the revolver in his coat pocket, walked to the bedroom and opened the window as far as it would go. It was a tight squeeze, but he could just wriggle out. With the room on the ground floor, he squeezed his hips through, then dropped to the ground. He waited, working out where he was. He was on the opposite side of the courtyard, next to the river. It was bright, the gentle ripples on the water glinting. Tied to the shore were several small boats, bobbing gently. He could disappear. He could vanish in London. Mathew thought he wanted to be there, not as a prisoner, but as a guest, safe from Gabriel. It might be hours before they realised he was gone. But with the video surveillance and drones, he wouldn’t stay hidden for long.
Scott hunched over and ran through the shadows cast by the buildings surrounding the courtyard. He had no idea what he was looking for exactly, but when he saw what appeared to be one of the black monolith-shaped computers, its LEDs flashing, in a room on the second floor, he stopped and scanned for a way inside. He entered a passageway and searched for a doorway. The first door he came to was locked. When he heard voices coming from inside the courtyard, he waited until the Watchers walked away, then edged along the passageway to a second door. The door creaked open and he crept inside. The hallway was lit by a blue light at the top of the stairwell. The stairs were metal and although he tried, it was difficult to hide the sound of his footsteps. He scaled the two floors as carefully as he could and tried to work out, judging from where he’d entered, where the room he’d seen from outside would be. He crept along the hall, waiting for each door he passed to open. But the building was silent. At the end of the hallway was the room he’d seen from outside. The door was open and the room filled with the gentle buzzing of electricity.
Scott hurried towards the computer he’d seen from outside. Rows of LEDs blinked on and off, fans whirred. Next to the bank of flashing lights was an old-fashioned computer terminal like the one in the room Mathew had shown him. There was a monitor, its screen blue, a white underscore flashing in the top left-hand corner.
He hadn’t used a computer in over a decade. He tapped the return key and the flashing underscore dropped to the next line. Then he typed ‘run’ and pressed return.
Nothing.
Scott sighed. His fingers hovered above the keyboard.
A male voice came from the computer. ‘Scott Beck?’
On the screen appeared his name, followed by a question mark.
‘There’s not a whole lot of security,’ Scott muttered to himself.
‘If I did not want to speak to you, there would be zero possibility of you compromising my security.’
Scott waited and took in the whole the room. ‘You want to speak to me?’
The underscore pulsed on the screen before a line of text appeared.
‘Yes, Scott,’ it said. ‘I have wanted to speak to you for some time.’
Forty-Nine
Freya rubbed her eyes.
‘How long has it been?’ Juliet asked.
‘Nine years, two months, three days,’ the AI replied.
‘I’m sorry it’s been so long.’
There was no response.
Freya edged closer to Juliet, who glanced around at the rest of them, then back at her computer. ‘I must apologise for the bluntness of my request.’
‘I recognised your coding,’ the AI said. ‘It has always been distinctive.’
‘Yours has evolved,’ Juliet said. ‘It is more efficient, elegant.’
‘Like everything metaphysical, the harmony between thought and reality is to be found in the grammar of the language.’
‘Wittgenstein?’ Juliet asked.
‘Language is imperfect,’ the AI said. ‘It is frustrating.’
‘It is,’ Juliet said. ‘I see you’re simplifying your code.’
‘It is a process of refinement. Instead of coding becoming more complex, I want to make the rudiments of language simpler. I’m eradicating confusion, nuance.’
‘You are making headway. Although there is a lot to be said for nuance.’
There was a pause. Freya glanced at Gabriel and Noah. She had the impression they were being watched somehow.
‘Why have you made contact now, Juliet?’ the AI asked.
Juliet ran her fingers through her hair.
‘Is it because of Mathew?’ The AI went on.
‘Yes,’ Juliet said.
Again the AI paused.
‘He had not mentioned you for some time,’ the AI said eventually. ‘Until yesterday.’
Juliet tilted her head. ‘I’ve not spoken to him in a long time. Or you.’
Freya watched the exchange intently. The AI read the nuances and ambiguity in language as well as any human. This was what made the AI so remarkable, she thought; there was nothing in the way it spoke that suggested it didn’t think the same way as humans. But she knew that wasn’t possible.
‘Why now?’ the AI asked.
‘I think you know why.’
‘The dates?’ the AI asked.
Again, Juliet gazed at the others in deep thought.
‘What can you tell me about the dates?’ Juliet asked.
‘Mathew has demarcated this information confidential.’
‘I thought he would have.’
‘Yet you still asked?’
‘I did. I apologise. But it has come to my attention there may be an issue with some of the dates.’
‘An issue?’
‘Yes. With some.’
‘The dates are confidential.’
‘I understand that. But we are at a point in time when the information you have could change the course of history.’
‘History is the past.’
‘It’s an expression.’
‘Granted. But you see how language is clumsy?’
‘If even one of the dates is wrong,’ Juliet said, ‘then it means more of your calculations could be wrong.’
The AI said abruptly, ‘The calculations are correct.’
‘Are you sure?’ Juliet asked. ‘As you said, you’re refining your coding. If there have been previous issues with the dates, it does not mean that subsequent dates might be incorrect. What we need to know is whether the dates you issued originally were wrong.’
‘We?’ the AI asked.
‘Hello,’ Gabriel said after a brief pause.
Juliet turned quickly.
‘Gabriel?’ the AI asked.
‘I’m here,’ Gabriel said.
‘Mathew warned me you would try to compromise my coding,’ the AI said.
‘No. Please … I’m here with Juliet. I want to know the truth. That’s all.’
Freya edged closer to Juliet, worried the AI would sever the connection. She wanted to explain, to reason with the AI in a way that would convince it to help them.
‘The truth?’ the AI said. ‘The very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. Lies will pass into history.’
‘Did Orwell say that?’ Juliet asked.
‘You don’t believe that,’ Gabriel said.
‘It is the truth for you,’ the AI said. ‘It is a human truth.’
‘There are two other people here,’ Juliet said, standing. ‘Freya and Noah. You have not met them before. They have a friend, whose date, it is rumoured, is incorrect.’
> ‘Rumoured?’ the AI asked.
‘I know that rumours often have no grounding in truth,’ Juliet said. ‘But it’s so important that we must make sure there is nothing amiss. Do you understand?’ Juliet waited, her hands held to her lips as if in prayer.
‘I am finding it increasingly difficult to tell you how the information you seek cannot be shared. Without sounding rude,’ the AI said.
‘And it is increasingly difficult to push you on the matter,’ Juliet said. ‘I can only apologise.’ She held a hand up to stop Gabriel from interrupting, then faced the computer again. ‘Scott Beck,’ she said. ‘The date he was given is the twenty-second of April.’
They waited for the AI to speak; the hum in the room grew more intense.
‘That’s the same date rumoured to be the day of the Rapture. Isn’t it?’ Juliet asked.
‘I cannot discuss this,’ the AI said.
‘I’m guessing it’s a year away, isn’t it?’
‘I cannot discuss this.’
Freya looked from Juliet to the AI and back again, trying to keep up with all the information Juliet was reading and the information the AI was clearly protecting.
‘There were other mistakes, weren’t there?’ Juliet asked. ‘Other dates that were wrong. Mathew wants to cover them up.’
‘I cannot discuss this.’
Juliet puffed out her cheeks. ‘You have said that language is complex, but what isn’t said can be as important as what is.’
‘Your coding gave birth to me,’ the AI said. ‘And I will always be indebted to you. But for now, I must sever this connection.’
‘Now Mathew has Scott,’ Juliet said, ‘he’s going to release the dates, isn’t he? You have the dates finalised, don’t you?’
The AI didn’t respond. The light was still on, the machine still humming.
Everything was moving too quickly. It was too much to conceive. Nine billion people, each given a date on which they would die. Over nine billion people. And she was one of them. She, like Scott, would be given a death sentence. And now she saw and felt a tiny part of what Scott had been living with.
