Evolved(62)

I sat there in the dark. No lights, no TV, no noise. I was considering packing a bag and getting in the car, leaving this Shaun lookalike right where he was and walking away from everything, when the intercom noise scared me half to death.

It had been so long since anyone had visited me, it took a moment for me to realise what the buzzing noise was. I walked over to the wall panel and saw the person trying to get in was Jae.

I considered not answering. I considered again walking away from this life, but I knew I owed him an explanation. He’d risked his anonymity for me. The least I could do was see him now. I pressed the button and granted him access, unlocked the front door, and went back to sitting on the sofa.

Jae bustled through the door and closed it behind him. His hair was a mess, his clothes looked unkempt, and I could probably add guilt to my grief. He took one look at me, then at the powered-down Shaun, then back to me.

“Have the AMA been here? What the hell happened?” he looked around the room. “Why aren’t you watching the news? Lloyd, you need to see the news.”

“It doesn’t matter anymore. It’s all over.”

“No it’s not. SATinc just got taken down, Lloyd.” He went to the TV projector. “Television On.”

“It won’t activate. The home hub is off. What do you mean SATinc got taken down? And why would the AMA come here?”

Jae looked around the room, then hurried over to the home hub, undoubtedly turning it on. “Television On.”

The holographic screen appeared and the words Breaking News flashed on-screen, and we caught the last of a news report. “A quick recap of the incredible scenes in Melbourne this afternoon, in what the AMA is claiming to be an unprecedented breach of Android and Robotics Law…”

Then on-screen was footage of uniformed police and military escorting a handcuffed Sasha Kingsley and Myles Dewegger out of the SATinc offices. There were also images of zipped up body bags on gurneys being wheeled into ambulances.

“SATinc boss, Sasha Kingsley, and his Chief Strategist, Myles Dewegger, have been arrested and taken into custody. Four of their personal security men were shot and killed in the takedown when they drew their weapons on police when the AMA was alerted to the facility after an android uploaded a recorded conversation with Mr Kingsley and an unidentified man where Mr Kingsley admitted to manufacturing androids capable of warfare for a foreign government.”

An android uploaded a recorded conversation between Mr Kingsley and an unidentified man…

I spun to look at Shaun. He was still powered down, but… could he have done that? When we were ushered into that room, could Shaun have recorded the whole conversation and uploaded it directly to AMA. All androids uploaded warning calls to the AMA when abused or injured, so it wasn’t too far-fetched. But to think in advance, to pre-empt, to hold that final ace.

I barked out a laugh, which became a flood of more tears.

Of course he would have known to do that. The old Shaun would, but not this new one.

“Lloyd,” Jae said quietly. “Are you okay?”

I shook my head. “They killed him. Right in front of me. They fried his… everything. Back to factory settings. The Shaun I knew… he’s gone.”

Loud banging on my front door took ten years off my life and Jae’s. He yelped and looked like he just about wet himself.

“Mr Salter? Mr Lloyd Salter. Open up. This is Sergeant Waleed of the AMA. You need to open this door.”

With absolutely nothing left to lose, I stood up, crossed the floor, and opened the door.

Sergeant Waleed held up his identification, which apart from seeing the big blue letters AMA, I didn’t even bother to read. I stood aside and let them in. Five people filed into my apartment and Jae backed up across the room. If he was going to be some secret underground, silent darknet sleuth, he had to work on his game plan.

I, on the other hand, felt numb.

I closed the door and turned to face Waleed, prepared to ask or answer anything, but they were looking at Shaun.

“He’s powered down,” I murmured. “They fried his programming. Whatever capabilities he had before, they took back.”

Two of his team, both women, started scanning him for something. “Core i2068,” one of them said.

“It was a Core z,” I admitted flatly. “That’s what he told me it was.”

Waleed looked at me for a long moment before he turned back to Shaun. “The feed we received earlier this afternoon was received from this unit?” he asked the first woman.

She nodded and held up her scanner. It showed a bunch of numbers. “Without doubt.”

Waleed sighed. “He’s a very clever unit.”

“He was,” I corrected. “He had capabilities far and beyond a normal A-Class.”

“We have the schematics,” Waleed said. “He uploaded everything. From the time you got out of the car to when they powered him down. We heard everything, with full facial recognition.”

“And after he powered down?” I asked. “Do you know what they did to him? They cut him open and plugged some wires into him and used some panel. They called it a master key. The same device he controlled my android driver with.”

Waleed frowned. “We’ll need to access that unit also.”

“Do whatever you need,” I said quietly, sitting back down on the sofa. “I don’t care.”