Quarantine

by Greg Egan

  'Up. Down. Up. Down. Down. Down. Up. Down. Up. Up.'

  Then I catch sight of her other bodyguard, Lee Hing-cheung, standing beside a connecting door, in front of which a vivid red hologram floats at eye level: keep out. We shake hands, and my copy of MetaDossier - via RedNet, and the infrared transceiver cells in our palms -engages in a rapid, coded dialogue with its counterpart in his skull, providing both of us with further confirmation of each other's identity.

  He whispers, 'Am I glad to see you. Five more minutes of this shit and I'd be chewing the carpet.'

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  'Down. Down. Down. Up. Up. Down. Down. Up. Up. Down.'

  'What do you mean? You've got Sentinel, haven't you?'

  'Sure. But it doesn't help.' I give him a quizzical look, and he seems to be about to explain further, but then he changes his mind and just shakes his head ruefully. 'You'll find out.'

  'Up. Down. Down. Up. Up. Up. Down. Down. Up. Up.'

  Lee says, 'You know what she's doing in there?' 'No.'

  'Sitting in the dark, staring at a fluorescent screen, announcing the direction that silver ions are deflected in a magnetic field.'

  I can't think of an intelligent response to this, so I just nod.

  'I'll see you in twelve hours.' 'Yeah.'

  I take up a position by the door, but I can't help sneaking another look at the display which the scientists apparently find so engrossing. The histograms twitch and sway - but in the long run, every one of them seems to be retaining its basic shape; on average, all the fluctuations appear to be cancelling out. Meaning, I suppose, that whatever elaborate tests for randomness these graphs represent, the deflections of the silver ions are passing them all.

  If I'm right about the telekinesis mod, then presumably Chung Po-kwai is trying to disrupt this randomness, trying to bias the motion of the ions in one direction; learning to use her new skills, starting with the smallest possible targets. But I don't understand why she's personally calling out the data. The computers must be monitoring the experiment via their own detectors, so why impose on the volunteer to provide a running commentary?

  The histograms flicker hypnotically, but I'm not here to amuse myself watching the experiments. I turn away from the screen - and soon discover that the words alone are equally distracting.

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  'Down. Down. Up. Up. Up. Down. Down. Up. Up. Up. Up. Down. Up. Down. Down. Up. Down. Up. Up.

  Up.'

  Some part of my brain seizes on every transitory pattern, every spurious rhythm - and, when each pattern unwinds, each rhythm decays, only strains harder to discern the next.

  'Up. Down. Up. Up. Down. Down. Up. Down. Up. Up. Down. Down. Up. Up. Up. Down. Up. Down. Up. Down.'

  Primed, I should have no trouble shutting this out, ignoring it. But incredibly, I can't. Lee was right - and P3 is clearly no better than Sentinel. I can't stop listening.

  'Up. Down. Up. Down. Down. Down. Down. Up. Down. Down. Down. Up. Down. Up. Up. Up. Up. Down. Down. Down.'

  Worst of all, I find myself - unwillingly, compulsively -trying to guess each direction the instant before it's called. No, worse: trying to change it. Trying to impose some order. If I can't shut out this meaningless droning, the next best thing would be to force it to make some kind of sense.

  Chung Po-kwai, I imagine, feels the same.

  Each session lasts fifteen minutes, with a ten-minute break in between. Ms Chung emerges from the ion room -wearing wrap-around sunglasses to keep her eyes from losing too much dark adaptation - to sip tea, stretch her legs, and tap out snatches of odd rhythms with her fingertips on equipment casings. She speaks to me briefly, the first time, but then conserves her voice. The scientists ignore us both, busily reviewing their data and running esoteric statistical tests.

  Each time the experiment restarts, I resolve to force myself to ignore the insidious random chant; after all, P3 may have failed me, but, primed or not, I should have some vestige of native self-control. I don't succeed, but eventually I change tactics, and manage to reach a kind of equilibrium where at least I'm no longer compounding

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  the problem by struggling, in vain, to attain the state of perfect vigilance to which I'm accustomed.

  The scientists don't seem troubled at all - but then, it's data to them, not noise; they're under no obligation to try to ignore it.

  So far as I can tell, the results don't improve as the experiment progresses, but I do notice one odd thing which I hadn't picked up before: the histograms are changing after each direction is called. It's easiest to see this when there's a run of ions all in one direction; most of the histograms grow steadily lopsided, and this trend doesn't reverse until the ion that breaks the run has actually been announced. But if the computers are collecting data straight from the equipment, this order of events is puzzling; whatever elaborate calculations are required to update the histograms, it's unlikely that they'd take more than a couple of microseconds to perform - which is certainly less than the time-lag between a human seeing a flash of light and announcing that it's 'up' or 'down'. Meaning what? The computers aren't plugged into the experiment? They're getting their data second-hand, by listening to Chung Po-kwai's words? That makes no sense at all. Maybe the scientists simply find the results easier to follow this way, so they've programmed in an intentional delay.

  Dr Leung finally calls a halt at 20:35. While the three remain huddled about the console, debating the sensitivity of the sixth moment of the binomial distribution, Ms Chung nudges me and whispers, 'I'm starving. Let's get out of here.'

  In the elevator, she takes out a small vial and sprays her throat. She explains, 'I'm not allowed to use this during the experiment -it's full of analgesics and antiinflammatory drugs, and they insist that I remain unsullied by pharmaceuticals.' She coughs a few times, then says, no longer hoarse, 'And who am I to argue?'

  The ASR tower has its own private restaurant, on the eighteenth floor. Ms Chung informs me, gleefully, that

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  her contract includes unlimited free food. She slips her ID card into a slot in the table, and illustrated menus appear, embedded in the table's surface. She orders quickly, then glances up at me, puzzled.

  'Aren't you going to eat?'

  'Not while I'm on duty.'

  She laughs, disbelieving. 'You're going to fast for twelve hours? Don't be ridiculous. Lee Hing-cheung ate on duty. Why shouldn't you?'

  I shrug. Ί expect we have different mods. The mod that controls my metabolism is designed to cope with short periods of fasting -in fact, it does a better job keeping my blood sugar at the optimal level if I don't complicate things by eating.'

  'What do you mean, "complicate things"?'

  'After a meal, there's usually an insulin overshoot - you know, that slightly drowsy feeling that comes with satiety. That can be controlled, to some degree, but it's simpler if I rely on steady glycogen conversion.'

  She shakes her head, half amused, half disapproving, and looks around the crowded restaurant. Steam rises from every table, drawn up in neat columns by the silent tug of the ceiling ducts. 'But. . . isn't the smell of all this enough to make you ravenous?'

  'The connection is decoupled.'

  'You mean you have no sense of smell?'

  'No, I mean it has no effect on my appetite. All the usual sensory and biochemical cues are disabled. I can't feel hungry; it's impossible.'

  'Ah.' A robot cart arrives and deftly unloads her first course. She takes a mouthful of what I think is squid, and chews it rapidly. 'Isn't that potentially dangerous?'

  'Not really. If my glycogen reserves dropped below a certain level, I'd be informed - with a simple, factual message from the relevant mod, which it would then be up to me to act on. As opposed to persistent hunger pangs, which might distract me from something more pressing.'

  She nods. 'So you've forced your body to stop treating you like a child. No more crude punishments and rewards

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  to encourage correct behaviour
; animals might need that shit to survive, but we humans are smart enough to set our own priorities.' She nods again, begrudgingly. Ί can see the attraction in that. But where do you draw the line?' 'What line?'

  'The line between "you" and "your body" . . . between the drives you acknowledge as "your own", and the ones you treat as some kind of imposition. Sure, why be inconvenienced by hunger? But then, why be distracted by sex? Or why give in to the urge to have children? Why let yourself be affected by grief? Or guilt? Or compassion? Or logic? If you're going to set your own priorities, there has to be someone left to have priorities.' She looks at me pointedly, as if she half expects me to leap onto the table and publicly renounce appetite suppression forever, now that I've been warned of the horrors to which it might lead. I don't have the heart to tell her that she's too late, on every count.

  I say, 'Everything you do changes who you are. Eating changes who you are. Not eating changes who you are. Spraying your throat with analgesics changes who you are. What's the difference between using a mod to switch off hunger, and using a drug to switch off pain? It's just the same.'

  She shakes her head. 'You can trivialize anything that way; everything's "just the same as" something less extreme. But neural mods are not "just the same as" analgesics. There are mods that change people's values -'

  'And they never changed before?'

  'Slowly. For good reasons.'

  'Or bad reasons. Or none at all. What do you think: the average person sits down one day and constructs some kind of meticulously rational moral philosophy - which they modify appropriately, if and when they discover its flaws? That's pure fantasy. Most people are just pushed around by the things they live through, shaped by influences they can't control. Why shouldn't they alter themselves - if it's what they want, if it makes them happy?'

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  'But who's happy? Not the person who used the mod; they no longer exist.'

  'That's pretty old-fashioned. Change equals suicide.'

  'Well, maybe it does.' She laughs suddenly. Ί suppose I must sound like a total hypocrite. If a little moral nanosurgery creates a whole new person, then my one-and-only mod probably makes me a member of a whole new species -'

  I cut her off quickly. 'You mustn't discuss that here.'

  She frowns. 'Why not? This is a company restaurant. Everyone here works for ASR.'

  'Yes - but there are twenty-three separate projects going on in this building. Different staff have clearance for different projects. You have to keep that in mind.'

  'All I said -'

  Ί know what you said. I'm sorry. But it's part of my job to make sure that security is maintained.'

  She seems angry for a moment, then says, Ί suppose I should take comfort in that.'

  'Why?'

  'Because I'd rather believe that your job is to keep me from opening my mouth in the wrong place, than believe that I'm really in need of a bodyguard.'

  The apartment is deep in the core of the building, so it has no true windows, but the real-time holograms in their place have such fine resolution and such wide angles of view that the difference is academic - except for the security advantages. I search each room quickly; it doesn't take long to be sure that there are no human intruders, and it's not worth looking for anything more subtle. A thorough sweep for microrobots would last a week, and cost several hundred thousand dollars. As for nanomachines and viruses, forget it.

  I bid Ms Chung good night, and sit in the anteroom, watching the entrance. There's no sound from within -1 think she's reading - and if anything's happening in the adjoining apartments, it's lost to the insulation. Even the airconditioning is inaudible. In fact, all I can hear is the

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  faint mixture of insect noises - probably synthetic - that's piped throughout the building for some fashionable pseudo-psychological reason; imitation Arnhem Land eco-ambience to keep us all attuned with Nature. Random at one level, but with enough order to keep it from becoming infuriating; in any case, P3 has no problem blocking it out. I slip into stake-out mode. Hours pass, uneventfully. Lee arrives to take my place.

  Chung Po-kwai's chant invades my dreams. I instruct Boss to filter it out, but it keeps sneaking in, disguised; a random telegraphy of dots and dashes in every sound, every rhythm, every motion . . . from myself as a boy, bouncing a basketball, swapping hands: right, left, right, right, left, right, left, right, left, left, left... to the mining robot in the warehouse, lurching in and out of its container - a subject itself supposedly forbidden.

  Flaws in P3, flaws in Boss . . . what have I got, a brain tumour? I run the integrity checks in every mod in my skull, and all declare themselves perfectly intact.

  The experiment continues, day after day, with no apparent progress. Po-kwai sounds as patient as ever as she calls out the data, but outside Room 619 her usual cheerfulness starts to take on a defensive edge, and I soon learn not to antagonize her by talking about her results. I can't really tell if Leung, Lui and Tse are disappointed; they argue amongst themselves, mainly in English, but use jargon that I find incomprehensible. There's no question of asking them about the project; to them, I'm basically just another component of the building's security system, no more to be kept apprised of the state of the experiment than a camera on the ceiling, or a scanner in the corridor. And rightly so; that's what my role should be.

  Coming on duty one evening, though, I find myself alone with Dr Lui in the elevator. He nods at me and says, awkwardly, 'So, how are you finding the work, Nick?'

  I'm astonished that he even knows my name. 'Fine.'

  'That's good. I hear you were . . . recruited specially.'

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  I don't reply. If discussing BDI is out of bounds, I'm hardly free to start chatting about the loyalty mod and the circumstances which led to its imposition.

  It doesn't take long to reach the sixth floor. Just before the doors open, he says quietly, 'So was I.'

  He steps out ahead of me, and passes through the security check without looking back. As I follow him down the corridor - a few steps behind, in silence -1 feel, absurdly, like some kind of conspirator.

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  7

  'Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Down. Down. Up. Up. Up. Down. Up. Down. Down. Up.'

  Ten in a row is rare enough to notice, but it still means nothing. Toss a coin ten times, and the odds are less than one in a thousand that you'll get ten heads - but toss it nine hundred times, and the odds are better than one in three of at least one run of ten or more. Toss it nine thousand times, and the odds are almost ninety-nine in a hundred.

  I glance at the histograms. Some are clearly distorted in the aftermath of the run, but already I can see them beginning to drift back towards their usual shapes.

  I've long given up any pretence of trying to ignore the data. Fighting it only makes it more seductive - and in the unlikely event of an intruder getting past all the other layers of security and bursting into Room 619, I doubt that my reaction time would be significantly impaired just because I've let myself notice the latest illusory pattern in Chung Po-kwai's chant. It feels like a kind of heresy to make this excuse; the priming mods are all about being in the optimal state of preparedness, nothing less. But given the apparent bug in P3, 'optimal' means something different now; I have no choice but to accept that. Lee and I have both dutifully informed Tong of the problem, but nothing will come of that; neither Axon - makers of P3 and Sentinel - nor ASR (who clearly have plenty of neural mod expertise of their own) are likely to waste their time and money investigating such an obscure flaw.

  'Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Down. Up. Up. Down.'

  Sixteen! A new record. I plug numbers into the tiny program I've written for von Neumann. I've been present at forty-one fifteen-minute sessions, or thirty-six

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  thousand nine hundred events ... in which there's a twenty-five per cent chance of a run of sixteen. But I have no time to ponder this -

&nbs
p; •Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up . . :

  My concentration falters, and I lose count. I turn to the histograms again. All the familiar ragged shapes have vanished, replaced by narrow spikes, growing steadily narrower.

  'Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up. Up.Up . .

  Dr Leung laughs and says, 'P has hit ten to the minus fourteenth. I believe we have an effect.' Dr Lui looks away from the screen, visibly overcome by emotion. Dr Tse glances at him, and scowls.

  The strange thing is, there's no hint in Po-kwai's voice that she's noticed her triumph. She just keeps calling the data as patiently as always - and the sound of her voice, even without the hook of randomness, is just as hypnotic as ever.

  Three minutes later, the run ends, decaying into the usual noise for the rest of the session. When Po-kwai emerges, sans dark glasses, she stands in the doorway for a moment, shielding her eyes with her forearm, then she squints about the room, looking dazed.

  And then, dejected.

  Dr Tse says, 'Congratulations.'

  She nods and whispers hoarsely, 'Thanks.' She hugs herself and shudders, then her mood suddenly brightens. She turns to me. 'I've done it, haven't I?'

  I nod.

  'Well, don't just stand there. Where's the champagne?'

  The ad hoc celebration only lasts about an hour; four people (and one zombie onlooker) don't make much of a party. I know there are twelve other scientists and nine other volunteers working on the project - they're listed in MetaDossier - but apparently Dr Leung isn't eager to share the news of her success with these rival teams.

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  The scientists talk shop, discussing plans to pump their subject's head full of positron-emitting tracers to confirm certain aspects of 'the effect' - but nothing they say gives me any clues as to how 'the effect' arises. Po-kwai sits by, looking tired but happy, occasionally joining in the conversation and out-jargoning them all.