The Big Hunt by Lance Parkin

Author:Lance Parkin [Parkin, Lance]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Book, Prose, Novel
ISBN: 9781844351077
Publisher: Big Finish
Published: 2005-02-28T23:00:00+00:00

8

Gathering Intelligence

There were a number of implications of what Benny had just said. Many of these were clearly running through Makins’ mind.

‘No,’ he said. ‘You’re falling into the second oldest trap in the history of evolutionary science. You’re assuming intent on the part of the animals.’

‘Damn right I am,’ Benny agreed.

‘No,’ Makins repeated. ‘No. It doesn’t work like that. We say things like “a giraffe’s long neck evolved to eat the tall leaves”, but it didn’t. It happened that the animals with long necks could eat more leaves, so they got more food, so they survived longer and so had more, or more successful, offspring. But no giraffe actually thinks about getting a longer neck, or plans it. How long did it take for the giraffe’s neck to grow that long? Millions of years.’

Benny smiled. She’d thought of this already. ‘These aren’t giraffes. These are machines. They’ve already been designed, and one of the things they were designed for was to adapt. They are programmed to control the process’

Makins was shaking his head. ‘This is nonsense. Robots don’t evolve. They don’t even reproduce. Look at that thing –’ the sabretooth in the middle of the room ‘– it’s a machine.’

‘I don’t understand how they do it,’ Benny admitted. ‘But we already know the robots have developed an ecosystem, and –’

‘– only you think that,’ Makins reminded her. He paused, decided to sound more conciliatory. ‘Benny, you’re a smart woman, but you’re an archaeologist, not a cyberneticist or an evolutionary biologist.’

Flynn had been staring him down the whole time. ‘I’m a scientist, I know about electronic systems. I don’t understand what’s going on here. What Professor Summerfield says is a more convincing explanation than anything you’ve said. Whether you call it evolution or not, the robots have adapted to our presence. If someone wanted to design a robot to kill humans, they couldn’t do a much better job than this sabretooth’

Makins was waving his hand now, trying to signal an end to the conversation. ‘Rubbish,’ he said. ‘Plenty of robots have been designed to kill humans, by other humans and by aliens. None of them look like this.’

‘None of them were working with the materials to hand here,’ Benny replied instantly. They were still firmly in territory she’d already thought about. ‘They have to cut their cloth according to their means.’

She’d lost Flynn, though.

Benny tried to explain: ‘This sabretooth looks a lot like an upgraded version of the wolf. I’m sure if we did a comparative analysis of the components, we’d see that it’s virtually identical. As identical as an aircar company’s family saloon this year and last year, anyway.’

Makins had pressed a control on his desk. ‘No,’ he said simply.

The door slid open, and two heavyset men walked in. Both were wearing slate-grey suits, not the sort of thing the hunters wore at all. Bantu security, Benny guessed.

‘I’m not having you analysing these robots,’ Makins told her. ‘These are the latest Bantu designs.’

‘They aren’t though,’ Benny shouted, as one of the goons reached her.

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