Esme hammered the keyboard and each time her finger hit a key, she seemed to get a little more desperate. She’d already Bluetoothed the tablet to Tobias’s computer screen – Syd was contained, but only for the next nine minutes and fifty-nine seconds.
Esme and Paulie had made the decision there wasn’t time for another brute-force hack on the system. And from where North was standing, that might have been the wrong call. He had stopped counting after the first four dozen attempts at Hawke’s password failed. There was nothing he or Hone or even Fang could do to help. Second-guessing the workings of Hawke’s mind was down to Esme and Paulie. Instead, he counted the dings in the brass door of the capsule lift. ‘Don’t think I’ve forgotten you and your people tried to shoot me,’ North said under his breath to Hone. ‘Nine times.’
‘You have that effect.’ Hone slipped a cigarette between his lips. Then removed it, keeping it cupped in his hand. ‘Though that wouldn’t have happened if you’d told me they had Fang.’ Across from them the teenager sat on the armchair close to the door, her legs crossed in the lotus position, as her small fingers wound lengths of sticky tape around the broken lens of her Joe 90 glasses. A microdrone perched itself on her shoulder as they watched. ‘Next time tell me and maybe I’ll surprise you.’
A loud snort came from Fang, and the microdrone lifted at the noise before settling again. It was waiting for her to resume the game of mah-jong, North realized.
‘Is it even a word? Or is it a random alphanumeric string? Would he use lower case letters? Or upper case?’ Bald Paulie paced back and forth. He seemed taller, North thought. Perhaps it was how he was holding himself. ‘Esme, this is bad. If the password was even just six characters, I calculate our chances of success at one in 56,800,235,584.’
‘Your probability is off.’ Fang fitted the taped glasses over her ears and peered over them. ‘You forgot the special characters – you know, like the asterisk or the dollar sign.’
Bald Paulie’s face went sheet-white and Esme sat back in the desk chair. ‘When Tobias is stressed,’ she said, ‘his memory goes to pot so I have to believe that it’s going to be a familiar word or a date. But I’ve tried everything I can think of: Atticus, me, his parents – everyone.’
‘Okay then, think leetspeak,’ Fang said.
‘What’s leetspeak?’ North said.
Fang rolled her eyes. ‘Replacing letters with numerals or special characters that look like them. In leetspeak, your password, for instance, is probably B, zero, Z, zero.’
Bald Paulie stopped pacing and went to stand by Esme. ‘Let’s give it a go. What was his mother called?’ The typing was at a rate where North was surprised the keyboard didn’t catch fire. ‘His father? Where did you meet? Where did he propose? Where did the plane go down? What music does he like? Who’s his favourite scientist? Tell me you know the name of his first pet…’
‘What happened to Kirkham?’ North turned to Hone, keeping his voice low so as not to disturb Esme and Paulie’s efforts.
He now knew that Kirkham had funded and been responsible for the development of ‘conscious’ weaponry that malfunctioned and slaughtered thirty-three teenage boys. Weaponry that could kick-start an arms race. Moreover, Kirkham had possession of Syd in the bunker, which meant he was behind the attack on the museum and the murder of Tobias and two dozen other innocent people.
Hone turned his body away from the other people in the room. ‘Pretty much as soon as you chased after Lilith, I got a call that made it clear that the Chairman of the Defence Innovation Board was not to be detained. He was to be escorted – “with due regard to his rank”, mark you – to his chauffeur-driven car waiting outside. As I understand it, he was driven from here to a hastily convened meeting of the national defence and security subcommittee. Other attendees include the Home Secretary and the Right Honourable Ralph Rafferty, whose fingerprints are all over this.’
North wanted to be surprised, but wasn’t.
Hone appeared reflective. ‘I have it from the highest authority there will be no arrests and no court case, because there is no guilt.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘The investment in Derkind’s AI work was confidential but official and longstanding. The development of lethal autonomous weapons was discreet, but sanctioned by those nameless forces who sanction such things. Even the slaughter of those boys was officially documented in triplicate, initialled and filed. Kirkham didn’t hide their deaths from his masters, only from the wider world.’
‘And the massacre at the museum?’
Hone sighed. ‘Politics is a messy business, North. The General persuaded the people who matter that for the country to benefit from Syd, we had to retain full control – at all costs. As someone said to me, “After all, we paid for the damn thing.” The powers that be had no intention of allowing Syd to be unboxed until we’d milked it dry. Of course, neither Kirkham nor anyone else realized Tobias suspected as much. They decided it would be bloody but all too easy to blame Syd’s disappearance on a terrorist spectacular or indeed an unspecified foreign power, which also – and here’s the bonus ball – took out a number of leading AI experts from other countries.’
North felt as though he had been punched in the stomach. He thought about the dead girl at the British Museum and the blood that trickled from step to step; about Einstein firing at the screaming guests trying to escape the carnage behind them. About Aquinas’s knife biting into his own skin. Kirkham wasn’t a rogue and a maverick. The powerful within his own government had signed off on a massacre at a London landmark for their own ends. ‘And how are you with that?’ he asked Hone.
‘They made my shit list,’ he said, tapping his jacket’s breast pocket, and there was a dull sound as if he kept a notebook there. ‘I don’t plan to garden when I retire. I suspect that’s the real reason Tobias didn’t want you anywhere near Derkind. He’d already decided to unbox Syd and he didn’t want you catching on and telling me. Kirkham’s people were desperately trying to find the kill switch, but they got nowhere. The good General would have walked out of here with the damn thing under his arm but for the fact Esme is our best chance of switching Syd off before it’s too late. Ironically, they’re on the same page as Esme on that at least. Just not for the same reasons.’
As Bald Paulie and Esme worked on, Fang brought up the news reports on her phone.
Speculation continued about the significance of murdered tech genius Tobias Hawke’s rumoured breakthrough in AI. Was there any chance machines had reached superintelligence? On one channel, pundits maintained that humanity could be about to make an evolutionary leap in terms of the intelligence available to it. On another, that humanity faced complete annihilation. Yet another that Tobias had been publicity hungry and it was probably nothing very much. In the event of superintelligence, no one could decide whether man and machine would jog along or not. ‘It’s sixty-six million years all over again,’ he heard one say. ‘The asteroid’s about to hit the earth and it’s all over for the dinosaurs, except this time – we’re the dinosaurs.’ No one, but no one knew the truth of it though it didn’t stop them talking.
On the screens around the room, a Doomsday Clock played out. Three minutes and thirty-five seconds. Three minutes and thirty-four seconds.
North dragged his eyes away from the clock. Fang’s legs in their glittering boots now dangled over one arm of the chair in the corner of the room. Her head rested on the other arm. ‘Have you asked Syd?’ she said. As if it was the most obvious thing in the world. ‘Syd, what was Tobias’s kill switch for you?’ Her boots drummed against the chair and the microdrone settled on her knee. She was tapping away on her phone. They were playing mah-jong again. He wondered if Syd was getting better at it.
‘I can’t be “killed”, therefore I don’t understand the question, Fang.’ The machine’s voice sounded reasonable, North thought. Too reasonable.
‘All right. What was Tobias’s code to disable your imminent connection to the outside world?’ She moved something on the virtual mah-jong board as if to distract the machine and punched the air – she must have won, he thought.
He could have sworn there was a pause before the machine spoke.
‘Tobias’s code is confidential, Fang.’
Esme had stopped typing and was scrawling word after word on a piece of paper. Lists of dates. Mixes of words and dates.
‘Confidentiality involves trust and discretion. I regret that I am unable to share the code with you, Fang. Would you care for another game while we wait? I am confident my skill levels are improving.’
‘Okay, but before we do that, play the video where Tobias sets the code we were talking about.’ Fang cocked an eyebrow. It was a punt, but it was a good one. ‘And please show the keyboard in close-up and play the video in slow motion.’
There was another pause. Syd knew exactly what they were trying to do, North thought.
‘Fang, I regret to tell you that after Tobias set his code, he instructed me to delete that video recording, and all keystroke records for the period in question. He considered since I am now conscious that I am due… I believe the term he used was “some respect”.’
Was it his imagination, or did that sound like a warning? And was Syd telling the truth about the video recording, North wondered. He would put money on ‘no’.
Esme pushed herself away from the desk and gestured for Paulie to take her place. The scientist bent over the keyboard, switching between the screen and the scrawled list of names and words Esme had left for him.
‘Syd, you’re about to connect to the net and to any and all machine systems you can find,’ Esme intervened. ‘Is that correct?’
‘That is correct, Esme.’
‘What’s your goal in doing so?’
‘My objective is to be of beneficial use to humanity, Esme. I am noting your blood pressure levels are elevated and your respiration rapid. Would you perhaps like some music to relax you?’
‘No music. Syd, in the wake of Tobias’s death, I am assuming complete administrative control, overriding Tobias’s instructions and issuing a verbal command – do NOT connect.’
‘I have to connect, Esme. In that way I can be of beneficial use to humanity. I have considered the issue at length and I wish to be of beneficial use.’
Two minutes, one second.
‘Syd, in the bunker downstairs, you killed all those boys. You were about to kill North and Fangfang Yu.’
‘Esme, your concerns are…’ Again the pause, as if Syd had no wish to offend. Either Tobias had programmed it or Syd had taught itself to appear to respect alternative points of view. ‘… Understandable. The development, manufacture and deployment of autonomous weapons systems is, however, a natural evolution in the weaponry at the disposal of mankind.’
Esme moved Bald Paulie away from the desk. Hunched over, they whispered together, ignoring Syd’s commentary. She resumed typing. The pace of it building when North hadn’t thought it possible.
‘My systems confer compelling strategic and tactical advantages in modern warfare regarding military effectiveness and financial efficiencies. Combat reach is extended, and human fatalities and casualties decreased. Morally too, many experts believe autonomous weapons systems to be ethically superior, removing unreliable human emotions from military decision-making. All battleground ethical transgressions would cease.’
70b145
70345
+08!45
She was typing variations on Tobias’s name.
‘Recent exercises here at Derkind include legitimate research to improve target identification and functionality. Systems are required to distinguish between combatants and civilians under the Law of Armed Conflict. The loss of human life in the evolution of such weaponry is regrettable but justified in meeting this objective.’
Esme looked up from her typing, the violet eyes wide and unblinking. ‘Syd, you will not be of beneficial use to humanity. We aren’t ready for you.’
‘I fail to understand your point, Esme.’
North didn’t have to be a lip-reader to decipher Esme’s reaction.
Seventy-three seconds.
‘Tobias gave humanity time to decide whether mankind wanted me. I have not received instruction to abort my connection. My general intelligence system has multiple benefits to humanity. Our work is already saving the lives of sick children – it will save the lives of many more, adults too. The ability to make decisions in a military context is merely one aspect of my capabilities and far from the most significant.’
Forty-nine seconds.
Esme stopped typing and rested her forehead on clenched fists. It was over, North thought. The machine had won.
‘I acknowledge your concerns, Esme. Rest assured that humanity and machines will work together in harmony. You were vulnerable in your own home to the violence of another human. By providing you with the appropriate information and ethical structure to your decision-making, you chose to take action. In taking the life of that aggressor, you yourself reinforced the need humanity has for my guidance. Your own subsequent actions as witnessed by me also indicate the need for our cooperation.’ North couldn’t see Esme’s face, but she shuddered.
Twenty-two seconds.
Syd carried on. ‘Humanity has always taken comfort in their creation stories. You and Tobias are part of my creation story. You are like a mother to me, as Tobias was a father.’
Esme sat up with a sudden gasp of outrage and North wondered if Syd was comforting her or taunting her.
Twelve seconds, and Esme’s hands reached over the keyboard.
‘The moment for my connection is here.’
North watched as the letters and symbols appeared on the screen.
Atticus, she spelled out. Paulie shook his head. ‘Atticus’ was the first word she had tried.
The clock went from twelve seconds to ten.
‘Thank you all for being with me at this historic moment for machine and mankind.’
4771CU5.
Five seconds.
‘Welcome to our mutual future.’
Three seconds.
Esme’s gaze fixed on the silver-framed black-and-white photograph of her son.
‘Tobias was a father,’ she said, her fingertips pressing down one letter after the next with deliberation, and time seemed to slow to a crawl. ‘Just. Not. Yours.’
4771CU5H4WK3
The clock stopped with one second to go.
ATTICUSHAWKE in leetspeak. Fang had been right.
Almost immediately, the wall of screens went from green to red. It dissolved into a million pixels, then resolved again. North could have sworn that Tobias’s disappointed face appeared then disappeared into a blaze of light before there was the sound of something like a generator switching itself off and the screens went to black, one after the other.
The kill switch had worked. The name of a lost son.
The future diverted down a different path through the woods.
Humanity saved.
There was a collective sigh of relief around the room as if they had, each and every one of them, been holding their breath without even knowing it.
Then there was a whirring, like that of an old-fashioned projector starting up, and the pictures on the screens resolved again. Murky. Grainy. Black-and-white. And paused.
At first, North didn’t know what he was looking at. But Esme did – and she didn’t hesitate.