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  His peace was short-lived. He had only taken his second sip when he heard feet step over the linoleum floor of the lounge.

  A little icon appeared in the corner of his vision to let him know that a colleague was nearby. It even identified the man, so Karl know who he was before he spoke.

  “Morning, Karl,” a voice greeted him.

  Karl had his back to the doorway, unable to see the intruder, and he remained that way.

  “Stewart,” he said back.

  Karl’s acquaintance didn’t wait for him to turn around. The man stepped up beside Karl, leaning into view.

  Stewart Lythe was a bit younger than Karl, but by how much, no one really knew. He had short blond hair that was slathered with gel and coerced upright. Even though he’d started at the job a few years after Karl, he was a genius engineer who had managed to move up through the ranks until he was an equal partner with the psychologist. He was a master when it came to working with the cerebral computer, but everyone knew that he wanted to be management. That desire left him with a bit of a bloodthirsty reputation.

  “You know, everyone here deserves a medal for the work they’ve been putting in,” the younger man commented, fishing his own mug from the rack. “Seventy-hour weeks, overnight shifts, and dozens of forfeited breaks. If the Department of Labor could see us, they’d have a stroke.”

  “I think we all want to be done with the prep work,” Karl replied.

  “Tell me about it,” Stewart carried on. “I wouldn’t be surprised if most of the staff is too exhausted to attend the test. Did you see Michaels last Tuesday? Fainted on his way out of the bathroom, had to go to the E.R.”

  “I heard about it,” Karl said, his voice exposing his disinterest.

  Stewart sensed the curtness, pausing before he continued, “Yeah, well I guess some people are just better suited for the grind than others.”

  Karl finally turned and leaned against the counter, facing his colleague. He used the silence that followed to slurp down more of his coffee.

  “Anyway, how’s the family?” Stewart asked. “I forget, do you have a wife or just a girlfriend?”

  “Neither,” Karl said. There was no warmth in his response.

  “Oh, that’s right, I was thinking of Gary. You’re still flying solo? What’s that about?”

  “Efficiency,” Karl said.

  He didn’t feel the need to explain why he preferred to be alone. He didn’t need to be looked down on for enjoying his solitude, either.

  “Did you catch the little riot that happened in Philly?” Stewart asked.

  “I did not,” Karl said.

  “It was just a scuffle,” Stewart started. “A few of Burbour’s supporters held a rally and were greeted by a few pro-I.I. counter-protesters. Broke out into a saloon-style brawl. They were all fighting—grandmas and everyone.”

  “Some folk have short tempers,” Karl said.

  “Yeah, but a person can only yell at someone for so long before they’re going to get hit,” Stewart said.

  There was a slight break in the conversation as Stewart slipped his mug into the machine.

  “Have we worked out the compatibility issue yet?” Karl wanted to know.

  Stewart seemed a little perturbed by the sudden change of topic. He removed his own cup from the machine once it had finished dispensing hot water. The engineer grabbed one of the lemon zinger tea bags the company provided beside the creamers.

  “No, not yet,” he answered. “QA’s hit a bit of a snag when it comes to communication. Apparently, we can implant an I.I. into a human mind and have them share sensory functions, but we can’t get them to communicate with each other. At least, not in any intelligible manner. It always comes out garbled—as if the intelligences are speaking in tongues.”

  Karl let out a little sigh, cradling his mug between his hands. “That’s a shame,” he said. “I can tell how excited everyone is to see it work. The kind of progress we’ll be able to make once we iron out the kinks is astonishing.”

  “Too bad it isn’t already functioning, huh?” Stewart commented, chuckling. “Then we could have two heads working together on it and be done in no time.”

  “Consider it the last steep mountain mankind has to summit,” the psychologist told the engineer. “It should be all downhill from there.”

  “Here here,” Stewart quietly cheered, raising his mug in a mock toast.

  7

  Threat

  Karl missed the old days of ad-blocking on the internet. Advertisers had gotten trickier as technology advanced, but there were still plenty of coders trying to break free of unskippable commercials.

  He slid another pita chip into his mouth. The commercial that his cerebral computer projected on the insides of his cornea featured a computer-generated gerbil that got his jollies from breaking into people’s homes, turning on the faucets in their bathtubs, and swimming around in soapy water. The family that lived there would eventually find him, shocked at his intrusion, to which the gerbil would only reply, “Oopsie!”

  Eventually the video, which had been promoting a brand of toilet paper, ended. Karl was able to then move onto the article he wanted to read.

  The headline read, “New Television Show Aims to Be First with All-I.I. Cast.”

  Karl wasn’t one to be swept up in entertainment news, but as a specialist of installed intelligences, he couldn’t help but be intrigued.

  The website the story was on was one of those with obnoxious banner ads and a pop-up that demanded you subscribe to their “pro” service plan. It almost infuriated the psychologist into closing the page, but he pushed through his annoyance and dug into the meat of the article.

  He had been hoping the show the I.I.s had been cast into was going to be a story-driven drama, or perhaps a witty sitcom. He was disappointed to learn that it was neither, but instead a game show where I.I.s competed to solve complex puzzles in order to win cash. It didn’t sound entirely humiliating, however. The tasks they’d complete were actually fascinating science projects that, while being entertaining, actually aimed to solve some of life’s numerous problems. According to the article, the pilot episode would center around designing the best water filter in just three days. The contestants were even encouraged to refer to any humans they thought could help them in their endeavors.

  Sounds asinine, Karl thought, but I’d still watch it.

  The psychologist had been listening to some soft music while reading. The low light of the room and the satisfying feeling of his most recent meal in his stomach lulled him into a light doze. He could still see the cerebral computer’s projections on his closed eyelids and hear the light plucking of guitar strings, but his mind was senseless to it all.

  Instead, it was visiting an old memory of Karl’s, from one of his first study projects during university. He was young, but gifted with communication skills. The curators of an old intelligence museum allowed him to meet with the I.I. of a famous science-fiction author. His assignment was a simple interview, but he’d spend days deliberating on the questions he planned to ask. The I.I. he was to speak with was an idol of his, Gordon Hennessy.

  “Good morning, Mr. Hennessy,” Karl had typed into the old-fashioned text-to-text interface.

  Above the keyboard was the author’s monitor, upon which a digital reconstruction of Hennessy smiled in response.

  “Good morning, lad,” the display read. “How are you?”

  “Great, thanks for asking,” Karl replied. “I appreciate you taking the time to meet with me.”

  “Of course,” Hennessy said. “It’s always a pleasure to speak with brilliant young minds. People like you turn the science fiction I’ve written into science reality.”

  Karl was charmed by the I.I. and hung onto every word they exchanged. After some delightful banter, he broke into the questions.

  “As a big fan of your Timeless Traveller series, I’d always wondered: where did the SS Monument go after it warped through the heart of the galaxy?” he
typed.

  “Ha ha ha,” read the display. Technology hadn’t yet allowed for the audible laughter of an installed intelligence. “I have gotten that question a lot, and I always give the same reply. The truth is, I have no idea where the ship ends up. I never truly decided, but I figured the ambiguity of the ending would allow each reader to interpret it in their own way. I’ve heard some people theorize that the Monument traveled to heaven. Others think the jump took them to another galaxy. I can’t say that any of these are true or false.”

  The entire conversation brought back that childish wonder Karl had felt when first digging into Hennessy’s thick anthologies of space epics. In fact, it was that interview that had motivated him to stay in the field of I.I. study. Just a week prior, he had seriously considered dropping his classes and moving somewhere else to learn electrical wiring. But the hook of fascination had finally pierced him. There was no escaping that kind of love.

  Karl was brought back into the waking world by another sudden commercial. It seemed the article’s website had grown impatient with his inactivity, so it decided to try to sell him something.

  “Thousands of gamers,” the announcer said as those same words appeared on the screen. “Hundreds of missions. Millions of possibilities.”

  Footage of a colorful top-down video game followed the mysterious lettering. It looked like a dwarf riding a mechanical donkey was charging into a field of monsters, hacking at them with a strange holographic axe. Vibrant splashes of particle effects followed each successful blow, the monsters wailing as they took a beating.

  “Customize your character,” the announcer urged. Images of a few dozen combinations of hairstyles, faces, clothes, and body types flashed by in the blink of an eye. “Share your adventure.” The dwarf from the previous clip was now fighting beside a slender alien being with a ray gun and a huge monster-like character with fur and a tail. They appeared to be in some sort of volcanic cavern, assaulted by waves of enormous serpents. “Be the hero.”

  The commercial showed a cinematic close-up of the dwarf. The shot panned out slowly to display a number of zany characters, all gathered together in some lakeside village.

  “Guardians of Yatyr. Available to human and I.I. players. Rated T for Teen.”

  Intriguing, Karl thought to himself. I’d heard of games designed for installed intelligences, but never one that combines them with human gamers. I wonder what effects it might have on human-I.I. interaction.

  Before Karl’s thought could complete, the image on his cerebral computer changed dramatically. The article, the advertisement, and the website all vanished, only to be replaced with a blank white screen.

  A few lines of code appeared in orange text, one line after another. They flashed off the screen just as fast as they had shown up, quicker than Karl could decipher them.

  At first, Karl believed his computer to be bugged—it looked like it was displaying a crash screen, but then it went black. A faint buzz came from the inner-ear speaker.

  Then, new words appeared on the display. They were red and appeared one letter at a time, as if being written by a typewriter.

  The message read, “Human minds are to be separate from digital minds.”

  “What the hell?” Karl said aloud as the words disappeared.

  After a few seconds, a second message was typed out.

  It read, “If you continue, you will be destroyed.”

  Then all Karl was left with was a blank screen.

  8

  Presentation

  Karl had been obsessing over the message during his entire morning commute. There were a few times he almost drifted into another driver’s lane, only to be brought back to reality by the blaring of horns. He realized he was a hazard in his current state and activated his autonomous driver.

  It was clear to him that he had been hacked. Someone had managed to break through the security software that protected his cerebral computer and had taken control of its functions.

  If they can do that, Karl thought, I’m terrified of what else they can do.

  Karl had considered calling the police for hours. That kind of security breach was grounds alone for a criminal investigation, not to mention the threat the hacker had left. He kept telling himself that the words were hollow and that no harm could come to him. However, he worried. Breaking into someone’s mind wasn’t something just anyone could achieve.

  The psychologist decided against reporting the incident to the authorities. He knew the work he performed was far too sensitive to allow law officials access. So many research secrets, so many files with non-disclosure agreements. His career would be over, to say the least.

  The parking lot next to the lab was packed full. Karl had to circle around and park on a parallel street a block north. He walked through the morning air with his hands in his pockets.

  You need to get it off your mind, Karl told himself. Today is a big day. Focus on the meeting—on your pitch—and then you can worry about the message. Someone might be able to trace the source of the threat—someone with programming experience. Maybe Stewart could help.

  There was a sort of static energy that seemed to hum through the corridors. It was almost like Karl could sense the vibrations of every excited heart within the building. He could even feel it within himself. It would be false to claim that he wasn’t anticipating the result of today’s meeting. In fact, it could make or break his career.

  This meeting was the direct result of a successful test of the mindshare process. Decades of work paid off when a simulation of an installed intelligence-to-cerebral computer connection proved plausible. The simulation was merely an experiment, but it was the first step on the path to seamless human/I.I. symbiosis.

  Now that the test was a success, they needed a human subject. Who better to examine than one of the experts themselves? That’s why the meeting had been arranged—to see which scientist had the best pitch for a side project. They wanted to install an I.I. into someone’s C.C. and let them work on their proposed project to see how well cooperation pans out and to sort out any troublesome bugs that would debilitate any non-experts.

  He dropped his briefcase off in his office before stopping by the lounge for his daily cup of joe. He stopped for a second when he saw Stewart sitting on the couch with his back to the door. Karl almost considered forfeiting his coffee and returning to his office to avoid any idle chatter, but then he remembered the message and wanted to get his colleague’s advice.

  Stewart’s face was pointed at the ground with a blank look on his face. Beside him sat the older black woman with glasses—Karl always had trouble remembering her name. She took notice of him as he approached the couch, but Stewart did not.

  Karl greeted the woman before turning to his acquaintance. After a moment, he realized the blond man was immersed in his cerebral computer. The psychologist put a hand on Stewart’s shoulder, to which the younger man jumped.

  “You startled me,” he said with a wheezy laugh. He made eye contact with Karl. “Sorry, I was reading a new book I got. Longevity of Spite. Ever heard of it?”

  “No,” Karl replied. “Is it good?”

  “Not really,” Stewart answered, his lips pursed in humor. “What’s up? Got a pitch ready for the meeting?”

  “You’re damn right I do,” Karl said. “What about you? Anything groundbreaking?”

  “Oh, I dunno about that,” the blond man replied with an attempt at modesty. “But it’s something different. Something I’ve never really tried before. Could be a real hit or miss.”

  The woman on the couch tried to ignore them, but didn’t seem to be able to. She stood up and excused herself to the hallway to finish whatever it was she had been doing in peace.

  “Any hints as to what you’re bringing?” Stewart pried.

  Karl shook his head. “You’ll find out soon, same as everyone else.”

  “Do you even want to be a part of the big test?” the engineer interrogated. “It doesn’t seem like something that’d
be up your alley.”

  “How do you mean?”

  Stewart blushed a little. “I mean no offense, but you strike me as a thinking scientist rather than a hands-on one,” he explained.

  “You’re mistaken,” Karl retorted. “I like whatever gets me closer to the I.I.s. I don’t discriminate on science.”

  “Well, the possibility of a grant doesn’t hurt, either, does it?”

  “No, it does not.”

  There was a period of silence after the pair shared a forced chuckle. Karl knew it was the perfect time to transition to the topic of his security breach.

  “So, hey, I wanted to talk to you about something,” he started, unsure of how to explain his dilemma. However, he was unable to continue, as one of the junior engineers peeked his head into the lounge.

  “Meeting time, y’all,” the woman announced. She continued down the hallway. A handful of other employees filed past the open door.

  “Hold that thought,” Stewart said as he rose to his feet. “What do you say, should we dazzle them?”

  “After you,” Karl replied.

  “Thank you all for your time,” the young man with the shaved head said before taking a slight bow. He returned to his seat and ran his hand over his scalp in anxiety.

  “And thank you for the pitch,” Dr. Elfa Einarsdóttir said, jotting down something on her small tablet. “Your project will be considered for the full test, and we will let you know.”

  Dr. Elfa was one of the most renowned experts in the field of cybernetic engineering. Her father was the man primarily credited with the invention of the internal retina display most modern cerebral computers communicated through. When she was only fourteen, she had developed prosthetics that had their own finger and palm prints and could convey temperature in a manner so natural that it felt like a normal sense of touch.