The Last Place to Stand (12 page)

“That's the computer that controls mommy,” she said.

In the morning, Dr. Chin arrived at the computer room to two team members talking excitedly. One was a bioengineer and another was an AI specialist. Both often had valuable input for this venture. “What is happening?” asked Dr. Chin.

“You tell us,” the bioengineer, H1549, said.

“This is getting a little weird for me,” said the AI specialist. His name was A116 (He had one of those expensive short ID's.) “I love AI, don’t get me wrong, but what we are seeing here reminds me of a scary bedtime story.”

“What do you mean?” said Dr. Chin.

“What I mean,” said A116, “is that your patient is rewriting his wetware.”

“What?” said Dr. Chin.

H1549, always much more patient with explanations, spoke up. “When we came in an hour ago, we heard him, over the cameras, muttering the phrase, 'Processing and Reformatting, Processing and Reformatting.' We thought that was odd, so we looked at his brain activity. Take a look at this! It's a shot from almost an hour ago.” He clicked the history function on the screen and chose a particular segment. On the screen was a picture of the patient's brain activity. It should have been filled in with color, but it was only a dead, gray image, except for a small corner of the brain which seemed to be fully active.

“How could he still be alive and have that little brain activity?” said the doctor.

Impatient, A116 blurted out, “Look at the other part, then think about it!” He clicked on the resume real time button on the monitor. It showed nothing but gray with no activity at all, then one area lit up followed by another and another until most of the brain became active.

“What does it mean?” said Dr. Chin.

“That's what we want to know,” said H1549. “Nothing like this has ever occurred. Ever.”

“I said, the whole thing seems like he is reformatting his memory space,” said A116.

“I still don't get it,” said H1549.

“Okay,” A116 said, “if a computer is to be reused, you have to get rid of what's on it. You erase every piece of data on it. Then once that is done, you begin a rewrite. You put a new operating environment on it. Then you add whatever programs you want it to have so that you can perform the tasks needed.”

“Right,” said Dr. Chin. “Are you saying that his chip is rewriting his brain? That’s ridiculous!”

A116 looked a little jittery, like he had had too much coffee or needed to adjust his medicine. “Yeah, yeah, that's right. When I helped design the software, one of the main feature requests was to have an AI system that would improve efficiency in speed and problem solving capability. What if the software I wrote did all I asked it to do?”

“What do you mean?” said Dr. Chin.

A116, excited now, like his eyes were going to pop out of his skull, looked back and forth between the two men. “What if it decided that the brain was not as efficient as it could be? Or maybe it decided that the interface could never match perfectly between the computer portion and the brain unless one was made more compatible. It might be reformatting the brain so that it functions with the same software as the main CPU. It was already artificial intelligence, so it’s learning, remember?”

“But that can’t happen!” said H1549.

“So you say,” said A116. “But I think that is exactly what's happening.”

“Then here's the question,” said Dr. Chin. “If the brain was erased, does that mean the patient is dead? Brain death has always meant death.”

“I don't exactly know.” A116 looked at the screen for a few seconds. “But for the first time ever, the brain had a full backup through the hardware we added. Even with the brain inactive, the CPU kept things going.”

H1549 looked tired and angry. “Yes, but what about the man, his personality, who he was? Where did he go?”

No one had an answer. A116 just muttered to himself. “Hmmm. Hmmm.” The room was silent.

It was warm and sunny and just after midday on the top of Tumuleiah
where there lay a stretch of land that had been recently cleared of brush. White and blue flowers had been planted on two sides and were in full bloom. In the middle, a red piece of cloth stretched down between a
gathering of people. Jane, in a white dress, that had taken a lot of bartering of services from Odysseus, walked down the aisle with a smile so contagious no one who looked at her could help but smile themselves. Already in front was Odysseus, wearing a black leather vest over a perfectly white long-sleeved shirt. He also smiled and he could not take his eyes off of Jane.

As she approached, music was played by a small group of string players. The music was smooth, but lively, for this was a celebration. Recent friends and even some who were only recent acquaintances lined both sides of the aisle and stood watching her. Her walk was stately and elegant. Her face, lightly freckled, lit up as she made eye contact with Odysseus. Her hair was tied back from her face, but was a long and flowing dark brown.

She reached the front and stood to the left of Odysseus as he held her left hand in his right and they faced the audience. The music stopped. He turned to the audience and spoke.
“Friends and neighbors. We welcome you as we declare our commitment of love for one another. As you may know, in the society we came from, there was no allowance for the choice of a spouse. But from here on it is a freewill choice.”

He turned to face her and spoke gently. “I know there was no choice in our meeting, but there was in our staying together, and for that I am grateful. From the first that I met you, I grew to love you. I realize that the meeting of the two of us together may have seemed haphazard, but it was originated by God. I now declare that you are the delight of my eyes and my heart, and I have always and will always love you.”

With tears in her eyes, she said, “I believe that you have always been the right man for me since you first held my hand. You have been gentle and loving to me and to our children. Your character is one I can trust and I give myself to you, to be your wife, who will love and respect you for the rest of my life. I will always love you.”

The two of them kissed, both with tears in their eyes. Many in the audience were also crying.

After the kiss, the music started up again with a very lively dance tune. They turned to face the crowd, took each other in their arms for a few seconds, and proceeded to dance to the music. The crowd began to pair up and to dance as well. No one sat out, girl or boy. When someone started to sit down after a dance, they soon stood up again as they were asked to dance with a new partner. The celebration went on this way for several hours.

Businesses had closed and so had schools for this occasion, for this was a small settlement and such entertainment was rare and welcome.

A table had been set up with food and drink for those who needed energy or refreshment for the great activity of the dance. Couples, long together, looked into each other’s eyes as if for the first time, reminded about the time they had said their commitments to each other. Girls giggled, told secrets, and giggled some more in groups of four or five. Boys talked in smaller groups, wondering what made the girls laugh like that. When one boy would work up the courage to ask a girl to dance and she accepted, the rest of the boys were encouraged and followed suit until everyone was up and dancing again.

When the sun was nearly set and those from the small community had said their goodbyes, Jane and Odysseus, having sent their children home, took each other again by the hand and walked down the trail to the place where he had proposed to her. “I want to show you something,” he said. Walking over to the same bench where they sat when he proposed, he pointed to the middle of the bench. At the top, their initials had been carved into it by the local wood carver in commemoration of their engagement and their wedding.

“Thank you,” she said. A silent tear slid down her face.

“I don't have a lot to give you, but what I have is yours” he said.

“That’s the only thing I ever wanted,” she said, and they kissed. And the only witnesses were the setting sun and the open plain before them.

Dr. Chin came back that evening from dinner to find that his patient had moved. He was now placed in a secure hold, a room for dangerous criminals. He approached the man on guard. “Why did they place him here and without my permission?”

“Sorry, sir,” said the guard. “I do not have that information. But there was a message left for you. Here it is.” He handed Dr. Chin a piece of paper. There was nothing written on it that could be read, but there was a series of numbers which, presumably, was machine readable. He took the paper and walked over to the lab where he had it scanned and the message was sent to him via secure feed.

“Dr. Chin,” it said, “your project has taken an unusual turn. What started out as a means of accelerating the evolution of man has become much more than we could ever have expected. More than we could even have dreamed. Although the project will now be under a different jurisdiction, we would appreciate your involvement. If you still wish to work on this project further, please meet us at boardroom 16 at 8:30pm.”

He checked his internal clock. It was 8:23. He had just enough time. Taking the pod and two lifts, he reached boardroom 16 at 8:29.

When he entered, he saw the Director of Operations and a man who was introduced only as General. The director was watching his view screen with rapt attention when he entered. “Glad you could make it,“ the general said.

“What is going on?” said Dr. Chin. He wondered if he should share what he already knew about some of the recent developments with the patient, but decided against it. If they knew the whole thing, maybe they wouldn't let him stay on.

“What isn't going on?” said the general. “Take a look at this.” Projected on the wall, was the interior of the secure hold. On a gurney, he could see an oblong shape covered in what looked like gray thread. All the wires from the monitoring systems had been severed.

“What is that?” said Dr. Chin.

“That,” said the Director, looking up at last, “is your patient.”

“What's happened to him?” said Dr. Chin.

“That's something I'd sure like to know,” said the general in his gravelly voice.

“Take a look at this, Doctor,” said the Director.

On the vidscreens, inset into the table, were vital statistics of the patient. All major body systems were presented. “But he’s not even connected to the monitors,” said Dr. Chin. “How is he getting this to us?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” said the general.

“Can I request some help on this issue?” said Dr. Chin.

The director looked up, “A116 and H1549? I thought they might be helpful as well. They are already on their way.”

“Thank you,” said Dr. Chin. “Can you put the vitals on the main screen?”

“Yes,” the stats showed up on the screen. He studied them for a minute before A116 and H1549 entered the room.

A116 did not even say hello, but barged in. “What's all that garbage?”

“Excuse me?” said the Director.

“I mean what's on the screen?” A116 said. “It can't be real, no one can have stats like that.”

“It's our patient,” said Dr. Chin.

“But he'd be dead!” said A116. “His heart rate has slowed down to near death and his breathing has stopped entirely. No one could live like that. Is he in a coma?”

“Could be,” said Dr. Chin. “Could you show the men the patient Director?” The image from earlier appeared on the screen. The gray thread wrapped around him, much like what a spider does to its prey.

H1549 gave a grunt of astonishment. Then he jabbed at the screen with his index finger. “Wha. . .What's that?”

“Our patient,” said Dr. Chin. “And he seems to be changing.”

H1549 said, “But wait a minute. How are we getting these stats?”

“We were just wondering that,” said the Director.

“I think I have an idea,” said A116. “The monitors were used to make sure he was healthy, right? What if it knows this and is using them to monitor itself while it makes these changes.”

“Why are you calling him an it?” said the Director.

“Because, with stats like that, how could it be human?” said A116.

H1549 walked closer to the projection on the wall, “And how can it access this? Look, there are no wires connected.”

“Well, there is the feed technology,” said the director.

“But that’s secure. There is no way to get in,” said H1549.

“No way?” A116 said, “No way? There's always a way. Any security can be breached in time. Wasn't the idea to build the best, fastest thinking machine on the planet? What security would be able to stand up to that?”

“So you're saying it has access to whatever it wants, even secure regions of our systems?” said the Director. He gave a look at the general and nodded. The general left the room immediately.

“Who was that guy?” said A116.

“Nobody,” said the Director. “Nobody at all.”

At the other end of the city, Wallace put down his headset. “Captain, we have been receiving more than usual static from our radios over the last couple of hours. I thought that odd, since these should be completely clear at the current distance. I tried to analyze it further, but what I found was just weird. Inside our signal I found another signal with a message repeated over and over.”

“What was it?” said Samuel.

“You’re going to love this. It said, ‘How do you keep an elephant from charging? Take away its credit card,’” said Wallace.

“A joke?” said Samuel.

“Yeah, an old joke,” said Wallace.

“What's the source?”

“I can't figure that part out,” he said, “It appears to be from all over.”

Zosimus was happy to have his sight restored to him. It had been a gradual thing, but even more gradual was the recovery of his soul from the lifestyle that had seemed to take it from him. Now, realizing more daily that he did not need to have the feeds to feel a sense of purpose, he began another healing venture: Making friends.