“Twenty characters.” Horatio added, “Related to war.”
“But war with your enemies, not mine, with your weapons, not Shakespeare’s.” Hamlet finished heavily, “And it has spaces in it, and it comes from The Tempest.”
Horatio gaped. “Why?”
“Look at how many events point to The Tempest. It’s the one play omitted from Access and from my memory. You bought it for Paulette; she was killed.” He smiled cynically.
“And Fate provided a tempest.”
“Until that level, security set up expectations of regularity, hiding the final password better than any irregularity. The final password makes no sense at all until you know the reason for the project.”
Horatio said, “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Think: globe, war, smiting sledded Polacks—that’s a little free, but I understand. All ending with one very final password.” Hamlet typed quickly, and stepped back so that Horatio could read it:
“THE CLOUD-CAPPED TOWERS.”
The screen flashed a brilliant white, then filled with orange-red mushroom clouds boiling up in blinding color and vanishing into the previous clouds. At the bottom of the screen, a few text lines said simply in black that sent out shadows from the screen,
“THE GREAT GLOBE ITSELF, YEA, ALL WHICH IT INHERITS, SHALL DISSOLVE, AND LEAVE NOT A RACK BEHIND.”
And the cloud-capped towers rose and billowed.
They watched, frozen, as the fireballs illuminated the backstage. When the flashes ended, the abstract came up. It was written by Peter Capek.
“THE CLOUD-CAPPED TOWERS PROJECT, FORMERLY THE SECOND HAMLET PROJECT, WILL PROVIDE VITAL MEDICAL INFORMATION TO DEFENSE AND CIVIL DEFENSE RESEARCHERS.”
“Why the second?” Horatio looked uncertainly at the screen, afraid of the answer.
“You were right that my name was an apt password, but it had associations too apt for secrecy. Hamlet was the name for the largest atomic bomb in the kiloton range.” Hamlet finished, “I learned that on Access and had a clue to the nature of this project.” Hamlet hit “Return.”
“DIRECTORY,”
the screen said.
“PROJECT SCHEDULE.
RAD EXPOSURE AND RELATED TRAUMAS.
TABLE OF SUNSHINE UNITS.
AUTOPSY METHODS.
PROJECTED SCHEDULE FOR COMPLETION.”
“Aren’t you glad we’re watching a screen?” Hamlet touched a key and brought up “Radiation exposure and related trauma.”
“Can you imagine being in the midst of these things?”
The next screen came up.
“Initial model synthetics will undergo simple experiments. Some will be fed plutonium, others will be bombarded with external radiation. A few will be left as controls, their reactions to illnesses studied by psychologists and psychosimulas.
“Initial radiation dosages should be minimal until the synthetics’ reactions are human-analogous. Only the highest level of human-analogous correlation (HAC ≥ 8.5) will be acceptable for more complex experiments.”
“No wonder most of you couldn’t really act.” Horatio was watching Hamlet’s face. “Average humans can’t act, either. They wanted you human and used Shakespeare characters as ideal starting points.”
“They used the world’s best-drawn humans as models.” Hamlet touched the keypad, scrolling the text upward. “And they wanted us acting and thinking around death as much as possible—something Shakespeare did for us. Read on.”
The abstract went on.
“Testing should measure confusion and disorientation as well as disability. On no account should testing be initiated on the more advanced synthetics until it is determined that they are stable. They are benchmarks for higher HAC levels.”
Horatio said, “That’s why Goode tried to make your deaths seem accidental. We could seem unstable and worth terminating, but we weren’t supposed to die yet.”
Hamlet turned to look at him. “‘We?’”
They read plan after plan: plutonium ingestion (a cigarette lit by Barnardo in a modern production); radiation burns (the flylight); and radiation-induced leukemia (Osric’s quarters, which held too large a dose for Gertrude’s slippers).
There was even a section on simulating fatalities in the ghost before trying them on a full-scale synthetic. (The radium glow and physical side effects; the ghost’s system was more complex than Hamlet and Horatio had realized.) The text called the androids “synthetics.”
“The synthetics as a group will test mass response to acute interpersonal suffering. Where the synthetics’ direct responses will show their range of emotions, their indirect behavior (including theater production values) should show their understanding of and empathy for pain, misery, despair, and death.
“The Thanatos System will keep them aware of death, but should also provide pleasure stimuli, enhancing life with death.”
Horatio muttered, “‘The nightmare death-in-life.’
Hamlet touched the screen shakily. “What next?”
Next was a feasibility study for the next level of Thanatos testing—on criminals, immigrants, Greenhouse Poolsiders—subheaded, “the disenfranchised, the intransigent, and the terminally impoverished.”
The proposal concluded diplomatically,
“No group within a democratic society should be dismissed as non-representative or impractical for study. Probably, however, geographically, economically, morally, and politically isolated groups would be the least objectionable subjects.”
Horatio turned away from the screen. “It’s monstrous.”
“Such a small step between killing androids and killing humans—but now it’s monstrous.” Hamlet looked bitterly at Horatio. “Et tu.”
Before Horatio could deny or apologize, Hamlet added thoughtfully, “Still, that suggests how urgent this project is.” He touched another file name:
“FINAL.”
The schedule had Julian deci-dates in the new system, three digits of the year and three showing the day of the year. Within two years, the Globe would move to Nevada, to a nominally abandoned testing site for nuclear weapons. Within two and a half years, there would be over a thousand synthetic humans there.
Within three years there would only be fifty.
Subheadings showed estimated causes of attrition: flash burns, radiation sickness, starvation, typhoid and sanitation diseases, cannibalism, violence, suicide—
Hamlet looked up. “You could have made surgeons.” His voice was flat and weary. “You could have made priests. You could have made meat and gnashed us raw and trembling.
“Instead you made us. Test animals. Scapegoats. Murderable muck. God!” Tears leaked from his eyes now, “Couldn’t you at least have hated us?”
There was nothing Horatio could say. He tried anyway. “My lord, the Teks are only a few of us.”
“And a few are not all, and many are not all, and most are not all. A majority chose your leaders. Who chose?”
They read on. The postscript to “FINAL” was succinct:
“Ultimately, Thanatos chips would be slot-loaded into all survivors of a polynuclear exchange, instantly adjusting them to catastrophic physical and social change.”
Horatio read it twice. “That’s it? That’s what Thanatos is?”
“A means to deal with what you won’t avoid, yes. Look at this.” Hamlet pointed to a cautionary note, ringed in colors and set off with stars, in the schedule.
Horatio bent to read it:
“It is imperative that this project be completed by the beginning of 2050, when it will be needed after a hostility-free polynuclear pre-engagement.”
Horatio read it again. “Data will be needed then?”
“Meaning, the Thanatos System will be slot-loaded into human survivors of a war.”
“Capek knew the date. How could he—”
“How do you think?”
“Our side is starting a war, five years from now?”
“Five good years, I hop
e,” Hamlet said acidly.
“This is impossible.”
“So are unicorns. Your people have made one.”
“It’s immoral.”
“Perhaps that made it more attractive.”
“They can’t do this.”
“Then stop them.” Hamlet grabbed Horatio hard enough to hurt him. “For your people and mine.”
Horatio stared. “Me? Alone?”
“Yes, alone—no. Not quite. You’11 work with someone you can trust, who has all the data and files from this project. You can bribe Thibodeaux to help you—yes, I know you worked for him.”
Horatio asked desperately, “Who? How?”
Hamlet said only, “You’ll know when you meet your help. I can’t tell you aloud. I don’t trust your world.” He stroked the red curtain, watching the dust swirl from it. “But I’ve loved it.”
He added absently, “Goode has called a special rehearsal since I suggested the modern-dress production. He wants to go over the fencing scene.”
Horatio said, not realizing how far his diction had slipped into the play, “My lord, I like this not.”
Hamlet smiled at him. “I liked it quite well.”
“You know Laertes bears a venomed heart.”
Hamlet looked him in the eye and said, “Who cares?” Hamlet added, “Are you back out of verse? That’s better.”
Horatio said, “But Goode tried to kill us—and he killed Capek, remember?”
“He thinks he’s already killed me. And this afternoon Claudius will kill me, and I Laertes. We always do.”
“I’m not just worried about Goode,” Horatio said slowly. “What do you remember from just after the last show?”
Hamlet nodded. “Everything. But this time I’ll be in control of myself. There will be no surprises for me.”
“Something could go wrong.” Horatio said, “My lord, why did you once say entropy was an elephant?”
Hamlet smiled, remembering their wine-soaked conversation on the roof. “Entropy is a fatal form of chance. It is heavy, and it weighs on one.”
“I thought so. Remember, Lord, things can happen more quickly than you can plan for them.”
“That’s what live theater’s all about.” But Hamlet’s smile faded. “We really do defy augury, and reality outstrips predictions. Best we not second-guess ourselves.” He smiled. “We can’t let the Curse of Consciousness keep us from acting at all.”
He left, looking happy.
But Horatio worried and knew that he was right to.
* * * * *
After leaving the stage, Hamlet walked quickly to the room in the hall and said, “‘Whoever hath her wish—’”
He spoke carefully and rapidly for ten minutes. When he left the room, he was still smiling, though not happy.
38
The cast assembled on stage in modern dress. The current fashion of tunics, tights, and capes gave an eerie fitness to a modern dress production. Goode, standing by a scowling Laertes, seemed to be another cast member. He said to Hamlet, “You’ll rehearse the fencing scene?”
Hamlet nodded. “We will. First I wanted to show you a new idea for the ‘Mousetrap’ scene.”
“The ‘Mousetrap?’” Goode looked honestly confused.
Claudius smiled tolerantly and said from his throne, “The players’ performance in Act Three. They reveal Hamlet’s knowledge of his father’s murder. The murderer, recognizing that knowledge, is frightened into action.” Claudius looked suddenly thoughtful.
“Ah.” Goode looked at Hamlet. “What is this new idea?”
“Let me show you.”
Gertrude said quickly, “We can’t do that, Hamlet. I threw out the lab jackets—”
Hamlet, talking into his fist, said, “Theater Access.”
The voice that answered was resigned and amused—far too lively for the usual flat drudge.
Goode’s head snapped up. “Who was that?”
Hamlet ignored him. “Costumes, ‘Mousetrap’ scene.”
The entire cast were suddenly in shimmering lab coats. Goode stared at Hamlet unbelievingly.
Hamlet clapped his hands. “Places.”
The entire cast moved to either side of the stage, Gertrude last. She held her arms out in her simula lab coat. “Alan, I’m so sorry.”
Goode ignored her.
The stage was empty. Hamlet said to his hand, “Access. Enact ‘Mousetrap,’ dumb show.”
* * * * *
A simula of Capek appeared at a simula bench full of Chem-Tek. Goode snapped, “Access terminate.”
Capek looked up in confusion, then back down. The lively new voice of Access said, “System override.”
A simula of Goode appeared across the stage, watching Capek on a simula wallscreen. Simulas of Eric and Billy joined Goode. The three spoke earnestly and soundlessly. Billy looked innocently eager.
The real Goode licked his lips and finally said, “Whoever hath her wish—”
“Has nothing,” Will Shakespeare answered. “System override and password change. The would-be biter bit, Doctor.”
Goode stared at Hamlet and whispered, frightened for the first time, “How did you learn all this?”
Hamlet waved back at the stage. “Don’t miss the good part.” Freddy’s Access ring shone on his hand.
A second simula of Capek, shimmering and transparent, conferred with the simulas of Goode and Eric. Eric slid a chip into Billy’s head, then placed a metal band over Billy’s head and—very carefully—a moistened glove on his right hand.
Billy walked, unlimping and mechanically, into a simula corridor and entered Capek’s lab.
Capek looked up in surprise. Billy, blank-eyed, slapped the glove against Capek’s left ear. The shell of the ear became moist. Capek, his eyes wide, stood, tottered, and died in slow and meaningless motion on the floor.
Billy walked back and sat blankly as the simulas of Eric and Goode conferred with Capek, then spoke to a wallscreen.
William Shakespeare appeared on the screen, spoke to the other simulas for a moment, then replayed the death scene for them in the lab—erasing Billy’s presence. Capek appeared to die by accident.
The simulas and lab coats vanished. Hamlet said in the silence, “Does the staging seem realistic?”
Goode nodded dumbly.
“I have a problem with it—a question of motivation. The murder, clearly, is corporate, and was executed by a man who didn’t know what he was doing. If something goes wrong and there is physical evidence of a murder, the police can be provided with a physical murderer who doesn’t even know he did it.”
Goode nodded again. Hamlet went on, “And you’ll tell me that the murder is not anyone’s fault, since it was a corporate decision, planned by thinkware, executed by the head of security and the highest FirstTek in this—in the lab we’re portraying.”
Gertrude said loudly, “This is in poor taste.” No one paid any attention.
“My question,” Hamlet said, “is this: even if a corporation, thinkware and all, requests a crime, individuals consent to it. Why would they? Jealousy, hatred, lust, of simple desire for power? In modern terms, no motive seems enough.”
Goode said quietly, “You don’t know another motive?”
“Yes.” Hamlet strolled to the center of the stage and said, as if to an audience, “What if the HeadTek, unknown to his people, had planned something monstrous—had set the plan in motion—” His voice shook. “And found funds for it and executed it, only to retreat from it in horror after it was nearly in place? What if the only way to silence him was to kill him, seemingly by accident?” He turned to Goode. “That’s a corporate motive that people who want and need jobs could accept.”
Goode, unmoving, said, “I have a better motive. Whatever the corporate motive, what if a man thought that, by killing the victim, he could save many others by ending the plans quietly? What if he thought there was a way to bring great good from the project, if only its original intent were kept secret. What if
he, by the murder, became head of the victim’s project and could see that that was done?”
Horatio watched them both. They might have been discussing a story from EZNews.
Hamlet answered, “Once a murderer usurps a victim’s crown, he discovers that he can no more stop the old king’s plans than he can stop the tide during a storm.”
Hamlet’s voice had wonder in it. “A plan is like thinkware; it says ‘go’ and we go. It says ‘kill’ and we kill. It says ‘lie, destroy, obey me,’ and we do. And all the while—” Hamlet looked about him now, at the preparations for the final act—“we could, if we but recognized the dominance of plan over will, know where we would end.”
He turned back to Goode. “Knowing that would change nothing, and the knowledge would be tragic. How does my interpretation strike you?”
Hamlet rolled up his sleeve, revealing his bruises from Hurricane Medea the night before.
After a moment, Goode nodded. “Bravo.” His voice was free of trembling, completely without regret. “Your play within a play is accurate, and you are quite right about how the murderer ends up. If I were you, I would add that once the murderer sees the plan, he realizes the necessity of the victim’s actions—whatever disappointment a highly moral Hamlet feels in the victim. If I were the director,” Goode said, “I would make it clear that the plan must continue.”
Hamlet said, “I would die first.”
Goode lifted the goblet from the props table, turning it in his hands. “I imagine you would.” He moved to the throne platform. “I’ll watch from up here.”
“You can have my chair,” Gertrude said, smiling. “I have to be down here for the blocking.” She was glad that Hamlet and Goode had made up.
Hamlet said to Goode, “Why not? Time on a throne—”
“Seems appropriate.” Goode smiled, sitting at his ease beside Claudius. He raised a hand. “Long live the king.”
Hamlet bowed and took his place in the fencing scene.
* * * * *
The scene was tense, as always: there was a poisoned foil, and a poisoned cup, and the moment when Laertes realized that Hamlet was too good a swordsman even to be touched, let alone defeated. Hamlet glanced up at Goode as Gertrude drank from the cup. Goode was expressionless, and Hamlet returned with relief to the action.
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