Night Call Page 15

  “I never meant to say —”

  “Oh, come now, everyone wants to threaten the Automatics. Politicians, law enforcement, thugs. You’re no different. And so, I’ve made a little Riot Act for dealing with you people. Hopefully then you will think twice before coming back to the Upper City to brutalize me with such trivial arguments —”

  “Sir,” Allen interrupted.

  Vannevar tilted his head to give the machine the floor.

  “Detective Roche is no thug. There is an issue that requires immediate attention. He was nearly killed by a ‘headless’ Automatic.” Allen mimed quotation marks with its fingers. I smiled. It sure was getting smart.

  “Headless?”

  “A term we use for Automatics without a Neural-Interface installed,” I said. “Two Red-eyes recently shot up a speakeasy, killing six people. Three of those were cops either undercover or off-duty, and two of those cops were tied to a smuggling ring we’re looking to expose. One Automatic was apprehended and shot, and upon popping it open, we found that it had no Neural-Interface. Moreover, when I found it again a few days later, it was moving again, still with no NI. We were hoping someone might be able to explain how this is possible.”

  “I see.” Vannevar placed his glasses on the desk and rubbed his eyes. “Was this an isolated incident?”

  “We uncovered the machine in a graveyard past 90th. There were a few more machines there, most of them headless as well, that also tried to kill me.”

  “How many is a few?”

  “Twenty, I’d say.”

  The old doctor got up from his desk and grabbed his glasses before walking to the far side of the office and pressing his hands against a section of wall near his worktable. Seams appeared, allowing access to a hidden room through a nearly invisible door.

  “Come. Perhaps we can work through this problem together.”

  We followed him through the door, and it was soon clear to us what the rest of the space on this floor was used for. A massive area resembling a factory floor sprawled out before us, filled with fabrication tools, workbenches, terminals, wiring kits likely more advanced than anything in the Lower City, and Automatic shells galore. In the centre of the room stood a fascinating display: an enlarged and exploded view of the innards of an Automatic, strung up by tough rods of steel and separated enough to view each and every part of the machine, while also being able to see how it all fit together. The surrounding frame seemed to be a Grifter model, but an old one: it had an angular head with rough edges, two small bulb eyes, a basic lockbox mouth, plated arms, and a barrel-chested frame to pad the interior wiring.

  “Before I begin, I suspect you have your theories. You seem intelligent enough to connect the dots. So please, Mr. Roche, give me your proposal.”

  I hated being put on the spot, but it was better than being ignored and talked down to. “An engineering comrade of ours” — Allen looked at me shiftily as I referred to Jaeger — “told us that he believes it involves the Cortex, which contains a gyroscope for feeding itself information about its relative location in the world. But it needs a reference for longitudinal coordinates, so it gets information from GE’s reference towers. We think it might have something to do with that.”

  Vannevar nodded, curling his lips in thought for a moment before speaking. “Your theory is interesting. However, the Cortex is much more complicated than just a storehouse for data. It is that, but it serves many other functions, too. Take the device in question, here.” He grasped a nearby pointer, extending it and aiming into the centre of the exploded display at an octagonal piece about the size of my fist. “It contains a gyroscope, yes. But the Cortex is essential, as an Automatic is useless without it. I’m sure you understand why.”

  I did my best to hide my ignorance. “Maybe give us a quick refresher, Vannevar.”

  He scowled. “Dr. Bush.”

  “Sure.”

  “Ugh. Cretins …” Vannevar shook his head. “The Neural-Interface is the ‘brain’ of the machine, but it is useless without a way to move the data. It can conceive information, but without a way to transfer it, the NI would generate data like a terminal, keeping it in a singular point. To this end, just as a brain needs a spinal column, the Neural-Interface needs the Cortex. The latter contains many crucial components besides the gyroscope, such as the ABS and ACE — the Automatic Balancing System and Aspect Conversion Engine, both old technologies from the Manual days — as well as the receiver, capable of receiving wireless signals. Though not powerful enough to transmit data, it can receive simple data, such as reference commands. So, while the Neural-Interface is able to create the signal to move the Automatic’s arm, the Cortex is the device that allows it to be executed through the ACE. With no Cortex, the Automatic is a vegetable trapped in its own mind. And without the Neural-Interface, the Cortex does nothing.”

  “Might the Cortex be able to receive signals from an alternative source in order to operate properly, Dr. Bush?” Allen asked.

  “Indeed, it could,” the old man said, smiling.

  “Wirelessly?” I inquired.

  “Perhaps … but the reference towers are not designed in such a way. They operate only on radio wavelengths in order to send a continuous signal that allows an Automatic to triangulate its position. A signal that could affect the Cortex would require a substantial amount of energy and would be much too weak to travel over long distances. Boosters would be required for the signals to be detected, as well as a specialized device to allow the reference towers to proliferate such a specific signal. We have been experimenting with a way to conduct wireless telecommunications using pylons connected to the underside of the Plate. As of recently, the pylons have been used for collecting wireless data from Automatics to alleviate the stress put on the Reference Towers. Unless someone has gone behind my back, nothing else has been done to those pylons or Towers.”

  As I looked over the exploded diorama, the pieces started fitting together in my mind. It might be a long shot, but I had a solid theory. “Could the reference tower’s signal be modified to connect to those pylons? As from a singular point? Someone sends Automatic commands through the towers to the pylons, they go to specific locations which are then detected by Automatics attuned to that signal, and then the Automatics execute the commands?”

  “Interesting theory, but as I said, it would require the pylons themselves — or at least the central Reference Towers on GE — to be attuned and modified to handle and transfer such signals. Furthermore, those Automatics in the graveyard — past 90th in the Lower City, you said — were much too far away for the pylons to have been within range.”

  “Someone could’ve set up makeshift radio towers, or piggybacked off old ones,” Allen suggested. “There would be much less interference in that area, allowing them to connect to more than one or two Automatics at a time.”

  The theory didn’t sound so crazy anymore. In fact, it sounded almost plausible.

  “How old is this tech? Are these Cortexes standard in new models?” I asked.

  “Almost all Automatic models have the same Cortex, just modified and updated — even the old Swinger models from after the War,” Vannevar replied.

  So … it might have been him. Fuck. It, I meant. Some son of bitch could be using my friend’s dead corpse to torment me. But why?

  First things first: time to confirm whether this theory we’d put together was real.

  “I need access to the engineers who work on those towers, to see if they were modified. They should be inside GE, right?”

  “Of course.” Vannevar put the pointer down and readjusted his glasses. “A floor below us, working on Automatic Support Projects. Do you think this was done by someone internally?”

  “I think it was done by someone who knew who to talk to. Time to do some digging.”

  Whatever the boys in the room labelled Tower Control were working on, they dropped it as soon as I kicked open their door. It wasn’t locked, but old habits die hard. At least thirty scient
ists stood up, complaining and murmuring to a man about what a nuisance I was. They weren’t like the engineers we had under the Plate; they wore pressed suits whose shoulders were reinforced with silver and copper. They had triangular and rhomboid shapes pressed into the fabric of their clothing, giving the impression that they were humans contorting into metal — or maybe the other way around. If they were all rich enough to afford such clothes, they were also rich enough to know what they had to lose.

  Vannevar had stayed behind in his office, sending the secretary from earlier to accompany us “for insurance reasons.”

  “All right, boys,” I said as I walked in, Allen right behind me. The secretary stayed outside. I flaunted the holster to one side of my waist and the badge to the other. “Let’s play a game. Who thinks they’re smart enough to talk themselves out of being a murder suspect?”

  The question travelled around the room like the latest gossip. Such words were foreign on this side of the Plate. They fell silent as soon as I began speaking again. “Now, we have a theory: someone here has access to the reference towers on GE, and therefore has an idea of how they operate. They might have had the crazy idea of modifying them to connect them to the pylons on the Plate, to radio towers on the ground, or who knows what else. Regardless, doing so has led to many, many deaths. How many, I can’t tell you, but if I had to estimate, I’d say the number of corpses equals the population of this room, tripled. And that’s in the last month alone.”

  Truth be told, I had no idea how many people had gotten corpsed in the past month, but they had no idea I was lying. The squares talked amongst themselves, and I kept talking to them while Allen looked each one up and down, doing its best to scout out who the conspirator might be. Some of them cursed at Allen, some calling it a “filthy Blue-eye,” and one even tried to spit on it. When Allen stopped next to one of them, I knew there was a good chance we’d found the right man.

  He was a technician with hair that was thin on top and thick at the sides. He wore a copper blazer with a brown vest underneath and had a squished-looking face. When I approached, he looked up at me, and I could feel his sense of unease.

  “What made you stop, Al?”

  “He didn’t yell at me.”

  “Huh.” I squatted in front of the man, and his eyes locked on to mine. “Consider yourself a smart man?” I asked.

  “Yes, sir.” Squeamish voice, with a faint lisp. Lucky for him he was working up here and not down there.

  “Sir? I’m no sir. Detective will do. Now, what do you do here?”

  “I calibrate the towers regularly, as many of us do. Record signal speeds, tune overall performance, install hardware updates and test parameters, make sure everything is running silky smooth.”

  “Do you work on the tower itself?”

  “Everyone has access,” he said, looking away from me, “in case someone needs to deal with a hardware problem directly.” His expression wasn’t exactly innocent as he skirted around the question.

  “Can any terminal connect with and broadcast to the towers?”

  “It’s an automatic system. However, there is a manual terminal set up for that use.”

  “Do you have access?”

  “No, only the directors and people with special privileges do.”

  “How might one get special privileges?”

  “I don’t know!” he exploded, making Allen back up. I didn’t move an inch. “I don’t know, okay? I just work here. Back off, will you!”

  I stood up. “You know what prison is like?”

  He kept his mouth shut, but his eyes went wide.

  “Now, jail is simple,” I continued. “Stay behind bars, wait for the trial, shit in your own bucket. But once the sentence goes through … then you go somewhere else. Most mobsters go to Rikers Isle. Rikers is bad, but there’s another place that’s much, much worse. It’s called Silverveil Prison, and it’s run by Automatics with a single human warden. They put the worst of the worst there and have no problem torturing, beating, sometimes even killing people. These guards don’t eat, sleep, or shit. If there’s a riot, they push gas in to calm everyone down. The guards are all Red-eyes — yes, Red-eyes — so they don’t feel a thing. If I find out that you did something to these towers and didn’t tell me, then when I get back here, I will drag you there myself and get my Blue-eye to kick the shit out of you before we push you through the gate. I’ll make sure that the next time you see light is when they turn the cremation oven on.”

  I might have overdone it, because everyone in the room was on edge. Allen had its hand on my shoulder, and the poor bastard I was yelling at was crying, with snot pouring out of his nose. But since I couldn’t pull out my gun here without causing a diplomatic incident, I’d had to resort to words. It was weird seeing someone so affected just by words.

  “He said … he said no one would know,” he sobbed, barely intelligible. “He said he’d kill me if I told anyone.”

  “He had dirt on you. Most do when they make demands. What did you do?”

  “I … I added a signal router on the towers and allowed it to bounce high-intensity signals.”

  “Who told you to do this?”

  “H-he contacted me through my terminal … the message came from the Special Privileges Terminal. I tried to find out who it was b-but …”

  “Show us.”

  He got up, wiping his eyes as we followed. The secretary gave me an inquisitive look when she saw the man in tears, but I shrugged and we moved on. The room wasn’t too far. It was locked electronically, but one solid kick was all that was needed. The lock stood true, but the hinges popped off and the door opened the wrong way. GE really needed to update its infrastructure.

  The interior was spartan, containing just a desk, a chair, and a terminal. On the walls were various sheets with operating instructions and codes. I pushed the technician into the chair and had him log in. “Directory, now. Let’s see who has access.”

  He did as I asked, then I pushed him out of the way, sat down in the chair, and scrolled through the list. While he couldn’t get into the system fully, he could at least see which users were allowed to attempt to log in. Many of the names belonged to head engineers: Vannevar, Whitehead, Baekeland, even Rockefeller. Some were neither technicians nor engineers: Greaves, head of the FBI; Bowsher, mayor of the city; and many others.

  “Why does every bigwig need access to this terminal? This do some important thing I’m unaware of?”

  “It … it activates the White-eye Protocol.” The technician had finally stopped sobbing.

  “White-eye?”

  “The extermination protocol. If there’s a massive Automatic uprising, or if Automatic crimes go up to a certain threshold, the White-eye Protocol is activated, causing all Automatics to enter a homicidal and suicidal state. They hunt down and destroy other Automatics, or themselves if none are around. It’s a last resort that would destroy the entire line of machines countrywide if activated.”

  “Huh.” My eyes caught on a name I’d been half expecting to see, but I was still surprised that my hunch had been correct. E. Masters. “Well, well, well.”

  Alarms suddenly sounded. The technician sprinted back to the Tower Control room, and we followed. The squares were all on autopilot, running around trying to deal with some issue. The technician returned to his desk and started typing at his terminal at a blistering pace.

  “What’s going on?”

  “Signal surge,” he said, eyes still on his terminal. “The towers and pylons receive an immense amount of data. We need to route it in real time through other pylons or it’ll overload GE’s communication network. These new systems are in their infancy, as you can see.”

  “Do you have a real-time feed of the signal? Intensities and all that? You set this up for that bastard Masters. You think you can track the signal through the pylons?”

  “You know quite a bit for a cop. Yeah, I can try …” A flurry of keystrokes changed the screen: lines upon lines of numbers show
ed values for devices I couldn’t even fathom as they tried to track down the cause of the flood. “Wow, yeah. Looks like something is bouncing through the towers. Pylons in Chelsea and the Lower East Side are on fire.”

  “Where’s it coming from?”

  “No idea … they’re both huge neighbourhoods. We don’t have that kind of capability to track where these signals go or come from, but we know it’s focusing in both those places.”

  “Fuck.” I rubbed the back of my neck. Still, it was better than nothing. “Masters made one mistake: he brought this right to your doorstep. At least we know two places where the source might be … time to narrow it down.”

  I called to Allen and we exited the room as the engineers continued troubleshooting. The secretary sighed with relief and escorted us back toward the main foyer.

  Our two hours were almost up.

  Chelsea and the Lower East Side were both massive locations, and the inaccuracy of the pylons didn’t help much. It couldn’t be a coincidence that Masters had been at the crime scene, had had access to the terminal that the technician had been blackmailed through, and was leading this year’s precinct inspections. He was up to something in conjunction with this smuggling ring, but I needed solid evidence before I went accusing an FBI agent of racketeering and murder. But why was some FBI agent running a smuggling operation that was cutting in on the Iron Hands’ action? And why kill two cops and get my attention? Anyone with two brain cells to rub together would know that might cause a small turf war.

  And why involve my old partner? Why use some beat-up old Swinger as a hit man? Unless Masters knew who I was. Those machines in the graveyard had targeted me, not Toby. What if all this was for me?

  When we reached the foyer, the secretary scanned the access card once more and handed it back to me. “Fifteen minutes left. You don’t dally, Mr. Roche.”

  “Detective, you mean.”

  Allen hit the button for the elevator. I turned to look out the window at the back of the elevator, seeing the sun shining down on the Upper City’s many buildings. No one in the Lower City ever got to see this — such a waste. I knew I should be soaking it in. Who knew when I’d see the sun high in the sky over Manhattan again.