by Jesse Karp
Laura could see Mal's face without turning to look, could see the guilt twisting deeper into his eyes.
"What do you mean, 'psychic virus'?" Laura said, thinking of the darkness crawling into the Starbucks, how it seemed to actually infect the people within.
"It's a hypothesis," he said. "A convenient name for a pathogen that thrives in the environment of human synaptic transmissions. Its form is unknown, but it has the capacity to alter human perception and information storage. It could even, conceivably, control its host's actions."
"That's exactly what this is!" Laura said with more vehemence than she was expecting.
"Possibly." Remak glanced at her with interest. "Much of the Global Dynamic is founded on similar thinking, that ideas multiply and transmit in a viral fashion, though documented proof is difficult to come by. I had been hoping to bring the information we had to my superiors, but when I tried this morning, well, you can imagine what happened. I'm lucky to be here and not in some basement interrogation room."
"What is this cooperative you work for?" Laura said. "A cooperative between who?"
"The cooperative is all funded by anonymous individuals and entities, collaborating interests outside the standard sociopolitical superstructure. We don't take a cent from government or industry; it's in our mandate. But we do recruit from government and industry, for our analysts, investigators, and theorists. Any field operative may be required to analyze, interpret, and act on any intelligence gathered. Multiple areas of expertise are required even before recruitment: economics, advanced mathematics, logic, strategic systems, game theory. Then the training: tactics, close-quarters combat, firearms, counter-insurgency, de molitions."
"You?" Mal asked.
Remak nodded.
"I used to work for the IRS."
"Sorry." Mal leaned forward. "The IRS?"
"They're not all accountants, Mal." Remak smiled only a little. "Some of their operations require more field know-how than military operations."
Mal nodded and sat back, trying to decide whether or not that could possibly be true.
"The cooperative was created to pursue avenues opened by the Global Dynamic, a theory developed by one man, culled from years of research in the corporate field. You see, after 9/11 there was an upsurge in government interest in the Global Dynamic. My cooperative predicted something like Big Black months ahead of time." Remak let out a long breath. "But governments work from a philosophy of definite, provable necessity: does this need to be done for things to keep working? Corporations, on the other hand, work from a philosophy of investment: will attention now profit us later?
"The kind of thinking—about social structures and interactions—that led to the Global Dynamic existed long before 9/11 and Big Black, and corporations saw its efficacy long before the government did. Corporations were collecting numbers on such social interactions decades ago for marketing purposes."
"So this one man," Laura said, "the one who developed the Global Dynamic, he worked for a corporation. Who is he?"
"I don't know his name. No one does. He's kept it well hidden. Even my superiors never knew it, though he was our primary consultant for many years and, I believe, a major benefactor of the cooperative. He was once a lower-echelon administrator, a corporate librarian for a company based in California called Intellitech. They collected raw data on human interactions and responses to a vast array of stimulation and input the world over. The company was founded by two graduate students with degrees in the field, and consequently, Intellitech's efforts in this area were far in advance of its competitors. Various departments accumulated the data, but this librarian was the first to collate it all.
"He saw ramifications, and he created the Global Dynamic rubric. It was a predictor of human behavior that was to be a great boon to human knowledge and understanding. But Intellitech saw other possibilities for it, far more ... profit oriented. Any corporation would.
"They weren't just interested in how to read the Global Dynamic, but in how to push it one way or another. In essence, how to make people think and feel according to the corporate agenda. Corporations were interested in how to get an entire city or state or nation to move in a desired way by faking this Global Dynamic, by creating the symptom and, in effect, having the symptom create the disease."
"Like launching a massive increase in action-figure marketing," Laura tested, "and causing the military action to follow in its path."
"Exactly." Remak nodded. "Reverse-engineering the Global Dynamic. Imagine what an arms manufacturer could do with the ability to manipulate a nation's aggression by, say, contracting a toy manufacturer to launch a multimillion-dollar marketing campaign for a particularly militaristic new line of action figures. There's no more producing the goods and waiting for the demand. With this kind of control, you can manufacture the demand as easily as the product itself."
Heavy silence fell on the car.
"In any event," Remak continued eventually, "the Librarian broke off from Intellitech, began using the Global Dynamic to serve other causes. As I said, he was once a great help to our cooperative. He was like an information dynamo, a living computer. He had always been private, though. His name was never disclosed. And, a few years ago, he cut himself off completely, with no warning, no explanation. He went away, wouldn't consult or advise; he just kept taking reports, collecting information. He still does. Reams of data go in; nothing comes out."
"What happened?" Laura asked.
Remak gave a small shrug and touched his glasses.
"We think he figured something out, saw something coming that none of the rest of us could, and it was so terrible, he removed himself."
"What do you think?" Laura persisted.
"I think," Remak said, "I'm going to ask him myself."
THE LIBRARIAN
"I THOUGHT NO ONE KNEW where the Librarian was," Mal said.
"No one knows where he is," Remak responded, looking through the windshield and scanning the large house and sprawling lawn cut by the long shadows of twilight. "But there are educated theories. The one I favor was corroborated by another agent, who claimed to have traced the route of certain electronic files transmitted to the Librarian."
"Traced them to here," Laura said, her eyes gazing somewhat mournfully over the still and tranquil expanse, not altogether dissimilar to her own town.
"For isolation, it's rather an ideal choice," Remak said.
Laura could hardly argue that. Given the condition of the GPS, they'd had to stop at a gas station to find a paper map. Laura had been flabbergasted to discover that such quaintly antiquated things still existed, and she'd had a crash course in how to navigate by them, as Mike was categorically useless, gazing out the window dimly as though the world were diminishing while he watched. It had taken them long enough to find the minuscule town of Pope Springs, Remak's first landmark, and then another hour to track this house down based on his complicated triangulation methods.
"So..." Mal hesitated, and silence filled the space. "Do we just knock on the door?"
"Yes," Laura said resolutely.
"Absolutely not," Remak said at the same time.
They looked at each other, and something crossed Remak's usually placid face. Was he impressed that she was stepping up, or irritated?
"I'm going to reconnoiter," he said. "You wait here."
"Listen." Laura put her hand on Remak's arm, and Mal felt an unexpected pang of jealousy. "You need him to trust us, right? Suppose you snoop around and he catches you. How's that going to look to him?"
Remak looked back up at the house, a gothic construction of wood with curtains drawn over all the windows. It presented a distinctly unwelcoming picture.
"Yes," he said, at the very least always able to see good sense. "You're right." He held his eyes on the house a moment longer and opened his door even as Laura opened hers.
He stopped. "What are you doing?" he asked her.
She looked at him and back at Mal and Mike, neither of
whom had moved to exit the car.
"Uh," she said, "going with you."
"Laura"—he looked at her sharply—"this man is a recluse and probably for very good reason. He's not going to—"
"What's less threatening," Laura countered, "a scary stranger by himself or a dude with an innocent-looking young girl?"
Remak removed his glasses and rubbed the bridge of his nose.
"All right," he said quietly. "Let's go."
"All of us," Mal said from the back.
Remak froze at the door again, his chin falling to his chest and his eyes closed.
"She's not going into that messed-up-looking place without me," Mal said.
Remak was uncharacteristically speechless. He looked at the two of them: Mal's flat resolution, the tiny smile crawling up the corners of Laura's lips.
He shook his head in resignation and finally got out of the car.
"Mike," Laura said. "Mike! Let's go."
Mike snapped to attention and looked around as if for the first time, then slowly departed the car with the rest of them.
They crossed the gravel road from the place beneath a shaggy tree where the car was nominally obscured. They trailed the curving dirt driveway up to the house, their shadows casting weirdly elongated monsters across the grass of the lawn.
"Hang back," Remak said to Mal and Mike as they neared the door. "Please."
Remak and Laura went up a short flight of four stone steps and stood before a large wooden door with an antique knocker on it. Laura's hand came up, but Remak's hand shot out and got to it first, lifting and banging the heavy thing three times.
They waited in a chilly breeze, the sounds of the first crickets beginning to ring in the evening. Remak knocked again.
After a minute, they exchanged glances and Laura shrugged. What now?
"Sir," Remak said to the door, "my name is Jon Remak. I ... I'm associated with the cooperative. I'm here on a matter of some urgency."
He looked around the doorframe, at the lintels of the roof, anywhere there might be a camera.
"Please," Laura said to the door, knowing her tone was a beseeching one, knowing it always convinced her parents to tack an extra hour on to curfew. "We have nowhere else to go."
No response.
"Maybe this is the wrong place," Mal said from behind them.
"Please," Laura said again, and now there was no mistaking the ache in her voice. "No one knows who we are. No one remembers us. We need your help."
There was an anxious moment of silence, then a click.
Laura looked at Remak, whose attention was now riveted on the door. Feeling as though she'd earned the right, she pushed it.
There was a large if minimally appointed foyer. A table on one side and a large couch on the other flanked a flight of old wooden stairs traveling up to a dark balcony. Remak stepped in first, then the rest came. The door closed behind them, sealing off the outside world. The interior of the house was a set piece, furnished and well-ordered, but like an artifice, untouched and empty of more than just people.
"What are your names?" A voice reverberated through the room. It was so clear and vibrant that only electronic alteration could have achieved it.
"Remak. Jon Remak."
"Laura Westlake."
"Mal Jericho."
"Mike," he said when Laura nudged his shoulder. "Just Mike."
"You've come here"—the electronic voice filled the room—"because you approached this cooperative and they turned you away?"
"No, sir, not precisely," Remak said. "I'm a field analyst. Used to be a field analyst. I was ... kidnapped, for lack of a better word, during an inquiry. When I escaped and returned to make my report, no one remembered me. I wasn't even on their files, or so they claimed. I understand that's hard to—"
"No," said the voice. "Not at all, unfortunately. And you, Laura. Who forgot you?
"My parents." Her voice was all but dead.
"I'm very sorry," the voice said. "Jon, you and Laura may come up. You'll forgive me, but I need to limit my exposure."
"No," Mal said, a gentle but heavy hand falling on Laura's shoulder.
"This is our only opportunity, Mal." Remak's voice was low and harsh. "You're going to have to trust me now."
Unconvinced by Remak's demand, Mal allowed his arm to fall to his side only when Laura touched his hand and nodded at him.
Remak and Laura turned toward the stairway.
"Up the stairs and through the door at the left," the voice directed them.
Together, they climbed the stairs, and the door clicked as they came to it. They pushed it open and disappeared into shadow.
Mal watched and, at the last sight of them, scowled.
"This seems like a bad idea," he said up to the shadows. He turned and looked at Mike. "What do you think's going to happen up there?"
Mike looked at him without expression for a moment, then, taking a deep breath and setting his shoulders, he rejoined the world around him all at once.
"They'll be tortured and killed. But don't let it get you down, kid. We're all gonna be dead inside a few days."
Mal's eyes burned into him.
"You've been a zombie since we left the city, and now you come out with that? What the hell's wrong with you?"
"Are you joking?" Mike said, with something of his old acid. "What's wrong? Are you blind and deaf and retarded?"
"Do you see Laura shutting down? Remak?" Mal demanded hotly. "Are they any better off than you?"
"You're goddamned right they are." Mike nearly shouted it back at him, his voice reverberating up the empty walls. "Know why? Because they care. Yesterday, Remak puts me in a grocery store and tells me to wait while he checks with his people. When he comes back, he tells me that no one remembers us, that we're somehow disconnected from our entire lives, anyone we ever knew and loved. So I make a few calls from a paycell and guess what? He's right. And I'm thinking, 'Holy shit, this is hell.' But when I'm over the shock and I'm thinking it through, about what it means to me specifically, I realize: it doesn't matter at all. I never met my old man; my mother has nothing but grief for me. My students, I don't miss any of them. I haven't got any friends worth a damn." Mike leaned closer, nearly into Mal's face, though his voice didn't lower. "My whole fucking life, it was so empty that when someone took it away from me, I don't even miss it.
"Remak and Laura had their lives taken away, but they want them back. I had mine taken, and I don't care. My mother was right all along: I don't matter at all."
His eyes burned into Mal from inches away, challenging him to find a solution to that.
And Mal couldn't. Was his own life so different? He had essentially been alone, even before his father left him. So he glared back at Mike, never willing to be the first one to walk away.
Eventually, Mike's eyes cooled and he walked away with a sneer. Mal watched his back as Mike stalked to a window, yanked the curtain away, and turned his gaze on the empty, darkening lawn outside.
Remak and Laura passed into a long hallway of rich, dark wood. There were two doors along one side and a single door on the other, and at the far end, across from them, another door. Laura looked up at Remak and they proceeded forward until, as they came to the single door, it clicked sharply in the murky silence.
Remak pushed it open.
"The doors here are heavy," he whispered to her. "Reinforced with metal inside."
Metal, indeed. They came into a room that was flat gray metal from the floor to the walls, whose corners were vague with shadows and crawled upward into darkness. In the middle of the room was a single gunmetal table, spotlighted with a pale yellow glow.
"There are chairs against the left wall," the electronic voice said from out of the dim reaches. Remak found two, made of a harsh metal that matched the table, and pulled them up. He gestured for Laura to sit and then did so himself.
Unprompted, Remak began speaking to the anonymous space around them, recounting their last few days. It was not pa
rticularly cold in here, but Laura felt herself beginning to shiver, a cold sweat pricking the nape of her neck.
When he finished, the room returned only a silence that seemed to vibrate from the shrouded corners. When the disembodied response finally came, it was like being haunted by a phantom.
"There are two kinds of evolution," said the voice from the depths. "There is Darwin's evolution, the mutation and adaptation of genes. This is a physiological process, occurring when an animal, a gene-carrier, interacts with environment. This change, of course, occurs over thousands of years."
The voice was coming from somewhere in front of them, but with the majority of the room cloaked in black, the Librarian might have been in the same room, hidden in the darkness, or somewhere else through the unknown halls of the house.
"And then there is cultural evolution." The voice vibrated out of the black. "The process by which our minds, rather than our bodies, adapt as they interact with environment. It is what our minds soak up from the world around us, from other people, from what we see, what we are told. Now, it takes millions of years for a flipper to become a leg. But our minds, our perspective, in a sense the very nature of who we are, can change in an instant, in the amount of time it takes to hear and process a word or interpret an image. Do you understand? Just as the dangers of our environment—persistent attacks by a predator species, eating a poisonous plant—will evolve us over a millennium, ideas will evolve us, too, over the course of months or minutes or seconds."
Remak nodded. To Laura, this sounded similar to the rudiments of the Global Dynamic as she understood it.
"Darwinian evolution is genetics," the Librarian's voice went on. "The units of transmission are genes. They move in the physical universe, the strongest ones surviving, passed from generation to generation. What, then, is the transmission unit of cultural evolution?
"In 1976, a biologist named Dawkins at Oxford University gave these units a name. He called them memes. They are conceptually alive, just as genes are. Like genes, memes are born in one person and are capable of implanting themselves in other people. Unlike genes, however, they move over physical space, but not in the physical universe. Memes are living ideas, moving from brain to brain in the space of a glance or a synaptic impulse, the most contagious life form ever to exist. These memes, these living ideas, are the carriers of human culture."