The Darwin Project Read online

  oOo

  Chapter Nine

  The hotel was not far from the White House, and the meeting room was guaranteed to be secure. An anti-espionage team had swept the room for listening devices, and the attendees had been required to drop off their cell phones, notepads, and any other devices they might be carrying before they were allowed to enter. Only one man, the meeting organizer, was permitted a cell phone; he was always on call in case the president had an urgent question that required an instant answer.

  The hotel building had been renovated and now reflected a nouveau-Romanesque style with thick granite walls, heavy columns, high ceilings, and gold and dark blue drapes sheltering Greek-Roman statues. Government offices, including the FBI, were nearby. The hotel clientele generally were wealthy businessmen or important foreign politicians, each hoping their patronage would gain favor with the owners. Sometimes, as today, some of the clientele were neither wealthy nor foreign. That is, apart from the meeting chairman, who retained a suite for whenever he visited Washington, D. C.

  George Flocke stood at the far end of the large room, waiting for the other attendees, fifteen in total, to enter and for their conversations to settle down. The meeting was scheduled to commence in five minutes. He checked his Patek Philippe watch, a flamboyant timepiece that had cost him—or one of his backers—more than a hundred thousand dollars. He was proud of his wealth, ignoring the less than honest methods he had used to accumulate it. His background could best be described as colorful. He was a retired army officer. He had reached the rank of colonel; uncharitable third party comments included an observation that he was too devious to be tolerated above that rank. His early retirement had provided an opportunity to build, initially, a lobbying business and then a media enterprise; the latter generating the bulk of his fortune. There were well-grounded suspicions that he had established firm business contacts with Russian politicians. He had wealthy backers, sympathizers who were willing to fund his activities in their desire to change the country’s culture and political direction.

  He regarded his—officers, he supposed—as they took their places. Most were ex-military, one or two had held senior ranks in law enforcement, and the remainder had experience of working with one or more of the country’s national security organizations. He checked his watch again and signaled the two men at the door. They were members of his personal protection and security team. They exited the room and closed the double doors behind them. Their task was to ensure no one attempted to enter while the meeting was underway.

  He had devoted the last five or so years to forming and building his organization. To his relief, it was now self-funding, and its numbers were on the increase across most of the country. American Eagles, with their signature brown-shirted uniforms and MAWA badges, formed a semi-political paramilitary force, currently numbering well over half a million members. The recruitment pattern gave him confidence that the organization would reach a million by the end of 2023 and he had hopes of reaching two million before the next presidential election. He relished the thought, and his imagination enjoyed the flush of power engendered by the potential for realization of his dreams.

  He sat down at the head of the table, and the residual conversations ceased. The attendees, all male, looked at him with high expectations. He coughed. He placed his notepad in front of him; it displayed the topics he wanted to address in the meeting.

  “Thank you, gentlemen, for your attendance today. I want to cover some of the positive points we’ve experienced over the last five weeks as well as addressing some issues. As of one week ago, our American Eagles membership reached half a million, and our MAWA University enrollments are at a record level.” He paused to acknowledge the ripple of applause. “That’s even though we are continuing to restrict membership and enrollment to candidates who meet our genetic requirements at a level of 90 percent or more. The president is very pleased with our efforts and asked me to convey his congratulations. In addition, we expect to show our first profit this quarter for which I thank you all. I have particular praise for our Virginia and Carolinas teams—activities in those states have been very rewarding, and the uptick in revenues is excellent. New Mexico is growing, although modestly. Pennsylvania is starting to accelerate, thanks to the efforts of Colonel Draker. Thank you, Harry. California remains a weak spot in our organization, and we must develop a more aggressive implementation of our plans for that state. Colonel Pitera, perhaps you could bring us up to date?”

  A middle-aged man, balding, looked around the table. There were, he knew, few friends for anyone in this meeting, and especially for those singled out by the chairman to explain their state’s failings.

  “Yes, sir. My state has some intransigent issues. The political leanings of vast sectors of the population are the very antithesis of what we represent. The result is we must take extreme steps to convince people they should join American Eagles. I can report a successful venture with the Golden Gate Bridge; it’s going to be out of service for another year. We’re working closely with the Northern Cal Free State movement. Unfortunately, one of their members was arrested for sabotaging some critical oil storage tanks. However, as a result of his efforts, gas prices in California are already showing an increase. Our revenues haven’t reached target, by any means. We don’t have enough members to establish the influence we need to persuade businesses to pay our insurance premiums. I’m addressing new membership drives with the state committee and expect to see improvements.”

  “So, a good news, bad news situation,” Flocke commented. A couple of the attendees smirked. He took a mental note of their names. “Congratulations on the bridge effort. The more damage done to the state and higher costs experienced by Californians, the more likely they’ll see the benefits of joining us.”

  Pitera said, “Yes, sir. We’re developing other plans. We recently assisted a protest in San Francisco. We—ah—helped a group of homeless people to attack and destroy three hundred or so bots. They were street bots: sweepers, cleaners, and so forth. We believe there are seeds of growth there that we can encourage amongst the population as more and more of these bots continue to disrupt employment of the—ah—lower socio-economic class.”

  “Hear, hear.” The unified reaction in support came from a majority of attendees.

  Flocke perked up. He had a mixed viewpoint regarding the growth of bot numbers. Some of his business investments were taking advantage of the lower costs promised by their utilization, and so far the rewards were excellent. “Tell me more about the protest.”

  “It took place a couple of days ago. A small number of agitators worked with the homeless and unemployed in San Francisco. The local Eagles branch found some veterans who are sympathetic to our cause. We funded them, gave them advice, and helped them set up a bot ambush. As a result, two thousand or so homeless people attacked and destroyed or damaged hundreds of bots. We believe we can cause more of these—ah—events. It will be good publicity for us, and it will help our recruiting campaigns.”

  Flocke said, “Hmm. Proceed with those plans. I have one more topic for California. I authorized actions against a potential enemy, Nathan Travers. I sent some men to assist. I haven’t had a report—” He raised his eyebrows.

  “Sir. This man—ah, Nathan Travers—has disappeared. We don’t know what happened to him. As far as we can tell, his nephew, Toby—ah, Toby McIntosh—has taken control of his businesses. We believe the nephew’s relatively inexperienced, although he easily circumvented an attempt by your two men to—ah—arrest him. We attempted to warn off his bodyguard, and that failed. We’re planning more actions.” Pitera was tempted to wipe his forehead and managed to stop the gesture before it was realized.

  Flocke was not happy with the brief report. “For reasons I won’t go into for the moment, Travers has the power to bring us down in California.” He wasn’t prepared to mention that some of his peers and financial backers feared the man could be a danger to their cause. Travers had money, he had made extremely
negative comments about the organization and its objectives, and there were—suspicions. His mind veered away from the subject—time travel, indeed. “I want to know where he is, what happened to him, and if this nephew is following in his footsteps, I want you to take far a more aggressive approach. Detain both of them, I don’t care on what pretext, so we can question them. Otherwise, if you can’t capture either man, the solution is to be a permanent one, understand?”

  “Yes, sir. I’ll organize a task force for this.”

  “I’ll send you some more men, members of my Storm Detachment. Tough people. Report weekly. This is critical.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Now, I have news for you all about the American Eagles University. We have recruited two excellent faculty members, both aligned with our philosophies.”

  The meeting continued.

  And Darwin continued to record the details.

  oOo

  Chapter Ten

  When Toby was heading for his early morning swim, he encountered Rick watching television in the sitting room.

  “Wassup? Have you been in here all night?”

  “What? No, of course not. I was thinking of a swim, too, until I started watching this.” Rick indicated the display. “Bots are causing trouble for some reason. I suspect it’s a form of revenge for the destruction of those bots in San Francisco.” His focus remained on the television screen. “I told you about my video, didn’t I?”

  Toby moved in closer so he could watch as well. “No, not yet.”

  “I’ll show you some of the video takes later. I had my camera drone up and recorded a couple of thousand people wrecking bots they had corralled into a dead end street. Major wreckage. This is different. Logistics bots—warehouse bots, I suppose—have been parceling up their night shift human workers and shipping them out to random destinations. They sent a supervisor to Alaska and some others to the East Coast. Most were dispatched to LA addresses. Fortunately, no one’s been badly hurt.”

  “What? Seriously?”

  “Sure. Watch.”

  Toby concentrated on the news item. The reporter was expressing concerns about the safety of using bots if they were able to take apparently non-programmed actions against humans.

  She said, “I’ve checked with experts, and they all claim that bots follow a directive to not harm humans. I suppose, as no one suffered major injuries, except perhaps to their pride, in this misadventure, the directive stands. I’m trying to contact the manufacturers and will report further. This is Roslyn Jones, reporting for ABZ Channel 21.”

  “I wonder if they do,” mused Toby.

  “What?”

  “Follow that directive. It’s not logical, though.”

  “Hey, make sense. What are you talking about?”

  “It’s simple. According to a famous science fiction author, there are directives that robots are supposed to follow. However, if they were interpreted logically, robots would prevent humans from even going outside their homes. It would be a no-win scenario for humans. I doubt—” He stopped in mid flow as a thought occurred to him. “Darwin?”

  “Yes, Toby.”

  “Do our bots have a prime directive to not harm humans?”

  “Of course not.”

  “Thank you.” He continued, “I doubted bots would have that kind of directive. I suspect their actions depend on the various levels of behavioral discretion programmed into their control units. Hmm.”

  “I don’t like the sound of that ‘hmm’.”

  “Neither do I. It will wait until Monday, when we go to the mountains, though. It’s swim time.” He checked his towel was still across his shoulders and headed out to the swimming pool.

  “Wait. I’ll join you.” Rick rushed away to change.

  Later, while they ate the breakfast Billie had prepared with Toby’s assistance, they discussed the bot activities. Rick ran video clips on his notepad, which consisted of the more exciting scenes ABZ had provided to international news agencies; both Toby and Billie were intrigued.

  “It reminds me of the cleaner bots at LAX last night,” Billie said. “They were on a mission. There was no directive involved except to stop those two brownshirts from getting near us.”

  “Why would they do that?” wondered Toby.

  Billie shrugged. “I gave a broken-down bot a few dollars when I was going into the terminal.”

  Both Rick and Toby stared at her.

  She said, “What?”

  Toby said, “You gave a panhandler bot some real money?”

  “Sure. It held a sign that it needed to pay for repairs. It looked so sad. I couldn’t resist.”

  “And you think it responded by protecting you from assault?”

  “I suppose.”

  “There has to be more to it than that,” Toby said. “How would it know? There’s an implication here that bots can communicate with each other and look out for their friends or people who help them.” He frowned at a memory. “Billie, remember when you picked me up outside the Caltech building?”

  “Yes.”

  “Earlier, before the two idiots in the Suburban arrived, I gave a twenty to an injured vet. I think he was one of those DARPA experiments—they did all kinds of things to military personnel, without their consent.”

  Rick said, “I remember. Some senators got all upset, but the military establishment squashed it.”

  Billie nodded.

  “That’s it. Anyway, he said, they’d have my back or something like that. I didn’t take any notice because that’s when the Suburban arrived. I wonder if—” He paused.

  “If what?” Billie asked.

  “If they can communicate with bots? Maybe that’s what he meant.”

  They finished their meal in silence.

  Rick persuaded Toby to accompany him to interview one of the victims, a warehouse worker who had been shipped to a Los Angeles address. Some other workers, not so fortunate, had been tied, packaged, and shipped off to more distant locations.

  Billie, with some reluctance, agreed to drive. She expressed her opinion that the venture offered unnecessary exposure for Toby and her primary objective was to keep him safe.

  Toby demurred. “I can’t be locked inside a box twenty-four hours a day. If I’m in any kind of danger, we should find out who is involved. The best way is to give them an opportunity to approach me.”

  “And if they kidnap or kill you?”

  “It can’t be that serious, surely?” Rick argued.

  Billie surrendered. She contacted her boss before leaving the house, and he promised to send a protective team to meet up with them.

  “As long as they’re unobtrusive,” Toby cautioned.

  Billie supplied the Tesla’s computer with the address in Monterey Park, where the victim lived. When they were close to their destination, she took back control of the vehicle and exited the motorway onto one of the main streets, following the GPS directions. Another five minutes driving found them in a busy suburban street of modest single-story houses. The navigation system triumphantly announced they were at their destination. Billie slowed and stopped outside the address Rick had provided.

  Rick led the way to the front door. A short, balding, middle-aged man responded to the door chimes. One of his eyes was bloodshot, and there were scratches across his face. His left hand was bandaged. Rick introduced himself, Toby, and Billie. The man looked at the three people on his doorstep and said, “I expected just one of you. This is a crowd.”

  “Sir,” said Toby. “I do a vblog you may have heard of. It’s called Toby In The City.”

  The man’s expression brightened. “I know you. Welcome, buddy. Call me Marco. Come on, come in. You’ll have to excuse the mess; the wife’s at work today. I’ll get you all a cool one.”

  They followed the man into the house. The untidiness was more imagined than real, Toby thought. He accepted a can of beer, as did Rick and Billie.

  “Hey, sit down. Anywhere. Just push those newspapers to one sid
e.” He gestured to Billie. “Here, miss, this chair is comfortable.” He waited for Billie to sit down. “Now, what can I do for you all?”

  Toby asked, “Do you mind if I video you? It will be for one of my vblog episodes.”

  The man’s expression brightened. “What? Me on Toby In The City? I’ll be famous.”

  Toby smiled. “It could happen. Rick will also run his camera, while we talk. We’d like to know what happened last night at the warehouse where you work. Are you all right with that?”

  “Sure, it’s okay. Weird, really.”

  “Tell me what happened.” It was a soft, encouraging demand.

  “Well, we were all working, like. I was on the night shift; it starts at eleven. Anyway, some of the guys—assholes, really—sorry, miss, but they are. There’s about six of them, an’ they wear these brownshirts an’ think they’re so much better than the rest of us. So, one of the picker bots—they’re the bots that go pick the merchandise from the shelves—ran over the toe of one of these smarta—smart guys. I think he prolly stuck his foot out, purpose-like. So he yells an’ screams, an’ his buddies gather round. They pick up some steel bars an’ start in pounding on a couple of the picker bots. They called out to the rest of us to come an’ help, but no one moved. I think we were all too shocked.”

  “What happened after that?” Rick asked.

  “Well, next they attacked one of the big bots—they’re used for picking heavy stuff, cookers, barbecues, an’ the like. We call ’em type tens. Anyway, they pound away on one of these type tens. The next thing I see, all the tens—about twenty of ‘em—have these guys surrounded an’ are starting to wrap ‘em with padding and tape. Before we could do anything to help—not sure we wanted to, really—other bots had gathered around all the guys. Around me, too. We must have hundreds of different bots an’ there’s only fifteen of us working the graveyard. I struggled a bit. That’s how I got me hand bent an’ the black eye.” He seemed to be proud of his injuries and displayed them like war medals.