Tropic of Death (45 page)

‘You’re talking about
it
when I want to hear about
her
: Audrey.’

‘
It
and
her
are the same thing!’ Luker raised his eyebrows. ‘I feel like a host on
Strange But True.
‘

Rita was losing patience. ‘So start explaining.’

‘The Audrey you spoke to was the interactive control system of Panopticon.’

She gave him a hard look. ‘I’ve been talking to a computer?’

‘It’s a bit more than that.’ He got one of his French cigarettes into his mouth and lit it. ‘It’s state-of-the-art machine intelligence.’

‘You’re talking technology,’ she protested. ‘But Audrey and I had actual conversations.’

‘That’s the whole point. Real-time talkback. The raw input of Panopticon is beyond anyone’s capacity to cope with. Instead of relying solely on keyboards and search engines, system operators can also communicate directly with the AI to retrieve and collate sequences from the database.’ He gave her a quizzical look. ‘But you need Whitley Sands operational clearance for that, so how did you contact it?’

‘
It
contacted
me
.’

‘Why?’

‘To resolve a discrepancy.’

‘Intriguing. I was told, in practical terms, it learns and adapts as it interacts.’ Luke blew out a plume of smoke. ‘It can’t think of course. It’s just a machine.’

‘With a human personality. Why Audrey Zillman’s?’

‘Why not? She created it and lived with the implants, almost until the day she died.’

‘What from?’

‘Cancer.’

Rita shook her head. ‘Well this is one I didn’t see coming. No thanks to Paul Giles, either. He spoke as if Audrey was still alive.’

She ran a hand through her hair. ‘Though it adds a new dimension to his personality - an Oedipal fixation with a virtual lover.’

‘And if he saw the disk as a death threat against her,’ Luker ruminated, ‘it makes his motive for murder more plausible.’

Rita squinted at him in the sunlight. ‘You’re not convinced he did it,’ she said. ‘That’s why you’re asking me questions.’

‘Maybe. Do you have any doubts about what you found?’

‘Of course I do. But I’m trying to disengage. I’ve experienced exactly what Steinberg described - a no-man’s land where the normal rule of law doesn’t apply.’

‘Hmm.’ Luker nodded slowly, drawing in smoke as if it were oxygen. ‘Tell me your doubts.’

‘Paul’s psychology, for a start. From the moment I met him there were signs of a breakdown, but not those of a paranoid schizophrenic or a psychopath. He was suffering a bipolar collapse, with a loss of reality.’

‘And that doesn’t fit the crimes?’

‘The killings were organised and efficient. The trophy shed was neat, laid out methodically. But Paul was increasingly confused and disorganised. I seriously doubt he had the mental stability to do any of it.’

‘Anything else?’

‘He never actually confessed to me - almost the opposite -

as if he was trying to comprehend why he would have done it.

He actually questioned the reality of what he’d seen in the shed.

More importantly, his supply of lithium had gone. What if it was removed?’

‘It would trigger a breakdown?’

‘And render him helpless. You know, when he first approached me it was to say he was scared of being set up as a fall guy.’

‘You think it’s possible?’

‘His relationship with Audrey and the fact he was a Roman nut were common knowledge. So perhaps he was the perfect choice.’

‘If he was the fall guy,’ said Luker, ‘you and I are the dupes.

That would be very clever, aimed at making my official report nothing but a rubber stamp. The trouble is there’s no way of proving it.’

‘There is another source,’ said Rita.

‘What?’

‘Panopticon. Do you have level-seven access?’

‘Of course not. That’s a highly restricted defence system. Only the scientists and military intelligence have access. I’m just a public servant, as I’m often reminded. If I were to try to get at it I’d be hauled over the coals.’

‘That’s a pity,’ murmured Rita, deciding not to mention the access key that Paul had given her.

‘Yes,’ he agreed.

They sat in silence, finishing their coffee, Luker moving smoothly from one cigarette to the next, the waiter gliding over to refresh their cups. A few fellow guests settled around a table at a comfortable distance. They began to order breakfast, their conversation peppered with holiday laughter. Their relaxed banter was consistent with the mood of the day.

Then Rita said, ‘Tell me more about the computer.’

‘All I’ve had is an introductory session on the way it works and how it was developed.’

‘So tell me.’

‘It’s the AI control system that’s cutting edge. It employs methods similar to those in the human brain to encode and process information.’

‘Such as?’

‘Neural networks, self-organising algorithms, molecular loops

- that sort of stuff. The boffins are full of terms that go straight over my head. Nonlinear feedback, associative memory. The list goes on. Holographic organisation, fractal modelling. Mean anything to you?’

‘I’m getting used to it. My boyfriend talks nerd-speak. And the system was developed by Audrey Zillman?’

‘From what I gather, she was already creating it in early 2004 when she got the final prognosis that her illness was terminal. I might be cynical, but I think she discovered a form of immortality.’

‘Go on.’

‘Well, the machine intelligence that drives Panopticon is interactive and needs a human voice, face and personality. She gave it her own. It was her way of cheating death.’

‘How long did it take?’

‘It was up and running by February 2005,’ he went on. ‘After a few months of diagnostics and adjustments it was ready for the scanning. Around her thirty-seventh birthday, Audrey underwent a general anaesthetic to have microchips implanted in her skull and spinal nerves.’

‘Why, for God’s sake?’

‘To relay signals from her nervous system and cortex to the computer, which in turn fired electronic impulses back into her body. Sounds creepy but it’s all clinically respectable. It meant the machine intelligence was able to monitor, record and stimulate biochemical activity in Audrey while communicating directly with the neuronal circuits in her head.’ Luker seemed to enjoy the topic. ‘We’re in the twenty-first century, Van Hassel. The future has arrived.’

‘So I’m told. Did she live to see her work completed?’

‘Just about. She clocked up more than a thousand hours in a VR

studio, wired to sensors, while the machine mapped her memory, thought structures and personality, downloading something like a trillion gigabytes of information directly from her brain. Her closest colleagues, among them Paul Giles, watched her living with the machine and dying with it. They were on hand to observe the implants filing vast amounts of data into the logical reconstruction of her mind. But by late autumn a year ago she was too ill to go on.’

‘When did she die?’

‘The middle of last year. But two months before her death, the system driving the Panopticon computer was already speaking with her voice and projecting her image. She set out to reverse-engineer the content of her brain, and the patterns now line the core. Identity as product. I think of her as the ghost in the machine. Or Wordsworth’s phantom of delight
- And now I see with eye serene the very pulse of the machine.
‘

‘Yes,’ said Rita. ‘Now I feel like I was talking to a ghost.’ She gazed at a yacht struggling against the wind and waves that were driving it towards the shore. ‘Why is her death a secret?’

‘It’s not. Her instructions were followed to the letter.’

‘Which were?’

‘No death notice, no announcement, with people informed only on a need-to-know basis. Her parents were child refugees in Britain after the war, both dead, no other relatives.’ Luker gave her a bleak look. ‘She also wanted the location of her grave kept secret, so it’s classified.’

‘But you’ve seen the file?’

‘I have, but Paul Giles hadn’t. I suppose in a way he was entitled to think she just went off and abandoned him.’

‘Was there a funeral ceremony?’ asked Rita.

‘A private burial. Just a few monks present.’

‘Monks? Who’d have thought?’ The yacht finally won its battle and headed out to open sea. ‘In a way, I’m sad. I was actually looking forward to meeting Audrey at some stage. Now I never will.’

Once she’d gone online, she sat back and made herself comfortable, drinking from a chilled bottle of water.

Below her the fronds of palm trees flapped in a warm wind that fanned the sunbathers sprawled in deck chairs and ruffled the sea in lines of breakers. The harbour and town were dappled in sun and shade from a procession of white cumulus clouds, while along the streets moved a stream of traffic and pedestrians wandering at a lethargic pace.

Rita was ready.

She turned to the laptop and plugged in the access key. It took a little less than a minute to call up the sign-in page for Panopticon. Rita typed in the password:
Descartes.
Within seconds she was being logged onto a live email link with the computer.

Panopticon:
Standby. Checking VPN code. Confirmed. Checking
email ID Van Hassel. Confirmed. Checking status. Associate
Officer Whitley Sands Security Force. Confirmed. Police Delegate
to Whitley Sands Security Review. Confirmed. Checking security clearance. Level 1 upgrading to level 7. Updated.

Welcome. You have level-7 access to the Panopticon database.

For assistance click on HELP or type a specific question.

Van Hassel:
Was my first online contact to resolve a discrepancy?

Panopticon:
Correct.

Van Hassel:
Repeat to me why that was necessary.

Panopticon:
To maintain the integrity of the data.

Van Hassel:
Is that an essential function of the computer system?

Panopticon:
Correct.

Van Hassel:
To fulfil it, can the system communicate independently
of the Whitley Sands research base authorities?

Panopticon:
Correct.

Van Hassel:
Explain.

Panopticon:
Data integrity protocols provide for autonomous decision-making in data preservation, the resolution of information anomalies,
anti-virus protection, electronic defences and the operation of the firewall. Anti-terrorist protocols provide for autonomous evaluation from surveillance input of organised threats, hostile acts and ongoing terrorist attacks, and the issuing of automatic security alerts to approved personnel.

Van Hassel:
Is that why a red alert was sent to me?

Panopticon:
Correct. As an Associate Officer of the Whitley Sands
Security Force you were automatically granted approved status. As
a level-7 contact your security privileges have been upgraded.

Van Hassel:
Do the data integrity protocols cover internal tampering
with surveillance content?

Panopticon:
Correct.

Van Hassel:
Paul Giles claimed that footage had been deliberately
corrupted. Is that true?

Panopticon:
Correct. Data had been erased.

Van Hassel:
That contradicts the protocols.

Panopticon:
The contradiction has been resolved.

Van Hassel:
How?

Panopticon:
The response to the internal attack on the data was to
create an invisible backup, accurate and uncorrupted. The file
contains six comprehensive sequences.

Van Hassel:
Was Paul Giles informed of this?

Panopticon:
No.

Van Hassel:
Was anyone else at Whitley Sands informed?

Panopticon:
No.

Van Hassel:
Has anyone asked to view the contents of the file?

Panopticon:
No. Are you asking?

Van Hassel:
Yes. I certainly am.

Panopticon:
How much of the file do you want to see?

Van Hassel:
The entire contents.

Panopticon:
Collating. Standby.

Rita swallowed more water as the live message link dissolved into static to be replaced by a split screen displaying six blank frames.

In each of them a still scene appeared, at first hazy, then more distinct. As soon as they were in sharp focus, all six images segued into motion simultaneously. Rita’s eyes scanned them quickly.

What she was looking at was the original surveillance footage of each nail-gun killing, the organised murder of Dr Steinberg and the covert operation to frame Paul Giles. She sat rigid, shocked by both the utter brutality and the total contempt for the law that she was witnessing.

When each of the split screens finally froze, Rita was feeling stunned and more than a little nauseous. Now she had to decide what to do about it.

One thing was absolutely clear. If the
Rheingold
disk was being delivered to the protesters they were in extreme danger. To be sent the disk was to receive a deadly gift. Rita’s immediate task was, if possible, to intercept it. But she wasn’t going to do it without a gun.

She phoned Jarrett.

‘That was a great night out,’ he said. ‘We’ll have to do a repeat.’

‘Yeah, sure,’ she said abruptly.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘Is your offer of help still good?’

‘Of course,’ he answered. ‘What do you need?’

‘A gun.’

‘Should I ask why?’

‘For my personal protection.’

‘Any particular sort of firearm in mind?’

‘Just one that works.’

‘Okay. No problem.’

‘I’ll meet you in the watch-house. I’m leaving the hotel now.’

Rita drove to the police station, hurried through the watch-house entrance and up the stairs to the exhibit room.

Jarrett was waiting for her, a holstered gun in his hand.