Clutch

CLUTCH David Alan Jones Copyright © 2023 by David Alan Jones All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law. Check out David’s website at davidalanjones.com While you’re there, join his newsletter mailing list for exclusive content, including tie-in stories for the Philip Klein series. Contents Part 1 1. Chapter 1 2. Chapter 2 3. Chapter 3 4. Chapter 4 5. Chapter 5 6. Chapter 6 7. Chapter 7 8. Chapter 8 9. Chapter 9 10. Chapter 10 11. Chapter 11 Part 2 12. Chapter 12 13. Chapter 13 14. Chapter 14 15. Chapter 15 16. Chapter 16 17. Chapter 17 18. Chapter 18 19. Chapter 19 20. Chapter 20 21. Chapter 21 22. Chapter 22 23. Chapter 23 24. Chapter 24 25. Chapter 25 26. Chapter 26 27. Chapter 27 28. Chapter 28 29. Chapter 29 30. Chapter 30 31. Chapter 31 32. Chapter 32 Epilogue Also by David Alan Jones About The Author Part 1Operation #BUZZKILL Chapter 1 The JetBlue Airbus A321 descended through a gray mist that clung to DC like cobwebs. Paul Marzo, engineer, programmer, and the nation’s leading research scientist where artificial intelligence crossed machine psychology, tapped his phone, skimming through the latest field test results from his lab back in Boston. The numbers amazed even him. “Sir?” A shapely stewardess stood at Marzo’s side. “Please switch off your phone while we make our final approach.” Marzo considered telling her to fuck off. CDMA digital phone signatures affected aircraft radar and guidance systems about as much as gnat farts affected tornadoes. Instead, he smiled and blanked the screen. Best not to call attention to himself on this of all mornings. Overestimating his worth to the company could lead to trouble. Sure, they had chosen him to brief a closed meeting of the Joint Armed Services Committee, but corporate favor spread only so far. Cause grief for a major global enterprise like Patch Incorporated, even if you were the senior vice president in charge of AI research and development, and they would thresh you like wheat. Or worse. The Airbus touched down at 6:30 a.m. on the dot. Marzo collected his carry on, a flat bag containing his tablet with a compact version of CORE soaking up most of its solid state drive, and headed for the exit. Muzzy-headed Bostonians egressed with him, smelling of humanity: body odor, cologne, perfume too liberally applied, and the rancid death breath of the newly awake. Marzo ignored the stench, and that said something about him. More glib than the average programmer, he had climbed the ranks at Patch as much for his social acumen as his considerable intellect. He knew how to get on with people. How to ignore their little foibles while masking his own. Of course, it didn’t take much to outclass the next best MIT graduate in that department. Marzo could carry on a simple conversation. That alone put him miles ahead of his peers, most of whom would rather stare at a screen than a human face. He knew how to get on at parties too, how to manage a project team with aplomb and a targeted personal touch that attracted notice and appreciation. He calculated his relationships, adding those that could aid his ascendancy, and shanking all others. But none of that meant he liked people. Crowds of his fellow humans turned Marzo’s stomach. Ronald Reagan Airport was rife with them. He ignored the teeming masses by focusing on his upcoming speech. Not that his delivery mattered. Adequate would do. According to the highest levels of scuttlebutt at Patch Inc, and Marzo had gotten this directly from his boss, Shirley Brisbane, CEO of the entire outfit, today’s Armed Services Committee hearing amounted to a fancy poodle contest. The president had all but signed off on using CORE to pilot drone strikes during a private fundraiser for his nascent reelection campaign three months ago. Sure, the committee would make a show of deciding if CORE fit the United States’ strategic defense profile, and if the military should foot the bill to implement it, but this was all rubber stamp bullshit. The government needed Patch’s AI expertise if they had any hope of maintaining parity with the Chinese over the next twenty years. With the President’s control over both houses, his chummy ties with three of the four joint chiefs, and his rare late-first-term popularity, Marzo had no doubt CORE would soon become the backbone of both the cyber and physical war efforts. Marzo’s phone chirped while he stood at the luggage carousel—a message from his wife. Good luck with the meeting, and did he want salmon or steak at their daughter’s wedding reception? Steak. A buzzing sound caught Marzo’s attention. A fat woman dressed in a floral print muumuu, no doubt calculated to hide her morbid obesity though the attempt failed in every respect, galumphed her way between him and the luggage carousel and stood there staring at him. “What?” Marzo didn’t have time for airport crazies. The blank-eyed overeater wore the sort of perplexed expression he associated with a lush or a pothead. Both probably. No doubt she wanted to borrow his phone and was gathering either the nerve or the necessary braincells to ask. He stuffed it pointedly into his back pocket. The fat woman smiled. To Marzo’s disgust, she had no teeth. In fact, she had no gums, tongue, or anything inside her mouth beyond her plump red lips. The hole that should have been her mouth was only that, a hole, an empty void filled with darkness. From that pit came a sound like insect wings, thousands, perhaps millions of them, all buzzing and battering against one another, the humming cacophony rising in pitch as the woman’s mouth opened wider, yawning like a barn door in her head. Marzo staggered back, his mind struggling to formulate a coherent, and more importantly,