Craig grinned, acquiescing. “Okay. I’m ready.”
“All right,” she said as she held her small tricorder in front of Craig and watched the screen for information on the progress of the tiny, robotic red blood cells that were now flowing through his veins. “Hit it.”
Craig inhaled and then began holding his breath.
“You didn’t have to inhale,” the doctor observed.
Craig’s eyes darted to her questioningly.
“Just let it out nice and slow, but don’t inhale again when you’re finished.”
Against all of his instincts, Craig began to let out his breath nice and slowly, just as he had been instructed.
“You’re married, huh?” the doctor asked, apparently rhetorically. Craig nodded anyway. “That’s a shame. You’re way too handsome to be married. Handsome young doctors like you should be single. Then single doctors like me could marry you instead.”
Craig’s eyebrows rose in surprise at the forward come-on, but there was something about the young woman’s demeanor that seemed to make it innocent enough. He took it as a compliment and smiled.
“You feel that?” the doctor asked him.
Craig wasn’t sure what she was referring to. His first instinct was that her forwardness was starting to cross a boundary. Just as he was going to speak, ruining the Freitas test for the sake of politely cooling the woman’s jets, she spoke again.
“No shortness of breath. You could keep this up for four hours before you’d need to take another breath. Congratulations. You’re officially a super soldier.”
The notion of being a superhuman hadn’t crossed Craig’s mind until that moment. It was surreal. What she said was true: He’d felt no shortage of breath. Like most technological marvels, it was difficult for him to fully grasp it, so he just accepted it with a slightly marveled shake of his head.
“So what happens when they run out of air?” he asked.
“The respirocytes will...” She smiled again as she thought of the absurd euphemism bubbling to the surface. “...expel themselves.”
“Ah,” Craig replied.
“You can get up now.”
Craig sat up as the doctor uploaded her results onto a larger wall screen behind the small bed. “Thanks. That was...different.”
She smiled. “Now you can tell your wife she’s doing good work. The fruits of her labor are breathing for you. When you’re ready, just start breathing again and the respirocytes will shut down.”
Craig nodded and smiled sideways. “I will.” He turned to leave but turned back quickly on a whim. “Hey, what’s your name?”
The doctor replied, “Daniella. It was nice to meet you, Dr. Emilson.”
2
Craig walked quickly—nearly running—toward his bachelor’s officer barracks as he pulled his phone from his pocket and began dialing the number of his wife’s laboratory. As he crossed the threshold into his room, the phone was already ringing. He slipped the phone into the ultrasonic dock that sat upon a modest wooden table and pulled his hardback chair over so he could sit. He waited eagerly for his wife’s answer. “Come on,” he whispered to himself.
“Hello?” his wife’s voice finally spoke. His heart soared.
“Sam! I was worried there—”
“I never miss a call when we schedule it, baby, and I never will,” she replied soothingly.
“I still couldn’t help worrying.”
The irony of Craig’s words weren’t lost on Samantha Emilson. “I think I’m the one who’s supposed to be in a constant state of worry.”
“There’s nothing to worry about,” Craig replied, almost too quickly. “How’s your day going?”
Samantha wasn’t oblivious to her husband’s clumsy attempt to change the subject, but she decided to let it go for the moment. “The feds were here again,” she replied, her aggravation clearly audible. “That’s three weeks in a row now.”
“Did they copy all your files again?”
“Yeah,” she replied resignedly. “Every day they come in here, we spend the whole day being ordered around, showing them the same things we showed them the week before. It’s getting impossible to accomplish anything with them around.”
“You’re getting things accomplished, all right,” Craig replied.
“What makes you say that?”
“Well, for starters, I’ve got respirocytes in me as we speak.”
There was silence on the line for a few moments before Samantha’s holographic image suddenly appeared, her face and shoulders hovering above Craig’s phone in crisp detail, interrupted only occasionally by the interference in the atmosphere. “Are you...serious?” she asked, her eyes unblinking.
Craig pressed the red ACCEPT button on his phone so his wife could see him too. He nodded sincerely. “I can hold my breath for four hours apparently.”
“I can’t believe it!” Samantha replied, astonished as she held her hand up over her face. “It’s real? They’re really using them in the field?”
“Well, you knew that already,” Craig said, smiling.
“I did, but...well, it’s different when you’re not limited to test subjects anymore—when it’s someone you know. It’s amazing to think they’re really out there.”
“They are.”
“I have to tell Aldous,” Samantha suddenly blurted, instantly jarring the smile loose from Craig’s face.
“Aldous? Since when are you and old man Gibson on a first-name basis?”
Samantha’s attention snapped back onto the eyes of her husband. “I’ve worked in his lab for three years, Craig. I think it’s about time he finally asked me to stop calling him ‘Professor.’”
“I don’t like that,” Craig replied. “The way he looks at you—”
“Stop it, Craig. You’re being ridiculous. He’s a sixty-year-old man.”
“I still don’t like it.”
Samantha smiled. “You can’t possibly be jealous of a man twice your age, Craig.”
Craig’s train of thought changed as he looked into the eyes of his wife, so clear and bright that he felt as though they were right there next to him. In reality, hundreds of miles separated him from Sam, and that distance would be far greater in just a few hours. “I’m sorry. You’re right. I don’t know what I’m thinking.”
“I’m sure you have a lot on your mind,” Samantha replied understandingly. Her thoughts quickly moved to speculation, and her voice lowered. “Why did they give you respirocytes? Where are you going where you won’t be breathing?”
“You know I can’t tell you,” Craig replied.
Samantha quickly began putting the equation together in her mind. “Wait a second. They’re not sending you into fallout, are they?”
“Sam—”
She could read him like a book. “Oh my God! No! Craig, no! Tell them you won’t go!”
“They don’t exactly ask.”
“You can’t go! Respirocytes aren’t going to save you in there!”
“Sammie, baby—”
“Don’t ‘baby’ me, Craig! I’m not a child!”
“I know, but sweetheart, listen—”
“What can you possibly say that will make me okay with you heading into nuclear fallout?”
“I never said where I’m headed,” Craig began, “and I promise that you don’t know the kinds of precautions that are being taken. You and Aldous aren’t the only scientists inventing new tech for this war, you know.”
“This shouldn’t be happening, Craig,” Samantha replied, her disapproval cemented. “We don’t support this war. We don’t support this ridiculous Luddite government. I’m sick of this! You shouldn’t be there.”
“I’m here to help people, Sammie,” Craig replied. “I’m not brilliant like you.”
“Not brilliant? Craig, you’re a doctor!” Samantha retorted, nearly aghast at her husband’s self-diminishment.
“But I don’t have your inventive mind,” Craig continued patiently. “I can’t help the world
the way you can. I can’t help the whole world with brilliant inventions. I can only hope to use the technology people like you invent to save one soldier at a time. That’s the only way my life can be meaningful—like yours.”
“This is wrong,” Samantha answered, holding her head in her hands. This was how almost every conversation ended ever since Craig had enlisted. Tears were forming in her eyes as she became further exasperated. “Risking your life for a mistake won’t give your life meaning. Competing with me won’t give your life meaning.”
Craig was at a loss for a moment. His wife had never openly acknowledged what they both knew: They were in competition with one another. Ever since they’d met in their first year at university, they’d raced against each other toward an invisible finish line, with Samantha always seeming to be the inevitable winner. Now, Craig feared he was racing toward a cliff. “This mission is important, Sammie. If it’s successful, this war will be over a lot sooner than the world thinks.”
“It’s insane,” was all his wife could reply, her eyes still lowered.
“Sammie, put the ultrasonic on.”
“My battery is too low,” she protested.
“It doesn’t matter. I have to go now anyway. Just put it on, Sammie.”
“Okay,” she replied, the earnestness in her husband’s voice compelling her to click the switch on the phone dock.
Immediately, there was a buzz on both ends of the conversation as the dock vibrated ever so lightly, but steadily on the table. Craig leaned in and cupped the back of his wife’s head, pulling her toward him and kissing her. It wasn’t a perfect kiss—there wasn’t a taste or any moistness to it—but the softness of the ultrasonic waves forming the shape of his wife’s lips as she kissed him was priceless. They kissed for nearly a minute, unwilling to end their physical contact before suddenly, without warning, Samantha’s battery gave out.
He leaned back in his hardback chair and stared into the empty place above the table where his wife’s visage had been only seconds earlier. “Bye, Sammie,” he whispered.
3
Craig walked across a sprawling hangar at Cannon Air Force Base in New Mexico, toward a waiting shuttle bus. As he neared the bus and began to raise his arm to salute the driver, a voice called to him from behind.
“Captain Emilson! Doc! The colonel wants to see you!”
Craig turned to the young airman and nodded. “Where?”
“I’ll take you to him.”
Minutes later, the young airman saluted the colonel as he delivered Craig to the door. Craig stepped in and saluted as well. The colonel waved the young airman away before motioning to Craig to come in. “At ease. Grab a seat, Doc.”
“Thank you, Colonel.” The colonel was sitting at a desk in a room so small that it appeared as though it may have been a converted supply closet; it was obvious that this was an impromptu conversation. The colonel was wearing augment glasses, reading something that was invisible to Craig.
“You wouldn’t believe the phone call I just got not five minutes ago,” the colonel began.
Craig listened intently but didn’t verbally respond; the colonel’s demeanor was deceptively casual, but it was a casualness that only went one way and was meant to demonstrate his power.
“None other than the chairman of the Joint Chiefs. And do you know who he wanted to talk to me about?”
Craig’s eyebrow rose inquisitively, but he remained silent.
“You! How about that? The Joint Chiefs are about to assemble in the situation room below Mount Weather, and they’re all talking about you. You wanna know why you’re the topic of conversation, Doc?”
“Yes, sir,” Craig replied.
“See if this rings a bell,” Colonel Paine replied as his eye went back to the projection from his aug glasses. He tilted his head forward to select something and then began reading: “We don’t support this war. We don’t support this ridiculous Luddite government. I’m sick of this. You shouldn’t be there.”
“Holy—”
“Yeah,” Colonel Paine nodded.
“That wasn’t twenty minutes ago—”
“Intelligent algorithms. Our Luddite government likes to use them so we can identify any interesting tidbits that might come up in a conversation.”
Craig didn’t know how to respond. He wanted to deny the assertion that he thought the United States government was Luddite, but he couldn’t find the appropriate words. It didn’t matter—Colonel Paine was on a roll.
“Your wife is pretty damned accomplished. A PhD when she was only twenty-six, recruited by the top nanotech lab in the country for her post-doc. But you’re no slouch yourself, Doc. You made it into med school before the world ended, back when it still meant something. You two are a couple of smart ones, all right. I bet you even think you’re smarter than your commanding officer.”
Again, Craig desperately wanted to reply. He shifted in his chair, his mouth forming the shapes of words, but he didn’t have time to settle on which ones to say before Paine went on.
“Have you ever looked up my file, Doc? No? Shoot. You’d think you’d look up the file of your C.O. If you had looked me up, you’d know I’m a Rhodes Scholar.”
“That’s impressive, sir. I didn’t know that.” Finally...words.
“Back when it meant something,” the colonel repeated.
Craig nodded in understanding.
“So now that you know you’re not being addressed by a Luddite idiot, let me explain something to you.” Paine pulled out his sidearm and held the gun up for Craig to see. “They teach you anything about game theory in medical school, Doc?”
Craig shook his head.
“Then you’ve never heard of Nash’s equilibrium?”
“No, sir.”
“Okay. Now we’re in business—there’s something I can teach you. In game theory, every scenario is broken down into a mathematical equation, and the entities in the game—whether they be individuals or whole countries—are assumed to be rational. You follow me so far, Doc?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Let me give you an example. Say you and I are gunfighters in the Old West. It’s high noon.” Paine wiggled the gun in his hand and looked at it, almost adoringly. “We’ve got a beef to settle, so there we are, in the middle of the town, dust blowing up around us. Somebody is going to die. That’s a given. Know why?”
“No, sir.”
“It’s simple, Doc. People who are rational always act in their own best interest. Let’s put some numbers to it. Let’s say you’re making up your mind about whether or not to draw your gun and shoot. You could just keep it holstered. If I keep mine holstered too, then our chance of survival is going to be 100 percent. Great, right? We could just walk away and call it a day.” Paine shook his head. “The only problem is, that’s a heck of a gamble, ain’t it? I mean, what if you decide to keep your gun holstered and then I pull out mine anyway?” Paine aimed his firearm directly at Craig’s forehead. “Your chances of survival just dropped dramatically. In fact, since I’m a dead shot, I’d have to say they’re damn near zero.” The colonel leaned back in his chair. “So, what are you going to do?”
“I’ve got to shoot,” Craig replied, swallowing as he did so.
Paine smiled. “That’s right, Doc. And why is that?”
“If I shoot, chances are 50/50 that I’ll survive. Beats zero, sir.”
“Well, you are a smart son of a gun.” Paine sat back in his chair and lowered his weapon. “Let’s change the equation a little bit, shall we? Let’s say that instead of guns, we’re holding nuclear weapons on each other. Instead of a fraction of a second for a bullet to hit our enemy, it will take several minutes. If you fire, the other player knows it and fires back. Both of you have a zero percent chance of survival. You know this scenario. It’s called mutually assured destruction, and it has held from the time Russia first got themselves a nuke back in 1948. No matter how afraid we got that nuclear war was going to happen tomorrow, in truth, we were alw
ays safe, because nobody wanted to start a war that would end with everyone dead.” Paine held his gun up and trained it on Craig’s forehead once again. This time there was something in the colonel’s eye that unnerved Craig. The killer inside emerged from his eyes as they fixed, hard and unmoving, upon Craig’s. “But let’s say someone—or something—found a way around mutually assured destruction. Let’s say Nash’s equilibrium went straight out the window. That happened once in history. The good ol‘ United States of America had a bomb and no one else did—and we used it...twice.” Paine’s tone became even colder as he spoke. “If I’m China, sitting here with an A.I. that can circumvent Nash’s equilibrium, and you’re the USA, sitting there holding yourself, what are you gonna do?”
“Whatever you say, sir.”
Paine’s face instantly went pale at the thought. After a moment of reflection, he sat back in his seat and lowered his weapon. “Not in this life, Doc. The USA will never do what anyone tells them—or at least that’s how our President looked upon the situation.” He crossed his arms and cocked his head slightly to the right. “I wonder how things would have shaken out had your wife been President.”
Craig kept his composure. He didn’t like having his wife brought into the conversation, but he also knew the stakes were high. If Paine was telling the truth, the Joint Chiefs of Staff had him and Samantha on their radar—and that was a place one never wanted to be.
“Now,” Paine continued, “I do read the files of every man under my command. I’ve read yours. It’s impressive. You’re a doctor, automatically an officer with the rank of captain. You could have hidden away in a military hospital, but instead you trained for Special Forces assignment. You’re a veteran of ten HALO jumps, one from 50,000 feet.” Paine paused, and his eyes met Craig’s. “Balls. You’re the most qualified man the Air Force currently has in combat S.A. Now, I didn’t know what the hell ‘combat S.A.’ is, so I had to look it up. That wasn’t easy, given its secret status, but hell, if I wasn’t gobsmacked to find out it stands for ‘suspended animation.’ I’m gonna assume you used your wife’s connections in DARPA to get yourself in on that.”
Post-Human Trilogy Page 2