Perion Synthetics (46 page)

“I don’t think it’s the synthetics you have
to worry about,” said Ferko.

“You talking about the Terminus?” asked
Javier, glancing at the three monitors to the right of his feet.

The center screen displayed a video feed from
the iron gates that spanned the entirety of the Perion Expressway. The steel
barriers were still up, sticking out of the evercrete foundations like pegs in
a corkboard. Behind the gates, a dozen men stood in tight formation, rifles not
pointed at the growing crowd but ready all the same. Javier had ordered the
lights at Perion Terminus turned down in an attempt to disguise his diminished
forces, but the media crews had brought their own van-mounted floodlights and
they were all pointed into the city. Reporters stood by the gates and spoke
into cameras while aggregators stood some distance away, whispering to their
wrists.

“It was that aggregator who brought them
here,” said Ferko. “I told Kessler it was a bad idea letting a feeder into the
city, but she said the order came right from the top. People weren’t ready to
see what’s been happening here. And now that we’ve had one little hiccup,
everyone’s running around like someone stomped on their ant hill.”

“And they won’t stop either.” Javier checked
his sliver. “They’ll stand out there all night asking questions even though no
one is answering. No idea why they do it.”

Ferko shrugged and rubbed his nose.
“Content,” he replied. “People on the outside are always looking for content.
Why do you think they install those whisperers? God forbid they go ten minutes
without a status update.”

“That status update crap isn’t content,”
said Javier. He motioned to the window. “You think I give a damn about what these
guys do with their time off? Feed me something useful like military strategy or
immobilization techniques. I don’t need to know you’re at the dentist.”

Ferko thought about the men down on the
street hidden behind makeshift barricades. In the blackout, only their flashers
were visible, tiny LEDs that let out quick bursts every sixty seconds. They
hadn’t moved from their original positions since Ferko first came up.

“Alpha Three, zero one hundred sit-rep. No
change.”

The radio on Javier’s chest crackled as the
transmission cut off. He squeezed the transmit button. “Copy, Alpha Three.
Let’s get a perimeter sweep north side.”

“Copy, Alpha.”

Ferko laughed to himself. Fatigue made
everything seem funnier than it was. The way Javier spoke to his men, it sounded
like he was invading China.

“I miss my bed,” said Ferko.

“We all miss a lot of things. Suck it up.”

“You always know just what to say, don’t
you, Javi?”

“I know what people need to hear to get them
through a situation,” he replied, turning his head to show Ferko his smile.
“That’s one thing synthetics have going for them. You tell them to do something
and they fucking do it. But us? We’re more complicated. We have to be
convinced
to go into battle, to sacrifice our lives so that others may live. You can’t
march an army at gunpoint—the Soviets figured that one out—you have to change
their minds with
words
.” He lifted his rifle. “Words are more powerful
than this thing, Ferko… when they’re used right.”

Ferko nodded, laughed to himself.

“Alpha Three, movement on the PE,” squawked
the radio. “Reading twelve tangos. Strike that. Eighteen.”

Javier’s feet came down in an instant,
knocking his water bottle to the floor. He picked up the binoculars and trained
them on the road.

“RTB, Alpha Three,” said Javier. “Action
stations, all personnel.”

Ferko sat up in his chair and tried to see
over the control board. With a groan, he stood to get a better look.

“I don’t see anything,” he said.

“Twenty-two tangos,” said Alpha Three.
“Thermal scan is reading below human thresholds.”

Javier growled. “Synnies. They’re back.”
Then, to the radio, “Prepare to open fire. Hold for my order.”

“Twenty-nine tangos.”

“I’m coming down,” said Javier. He kicked
the chair back with his leg and started towards the door. Pausing, he cast a
look back at Ferko. “You stay here, yeah?”

Ferko nodded.

Javier pulled a revolver from his hip and
held it out.

“I don’t think I could shoot anybody,” said
Ferko. “Even a synthetic.”

“It’s not for them.” Javier smiled. “I’m
fucking with you, Ferko. Just point and shoot. Don’t even think about it.”

Ferko took the gun; it was heavier than he
expected.

Javier scurried down the circular staircase
in the center of the room. Ferko moved closer to the window and watched the
flashing LEDs rearrange themselves into two groups, one on each side of the
road. A minute later, a new LED emerged from the motor pool, walking in a
straight line between the flanks.

“Control room, this is Alpha Actual. Copy?”

Ferko followed the voice to the control board
and located a speaker just above the north camera feed. He pressed the small
button beside it.

“Roger dodger, Alpha Zulu,” he replied.

“Cut the shit, Ferko. On my signal, I want
you to hit the highlights. Think you can manage that?”

“Wilco?”

“Good enough,” said Javier.

Ferko moved down two panels to the
facilities vidscreen. It held a virtual control panel for all lighting in and
around Outpost Alpha. Most entries, including the exterior floodlights, had
glowing red icons next to them.

“Thirty-seven tangos.”

There was nothing in the space between Ferko
and the Spire, just miles and miles of empty blackness, and yet one of the men
claimed there were thirty-seven synthetics walking out of the gloom,
thirty-seven potential killing machines with unknown intentions headed for the
outpost, the PNR, and maybe even…

“Give me some light!”

Ferko ran his finger across the control
panel, tripping the switches for the floodlights. The Perion Expressway lit up
under the glare of Outpost Alpha’s high beams. LED pinpoints became dark hulks
of crouched men, their rifles leveled over the barricades. Javier Espinoza
stood alone in the center of the road, his rifle in one hand and a radio in the
other.

Thirty yards in front of him, both lanes of
the Perion Expressway were filled with uniformed synthetics. Ferko recognized
them as former members of the outpost’s security detail; they were still
dressed in the same black as the men pointing guns at them. And though they
carried no weapons, Ferko felt his fingers tighten on the revolver. They were Scorpio-class
synthetics with the programming to put a man down with their hands as easily as
they could with a gun. Ten men against what looked like fifty Automated Guards.

Despite the unfavorable odds, Javier seemed
undisturbed.

One of the synthetics approached, his face
blank but his steps purposeful. He stopped when Javier put up his hand.

Ferko heard the conversation over the radio.

“That’s far enough, soldier,” said Javier.
“State your name and business.”

“A707101498, Private Henry. Returning to
duty, sir.”

“Where have you been all day, Private
Henry?”

“The private does not know, sir.”

The other synthetics fell into place around
him, organizing themselves into five rows of ten.

“So all of you decide to go AWOL and now you
want to come back like nothing happened?” asked Javier.

“Sir, yes, sir,” answered the company.

Javier stood with his hands clasped behind
his back while the rest of his human contingent formed up behind him, the
scopes of their rifles glued to their eyes. Ferko tried not to blink, expecting
to see the synthetics cut down in a hail of gunfire. Instead, Javier looked
down for a moment and then stepped forward. He got in the lead synny’s face.

“You do this again, and it’ll be your ass. I
will personally melt you down. You get me, private?”

“Sir, yes, sir.”

“Then back to your fucking stations,” said
Javier. “This ain’t no goddamn block party.”

Fifty salutes flashed in the blinding light,
and the synthetics dispersed into the building.

Ferko was still shaking his head when the
hardline began to ring. He located the handset on the control board and picked
it up.

“Hello?”

“Espinoza?” asked a female voice.

“No, this is Ferko. Kris Ferko. I work in
the scanning room.”

“I know who you are, Mr. Ferko. This is Sava
Kessler. I need to speak to Captain Espinoza immediately. We have a situation.”

“We know,” said Ferko. “But it’s okay now.
They’re back.”

“What?”

“Captain Espinoza is outside dealing with
some synthetics who just showed up. He’s putting them back to work.”

There was silence on the line.

“Ms. Kessler?”

“Lock it down, Mr. Ferko. Tell the captain
this comes from the very top. On the order of James Kirkland Perion, you
shut
down
the Perion Expressway. No one comes in, and no one goes out. And
do
not
let your synnies near the PNR. Quarantine them, keep them locked up.”

Ferko shook his head. “I… are you sure? They
seem harmless.”

“This is not a fucking suggestion, Kris! You
lock that shit down now or you will answer to the man himself.
No one
gets within a hundred yards of the outpost or you put them down. Is that
clear?”

“Roger,” said Ferko. “I’ll let the captain
know.”

“Do it now,” said Kessler.

The line went dead.

Ferko put the phone down and wandered over
to the window again. A synthetic was pacing the road with Javier.

Both of them had rifles slung across their
backs.

“The strange thing about humanity is that we are always
giving it away.”

Sava Kessler had retreated to the imaginary construct
in her mind as the elevator headed for the lobby. There, in the virtual dream
world, the problems facing Kaili Zabora took physical shape, represented in
wispy white forms dancing around her, fading in and out as their priorities
changed or their solutions were found. Constant in this construct were two
entities. One of them was her sister, Anela, looking proud and powerful in the
tight red dress she had so often worn in the Net. Her avatar had been burned
into Sava’s mind at the age of fifteen, the year Anela had met her end at the
hands of a man named G and a woman named Natalie, two people who had gone so
far off the grid even Calle Cinco couldn’t locate them.

It was Anela who spoke to her in the quiet
times, offering advice or encouragement when necessary. Deep down, Sava knew it
was her own voice coming from Anela’s avatar, but technicalities of that nature
were easily overlooked when the situation was dire, as it was now.

“Anthropomorphism likely started with pets—animals
already demonstrate human characteristics—but then it spread to inanimate
objects, some even too large to grasp.
The sea is a harsh mistress.
Have
you ever heard that saying, Kai? An entire body of water imagined as a living,
breathing woman, capable of thoughts and emotions. Not that anyone
truly
believed the sea was a real person. These were simply metaphors, harmless
language nobody took seriously—until the day they went too far. Do you remember
that day?”

In the construct, a diminutive Sava nodded
at her older sister.

“January 23, 1988,” she replied, back in the
real world.

“Yes, January of eighty-eight. The United
States government ratifies full corporate personhood, allowing businesses like
Vinestead International to have the same rights and protections as naturalized
citizens. Political contributions, tax loopholes, privately funded military
companies: these all become permissible and
protected
under federal law.
And look where we are now.”

Sava turned to face the other entity in the
construct. It loomed beyond the border, extending below the horizon as if it
inhabited the true world and the construct were just a bubble floating within it.
The entity took the shape of a titanic demon, outlined by red flames that
graded to deep black. Two pinpoints of brilliant light shone where its eyes
should have been, but Sava was often distracted by the horns above them, the
blood-stained ivory reaching into the infinite ether, tips engulfed in blue
fire. This shadowy creature had no true name, but Sava felt a word roll off her
tongue every time she set eyes on it.

Vinestead.

May they burn in hell.

“It’s not all bad,” said Sava. “If Ferko is
right, and the synnies are going back to work, then maybe the company can still
be saved.”

“True,” replied Anela. “Just because they
can
leave does not mean they will. But we both know what will happen when
Vinestead finds out they can take one out of the city.”

The construct shuddered as the demon came
closer, perhaps trying to listen in on the conversation. To the right, a
smoke-based Cyn took shape, pulsed twice, and dissolved.

“She screwed everything up,” said Sava.

Anela walked in a circle around Sava, her
high heels clacking on the invisible floor. “It is a setback, as is the loss of
Robert Gantz, but like you said, there is still hope. The company’s inventory
remains intact. As long as you can keep it in the city, Perion Synthetics may
continue to prosper.”

The elevator vidscreen flashed into the
forties.

Sava put her hands to her face and rubbed
her eyes. “Sometimes I just want to go home. I miss San Diego.”

“We all want to go home,” said Anela, “but
there is a war going on, Kai. Right now, Vinestead is winning that war because
they stand unopposed. You know how much we need Perion and what it would mean
if the company were to not exist when the sun comes up.”

“I know, but…”

“You promised me you would carry on the
fight. Now that we are so close, can you really walk away from it all?”