Artificial(ish) Intelligence

Chapter 56

Just moments earlier, a last-minute turn caused the low undercarriage to scrape against the kerb. Will didn't notice, he was too busy holding on to his life.

He laughed. This was more like it. Libbi had discovered the impatience level had been dropped to low, presumably from the previous fare. Now it was set to busy-executive, only one step below soccer-mum-collecting-kids.

They'd lost the van at one point, when it used unconventional roads that their car's GPS was programmed to avoid. But now that safety precautions were lowered, they'd re-found it and were keeping up.

And then Will noticed his hair hanging in the air. It was as if he was in a zero-g FPS, set on a space station. But this wasn't a game, and appeared to be quite an unnatural occurrence.

"Maanavata mahaan hai."

The unrecognisable words came to his head. Was it a memory, or a phrase uttered out loud?

He peered through the large window at the large explosion that seemed to be expanding in slow motion. Suddenly his car came hopping down, skidding against the asphalt. His hair regained its dead, stringy nature.

They'd been protected from the bulk of the blast by another car, parked on the side of the road. A few large pieces of it came crashing down on the road behind, partially hidden by the smoke.

"Will!" said Libbi, fluttering to the rear window, her camera fixed on its mangled remains.

"No one was inside," said Will. He was certain. Well, reasonably sure. It was at least a fifty-fifty. "What's that?" he said.

Fine particles of red rippled toward them, floating in the wind like a swarm of bees.

Libbi zoomed in. "Flowers," she said, ending in a slight inflection. "Shredded carnations."

"Just another attack from the Human Liberation Army," said the car, picking up speed. "Nothing to worry about. I'll get you where you need to go."

"Is anyone hurt?" said Libbi. "We need to go back."

"This is for Paige," said Will. "We need to find out who those guys are."

"But what if they need our help?" said Libbi. "If you have the ability to help someone, you have the responsibility to do so."

"What are you going to do? Take pictures of them?"

"I know," said Libbi. "But still..."

Will took a moment to check out the early reports from the scene of the explosion, an automated haul of ambulance chatter and social media mentions. At first the death toll was in the thousands, but it shrank quickly as trustworthy sources were identified and corroborated. "Scratches," he said. "Light burns. Someone's got a broken arm. But that's it."

"OK," said Libbi, but her metallic body continued to face the direction of the bomb blast, even as the car made a number of turns.

It didn't take long for the van to pull in through an open chain-link fence. The area seemed light industrial, filled with warehouses and stone masons and small factories. Large frames rolling on tracks dotted the skyline, 3D-printing the frames of new buildings, complete with plumbing and electrical. As their car drove past, Will strained his neck to see where the driveway lead to.

"Offices?" said Libbi. "Or something else?"

It was hard to tell. They looked like repeating sections of a warehouse, each with its own angular pitched roof, but the scale was all wrong. They each had a door and small window obscured by metal bars.

"Must be their haitch-queue," said Will.

While they considered the location, their car continued on for almost a block.