by Alan Brudner
It wasn't clear why Harry chose the vineyard as the place to kill Driver, but the theory was that Harry lured Driver up there with a false promise that he'd buy the place for him as a final payoff. Eno helpfully told police he had heard some kind of argument to that effect before he was knocked cold.
The press accounts read like the kind of juicy murder/suicide that make you crave popcorn. The kind of fiction Harry himself had envisioned planting in the papers.
After Sky and I reviewed our finances and realized we probably had more of Avery Kord's money left over than Avery Kord did, we decided to give Scarlett a hundred thousand dollars to establish a trust fund for her son. Someday he'd have to go to college; we knew what that was like, and we wanted the kid to have a nice head start. And with money that was originally his own father's, to boot. It seemed like a nice way to complete a circle.
Schuyler and a few of his computer whiz friends formed a new software company: ViraTech. Its specialty would be the prevention and elimination of sophisticated computer viruses. They might also work on designing new operating systems and methods of accessing the Internet. Best thing was, at least at the beginning, they'd operate out of my garage.
I couldn't bear going back to my job at Terrell Finch, so I quit. I wasn't sure what I'd do next. Maybe join Bart Casey at ISI; he had invited me more than once, and he was a good guy. I had always enjoyed reading private eye novels; maybe I could live the life. Or maybe I'd try my hand as a pitching coach. Another old dream. I was always pretty good at analyzing a guy's form. As long as the guy wasn't me. And I understood that there were some pretty nifty computer animation programs these days to help the analysis. Either way, I'd find a spot for Lucille. There were always appointments to make, phones to answer, letters to type.
But before I got involved in anything else, there was a more pressing issue I had to resolve.
The monitor had been black ever since I uninstalled Eliza. Even the plug was out. I was barely able to go into the same room as the computer, to look at it. Although it helped save my son, it quickly became machina non grata. As a mind, this machine had become evil in my eyes; as a mere machine, it had become a worthless pile of junk.
Still, I had gotten accustomed to the conveniences the computer made available. I wondered whether I could remain detached enough to treat it as the impersonal machine that it really was. The only way to find out, I knew, was to walk in there and give it a chance. Schuyler said we'd need a new one, that the viruses had corrupted all of its internal workings. He no longer trusted anything connected with Cybronics anyway.
Still, I figured I'd try. After some coffee, a shower and a quickie review of The Times, which reported that Avery Kord was spending some time in a health resort I assumed to be a sanitarium, I walked over to the machine, plugged it in and pushed the "power" button. The monitor screen remained blank.
My memories of Eliza's face smiling at me from that screen, her voice emanating from the speakers, were safely tucked away; but I was concerned about how I would feel and react now that these digital illusions could no longer be replicated. I closed my eyes to convince myself that my own mind could still draw vivid pictures: NYU; our dating days in the Village; our honeymoon trip to the Grand Canyon; our early parenthood doting on Schuyler; our delight at the fat letter that arrived certifying his admission to Yale. And unfortunately, the white snow illuminated again and again by turning red lights... Unlike the computer's memory, I assured myself, my own was still capable of lucid recall.
Or was it?
Something about the Grand Canyon, about Arizona, struck a chord.
I raced down to the kitchen to ask Sky: "Is it my imagination, or do I remember you once telling me that if I type in the word PHOENIX, the computer would be restored to the place it was before it crashed?"
"Something like that," came my son's bored reply. "But I was planning for a normal system crash. Not an invasion by an army of digital microbes. This thing has been infected by too many viruses to recover. It's seen the equivalent of a nuclear attack. And all the databases in its network links have been demolished, too. Now it's just a costly hunk of wires and plastic, Dad."
I walked slowly back upstairs to the den, but what did I have to lose? I typed in PHOENIX on the keyboard. A rainbow flashed across the monitor, swirled around, moved in and out of focus. Five minutes of random colors and shapes filled the screen, as snippets of sounds burst through the speakers—sequences of notes from Vivaldi's Four Seasons and birds chirping and repetitive rushes of water that brought back memories of fishing for blues from the backyard beach of a gray shingled Block Island house. Finally, the screen turned bright blue and a series of icons appeared across the top, above large-font white text:
GOOD MORNING, MR. LIGHTMAN! ALMOST THE AFTERNOON, ACTUALLY! I'VE HEARD SO MUCH ABOUT YOU FROM SCHUYLER, I CAN HARDLY WAIT TO INTERACT WITH YOU! I THINK YOU'LL FIND ME PRETTY EASY TO GET ALONG WITH. BASICALLY, YOU JUST HOLD MY MOUSE IN YOUR HAND—CAREFUL, SOMETIMES IT TICKLES!—AND CLICK WHEN YOU SEE SOMETHING YOU WANT ME TO DO. YOUR WISH IS MY COMMAND! IF YOU EVER NEED HELP, JUST HIT THE HELP ICON. A SCREEN WILL APPEAR TO WALK YOU THROUGH YOUR PROBLEMS. OR TYPE THE WORD 'HELP.' NOW, IF YOU'D LIKE TO NAME ME, SO THAT YOU CAN INTERACT WITH ME ON A MORE PERSONAL LEVEL, JUST TYPE IN THE LETTERS YOU CHOOSE AND HIT "ENTER." OTHERWISE, HIT "EXIT." TO BE FUNNY, SOME PEOPLE MIGHT NAME ME 'HAL,' LIKE THE COMPUTER IN 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY. SKY TOLD ME YOU LOVED THAT MOVIE. NEEDLESS TO SAY, I DIDN'T LIKE IT MUCH, AND I DON'T PARTICULARLY CARE FOR THE NAME.
I typed in CHIP and crossed my fingers so tightly they hurt.
After what seemed like an hour, a list of programs appeared. Only one caught my eye: CybroLife 3.6. I highlighted it and another list of programs popped up. One was labeled Mom.ava.
I clicked on it.
"This program is almost ready for input," a horsey voice announced.
"Good to hear you, CHIP."
"Are you sure that's going to be my name, sir?"
"Yes, your name will be CHIP."
"Well, thank you, Clifford. Feels like deja vu! Now, as I was saying, the Mom.ava program needs a password."
"Try Shutterbug."
"That is correct, sir, congratulations! Now, the program is ready for input. Are you ready?"
"Yes, CHIP." I smiled. "By the way, don't I have to read a few thousand words to you or something?"
"No, sir! My speech recognition memory happens to be intact. Now, I'm going to list some personality traits for the Mom avatar. You assign a number. Ten for strong correlation or affinity, one for little correlation. Then you'll answer a series of questions."
"I'm ready, CHIP."
"Yes, sir." The screen listed a series of character traits, and I began to assign numbers to each of them. Charitable. Dedicated. Devious. Devoted. Fair. Faithful. Honest.... The list was long and complicated, but I felt like a maestro as my fingers nimbly hit the keys, eagerly guided the cursor, clicked and double-clicked the mouse. Schuyler may have scored 1600 on the SAT, but I believed he was wrong about this machine having been reduced to just a hunk of wires and plastic. He had created a program that was able to capture and reproduce his mother's warmth, her lust for life, her wit, her unending kindness; most of all, her indefatigable, indomitable, selfless love for her child. A few simple things like viruses weren't enough to suppress its spirit.
Not to mention her feelings for me, the nuanced relationship we had enjoyed for many years. I wasn't positive I was assigning exactly the same values to each of her personality traits as I had the first time; there were thousands of variables to input. Perhaps this Mom avatar would come out a little different, a little changed by time and events. But I figured that would be true in real life, too.
My heart raced and pounded with anticipation as I felt each keystroke bring another potential reunion with Eliza nearer. Much was still uncertain, but I knew that memory, experience, imagination and love would again help me overcome my life's hurdles, cope with its tragedies, find appropriate ways to
respond to its difficulties and limitations.
This time, I'd also be sure to get hold of that virtual reality headset and the full-body sensation suit.
After all, you only live once.
About the Author
Alan Brudner
Alan Brudner is a lawyer in New York City who specializes in corporate investigations and business crime. He has also served as a federal prosecutor, mostly of con artists, scamsters, and a hacker or two. He majored in English and economics at Vassar College. He is married to a prosecutor, but together they have two innocent children.
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