Kzine Issue 12

by Mike Driver

  The skin is smooth and pink. The eyes are large, blue and staring. The voice is mechanical and robotic. There is something disconcerting about the blank and expressionless face. Its features are too large, crude and immobile to be human. Despite the illusion of a 3D image, ‘Ava’ is by no means a convincing or authentic representation of a person.

  In a way, that’s a good thing. Perhaps in the future, they will refine the software, and make the image and the voice more sophisticated, more realistic. I have heard the Japanese have developed an automaton that can almost pass for a real human being.

  But you wouldn’t want people mistaking this for the real thing, particularly not the patient.

  Still, there’s no danger of that with ‘Ava’.

  I’ve heard that computer scientists have developed a computer that can hold conversations with humans that suggest the ability of Artificial Intelligence to develop independent consciousness: The elusive Turing Test. Such an ability would be rather counter-productive in the kind of software we’re using, I think.

  ’Ava’ is full of surprises though.

  She seems to have some kind of awareness of me. I don’t know if this is part of the software, or comes from information that Tara has inputted. I need to check this with the manufacturer. I also need to check that from now on, I record all of Tara’s interactions with her avatar. If I don’t, it could seriously jeopardise the results of the trial. ‘Ava’ has been talking about Tara’s supposed relationship with a man she suspects of controlling Tara with drugs or hypnotism.

  As with many paranoid schizophrenic delusions, there is a distorted truth to this: Though Tara has made a great deal of very positive progress, she is still on prescribed anti-psychotic medication, and will be for the foreseeable future; she has also undergone hypnotherapy in the past, before she enrolled on this clinical trial of the new therapy.

  Of course, I myself was not responsible for this previous treatment, and the male authority figure ‘Ava’ mentions could be a generic mental health professional, representing the patient’s deep-seated resentment against the clinicians that have treated her illness since her youth, a subconscious hostility she expresses via her ‘voice’, which has been incorporated into the avatar known as ‘Ava’.

  It’s important to remember that Tara has been having episodes of one kind or another since early childhood. Her file mentions an ‘imaginary friend’ of the kind often associated with children of that age, particularly those with no siblings. It is all too easy to blame the parents for the escalation that subsequently happened. But parents are not mental health professionals, and the circumstances in this case are rather unusual and distressing.

  When Tara was four years old, the family moved into a house adjacent to a property that had recently been vacated in highly tragic circumstances. At first, when Tara wandered into the inadequately fenced-off neighbouring garden, and returned with stories of the little girl she’d met, her mother wasn’t unduly concerned. She was happy for Tara to explore the tall grass and rampant weeds next door, while she struggled to unpack and sort out the house, as long as the child didn’t wander too far out of sight. The ‘friend’ she put down to Tara’s vivid imagination, until she found out about the house’s previous occupants.

  After that, she and her husband had a large, new fence built between the two properties, a measure that didn’t however put a stop to the child’s talk of playing with an unseen little girl. To make matters worse, Tara had named her imaginary friend ‘Eva’, surely an unfortunate coincidence, since her parents had taken pains to protect her from the details of the fire and its devastating consequences, including the name of the child who died in it. Of course, she could have somehow found out through some other source, such as the local TV news, or by overhearing school gate gossip. But the parents were beginning to become wrapped up in their own neuroses about their daughter by this point, and probably could not see that possibility.

  As she grew older, Tara found it difficult to make friends, spending more and more time in the nearby woods, apparently alone. Though she had stopped mentioning ‘Eva’ to her parents, they were convinced that Tara was somehow ‘possessed’. There were visits to a child psychiatrist, even some dubious attempts at exorcism.

  Eventually, they became convinced that the neighbouring property was haunted, and that its evil influence extended to theirs. They moved house again, a decision that seemed to have solved the problem, though I believe it simply added to the trauma by affirming their daughter’s delusions, which lay dormant for a while until Tara left home. It seems to me that the parents’ own fragile mental health, worsened by the strain of this situation, left them in no position to provide the girl with the help she needed to overcome her psychological problems. At the risk of sounding judgemental, I also feel that their deeply-held religious beliefs were far from helpful in this case, leading them to give credence to a supernatural explanation for their daughter’s delusions, and enabling them to grow into the acute psychotic disorder she now suffers from.

  I am cautiously optimistic however that this new treatment does offer hope of a breakthrough. Ava’s persecution of Tara has become less aggressive, enabling the patient to take control of the conversation with the ‘voice’. Ava is beginning to take Tara’s point-of-view on board more, and starting to say things that are less vituperatively critical of Tara’s treatment.

  I do have my reservations though. I’ve begun to wonder if there’s a hint of insincerity in those blank, blue, computer-generated eyes, of sarcasm in that cold, mechanical voice. Sometimes when I enter the room where Tara and ‘Ava’ are ‘conversing’, it often seems to me as if there is an awkward pause, as if they are discussing something they don’t want me to overhear. It’s possible that I should contact technical support, in case there is some sort of virus affecting the software, for other odd things have happened too. It sometimes seems as if the avatar’s ‘face’ is pressing itself against the inside of the monitor screen, the features distorting like a child squashing its face against a glass window. This illusion no doubt arises from some glitch in the 3D imaging. It cannot however explain the tiny crack I noticed on the edge of the screen.

  It’s possible that Tara is less stable than she appears. In future, I will have to keep a closer eye on her to make sure she is not secretly damaging the screen. Yes, that must be the explanation.

  GATOR GIRL

  by C.I. Kemp

  “Staring into the jaws of death” may sound like a cliché to you, but in my line of work, it’s a regular occurrence. It’s what I was doing – literally – the day I met Lilly St. Clair.

  I work the Brownell Alligator Preserve in Brownell, Florida with my partners, Tim and Daimien. We wrestle gators for tourists, do road shows, educate people about Florida wildlife, but mostly, we’re in the business of gator rescue.

  In New Jersey, where I grew up, you might see something with fur and a bushy tail running across your lawn. In Florida, you’re more likely to see something with scales and teeth. As Florida gets more developed, wildlife habitat keeps getting smaller, and human-alligator encounters get more frequent.

  That’s when we get calls.

  The day I met Lilly, we got a call about a nuisance gator who was where he wasn’t supposed to be - in a local park. Tim was out-of-state, so it was just Daim and me.

  The park official who called said the gator was “a big mother – eight, maybe ten feet.” Daim and I didn’t put too much weight in this description – most civilians tend to exaggerate when it comes to gator size.

  The guy was exaggerating. The gator in question was a six-footer. If you think that’s good news, guess again. The smaller gators tend to be faster, more flexible and more feisty and they don’t tire out so quickly . I’d rather deal with a ten-footer any day.

  A full-grown alligator can bite through cinder block. This little guy might not have quite that much power, but he could still snap the thickest bone in my body the way I’d snap a toothpick.

>   We worked it this way: I’d be in front of the gator, just out of reach, waving my arms or hat. It’d come at me, and I’d try to get close enough to touch its lower jaw. When you touch this part of a gator’s body, its instinct is to rear up and jump at you. They jump fast, which means we have to move fast. The longer this goes on, the more quickly the gator tires, making it easier to capture.

  Unfortunately, this gator wasn’t getting tired; we were.

  The gator was making an O with its body, so that it could bite its own tail, or anyone trying to grab it. That “anyone” was Daim and he had to hustle to stay out of reach of those jaws.

  I was waving my hat in front of the little guy when he reared up – and stopped. I mean stopped. It was like watching an action sequence on a DVD then hitting the Pause button.

  Next thing I knew, a body jumped on the back of the gator, only it wasn’t Daim’s. Daim isn’t petite or curvy with delicate rounded breasts that strain the fibers of a sleeveless t-shirt. He doesn’t wear jean cut-offs revealing satiny thighs and calves, he doesn’t have long blond hair, and he doesn’t wear an impish grin when sitting astride a gator whose forelegs are suspended in midair.

  That’s right, I said “suspended in midair.”

  “Come on, guys, I can’t hold this bad boy forever.”

  I stood there, more open-mouthed than the gator. Daim too.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  “Name’s Lilly St. Clair, and from now on, I’m one of you.”

  Daim looked at me. I looked at him. Daim was the first to speak.

  “What do you think?”

  “Dude, I think I’m in love.”

  “So how’d you manage that trick, Lilly St. Clair?” Daim asked .

  We were sitting in Belle’s Tavern, nursing three mugs and a pitcher of Belle’s Best, a home brew to die for.

  “Wasn’t a trick,” Lilly answered. “I can do things…make things happen…by thinkin’ ‘em…”

  She was fumbling for words, so I jumped in.

  “Psychokinesis.”

  “Sigh-coe-what?”

  Daim snorted. “College boy.”

  “Psychokinesis,” I repeated, ignoring Lilly’s bewilderment and Daim’s gibe. “It means the ability to move or manipulate solid objects with your mind.”

  Daim took a swig of brew. “Yeah, right.”

  “Most cases of pychokinesis have been disproved as tricks or hoaxes,” I went on, “but there’s a handful that appear to be legitimate.”

  “I’ll believe that when I see it. I still think it’s a trick.”

  “’Kay,” Lilly said placed her elbow on the table across from Daim with her upper arm and forearm in a V-configuration. “Come on, Daim.”

  “Come on, Daim, what?” he asked.

  “She wants to arm wrestle you, dufus,” I snickered.

  “She’s kidding.”

  “No, I ain’t.”

  Daim laughed. “Yeah, right. Honey, I’m all guy. I wrestle 400-pound gators and can bench press as much. You beat me at arm wrestle? Not going to happen.”

  “You scared?”

  That did it. Goaded, Daim placed his elbow on the table and went palm-to-palm with her. “Give the count, Jack.”

  “One. Two. Three. GO!”

  Soon as Daim heard the “GO,” he worked his hand up her palm and started to pull down towards the table. I could see he was trying to be gentle. He didn’t want to hurt her. She was just a girl, after all.

  Except try as he might, Daim’s hand wasn’t going anywhere. Something was keeping it where it was, pushing along the length of his forearm, forcing him down. On the other hand (pun intended), Lilly’s fingers were around his in a grip that looked like it couldn’t dislodge dandelion fuzz.

  She was wearing that same impish grin as her arm followed Daim’s, inch by inch, towards the table top.

  Daim was straining — I could see it in his face, along with utter bewilderment. Having lost my share of arm wrestling matches, I know how it feels when you’re up against superior strength. You feel the burn all along your arm and your wrist, and Daim had to be feeling that now.

  Finally, his knuckles hit the table with a thud that made the mugs jump.

  Daim sat there wide-eyed with disbelief, looking as foolish as he probably felt. After seeing what Lilly did with that gator, Daim never should have agreed to this match. But guys can be dumb, and in Daim’s own words: “I’m all guy.”

  “More beer?” Lilly asked and, keeping her arms at her sides, proceeded to pour. She didn’t spill a drop .

  Just because someone says they want to be one of us doesn’t mean we let them. We start them out as volunteers doing safe non-controversial work. Sweeping floors. Running errands. Bringing lunch from Belle’s. Maintaining the grounds.

  One day, Daim announced, “I want to try an experiment.” He led us to the pen where a particularly bad-tempered fifteen-footer lolled.

  “See that big guy in there? That’s Tiny. When we step in there, he’s going to explode. You think you can keep him still?”

  Lilly craned her neck to get a look at Tiny. Right now, he was half-submerged in his man-made lagoon. Daim was right, though; as soon as we entered his enclosure, he was going to come for us.

  “He’s faster than he looks.”

  “No problem.”

  Daim picked up the medical kit we used to extract blood from the gators. “Here’s what we’re going to do. Jack and I are going to go in there. Soon as he comes for us, you hold him down with….” At this point, Daim tapped his forehead.

  “Why?”

  I saw where Daim was going. “When we capture an alligator, the process puts them under a certain amount of stress. That’s not good for them, so to calm them, we cover their eyes with a towel once we have their mouth taped.”

  “I want to measure how stressed they are while you’re doing your thing,” Daim went on. “You ready?”

  “Ready.”

  We stepped into Tiny’s pen and gingerly made our way toward him. Running true to form, Tiny lunged his bulk out of the water at a speed you wouldn’t believe. He came for us…

  …and stopped short – same as the six-footer Lilly had jumped back on that first day.

  “Let’s do it!”

  Daim and I straddled Tiny, me in front, Daim in back. Daim took a syringe from the kit and extracted blood. When we were done, Daim and I beelined our way out of the pen and Lilly released her hold on the big guy. Tiny resumed his charge and made it to the edge of the pen in seconds. Even though we were safe outside, Daim and I were breathing hard. So was Lilly, harder than us, in fact.

  “Okay, let’s run some tests.”

  The three of us hit the lab. The test results were not what we expected.

  Tiny’s blood showed a low level of testosterone and corticosterone secretion during the time he was immobilized. In plain English, this meant that he was less stressed than usual while Lilly was holding him steady.

  Daim and I looked at each other in amazement, not the first time since we’d met Lilly St. Clair.

  “Dude, you know what this means?”

  “Yeah. We need to run more tests.”

  “If the results are the same, we’ve got us a way to capture gators, stress-free.”

  “If you boys, don’t mind, I’m pooped,” Lilly said, still breathing hard. “I’m heading back to my place to lie down.”

  Over the next few days, we ran a series of tests and the results were always the same — the gator’s stress level was way down, and Lilly came away exhausted.

  She started going out on calls with us and our jobs became a lot easier.

  Two weeks later, my place became her place.

  “She’s Conjure Folk.” That was Tim’s assessment when he first got to see Lilly in action.

  We don’t only get calls about gators. Sometimes, it’s snakes and this time, it was Lilly, Tim, Daim, and me against a fifteen-foot Burmese Python.

  It was the first time Lilly had seen
a snake that size, so I brought her up to speed.

  “People buy small Burmese Pythons, thinking they’ll make good pets,” I explained. “Thing is, they don’t stay small. They grow, and once they start growing, people get scared and set them loose. They can get anywhere from twelve to twenty feet and they’re strong. Once they’re full grown, nothing’s safe from them, not wildlife, not pets, not even people.”

  We found this behemoth in a back yard, where the owner was raising chickens. This turned out to be a good thing for us, since the snake had just gorged itself on one of the birds. We could tell by the lump along the length of its body. I say “good thing” because after a snake eats, it tends to be more sluggish than usual.

  Tim, Daim, and I were getting into position to wrestle the snake into a large catch bag. Lilly was off to the side.

  Sluggish or not, this snake wasn’t going to make it easy on us. It saw us as a threat and as I watched, the lump in its body started making its way towards its mouth. It was disgorging its latest meal so that it would be fast and aggressive, operating in full fighting mode.

  As I watched, the lump began to slow, then finally stop. Way to go, Lilly!

  Lethargic or not, the snake tried to defend itself. Lilly managed to keep the python’s thrashings to a minimum, but it had enough mobility to strike if we got close. Don’t think that because a python isn’t venomous, its bite is trivial. Its mouth has a mess of bacteria plus teeth capable of inflicting a deep wound in human flesh. You get bit by a python, you’re talking major infection.

  It was after we’d gotten the snake bagged, that Tim made his pronouncement.

  “What’s ‘Conjure Folk?’” I asked.

  Tim Osceola’s lived in these parts for over fifty years. He’s not only a champion gator wrangler, (and mentor to Daim and me), but he knows all about Florida folklore and superstition – at least what I thought was superstition.

  “Down here, people who live in the swamps know things you’ll never learn about in college, Yankee. They have skills and talents you could never understand, not unless you’ve lived here all your life.”