by Dima Zales
The nurse double-checks the vital signs and makes a Grinch-like face. In a Russian accent that confirms my Rudar’s suspicions, she says, “I’ll be around if I’m needed.”
Without waiting for anyone to respond, she exits the room.
“How are you?” I ask Mom.
She shrugs, clearly overwhelmed by all this activity.
“You’ll be fine, Nina,” Ada says. “I’m sure of it.”
I’ve read through countless reports and studies on the treatment, so I should be as confident as Ada is. But I worry, because as the poem goes, I only have one mother.
“I feel a slight burning in my arm,” Mom says. “But it’s not too bad.”
“That’s normal with intravenous delivery.” Ada plays with the silver stud pierced through two spots in her ear cartilage. “It would’ve been worse if you’d gotten all the liquid at once. You might’ve felt nauseous.”
I wonder where Ada learned all this medical info. Her background is in software, like mine, though I haven’t written a line of code in a decade. In contrast, Ada is the most genius programmer I know, and that’s saying a lot. As part of my job, I meet tons of talented software engineers—not to mention I’m besties with a world-renowned techie.
As though she read my mind, Ada says, “I was in the room with a few of the other participants, so I know what to expect.”
This is yet another example of Ada’s strange behavior around me, which began when I broke up with my ex a few months back. Is she hinting that she disapproves of my apparent lack of interest in the other participants? If so, she might actually have a point there, but she has to understand that all this—from investing so much of my own and my venture capital fund’s money into Techno, to getting my friends in the industry involved in the Brainocyte research and development—is to help my mom. At least, that’s my primary motivation. Of course I’m glad this technology will also lead to great things for other people, but I hope Ada can forgive me for focusing on the most important person in my life.
“How are things looking?” Ada asks loudly enough that the people in the back can’t ignore her.
David, part of Techno’s army of engineers, gives her a thumbs-up and says, “So far so good.”
Ada nods at David, then looks at me. “Don’t worry,” she says. “Nina is still set to be the first participant to proceed to Phase One.”
Looks like my suspicion was right. It must irk Ada that I’m not showing interest in any of the others. Once I make sure Mom is doing well, perhaps I’ll pay some of the other participants a visit, starting with Mrs. Sanchez.
“What exactly is this treatment?” Uncle Abe asks and sits down on the couch—the only surface not covered by wires.
Ada looks at my mom, who doesn’t reply, leading me to believe she forgot the details of the treatment. Usually, that would upset me, but since we’re doing something to fix this very problem as we speak, I remain optimistic.
“That liquid contains Brainocytes,” Ada says when she’s sure neither my mom nor I want to take the lead. “They’re the product we’re testing.”
My uncle and, sadly, Mom look at Ada with blank expressions, and Mom mumbles a paraphrase from a Russian proverb about how eggs are about to teach the hen.
“Okay, let me start over,” Ada says and takes a seat on the other end of the couch. “Brainocytes are a type of nanocytes designed to penetrate the blood-brain barrier and create the most powerful brain-to-computer interface—BCI—ever made.”
The blank looks don’t change, so she says, “How much do you know about nanotechnology and neuroprosthetics?”
At the mention of nanotechnology, Mom’s eyes shimmer with recognition. “After I finished college the first time, we had a scanning tunneling microscope where I worked, so the idea of molecular machines was often discussed, especially when the translations of Eric Drexler’s work became available.”
“Why do I have a feeling I’m about to regret my question?” Uncle Abe mutters.
In his defense, he must’ve heard Mom talk about her old job more often than I have. That old job is closely intertwined with the whole affair involving my father, so those memories are like emotional dynamite for Mom. Since I can tell my uncle is about to say something that might really upset her, I stop him by plopping down on the couch between him and Ada.
Smiling at Mom, I say, “The simplest way to explain Brainocytes is to say that they’re a bunch of super-tiny robots. They’re currently swimming through your bloodstream into your brain, where they’ll plug into your neurons. This will allow for all sorts of interesting interactions.”
I’ve seen this exact expression on Uncle Abe’s face when he tried uni sushi and learned that uni is Japanese for a sea urchin’s gonads. Once he’s won the yuck battle with himself, he says, “That sounds pretty invasive and creepy, but if anyone was going to agree to such a treatment, it would be our Nina.”
It’s true. Mom is more adventurous than her brother in every way, including her choice of foods. She loves uni.
Through the couch cushion, I feel Ada stiffen as though she’s preparing to spring into action. I’m not surprised. The topic my uncle hit upon is Ada’s pet peeve.
“It’s not invasive at all,” she says, her tone veering dangerously close to patronizing territory. “Nina is getting the safest neural interface of its kind. By not requiring the opening of the skull, as other similar technologies do, we avoid the risk of infection, not to mention leakage of cerebrospinal fluids—”
“This isn’t the first time someone’s tried to work directly with the brain,” I interject before Ada can smack my uncle with a technical treatise. “Parkinson’s and epilepsy patients already receive special brain pacemakers. Other products on the market—like retinal implants, for instance—allow the blind to regain some rudimentary sight, and cochlear implants allow the deaf to hear. Some implants turn thoughts into computer commands so quadriplegic patients can control their prosthetic limbs. Brainocytes can replace all these brain-implanted devices and, as Ada was saying, in a much safer way.”
“I understand,” Uncle Abe says, but his tone makes me doubt that he actually does.
Pretending I’m still explaining things to him, I continue for the benefit of Mom’s failing memory. “The Brainocytes are the hardware. They’ll lodge themselves all over Mom’s brain, and once that’s done, we can use the right software”—I incline my head toward Ada, acknowledging her key role in the creation of the necessary apps and interfaces—“to treat Mom’s condition by stimulating the correct neurons in the carefully selected portions of her brain, all with the aid of external supercomputers. The idea is to simulate brain regions to supplement any missing functionality in the heavily damaged parts.”
Ada sighs, and under her breath, she murmurs something along the lines of, “So this is how much you have to dumb things down for investors?”
“Sorry.” I gently poke Ada with my elbow. “Do you want to take a stab at explaining Phase One to my uncle? I’m sure you can go over it without insulting anyone’s intelligence.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” Ada says, “especially since Phase One is very easy to explain. We’ll primarily be working with neurons responsible for vision, specifically the ones within the ventral stream. My Augmented Reality Information Overlay suite of services will evoke Einstein’s API—”
Uncle Abe chuckles, interrupting Ada, and even Mom’s eyes appear glazed over. Despite all of Ada’s prodigious cognitive abilities, adjusting to her audience isn’t her strong suit.
Sighing in defeat, Ada says, “Why don’t you have a go at it, Mike? Meanwhile, I’ll make myself useful by checking the monitors.”
She gets up and trudges to the other side of the room.
Unpeeling my eyes from the tightness of Ada’s black jeans, I say, “Ada had one thing right. Phase One is really simple to explain, especially in comparison to the other stages. In a nutshell, you’ll see text boxes hanging in the air, like thought bubbles in cartoon
s or dialog in comic books. These notes will be provided to you by an advanced artificial intelligence called Einstein, which is like Siri in your phone”—I look at Mom—“or Cortana in yours”—I look at my uncle—“only a thousand times more versatile and way smarter. By the way, Mom, Einstein was designed by my friend Mitya. You remember him, right?”
“Yes, I do,” Mom says in Russian, and I see the grateful smile she adopts when her memory works like it should. “He’s such a good boy and a wunderkind to boot.”
“If you say so,” I say, feeling a pang of jealousy at my mom’s unabashed admiration for my friend. Though she thinks very highly of my mental capabilities, Mom is biased toward people whose work results in actual products. She calls them “doers.” As a result, she admires software wizards like Ada and Mitya, since she can see the apps they write. Because I merely invest money in companies, I’m not a doer and thus don’t make her as proud. Never mind that without me, a lot of doers wouldn’t get their ideas into the market at all.
“You didn’t see the debauchery your good boy Mitya partook in at MIT,” I tell her, then stop, realizing I almost incriminated myself. Mom might correctly deduce that as Mitya’s former roommate, I was also involved in said debauchery.
“Everyone does something stupid in American colleges,” Mom says, not missing a chance to brag about her personal experience with this venerable institution. “Now can we please get back to explaining what’s happening in my head?”
“Right,” I say. “At first, you’ll have extra information about everything around you, consisting mostly of notes on new people you meet or new places you visit. It won’t be that different from me walking around with you, giving you reminders. Of course, we wouldn’t give you Brainocytes just for this phase, since special glasses or contact lenses can be used for this type of memory assist. Another company my fund’s invested in is actually aiming to do just that. But Phase Two takes things in a far more interesting direction, one that can only be achieved with Brainocytes.”
“We’re ready,” Ada says excitedly. “Just waiting for JC to join us.”
The door opens, and JC prances in.
“I always thought CEOs were like the devil,” Ada tells him. “I was just talking about you, and here you are.”
I inwardly smile. JC’s lucky Ada isn’t Russian, since the equivalent of “speak of the devil” in Russia is “remember the shit, and here it is.”
“Hello, Adeline,” JC says, using Ada’s full name as a small retaliation.
Ada hides her face behind the screen, but I can tell JC won this round. Ada hates her full name almost as much as she loves her nickname. The latter honors her namesake, the Countess of Lovelace. Ada Lovelace designed the first-ever algorithm for a mechanical computer that Charles Babbage was planning. The machine was called the Analytical Engine, but sadly, Babbage didn’t actually build it, so the historical Ada never saw her programs run on it.
JC ignores Ada and gives my mom a creepy smile that, combined with his red hair and rounded face, makes him look like a lecherous leprechaun. Well, the smile is creepy in my opinion. Mom glows in response, so as icky as it seems to me, she appears to like it. Again.
In his late forties or early fifties, JC is the oldest employee at Techno, a place where some people call me, a thirty-five-year-old guy, “sir.” But his age isn’t why JC is the CEO. He’s the CEO because he has an uncanny knack for motivating the people around him. JC’s weapon of choice is getting folks as excited about technology as he is, a technique that doesn’t work on Ada because she doesn’t think JC is excited enough—which, compared to her, he isn’t. I wonder if Ada would make a better CEO because of that. Not that she would want the job; she doesn’t like managing people. Just getting her to lead a team of super-bright software engineers was an epic effort that required bribes and pleading.
“Your name is JC, isn’t it?” Mom says.
“Yes. May I call you Nina, then?” JC walks up to her and touches her IV-free elbow.
“Please do,” Mom says.
Maybe it’s me, but her remembering him when she forgets most other people makes JC look smug, and I’m tempted to tell him my mom’s favorite saying about men: “To a Russian woman, a man needs to be only slightly more attractive than a gorilla.”
“Can we please start Phase One?” Ada asks.
Interesting. Ada interrupted this weird exchange. Maybe that means I’m seeing things that aren’t there? Ada is no expert when it comes to social interactions, but she isn’t rude. If she noticed older people flirting, she wouldn’t have intruded. She must not have picked up on the same vibes.
“If Nina is ready,” JC says, “I think that’s a great idea.”
“I’m ready,” Mom says.
JC nods at her solemnly and walks over to stand next to Ada.
I get up from the couch and join them.
“Okay, when I press this button”—Ada brushes her finger against the Enter key—“Phase One will begin.”
“Do it,” Mom says and closes her eyes.
Ada’s finger dramatically hovers above the key for one long moment. Then she presses the button with a flourish.
Chapter Four
Mom opens her eyes and blinks so fast I wonder if she’s trying to communicate in Morse code.
At first, the screen displays only static.
As Ada frantically types on the keyboard, the picture becomes clearer. Soon after, I see a ghostly outline of the room from Mom’s point of view.
“This part will be encrypted shortly,” Ada says to no one in particular. “For now, it’ll help us get an idea of what Nina sees.”
I make out shapes that correspond with the people in the room. Since this is Mom’s neural data we’re looking at, I half expect to look taller and handsomer—and maybe even have a halo over my head—but I’m just a shapeless blob, same as everyone else on the screen. I think that’s from our algorithms, though, and not my mom’s true perception of me.
The metadata shows up next to the shapes, just like the thought bubbles I expected. I don’t know about Mom, but I find these bubbles helpful. They make me recall the names of a few of the shyer engineers in the room.
Mom attempts to remove the brain-scanning contraption from her head as she looks around. Uncle Abe rushes in to help her. Some of the nearby monitors go berserk, but no one seems worried about it.
“This is so weird.” She waves her hand next to where her brother’s nametag data must be. “I feel like the Terminator.”
Uncle Abe helps Mom gain a greater range of motion by removing more monitoring equipment.
“Can I change what these subtitles say?” Mom asks after a few seconds. “Can some of them be in Russian?”
“You’ll have to learn how to use the mental computer interface first,” Ada says. “That’s something we’ll work on for the rest of the day.” When Mom frowns, she adds, “If you want to change a couple of them manually right now, you can. In fact, it’ll give us a small head start since we were going to have you type on a keyboard during the interface portion anyway. Let’s remove that IV and the rest of the gear so you can be more comfortable.”
“I’ll go get the nurse,” Uncle Abe says. “It’s safe to take all this stuff off, right?”
“Quite safe,” JC says. “Most of that equipment is meant to collect data for us, but we have a dozen more subjects to go. We’d need to remove all those devices to take the brain scans in a few minutes anyway. Besides, the Brainocytes are now collecting the most important data.”
When my uncle leaves, Ada tells Mom, “We’ll teach you how to keep your Einstein database up to date. It uses face and voice recognition technology, and it’ll know when you meet someone for the first time. From there, you’ll learn how to store a new person’s information. Relatedly, for future phases of your treatment, your Brainocytes will start monitoring your brain activity at crucial moments, such as when you interact with people you know well. Should your condition worsen, the Brainocytes will he
lp your brain by recreating these healthier brain states when you meet that person again.”
“She means you won’t just see text, but also feel the right feelings,” I chime in.
The door opens, and the nurse, Olga, lumbers in, followed by my uncle.
She frees Mom from the IV, the blood pressure monitor, and all the other medical equipment. With a lack of curiosity bordering on the pathological, the nurse once again leaves the room.
Mom shuffles over to the monitor.
“Here,” JC says. “Touch the text box you want to edit and type in your custom information.”
“Wait,” Ada says. “If she’s going to use the keyboard anyway, why don’t I start the BCI learning algorithm?”
“We won’t gain much by capturing these few keystrokes,” JC says, “but go ahead if you want.”
Ada’s fingers dance over the keyboard, something pings, and she gives Mom a thumbs-up.
Mom proceeds to edit the metadata bubbles.
“That’s not funny,” Uncle Abe says when he sees the bubble she changed above my head. She replaced “Mike Cohen” with Russian text that roughly translates to, “Dear self. If you ever need this reminder and can no longer recognize Misha, your only son, it’s best for everyone if you arrange for yourself to be euthanized.”
Above Uncle Abe’s head is something similar.
After I read JC’s bubble, which says, “Interesting young man,” I realize we’re literally intruding on Mom’s private thoughts.
“When will you turn on the encryption?” I ask Ada.
“Now, actually,” Ada says and presses a few keys. When the feed from Mom’s vision goes static, she adds, “The data going to Einstein and other servers was already encrypted, so there’s nothing to do there.”
“You didn’t have to do that,” Mom says. “If I need to sacrifice my privacy to help with the study, I’m more than happy to do so.”
JC and Ada exchange looks. I strong-armed everyone into letting Mom into the study because she’s my mom, but I also knew she’d make an outstanding participant—as her willingness to let us spy on her demonstrates. Not that I would’ve done anything differently had she been the worst patient in the world; when it comes to Mom, filial loyalty trumps all.