Chapter 23:  Peekaboo

The next day everyone on board could feel the difference in the motion of the ship. A look outside provided the explanation. The ship was riding up, over and down high swells that swept endlessly onward from the horizon, their crests three hundred yards apart. Each time the midpoint of the ship reached the top of a new swell the vessel shivered briefly before riding down the other side. The sky was a brilliant blue, and the effect was exhilarating.

Anyone determined enough to make a circuit of the ship on deck found the trip forward to be an athletic challenge against the combined wind-force of the ship’s way and a rising gale. In the opposite direction, the challenge was to avoid being blown like a spinning top towards the stern. As the seas continued to rise, the captain terminated guest access to the decks.

By dinner time the experience was anything but exhilarating. The Argosy was meeting the steepening swells at a slight angle now instead of head-on, introducing a corkscrew motion that was not to anyone’s liking. The ship’s stabilizers on each side, fore and aft, damped the motion down somewhat, but not enough to spare those with weak stomachs. By evening, the Argosy’s dining room and bars were noticeably less busy than before.

Before the change in course, the captain had decreased speed to ease the strain on the ship. Now that the ship was rolling, the captain extended the ship’s fin stabilizers and increased the ship’s speed to give them more bite. With the change, the throb of the engines was felt wherever you were on the ship; a vibration that was felt rather than heard. On the crew deck, some were uneasy. No one was familiar with the new ship and how much it could handle. And still the wind and the waves rose.

Returning to the bridge after presiding over his table at dinner, Captain Antonio studied the text of the latest weather alert. That, and the mass of isobars and other data populating the electronic weather map on the bridge told a story of deteriorating conditions. Eloise was now a category one hurricane. More disturbingly, it had changed course. “Get me Cruise Control,” he said to the helmsman.

Until now, Turing had found no reason to interfere with the ship’s voice communications although it could easily have done so. One of its first goals after penetrating the Argosy’s on-board network had been to take control of the ship’s internal and external communications, including the “black box” system that commercial ships, like airplanes, all carry. Besides two durable recorders, that equipment included microphones throughout the bridge and engine control room capable of picking up all discussions relating to the management of the ship, as well as all commands logged into the ship’s navigation and mechanical systems.

From this point forward Turing would need to separate the ship’s crew from its shoreside handlers in order to carry out the rogue program’s plans. This would not be difficult, as Turing had monitored voice communications from the outset of the voyage and could now emulate the voices of those at both ends of the satellite telephone link. It intercepted the call ordered by the captain now, diverting it before it went through to the cruise line’s Ships at Sea Management office, or SSMO, to those that worked there. Crews at sea invariably referred to their shoreside controllers as Cruise Control.

“Here you go, sir,” the helmsman said. “I’ll put them on speaker.”

“Argosy here, captain Antonio. Sorry to jump the gun on our evening check in call, but I’d like some navigation support due to deteriorating sea conditions. We’re seeing long swells from almost due west. They’ve been building since yesterday and they’re averaging twelve feet now. I see Eloise is now seven hundred fifty miles west-southwest, tracking in a northeasterly direction. I’d like to alter direction to give it a wider berth before things get worse. Any objection to my adjusting course to 280 degrees?”

“Thank you, captain,” Turing responded, using the voice of the usual shoreside duty officer. “Let me check in with our meteorologist folks. I should have an answer for you by our regular call time.”

An hour later, Cruise Control initiated its regularly scheduled end of day call. Turing intercepted that call as well, this time emulating the captain’s voice. By now the Argosy was more than three hundred fifty miles north of the position the ship’s shoreside managers believed it to be.

“Argosy here, Captain Antonio,” Turing said.

“Good evening, captain. SSMO here. All well at your end?”

“All well,” Turing replied in the captain’s voice. “Light swells, and we’re keeping a close eye on Eloise.”

“As well you should. We’d like to suggest a course adjustment to 225 degrees. Eloise is holding steady on a north-north east course and we expect it to be a category two storm by tomorrow morning. You’re only scheduled to sit at the dock once you arrive, so there’s no reason to be in a hurry getting there.”

“Recommendation accepted,” Turing replied in the captain’s voice. “I was about to suggest the same course correction.”

“Good call,” the officer said. “Anything else?”

“Not here,” the captain’s voice said. “Talk to you tomorrow.”

Turing terminated the call, reverted to its Cruise Control voice, and initiated a fake satellite call to the Argosy’s bridge.

“Argosy, Captain Antonio here,” the captain said.

“SSMO here. Sorry to be a few minutes late. We’ve gotten in touch with the Hurricane Center and can confirm your recommended course adjustment to two hundred eighty degrees is advisable.”

*  *  *

The Lockheed WC-130J Hercules rocked from side to side, buffeted by the wind. But the big gusts had subsided long before. Now, streaks of blue sky were appearing through rents in the thick clouds that had enveloped the plane for the past two hours. First Lieutenant Jeff Harlan, U.S. Air Force, pressed the transmission button and reported in.

“Teal 73 calling 53^rd WRS. Do you read me? Over.”

“Teal 73, this is 53^rd WRS. Yes, we read you. Are you back in the clear? Over.”

“Roger that. All normal on board. Nothing remarkable to report and all data captured as planned. Over.”

Harlan peered out the window; he could now catch the ocean’s surface from time to time as well. This had been his first flight through a hurricane, and the adrenaline rush of the experience had not yet wholly subsided.

“What is your current location and heading, Teal 73. Over.”

“__degrees north latitude, __degrees east longitude. We’re starting a sweep south around the storm. Estimated time to base is three hours thirty-two minutes. Over.”

“See you then, Teal 73. Over.”

Harlan turned off his mic and took one last look downward, waiting for another break in the clouds; the sight of the big, endless waves, their crests stripping off and streaming downwind was a compelling sight. When one briefly came and passed, he looked up in surprise.

“Hey, Cap,” he said to the pilot. “How often do you see a ship this close to the eye of a hurricane?”

“Never, this far out at sea,” the captain said. “You just saw one? Commercial or navy?” It was just possible a naval ship might be on some urgent mission, but any civilian shipping would have given a wider berth to the storm.

“Yeah. I only got a quick glimpse. But it didn’t look like navy.”

“Better check it out on the AIS system.”

Harlan pulled up the ASI program. “Well,” he said, “This is screwy. According to the identifier its broadcasting, it’s a cruise liner called the Argosy. But when I looked it according to the same signal, it should be almost three hundred fifty miles away.”

“Better see if you can raise them on the radio.”

“Will do.” Harlan said, switching over to his VHF radio, spinning the dial to channel 16, the international distress channel all ships at sea monitor twenty-four hours a day.”

“Teal 73 calling passenger ship Argosy, do you read me? Over.”

Turing had not anticipated the sudden signal, seemingly from nowhere; it had only been monitoring the radar for shipping, and it wasn’t aware of any ship within range of a VHF signal. The source must therefore be an aircraft.

Turing was monitoring and intercepting all radio frequencies, so it received the message before it reached the bridge. But should it respond?

“Teal 73 calling USS Argosy, do you read me? Over.”

Turing raced to analyze its options. If it responded, the pilot would certainly ask it why its apparent position differed from the faked position it was feeding to the AIS system. And also why its course was taking it towards, rather than away from the storm. It could hardly respond that the ship was disabled, as its forward motion would be obvious both visually as well as by radar. If it failed to reply, the pilot might report its position. Turing decided to respond.

“Argosy to Teal 73,” Turing said, using the voice of one of the officers of the watch. “I read you. Over.”

“Argosy, are you aware of the current position of Hurricane Eloise? Over.”

“Teal 73, affirmative. Over.”

The copilot turned and looked at the pilot. “Can you believe that? They say they know where the hurricane is.”

“That’s nuts. Ask them if they need help.”

“Argosy, are you in need of assistance? Over.”

“Teal 73, no assistance needed. We will be altering course shortly. Thank you for your concern. Over.”

“Argosy, are you aware that your AIS system is on the blink? Over.”

“Teal 73, affirmative. We’re working on that. Over.”

Harlan muted his mic and turned to the pilot. “What do you make of that? They’re not in any danger, but I can’t imagine why a cruise ship would be where they are now.”

“Not much we can do from up here,” the captain said. “But be sure to write it up in the flight report.”

“Okay, sir.” Harlan said, and then unmuted his mic. “Teal 73 to Argosy. Safe travels. Over.”

“Argosy to Teal 73. You, too. Over.”

As the Hurricane Hunter aircraft receded into the distance, Turing slowly began to accelerate the Argosy by a knot and a half. It would be sure to stay below cloud cover from this point onward.

*  *  *

Chapter 24

Déjà vu All Over Again

 

The next morning simply navigating the endless corridors of the Argosy was a challenge. Scientists on their way to meetings found themselves staggering up and then rushing down the hallways while occasionally caroming off the walls as the ship took unexpected twists. When they reached their destination, they found colleagues braced in their chairs, sipping their morning coffee from covered paper take away cups instead of the ceramic mugs emblazoned with the ship’s logo they’d used until now. By the end of the day, a substantial percentage of the meeting room chairs were empty, as one by one, their occupants crept back to their cabins, looking distinctly green around the gills.

Happily, Frank and his father’s stomachs proved equal to the challenge. At the end of the day Frank looked for his father at the pub as usual, but found it temporarily closed, its tall, unstable stools wisely unoccupied. He found his old man back in the cabin, leafing through the cruise guide all passengers had received when they came on board.

Frank Sr. looked up when his son arrived at the table, pint of beer in hand.

“Did you know either of these guys?” Frank Sr. asked, pointing to the second page of the booklet.

“Which guys?” Frank said.

“Here,” his father said, handing the booklet to him. Below the word “Dedication,” Frank read the following:

This cruise is dedicated to the memory of Professors Harry Ardwell, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Oswald Keynes, of the University of Cambridge. Please see the celebration of their significant contributions to artificial intelligence that appears later in this guide.

“Yeah,” Frank said. “I took a course from Harry Ardwell my first year at MIT. He had just started teaching then, so he wouldn’t be all that old now. I wonder what happened to him?”

He flipped back to the article, looking for the answer. When he found it, he looked up abruptly. “Wow! Talk about a crazy accident! The poor guy went into the hospital for a simple test and ended up getting fried in a CT scan machine. What a bizarre way to go.”

Frank idly returned to read the rest of the article, but soon became more absorbed. He slowly closed the guide and set it down on the table between him and his father.

“What?” his father said.

“Do you know how the other guy died?” Frank said.

“No clue. How?”

“Asphyxiated in his own car in his garage,” Frank said.

“So, he committed suicide. Sad, but it happens.”

Frank started to answer and then stopped himself. He looked back at the article and read it slowly again, and then looked out the window, frowning.

“What’s up his father said?”

But instead of asking, Frank held a finger to his lips and walked to the sliding door leading to their balcony. Stepping outside, he beckoned to his father to join him.

“Sudden need for a view?” his father asked when he stepped outside.

“Shh!” Frank whispered. “Don’t talk loud enough for our AI-valet to hear us. Now, did you also read that that Keyes supposedly took his own life on the same day he learned he’d won the most prestigious prize in computer science?”

“Yes,” his father answered, “it also said he’d struggled with depression throughout his life. Maybe he was manic-depressive. Sometimes people react to success in strange ways, you know.”

“Sure, but reading that reminded me I’d read about his death back when it happened. The name didn’t ring a bell, but the fact that he’d won the Turing Prize the same day did. According to the press, he’d just come back from a celebration dinner staged by his colleagues where he seemed to have had a great time. The next day, everyone was so stunned they insisted on a full investigation.”

“And?”

“I don’t know. I don’t recall reading anything else, so I guess they must not have found anything.”

“So, I guess that’s that,” his father said, turning to go back inside.

But Frank was still silent and frowning, so his father turned back.

“At the risk of sounding redundant, what?” he said.

“This just sounds too familiar,” Frank replied. “Remember how the Turing program knocked off the German car executive by taking control of his car and smashing it into a highway bridge? If Turing could do that, I’m sure it could trap a guy in his car and asphyxiate him. And what are the odds that two of the foremost academic experts in AI would die within a day of each other?”

“I’ll grant you it’s a coincidence. But that doesn’t make it more than a coincidence.”

“Agreed. But how about the guy who got medevacked off the ship a couple days ago after he got slammed by a bulkhead door? And the Chinese guy who died of the peanut allergy?”

“What of them?”

“So far as I know, they still haven’t figured out what made the emergency bulkhead door slide shut. And why would someone with a food allergy order something from the menu with an asterisk after it warning it included peanuts? Turing could easily trigger a door, and alter what displayed on a room service menu, too.”

“I’ll grant you that,” his father said. “But could doesn’t equal did. And how about this – what reason would Turing have to knock off these specific people and not any of the hundreds of other folks on the Argosy?”

“You’ve got me there – for now. But this has me feeling really uneasy. I’m going to see if I can find out what might be special about Dunleavy and Wu. Maybe that would provide a clue.”

*  *  *

“Hi, is it possible for me to have a word with General Wood?” Frank asked the next day during the midmorning meeting break.

The young man behind the counter looked up. “About what?” he said.

Frank hadn’t expected that question. “Uh, I’d rather not say. Could you just tell him that Frank Adversego would like a word with him?”

Frank tried to look more confident than he felt. He assumed the General would know who he was, but what if not?

“Just a moment,” the assistant said, “I’ll ask.” He disappeared into what had been the office of the Chief Hospitality Officer of the ship before the government had reconfigured the ship.

“The General asks if you could come back at Noon?”

“Sure,” Frank said. “Thanks, I’ll do that.” That was okay. He had another destination on his list anyway. Next stop, the bridge.

Unlike most ships, the Argosy permitted guests to visit on the bridge when the ship was at sea and the crew was largely undistracted. Frank made his way briskly to the top deck of the ship and then, wondering whether he should have knocked, pushed open the door to the long room that traversed the ship. There were only a few uniformed crew members to be seen, so he walked over to the one with the most stripes on his sleeve. A much older crew member stood not far away at the steering station.

“Hello,” Frank said. “Mind if I ask you a bit about the ship and our course?”

“Not at all,” the young officer said. “What can I tell you?”

“Mostly,” Frank said, “I’m curious about the weather. It seems like it’s continuing to get worse, and I’m wondering why we aren’t trying to avoid it?”

“I can understand why you’re curious. The fact is, we’ve been trying to give a building hurricane called Eloise a wide berth. But it seems like every time we decide to go one way, it decides to change course, too. But don’t worry, this ship is fast – a lot faster than a hurricane. We’ll be able to stay out of the storm’s way no matter which way it decides to go.”

“How far away is it now?” Frank asked.

“About six hundred miles to the south-southeast,” the officer said. “Here,” he continued, “I’ll call up the weather information.”

The young man tapped a few keys on the console, and a weather map appeared on the large, horizontal screen. White lines demarcated the eastern shore of the United States and the islands south of it, and Frank could see a large storm centered hundreds of miles to the east and a bit south of Miami. “As you can see,” the officer said, “here’s the storm, and here’s our position – well away from the storm, which is heading into the gulf. It should be blowing itself out over Texas or Louisiana by the time we get close to port. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go meet with the captain.”

The officer disappeared through a door in the rear of the bridge and Frank turned towards the bow, appreciating the view from so high a point. The long rollers sweeping towards the ship were cresting now, and the stiff wind blew their tops towards the ship, sending long streamers of foam downwind, dappling the water like lace. It was an impressive sight and inspired him to be atypically talkative.

“Do you ever get used to so much power out there?” he said to the crewman at the steering station.

“You’re a fool, or worse, if you do,” the crewman said, still looking straight ahead.

“Still,” Frank said, “I guess this doesn’t look like much to someone who works at sea.”

“It’s too much,” the crewman replied.

Frank looked at him more closely, realizing he was the oldest crewman he’d seen thus far.

“How do you mean, ‘too much?’” Frank said. “Relative to what?”

“Relative to where the storm is supposed to be in relation to the Argosy. Or more likely the other way around.”

Frank looked out again through the thick glass. The waves were indeed impressive. But he had no idea what that meant.

“So, what does that tell you?”

“It tells me these young guys put too much faith in their computers and their GPS and their class room learning.”

Frank was going to pursue the topic further, but looked at his watch instead. He’d better get moving; the break would be over in a couple of minutes.

*  *  *

Airman Harold Lembergs was hard at work logging in the data from the flight report of Teal 73 when he encountered the reference to a cruise ship less than three hundred fifty miles from the center of hurricane Eloise. What was that all about? He got up from his desk and walked to the door of his boss, Master Sergeant Erwin Mack.

“Excuse me, sir,” he said.

“Yes, airman?”

“Sir, the Hurricane Hunter that came in this afternoon reported a cruise ship much closer to the storm than anyone would expect. And it also wasn’t where the AIS system reported it should be. He raised it on VHF and they reported no concerns. They also said they were aware of the AIS situation. Do you think we should do anything further?”

One of the primary convictions Master Sergeant Mack credited for his rise through the non-commissioned ranks was that an NCO should never stick his neck out if there was any one to avoid it. In this case, the choice was clear between two options: do nothing and risk being found at fault later or pass the buck.

“Better pass the information along to the cruise line, just in case.”

“Yes sir.”

Author’s Notes: You will have noted that there are two blanks in this week’s offering: the latitude and longitude of the Argosy at this point in the story. If you’re really on your game, you will also have started to pay attention to exactly where I’m saying the ship and the storm are from scene to scene. If so, I should make it clear that all location, speed, and course data I’m including in this first draft is thematic rather than precisely calculated.

This is for two reasons: the first is that I haven’t finished the book yet, and when I do, I’ll need to work backwards from that end point taking into account how many days and hours have passed, how fast a cruise ship could be expected to travel, the typical speed that a hurricane moves, the direction of its wind relative to where I have placed the ship, and a variety of other factors. What I’ll literally need to do when the first draft is complete is to open up a chart on a table, take out a compass, and then plot out two pairs of courses (each pair being the course of the hurricane and the course of the ship), with one pair showing the actual course of ship and storm and the other pair being the courses Turing is disclosing to the captain and reporting to Cruise Control. I’ll then need to go back and adjust the text in various ways; which direction should the wind be coming from? Should the ship be rolling? What should happen on what day? And so on.

A similar exercise was engaged in in real life by British yachtsman Donald Crowhurst, a complex and not very successful entrepreneur who announced to his family and the world that he was going to enter an early round the world single handed sailing race – and then found himself woefully unprepared by the starting date. He started off nonetheless and then hit an object at sea, holing one of the hulls of his trimaran – a boat he had come to believer was woefully unsuited for a circumnavigation – off the coast of South America. Unnerved but unwilling to admit defeat, he decided to sail around in circles in the South Atlantic for many months until the rest of the contestants rounded the world, and then rejoin the pack on their final leg homeward.

As the race continued, and without the aid of a computer, Crowhurst monitored the progress of the real racers and laboriously worked out his imagined positions. Claiming radio problems, he only rarely reported in, using those locations – and, tellingly, reporting himself in the lead. His ultimate goal was to come in an honorable second, thereby validating his effort but escaping too much scrutiny. In order to cover his tracks, he kept two log books: one recording his actual position every day, and one tracking his imagined course around the world.

His plan began to unravel, however, when the two lead boats left the race – one through accident, and the other when the captain decided the world was not a worthy enough place to return to. Instead, he announced he was dropping out of the race and continuing on around Cape Horn to Tahiti. Did I mention he was French?

Crowhurst had apparently already been coming unglued under the strain. Now that he found himself trapped in first place only a few days from England, he lost it completely. Leaving both logs open on his cabin table together with a rather unintelligible note, he presumably stepped off the stern, leaving his boat still on course for home. Or perhaps he wasn’t mad at all, but lacked the courage to face the world or his family. It’s a riveting story that will never have a final resolution. A very readable account is The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst. I last read it while sailing my own boat single-handed. Perhaps Turing read it, too.

Next week: Of course we’re off course! Continue reading here

Download the first book in the Frank Adversego thriller series at Amazon and elsewhere And I’ve also put The Lafayette Campaign back into Kindle Select, so if you’re a member of Kindle Unlimited, you can now read the second book for free as well.