The Turing Option

“Next I want to show you another bit of programming. This was retrieved from the data bank in Mexico. A chunk of instructions that I don’t even remember — but I was the only one who could have possibly written it. Here, let me split the screen and put this one up there as well.”

The two programs were side by side on the screen. Brian scrolled them slowly forward together. Ben looked from one to the other — then gasped.

“My God — they’re exactly the same.”

“They are. One I wrote over two years ago. The other is inside this machine here. Identical.”

Ben was suddenly very grim. “Do you mean that there are no other records of this bit of programming anywhere in the world? That it doesn’t have any commercial use in another program?”

“I mean just that. I wrote it and backed it up in Mexico. The original was stolen. The thieves probably didn’t understand it enough to rewrite it so just used it as is. And whoever stole it — built it into this bug-plucker. We have them!”

“Yes,” Ben said, very quietly. “I think that we do.”

30 September 12, 2024

“Do you realize that it has been all of a week?” Brian said. “An entire bloody week has gone by since I proved to everyone’s satisfaction that the bug-plucking metal bastard was built by the same people who stole my AI. And, perhaps not important to you, but damn important to me, also the same people who shot half my head away at the time. And in that week absolutely nothing has been done.”

“That’s not quite true,” Ben said, as quietly and gently as he could. “The investigation is continuing. There must be over eighty agents working on this one way or another—”

“I don’t care if the entire FBI and CIA put together is on the job. When will something be done?”

Ben sat in silence, sipping at his beer. They had been in Brian’s quarters for over an hour, waiting for the promised call. Everyone was on edge over the delay. Ben had explained this slowly and carefully more than once. But Brian’s patience was gone — and that was understandable. The tension had been building ever since the discovery that DigitTech was manufacturing AIs using his design. He kept waiting for something to happen, some breakthrough to occur. No work was being done in his lab — and he wasn’t helping the situation either by mixing himself a third lethal-looking margarita. Since one of the corporals in the club had shown him how to make these he had never looked back. He raised the glass and was taking a good-sized gulp when his phone rang. He swallowed too fast, slammed the glass down and groped the phone from his belt. Coughing and gasping as he answered.

“Yes—” He coughed heavily. “Would you say that again? — Right.” He dabbed his eyes and lips with his handkerchief, finally got his breath back. “Conference call in ten minutes, I have that.”

“Let’s go,” Ben said with great relief, putting down his glass and climbing to his feet. When they went out of the front door of the barracks they found that Major Wood and a squad were waiting for them.

“I don’t like this public exposure,” the Major said sharply.

“It’s not as if we were going very far,” Ben said. “Just to the administration building, which as you can see is right down the drive.”

“And damn close to the front gate and almost in sight of the public road.”

“Major, I’ve explained this before. There is no other way that this can be done. We need to use the conference room. Everyone is cooperating. Following your instructions, all the Megalobe employees were sent home at noon. The techs have swept the room and the entire building. What more could you possibly ask for? An antiaircraft battery?”

“We’ve got that already. SAMs on four buildings. Come on.”

There were heavily armed soldiers everywhere — even the cooks had been pulled out of the kitchen for this operation and formed part of the guard. Although it was only a few hundred yards to the building the Major insisted that they drive there in an armored personnel carrier.

Brian had never been in the Megalobe conference room before and looked around with interest. It was decorated with quiet luxury; the Van Gogh on the wall might possibly be real. Subdued lighting, thick carpeting, mahogany conference table with chairs along one side of it. The table itself was drawn up against the picture window that stretched the length of the wall. Here on the fifth floor they had a perfect view across the desert to the mountains beyond.

“Just about time,” Ben said, looking at his watch. Even as he spoke the desert view vanished and was replaced by another conference room. Only then did Brian realize that the entire wall was a high-resolution TV screen scanned by 3-D eye tracking cameras, just now coming into production.