7: Testing times

"There may be an issue" Mr Pinko came up behind Jack and Thomas

"You don't say" Jack replied, eyes darting around, looking at the drones, seeing if any of them could be considered immediate threats. Thankfully, unless they decided to start throwing vol-au-vents at him, the physical threat seemed low. But that wasn't cause for complacency, a call, or face recognition alert could easily have already gone to Cit-Pro.

"I encountered a threat in a back staircase" Mr Pinko continued

"Cit-Pro?" Jack's fears were gaining ground

"Affirmative. Two RAs"

"What? RAs? Two? Shit, we gotta get out of here. Where are they now?"

"I took the liberty of neutralising them. But I suspect others may be en-route"

"Ok, so we leg it back to the lifts?" Jack was getting antsy

"But what about checking out dad's office?" Thomas spoke up

"Too late kid. SHIT. How'd they start seeing me again?"

"Civic Centrale is constantly evolving in their technological ability. The usefulness of the hat was time limited" Mr Pinko's explanation was said matter-of-factly.

"Could have mentioned that earlier, furball"

"I had assumed it was obvious. Nevertheless, the speed of their adaption has surprised even me"

"So we need to get out. Lie low" Jack's mind was racing. Out of the Towers he had favours he could call in, places to hide. But in the Towers was equivalent to being sat in the lion's den. Naked. And covered in meat sauce.

"There may be a solution that satisfies all our current objectives" Mr Pinko spoke

"What?" Thomas asked anxiously.

"The rear staircase runs via the office complex's local server room. If we exit that way we can still look for evidence as to Mr Panthros' location"

"Sounds good" replied Thomas. Jack just responded with a grimace, he had a lot of bad memories attached to server rooms.

Mr Pinko led the way through the crowded room to a non-descript door at the rear. He pushed through, looked around for further threats, then took the staircase down. Thomas and Jack followed him onto a small landing where the stairs switched back on themselves. Here was where the two RAs lay, one flat on its back on the landing with its rib-cage ripped open and circuitry spilling out. The other was lying half on the landing and half on the stairs.

Literally, as in it was in two pieces.

Jack's gaze flashed from the scene of detestation to Mr Pinko; just how powerful was that thing? before darting back to the bodies as a metallic glint in among the wires caught his eye. He stopped. Lent down to root around.

"We must make haste" Mr Pinko had seen Jack halt next to the bodies

"Just a sec. What the...?" he stood back upright with something in his hand, a gun.

"Woah" said Thomas, who was now stood next to the gorilla and looking at Jack.

"It is standard for a Reconnaissance Agent to be armed" Mr Pinko said simply

"Not with ancient equipment like this. It isn't even bio-coded" he was looking at the handle where on any weapon from the last 50 years would have a palm reader to ensure that only the registered user could operate it. "I haven't seen anything like since I was a kid. Plus, RAs have their weaponry integrated, not hand held like this. This is something else"

"You know much about Cit-Pro operatives" a statement, not a question, from Mr Pinko

"Gotta know your enemies, right?" Jack raised an eyebrow at the gorilla.

"So why did this RA carry one then?" Thomas puzzled.

"Couple of options" Jack replied "One being that it was gonna carry out an unrecorded hit"

"No way? Just how bad do Cit-Pro want you Jack?"

The old man just shuck his head in response to Thomas' question. "We gotta get moving"

Even in this advanced age of constant connection to a Megatropolis wide Transnet, companies--and some individuals--maintained their own separate systems. Partly it is about multiple redundancy, partly about being able to run custom firmware, and partly because people still want to maintain at least some privacy. Robert was concerned with all three aspects, and had rented a server space in the office complex accordingly. Among the banks of similar looking systems, Robert's servers stood out even to Jack, like sleek grey monoliths among stone age antiquities.

Thomas was quick to begin the process of wiring himself in to the system - physical connection needed to avoid remote infiltration, the security measure known for many years as maintaining an air gap. Mr Pinko took up position between the server and door as guard. Jack, meanwhile, with nothing better to do set about thinking, trying to connect a few things that had seen out of place in the last couple of days; nagging feeling that there was a link tantalizingly close.

"I'm not seeing anything" Thomas said after a few minutes "It's just standard office sort of stuff. Dad had a lot of business interests, but nothing I can see out of the ordinary"

"He was never going to make it obvious though, was he kid? Any clues are probably deeper" Jack grumbled

"I've got my best scripts running, some of them dad helped me put together. Nothing's coming back. The absence of anything untoward is almost suspicious"

"How' you mean?"

"I know dad had some shady things going on. Not Civic-Centrale hit squad shady, but shady enough to keep hidden"

"So what you're saying...?"

"Dad wiped the evidence, like he knew something bad was coming"

Jack frowned "Or he had somewhere else to store it?"

"I don't, er, follow. WHATAREYOUDOING?" Thomas' iris' resolved back to their usual brown after have shaded over grey during his search of the server. His vision focused back in the room, he came round to the sight of Jack with the gun pointed at Mr Pinko.

"Get behind me kid, we've got a fuzzy pink traitor in our midst here" Jack didn't take his eyes of the gorilla as he barked the instruction at Thomas.

"What are you talking about?" confusion writ large over the younger man's face, arms open, pleading.

"A few things coming together in my head. Not as quick as I used to be, but I get there in the end"

"There is no need for this Mr Jack" the gorilla spoke calmly "I offer no threat"

"How'd I take my coffee furball?"

"I am not sure as to the relevance of your question"

"Any question is relevant when the person asking it has a gun pointed at you" Jack asked through clenched teeth. His gun arm wavering slightly as the adrenaline pumped.

"Jack, please, what is going on?" Thomas interjected.

"Do you know how I take my coffee, kid?"

"What? No? Why would I?"

Someone at the CHub does, as when I woke from the scenario this morning a drone brought it right to me. Two sugars, just a little milk. I never ordered it. And the drone, which shouldn't have been able to see me anyway, had it ready. Almost as if directed to do so by someone that knew my preference and could see me" he nodded at Mr Pinko "like your companion here"

"So? Mr Pinko is very perceptive"

"Indeed. Perceptive enough to get inside my scenario. The scenario in which I drank coffee while talking to your mother"

"I told you that it was impossible to see a client's own memory scenario" a hint of resentment in Thomas' voice

"Impossible for you, but maybe not your dad and maybe not his creation here" another nod "What about it furball? Enjoyable viewing?"

"Your version of events is simplistic" Mr Pinko neither confirmed or denied the accusation, Jack noted.

"And then there is the gun" Jack continued "Remember how on the stairs I said that there were a couple of reasons why a gun nearly as old as me could have been with the RA?"

"Yeah, an unrecorded hit" Thomas answered the question "As in the reason we can't afford to waste time waving that gun around in here"

"That is one reason. Another being that it was planted"

"Planted? By who? Mr Pinko? Why?" questions spilled out of Thomas

"Now that is the interesting part, why? It doesn't make sense that Mr Pinko is some kind of Cit-Pro agent, he's had ample opportunity to either arrest me or kill me already, neither of which he has done" Jack smiled "Indeed, even since I've had the gun pointed at him, while deliberately being within his arm's reach, an arm that can rip an RA apart, he hasn't made a move. He isn't a spy. He's a test"

"A...test? From who?"

"One way to find out. End the test, pull the trigger"

A click of firing pin, but no bang of a shot. Jack nodded to himself and dropped the gun.

"Did I pass?"

A pause, then Mr Pinko spoke "With flying colours, old friend"

Jack approached the gorilla, looking into its dark brown eyes, "Is that you Robert?"

"Sort of" replied Mr Pinko

"I'm so confused" Thomas rested his head against the cool window of the autocab. "My dad is a big pink gorilla?"

"No. It is more that a big pink gorilla is an approximation of your dad" Mr Pinko spoke from the front of the cab, his bulky body squeezed awkwardly into the seat.

The Towers receded in the distance behind them, Jack peering out the roof looking for a tail despite both Mr Pink and Thomas assuring him that they'd masked their presence in the cab. Cit-Pro would catch up with them eventually, but for now they were putting distance between themselves and any pursuers.

"An approximation?" Thomas asked uncertainly

"Yes. I am in effect a manifestation of the personal assistant that your father had installed on his personal uplink"

"We all have personal assistants" then a glance over at Jack "Ok, most of us have personal assistants, they come as a default on even the most basic uplink. It's just that those assistants don't then tend become sentient in the body of a retired e-zoo animal"

"Please let me continue. I have been alongside your dad for years now, helping catalog his affairs like a traditional assistant. But he made a few additions to my programming. Enabling me to learn more about him, about his experiences. He backed this up in the servers at his office."

"Hence the need to lead us there" Jack piped up

"I led you no where. Robert was confident that Thomas would head to that location of his own free will. He was less sure, however, about you Jack"

"Hence the test"

"Tough times lie ahead, Robert needed to know you still had the sharp mind he remembered, if you could spot threats and react accordingly, even if your physical body is eroding"

Mr Pinko was right about Jack's body, but the old man still didn't appreciate being told so and he lapsed back into silence.

"If you share my dad's experiences and memories, then the two of you are one and the same, no?"

"That is a philosophical question that I am not fully equipped to answer. I would say that I only share his memories from when my software was first created. I know little of his past"

"Hence the effort to tap into Jack's scenario?"

"Yes, but your father's work was incomplete on that front. I could glean little from the scenario itself other than you mother was present and that Jack likes his coffee a certain way. I attempted to use this little information as best I could as per your father's instructions that I verify Jack's abilities"

"I see. But if you are not a complete version of dad then, why did you refer to Jack as 'old friend' back in the server room? You switched tenses then"

"You have a sharp memory" Mr Pinko smiled, something a little terrifying given his form. "Your father left instructions within my programming, certain personal messages to give should specific criteria be met"

"Did he leave any messages for me?"

"All in good time, Thomas"

The young man frowned, "hang on, was that Mr Pinko or dad saying that?" but the gorilla ignored his question turned his head to look out of the front of the cab.

"What about the RAs on the staircase?" Jack returned to the conversation

"What about them?" Mr Pinko said without looking back.

"Well I can understand you hiding an empty gun about your person, but not two RAs, so where did they come from?"

"The Citizen-Protectorate of course. I was not lying when I remarked in the gallery that their speed of technical evolution had surprised me. My initial intention had been to plant the gun in Robert's office, to test your observation skills and to see if given your knowledge of Robert you would recognise that it was out of place. But, after dealing with the RAs I adapted the plan"

"So you really can rip them apart bare-handed?"

"In closed confines with the element of surprise, yes"

"I gotta feeling that might come in handy"

"What do you mean?" the gorilla continued to stare out ahead. The cab came off the autoroad, hitting the turnpike down into the West Sector.

"We gotta get out the Megatropolis. My hat ain't working no more, you destroyed 'bout a billion creds worth of Cit-Pro equipment back there and we're the ones supposed to be looking out for junior here" a nod at Thomas.

"But what about dad?" Thomas asked meekly

"Your dad always played the long game, kid. No way he expected to bust his arse out of whatever holding pen they got him in within a day or two. Getting into Civic Centrale is no mean feat. It's the sort of job that takes preparation"

"The sort of job that is your forte" Mr Pinko was smiling again.