by John Akers
“You’re cleaning that up,” Cevis muttered. Pax was too drained to respond. Instead, he just wiped the sleeve of his tunic across his mouth.
“Are they coming after us?” asked Cevis.
“No,” said Pax, without even looking around.
“How do you know?”
“I just know.”
Cevis looked at him for a moment, then said, “Okay.” He paused a moment, then added, “Some other time you can explain what the hell happened back there. Right now, I need to rest.” Then he faced forward and closed his eyes.
“Okay,” Pax said. He leaned back and closed his eyes as well.
All of a sudden, he didn’t know how much later, he was awakened by a synthesized doopdoopdoop sound that indicated an unknown caller. “Sir, there’s an anonymous caller,” said Gabe, sounding flustered. “I don’t know how it got through, or how we’re getting a signal for that matter…”
“It’s okay, Gabe.” He glanced over at Cevis and saw he was sleeping. “I’ll take it.” Even though no caller image appeared after the doo deep sound, Pax whispered, “Alethia?”
“Hello, Mr. Pax,” said Alethia.
“Alethia,” said Pax quietly. “I’m glad you’re okay, I wasn’t sure what happened to you.”
“I’m fine. Just a bad headache and some sore ribs.”
“Alethia, I’m so sorry!” said Pax. “Those people, my God, Angelo! How could that have happened? I didn’t know it could! I just…” His voice cracked, and he began to weep.
“It was an accident, Mr. Pax. We didn’t know it could happen either. We knew Omnitech was most likely working on integrating the CortiTrak BCI with the Univiz, based on its purchase of the company, but we didn’t realize you’d already had the surgery done to yourself. When the Infinet granted you access to the Story of Man as the internet access point, it also gave you administrator permissions to the Story of Man. It was intended as a show of good faith. I was about to tell you, but then Mr. Pierson showed up, and I didn’t get a chance. The Infinet apparently interpreted some of your thoughts as commands and tried to carry them out. The movements of the platform and the cable arm breaking through the roof, were all attempts to carry out what it thought were commands from you.”
“I just had the BCI surgery last week,” said Pax. “Christ, I could barely move the damn training shapes at all.” Then something occurred to him. “So did the Infinet know Cevis was coming?” he asked
“Of course,” said Alethia.
“Why did it let him in? Why didn’t it stop him when he shot a hole in the roof?”
“Until that moment, it didn’t know Mr. Pierson was armed. Based on what it knew of Mr. Pierson, it knew he meant you no harm, and it was critical not to hurt him, given your close personal relationship.”
“You mean,” said Pax, “it was willing to risk your life to avoid angering me if Cevis should get hurt?”
“The Infinet still considers its original proposal to you the only way to ensure humanity doesn’t destroy itself. Every other consideration is of secondary importance.”
That reminded Pax of something. “Hey, has the app been posted yet?”
“Yes. It was posted to the Univiz app store, and the emergency alert was sent out just a few minutes after you spoke with Qathi and Emma. More than 50,000 people have installed it already, and it has successfully quarantined every infected network and device it has connected to. The Infinet estimates that within 24 hours more than 75 percent of Univiz users will have installed the app, and within 48 hours more than 98 percent will have. Omnitech will most likely receive a massive surge in orders for UVs, so you should get your production ramped up immediately. And sometime in the next few hours, you should hold a press conference explaining how you managed to neutralize the virus.”
“How I neutralized the virus?”
“Yes. The Infinet thinks it would be best if you took the credit. As a sign of good faith, while you take time to think about its original proposal.”
Pax sighed. “All right. Although I don’t know if anyone will believe it. Everyone knows I’m a designer, not a security specialist.”
“We can provide you with the names of some society members who are well-known programming experts. They will vouch for the fact that you organized the team that came up with the antivirus. But you won’t need to get that specific. Just tell anyone who asks that you pulled together a crack team that found a cure for the virus and leave it at that. What matters is it worked. You’re not obligated to give any details. Claim it’s a competitive secret.”
“I’ll have to explain why I was on Socotra, too.”
“You don’t have to say you were on Socotra, and you shouldn’t. The location of your transmission to Emma and Qathi was hidden by the Infinet. No one ever need know where you were. You can say you were in Djibouti because you wanted to go somewhere that would be largely unaffected by the virus. The Infinet will send you some other suggested talking points later on.”
“Okay.” Pax thought about all the unanswered questions he had about the Infinet, about the Society, and about her. In a hopeful voice, he said, “Maybe I could bring Cevis back and…”
“No,” Alethia said firmly. “What we showed you was for you alone. The Story of Man has already begun to decompose itself. Within 24 hours the tower, the buildings, and the submarine will all be gone. Our members have already begun dispersing across the globe, back to their regular lives.”
Though it sounded absurd, Pax no longer doubted her. “Okay,” he said. “I just thought if maybe I could convince Cevis…”
“You will not convince Dr. Pierson of our mission,” said Alethia firmly. “The Infinet would have brought him along with you if it would have helped. And whether or not he helped you create the Univiz is irrelevant now. You made it, and you control it. Connecting it with the Infinet is your decision alone.”
Pax thought but didn’t bother to ask what the Infinet would do if he chose to talk to Cevis anyway. Then he pushed the thought away, unsure of whether the Infinet could still hear him or monitor what he was thinking. To stop his wandering thoughts he said, “I forgive you for abducting me.”
“Thank you, Mr. Pax. I always believed that eventually you would.”
Pax swallowed but found his throat was completely dry. He wished he had some water.
“Tell the Infinet thanks for putting this decision all on me,” he croaked.
“You can tell it yourself,” Alethia said. “Goodbye, Mr. Pax. We’ll be in touch.”
The call ended, Pax looked out the window at the ocean rushing by below. The helicopter stayed low, no more than 20 feet above the highest waves.
An incredible sense of relief washed over him. A little over 24 hours from now, he would be back home, a hero the world over for finding a cure for the virus. Yet the question of what to do about the Infinet remained. He couldn’t talk about it with anyone except Alethia, or one of the other society members. No one else would believe him. And he believed Alethia when she told him any physical evidence would be gone by the time he was back home.
Eventually, he sat up and looked over at Cevis. He was still sleeping. Pax sat back in his seat.
Hello? he thought.
“Mr. Pax, were you trying to say something?” said Gabe.
“Ah, sorry, Gabe, I didn’t mean you. I meant…” His voice trailed off, and he waited for a moment, although he wasn’t sure for what.
Then came a voice unlike any he’d ever heard before. It was neither male nor female, young nor old. It didn’t sound like a human voice at all, but neither did it sound robotic. It was light and melodic, like the sound of a beautiful instrument he’d never heard before. It was clear, as if all impurities had been filtered from it, leaving a sound like pure crystal.
“Hello, Mr. Pax,” said the voice. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”
Chapter 59
Thursday, May 22, 9:18 AM PT
“Chaotica” Virus Quarantined Through Univiz App
By Donald Hirsch in New York
In a stunning turn of events, a Univiz app published three days ago appears to have completely quarantined the massive “Chaotica” virus that had commandeered billions of devices and spurred violent uprisings all over the world. The app, called “Chaoticure,” has returned previously infected devices the world over back to normal functioning.
The leader of the team that created the application, Mr. Oreste Pax, CEO and founder of Omnitech Industries, had mysteriously disappeared last weekend. Then he suddenly reappeared, app in hand, halfway around the world in West Africa. Mr. Pax claims he received early notification of the virus through undisclosed channels, and he decided to go to a remote location in Djibouti, where he and the members of the app development team could work without fear of the virus. Mr. Pax refused to say why such extreme precautions were needed as opposed to simply finding a remote location in America.
Equally as bewildering as Mr. Pax’s temporary disappearance was the fact that no software engineer from Omnitech, a company legendary for the security of its products, was involved. This suggests the app was developed by a team completely outside the company, but who they were, or how Mr. Pax knew them, is a mystery. Some have called for Omnitech to hand over the code to the U.S. government, so the means by which the attack was created and halted can be better understood by the people responsible for the nation’s security. Other groups have been equally adamant that Omnitech should keep the code behind the app private, given the government’s long history of developing highly sophisticated cyberweapons, only to have them stolen by the very groups they targeted.
Nonetheless, given the dire situation beforehand, Mr. Pax is being celebrated the world over as a hero. He has kept his public appearances to a minimum since his return to the U.S., understandably claiming exhaustion. He has been invited to the White House for a briefing and a congratulatory luncheon with the President. In time, public demand for more information may compel Mr. Pax to reveal additional details regarding the app’s creation, but for now, it appears he is being left in peace.
Mr. Pax’s achievement is being especially lauded by Omnitech’s shareholders, as demand for the latest version of the Univiz has skyrocketed. Inventory in physical and online stores all over the globe, particularly outside the U.S., was cleaned out within 24 hours of the publication of the Chaoticure app.
It is noteworthy that Omnitech has modified its standard software agreement to allow the Chaoticure app to be applied to any device connected to a network which a UV owner can access. This has enabled anyone with a Univiz to quarantine entire neighborhoods by having neighbors temporarily share their network passwords with them.
Similarly, relief organizations around the world have been flying to remote parts of the world where the virus had been reported, but no local residents owned a Univiz. Despite the disagreement over whether the app’s code should be shared with others, Omnitech’s gesture was lauded the world over as a triumph of human decency over profit-mongering. Only time will tell whether it sparks a long-term change from the acrimony that has so sharply divided both the nation and the world, and lead to a new age of civility and openness, or whether dispositions will return to the way they were before.
Epilogue
One week later
The white-haired man looked stoically at the monitor array as the last of his devices succumbed to the antivirus. The cold rage, the desperation he had felt a week earlier when he realized the quantum computer had found a way to beat him had disappeared. Although the effort to which he had dedicated himself for more than two years had failed, he did not feel despair.
Instead, he felt vindicated, because he had been right. He had proven, without a doubt, that humanity, left to its own devices, would have destroyed itself in service of its lust for subjugating anything it defined as Other—even if the Other was really itself. In the face of an existential crisis, rather than come together, humanity had exploded. If the q-comp hadn’t saved it, human civilization would already be a smoking ruin, and the rest of the Earth’s creatures would be free to live once more as God intended.
No matter, all was not lost. He’d managed to hide several of the supercomputers before being rooted out by the q-comp. Plus he still had some money, though not nearly as much as before. Most importantly, he was still alive and free. His plan was dead, but not him.
Now he would rise from the ashes, armed with a new plan. He had left the Univiz network alone before, because he had believed his virus would spread too swiftly for anyone or anything to respond. His arrogance had been his undoing. But the q-comp couldn’t defeat him on its own. It had needed the help of the Univiz to stop his virus. He knew Oreste Pax’s claim of going into hiding to develop the antivirus program was a lie. The q-comp had created the antivirus program and simply convinced Pax to distribute it through his worldwide network of UVs.
Now he would turn his attention to them. To Omnitech. To Pax. And especially to the quantum computer, the one they called The Infinet.
The white-haired man smiled, and stood up and pushed his chair back, the wheels now moving smoothly over the empty vinyl flooring. He had cleared it of all wrappings and refuse that morning, gathering and throwing them into the dumpster. It had been the first time he’d been outside in weeks. The sun had been painfully bright, but it had felt good to walk about, to feel his muscles flexing and contracting. All of it reminded him he was still very much alive and free.
And dangerous to those who had opposed him. Because he knew the fools who believed a cybernetic Jesus could deliver mankind to the promised land. The silly idealists who had once called him Gaon, then ignored his most important advice, to stop trying to save that which could not be saved.
He stood and walked over to the window and opened the curtains with an abrupt yank. Dust flew everywhere, illuminated by the bright sunlight. Outside, a couple made their way from their car, parked under a corrugated metal-roof carport, to their building. Each of them was carrying four plastic bags stuffed with groceries. He didn’t know them, yet he loathed them nonetheless. Their unearned comforts, their unappreciated gift of existence.
No matter. He’d proven their civilization was a house of cards, and now he would blow it down, using every means at his disposal. He would infiltrate the Univiz network and use both it and the Infinet to finish the job he’d started. He had built the Infinet, and he knew how to pry apart its nanoscopic wiring and gain control. And this time, he would not be careless. This time, he would not make a mistake.
I’m coming for you, Alethia. You too, Mr. Pax. Enjoy your fleeting moment in the sun while you can. The people you’ve saved will stress and fracture yet again, only next time, you won’t be there to save them.
Author’s Note
Thanks for reading The Infinet. It’s my first novel, and I hope you enjoyed it. If you have a moment to leave a rating, I’d appreciate it.
Amazon: http://bit.ly/EOB2zSa04Q
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Thanks again,
John
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Acknowledgments
The creation of this book has been a five-year odyssey starting with the 2012 National Novel Writing Month competition. So thanks to the people behind NaNoWriMo, because without it I probably never would have tried.
Many people served as beta readers and provided valuable feedback along the way. To Gia Rozells, John Spindler, Gary Klett, Stephanie Johnson Hopper, Evan Klein, Jennifer Flood, John Van Roekel, and Mark Harriman, my sincere thanks. Special thanks to Rev. Darryl Kistler, the Star Wars-loving padre who endured not just one but two drafts, and provided essential feedback and encouragement. Special thanks also to George Eckel, one-half of a dynamic two-perso
n lunchtime critique group, who provided critical developmental editing advice. Thanks to my kids, Alianna, Westley, and Jillian, who always thought it was cool Dad was writing a book. And a very special thanks to my parents, Lane and Jeanie, who dusted off their decades of editorial expertise and tirelessly improved every chapter I pushed at them, and encouraged me every step of the way.
Most of all, thanks to my wife, Adonia, who knew of my longstanding dream to be a writer. It was she who encouraged me to take on the NaNoWriMo challenge in the first place, and without her initial push I never would have gotten started. Her encouragement, feedback, patience, and love, more than anything else, made this story possible.
About the Author
John Akers was born in New York City and grew up in Westchester County. He got his undergraduate degree in behavioral sciences at Rice University, and to this day he enjoys telling people that he got a B.A. in B.S. Later he earned his master’s degree in human factors engineering at Georgia Tech and since then has worked at a number of well-known Silicon Valley companies. John’s interest in human-computer interfaces and the history of technology became the inspiration for his first novel, The Infinet. He is currently working on book 2 in the Trivial Game series.