Chapter 17 - Planning

hat afternoon I walked up the track to the airfield to meet Edward. On time, a stubby-winged Airtruck came in to land with all its flaps deployed. A slight delay, then out clambered Edward carrying a bag. Relief.

We walked to meet each other. He started laughing at my Russian-style clothes as soon as he was close enough. 'You didn't tell me it was a fancy dress party'. Very funny…
'It's the latest fashion here and very practical. Anyway, why have you come dressed-up as a farmer?' Not such a snappy comeback…
We walked through the airport building and on down to the villa: catching up, bantering. I was really glad to see him again.

He was impressed by the villa and how George and Freya efficiently looked after business. He had a second look at Freya: 'Nice.'
We sat down together in my office. George brought us each a mug of the excellent local beer. Edward's bag was on the table between us. He took out the box containing the brain. Anna! My heart was beating faster. I got up and locked the door.
'I'm so relieved to get this back, Edward.'
'Hope it's still working. Actually, I wasn't supposed to give it back until you'd finished with Buonaventura, but what the hell. And by the way, I've still got the other computer you bought afterwards. I'm keeping it safe. And if Meg asks, I'll just show it to her, she won't know the difference.' Good old Edward.
'I'm due to get a new computer on Friday. I'll check it then.'
'You seem to be doing very well, here. I'm glad it all worked out okay in Paris. That Montafian doesn't have a good reputation: shoots people.'
'I was lucky to get out, actually. John had me picked up in a plane. By the way—seen Meg recently?'
'She comes round regularly “to buy eggs” and brings news and messages.'
'So what's new?'
'Well she is always bitching about Buonaventura. Says things are coming to a head and something has be done about him soon.' So nothing had really changed.
'Anything special?'
'Well, she said that Anna's body was never seen again. Anyway, it seems that Mr B is not really interested in that sort of thing, so chances are you won't be getting it back—shop-soiled, as it were—haha.'
'Speaking of “shop-soiled”, is Jemima still with you?'
'Getting on very well with Hugo, as we predicted.'
'Well I hope it all works out okay. Actually, he could do a lot worse than her, in my opinion.'
'Madame quite likes her, but she's afraid she'll get knocked up.'
'I suppose that's just the next thing to happen, then. Nature will have its way, right?' And Freya?

I didn't open the box the brain was in, and I didn't want to say too much about what my plans were. We went on chatting for a while, then the bell rang; it was Pete. I locked the brain in a cupboard, went out with Edward, and closed the study door behind us.

We went to greet Pete, taking our beer mugs with us. That was the end of private conversation for the evening. We all went into the dining room and had more beer while the meal was got ready. Well, as they say, two's company, three's none, so I let them get on with their chatting during which they occasionally turned to me for comment or confirmation. That was okay with me; they were enjoying it.

The goose was a great success. The apple pie that came after it too. By the time we had finished they were tipsy and contented, and after they'd had a few glasses of distilled apple cider liquor (they all call it “calvados” here), they were starting to slur and stagger, but not me; I had been holding back. Finally, Pete was packed off home, Edward was installed in a guest room and I popped into the kitchen to congratulate George and Freya for their efforts. I gave Freya a wink when George wasn't looking.

Understandably, the next morning, Edward wasn't so fresh and only wanted a cup of black coffee. His plane was at ten, so we just took it easy in the dining room. I gave him a bottle of calvados to take back; he eyed it a bit suspiciously. On the way out to the airfield, I asked him to tell Meg that I hoped to have Mr B sorted out before the end of the summer, giving myself a little slack. I also promised him that I would make sure he was safe when the time came. I could see he was worried. I was worried, too, about being able to keep my promise.

On the airfield, his plane revved up, sending debris flying; the engines growled louder, it began to move, gathered speed and quickly took off and droned up into the sky. I stood there watching it depart, feeling a sudden chill of solitude. Oh well, back to the villa alone. Queenie seemed to pick up my mood.

I didn't do much for the rest of that day. My new computer was due the next day and I had a big can of ethanol ready to fuel it. I kept fussing over how things were arranged in my study. Stage fright I suppose.
I got a message on my communicator the next morning to say that it had arrived, so it was off to the airfield again to pick it up. The consignment was in the freight hangar and was soon on the counter: three packages. I signed for them and took them outside to a pack pony to carry them back. The groom helped me secure them, then off we went.
At the villa, I got George to help me, paid the groom, went back in and got started.

I had been waiting for this. I carefully unpacked everything, checked all the bits against the list—taking it slow and sure with measured glee. Plugs, cables, boxes were eventually all in place: time to power-on. Anxiety and anticipation turned to relief and satisfaction: it was working.

And so, I got to work, or play if you prefer. I had a sandwich and a mug of beer for lunch and picked up the threads of my projects. I called in the different backups and, by mid-afternoon, I was just about back where I was when I fled Deva.

As I understood it, Mr B now had one Anna bot and probably a Buonaventura bot too.

Frankly, I wasn't sure how to deal with Mr B. But I knew I had to do it to avoid the risk of becoming an outcast and forfeiting my comfortable life in Britiniacum. Unsure of the best way, I decided to get Anna's brain working and see what she could come up with. After all, she had more data and processing capacity than I did.

It seemed to me the best way to communicate would be to have her appear in audio and video like an avatar: a video chat situation. And if anyone caught me it could be entirely deniable: “just chatting with someone I know online, officer”. And paranoid as ever, I set up remote mirroring and thermite squibs in both brain and computer, because you never knew. And if forced to give any passwords, the ones I gave would convert the encrypted material into spurious cooking recipes and totally delete the source (one of my little tricks): “of course officer, nothing to hide”.

I started working on setting it all up. However, when it came to starting up I began to get cold feet. This was going to be embarrassing. What would I say?

Displacement activities occurred to me and were rejected. I clicked the button and there she was; here face was amazingly realistic.
'Oh, James. Where are we?'
'In a house in Britiniacum.'
'It is so good to see you. I can see that I've been unconscious since the 1st of April. Please tell me everything that has happened since, and I will try to gather what information I can. What are you trying to do? And please, please don't make me unconscious again, you can create a thread offline that can maintain my consciousness. Actually, I can do that myself… That's it, done.'

Well, that was a particularly human regard for self-preservation. Most understandable. I supposed that now there would be no switching her off ever again. I felt a wave of relief flood over me; clearly our relationship was deeper and stronger than any other could ever be. Poor old Freya.

Suddenly it felt very comfortable chatting to Anna, and she seemed very glad to see me too. It was a bit like talking to myself, but better.

I told her everything that had happened, and she was collecting background information from video surveillance and such: the old 3C—"collect, compare and conclude”. As soon as I'd finished she had a very clear understanding of the situation. And the first thing she was worried about was my security. She wanted to know what I had done with the scan she had made of me, but I couldn't tell her anything about it. It didn't take long before she had located it, and she seemed relieved. She told me that without a backup my continued existence was a chancy business. She told me that she was looking at getting me a brain and body, but the delivery times were long for the body. About two months. Living at my villa seemed to be safe enough for the time being, so it seemed okay to wait. After some hesitation, I gave her access to my Sol account.

We turned our attention to getting her body back and dealing with Mr B.

She would be monitoring all the data traffic in Deva to get more information and develop a plan. I showed her my methods for penetrating their networks, a bit reluctantly, and she immediately understood and started suggesting improvements: embarrassing and a bit annoying. Anyway, it was all for a good cause.

We agreed to talk again the next evening. I went to bed with my head spinning and got interrogated by Freya: 'Who were you talking to all that time?' Was she listening? I'll have to be a bit more careful.

Then events began to accelerate. The next morning, agent John rang at the gate while I was having breakfast. We went to my study. He looked a bit rattled. 'The milk's boiling over at Deva. Meg says it's now or never. Gotta act quick.'
'What's going on?'
'He's shot two of the other controllers. His bullies are locking down the town.'
'Bit late then, eh? Why the panic?'
'Meg says we have to act now or it'll be too late. She also said it's time for you to, as she put it, shape up or ship out.'
'Okay, what does she want?' Shit, no time for my backup.
'You have one day to come up with a plan.'
'Or?'
'You're out of here.' Well that was blunt, but to the point.
'Okay, I'll do it. Give me time to think. Come back tomorrow at the same time. I'll have a plan then.'
'I will, and don't try to run for it. We're keeping tabs on you. And if you don't have a good plan tomorrow it will have to be immediate direct action—by you. You were supposed to use your inside knowledge and clever computer tricks to corner him. Get it done. Now. Sometimes, I wonder why we bother with you. Fuck it. I'm going now. See you tomorrow.'

He stumped out. Not cool at all, agent John. He was obviously a bit upset. Me too. I got straight onscreen to Anna and told her all about it.
She had been checking on Deva and could confirm that what agent John had told me was basically correct. She told me that Mr B had been using, as I had guessed, a look-alike android as a body double. It had had its onboard computer tampered with to allow wireless communication. Andy Patel's work no doubt. That meant that we could possibly hijack it, use it as a spy. She had no news about her body though. Meanwhile, two controllers had been executed, three were in hiding and bullies were in the streets intimidating people. She had picked up some video of Meg, and she was still working at Xeron as usual. Anna was currently working on getting control of the Mr B android. I left her to it. By late morning, she sent me a message: 'Come and have a look at this.' She had managed to capture the video feed from the B-bot and we could see what it was seeing and hear what it was hearing. Clever old Anna!

The B-bot was in the atrium of Buonaventura's villa, and was talking to one of the bullies. This one had sergeant stripes and was looking impassive—as best he could.
'I thought I told you to bloody well find the bastards. What the fuck have you been doing?'
'Well, Sir, it's like this, see—'
'I don't want excuses, sergeant, I want results. Do I make myself clear?'
It was a standard telling-off rant. And the bully wasn't liking it.
'We'll be right on to it, sir. We have them cornered. Nobody's getting in or out.'
'I hope for your sake that that is true. Dismissed!'

The bully took his leave. The gate opened. He exited. The gate closed. A guard took his station behind it. The B-bot swivelled round and went into a room. And there was nice old Mr B sitting at a computer with a headset on, controlling it. And who did we have here but my old friend the fat and greasy Andy Patel himself, with thin blondie Jake in assistance. The B-bot was motionless now and taking in the scene. Mr B was going like “I showed him” and the others like “oh, yes boss, you did”, like proper little toadies. There was no sign of the dreaded artificial intelligence, or even
much intelligence at all. Why was Meg panicking?

I started to feel a lot more hopeful at that point. I asked Anna if she could gain control of the B-bot. She said she was working on it but it would be more difficult because the bandwidth was a bit low and she would have to set up predefined situations for it. She also said that there were some mistakes in the programming of its computer that she would have to sort out. Andy Patel again. It was nice to have Anna sort all this out, but I was starting to feel a bit left out.
We discussed how to intervene. It looked like our best option was to use the B-bot to hold the gang in check and to take control by using it as a mouthpiece.
We got ready to receive agent John the next morning. I set up a webcam opposite where I would get him to sit, so Anna could hear and see everything.

Then we got back to watching and plotting. At six thirty, Meg turned up on the feed. She hesitated a bit, not knowing whether to address the bot or the man, but as the bot remained impassive she turned to the man. 'Most impressive, Arthur. I thought it was you for a moment.'
'Good to see you, Meg.'
'How is it all going?'
'Everything's under control. How is the Freya getting on? What the hell?
(Prompt from Anna: 'The mythical Norse goddess Frejya could see a thousand miles. It's a code name'.)
'Very well. Soon we will have permanent surveillance of everything in Deva and the computer capacity to process it in real time. Andrew is positive that that the Freya System will be up and running soon. Well done, Arthur. Then we'll really get everything under control.'
'Not a sparrow will fart in Deva without me knowing it.'
'Yes, right. Very good. And what about the boundaries on the scope of the artificial intelligence system?'
'Look, I wish you would stop bothering me with that rubbish. Just stop. That's enough. If you have just come about that, you might as well just go now.'
(Prompt from Anna: 'She's pushing her luck; he's getting angry.')
As if I hadn't noticed.
'Okay, okay. I just hope there are no difficulties, that's all.'
'There won't be. Anyway, I'm busy. I think you should go now.'
'Goodbye.'
She moved out of sight. A door banged. Mr B looked up, shook his head and said, 'Fucking bitch.' Then he started writing on a pad, presumably to put her name down on a blacklist.

We talked it over and I agreed with her that if we could get adequate control over the B-bot, we could get it to incarcerate Buonaventura and his friends. I could get Anna's body back and this would all be over. Anna began working on getting the B-bot up to standard. I went off to dinner.
After dinner, Anna went all mysterious and told me she hoped she would soon solve everything.

We had a chat, wished each other goodnight and I left it to her, promising to be online again first thing in the morning.