Every Last Mother's Child

by William J. Carty, Jr

  Chapter 6: Discovery

  One of Kellogg’s people came into the restaurant where Kellogg was having breakfast waiting for some of his people to meet up with him. He dropped a piece of paper on the table and walked out. Puzzled; but in no hurry less someone see that he was interested in the paper he took his time finishing his breakfast, and reading the newspaper like he did every morning. When he had thoroughly read the newspaper, preferring hard copy to what he could get on his pad, he folded the newspaper up and picked up the note from the table as if he was picking up something he had dropped by accident.

  Kellogg waited until he was in his small apartment before he read the note. “Meet me at two. NO electronics of any type. 1000 hours.”

  Kellogg shrugged destroyed the note and went out again. Kellogg had learned years before to not trust electronics. That they could be compromised and they could give you away. In his apartment he had a holovision. One that was several years old with no fancy program tracking, or expert system. He had one communicator that he always left in his car. They could be tracked, and he wasn’t sure that the AI working for the phone company couldn’t turn it on without the owner knowing about it. He rarely used it. It frustrated the hell out of his people when they had to get messages to him the old fashion way, by the centuries’ old; but secure method of sending a courier to give him the message.

  Two was an open field south of town that had visibility for over a mile. Kellogg’s team had a contract to cut the field two or three times a month. It was on this pretext that Kellogg met with his agent, to see if the field needed cut. Although it wasn’t secure in the sense no one could not see what they were doing; it was secure from most electronic listening. Kellogg wasn’t naive enough to believe that his meeting in the field couldn’t be bugged. He just hoped that by the way they had made the arrangements that no one had time enough to get in position to bug the place or put a set of eyes on them.

  They were wrong; Junior the deep space surveillance computer had taken over a surveillance satellite and watched the meeting. For the last few weeks he had been keeping track of Kellogg.

  When he got to Two, the agent was waiting for him throwing a Frisbee with his dog. The dog, an old friend of Kellogg’s came right up to him. He took the Frisbee from the dog and gave it a toss.

  “You rang?” the ex-closer commented.

  “Yeah boss,” The man said as his dog came back up to him. As he tossed one of the oldest toys to follow man to stars, a Frisbee, “We may have a problem with the AIs.”

  “I heard about the court case I thought it was resolved.” Kellogg said.

  “Oh that was,” the man said as his dog came back. “But I think we have an AI that has gone over to the other side.”

  “Other side,” Kellogg asked petting the dog as they walked through the field.

  “I can’t prove it; but I think there’s an AI that is covering Hozenbur’s tracks.” The man stopped and looked Kellogg. He worked in the Queen’s Attorney’s office as a banking and financial investigator. He had come to Kellogg years before when his spouse had been killed by a closer. Since then he had been almost fanatical about rooting out closers and helping to close their files. He had almost killed Kellogg at the time. Since then they had developed an uneasy alliance. The man didn’t quite trust the old closer, but neither did Kellogg trust the attorney. But then Kellogg trusted very few people and then not fully.

  “What makes you think the AIs are helping her,” Kellogg asked.

  “It’s the small things that can be covered for a short period of time.” The man said, “We have little black market economy here on Trena. What there is casual. A guy builds something at your home instead of paying cash which the crown can tax he tells you his kids need school clothes. You take the kids out and buy them clothes. Or something like that. It’s real casual, but it’s still traceable. The thing is though is that if Hozenbur has bought anything in the last few weeks it would be recorded. The credit card, or debit card that she used is biometrically keyed to her. Part of this is a photo embedded in the card. That compares her face to that of the person presenting the card. Well Hozie’s image and that of everyone who has ever worked for her has been posted to the financial network. We know they are here on Trena as we have found evidence on the two dead closers, and a third we found the other week. But there is nothing on the finance system computers. Without the help of an AI to modify IDs or to tell the banking computers to ignore certain transactions they just can’t hide.”

  “This is serious,” Kellogg said, “If the bank computers are cooperating with Hozenbur it could mean that they are manipulating the evacuation list too. But what would an AI get out of this. How can they be bribed, or threaten. I would think that it would be really difficult to do that with an AI. That is why they are thought to be more secure than people!”

  “I know,” The man said, “After this meeting I am going to meet with a couple of people at the Thonian Embassy. Duck Lewis from Corps De Chameleon will be there, a couple of cybernetic people from TU and the internal security unit of the militia. I hope I am wrong, but there is evidence to suggest that maybe one of the banking or financial AIs are assisting in keeping Hozenbur’s whereabouts secure.”

  “Okay keep me posted,” Kellogg said. The agent walked off and Kellogg spent the next hour or so wandering the field as if trying to make up his mind if it needed cut again or not. He was not considering whether the field needed cut again or not. He was deep in thought. He knew there was only one way for his agent’s theory to be tested. But it was at some risk to him and his operation. The worse part about it he couldn’t tell anyone. If he did the AI network would know in a heartbeat that they were being set up. If the AI told Hozenbur that he was on planet and where, that maniac would come for him sure as the sun rises and sets. He needed to find a way to tell Wilson and the Queen what was going on. He did have privileges in the Palace now; this meeting had to be held some place where the AIs couldn’t track his conversation.

  He walked back to his car and called Francine, “Francine, how about me taking you out for a drink tonight.”

  “Okay,” the clone said, knowing that something was up. Although she did occasionally share a drink with Kellogg, she didn’t really like him. She knew all of his history and how many clones he had killed in his past life. For that reason alone she was uncomfortable around him. He was a tool she used on occasion to help her people.