Faster

by Alex Schuler

  She led him down the hallway, surprised to find her palms sweaty as she gripped the wine bottle. Her mother could have followed her to the door to greet Ted, but she knew her mom would prefer that he come to her. Everything was a power play with Catherine. Sam stopped at the entrance to the kitchen and took his hand before stepping inside.

  “Everyone?” she said. “This is Ted.”

  Dani, her fingers covered in frosting, looked up, smiled, and waved. Catherine was busy brushing rolls with butter and sage, her back to the doorway. She spent a few moments finishing up before sliding them into the oven. She slowly turned around and gave Ted a detailed inspection from top to bottom.

  “Hi,” he said. “Nice to meet you.”

  Catherine wiped her hands across her apron and walked over to them with her hand outstretched for a rather formal handshake. Sam passed the bottle of wine to her mother, saying, “Ted brought this.”

  Catherine glanced at the bottle and frowned. She said, “A merlot? We’re having turkey. I prefer a crisp white wine myself. No worries, I have plenty of bottles in the wine cellar.”

  Sam groaned under her breath as her mother deposited his gift onto the counter, sliding it into a dark corner. She’d hoped her mother would start things off on a positive note, but it was obvious they had a long way to go. She looked up at him and tried to smile.

  “Really?” he replied. “I only drink red. I guess the merlot’s for me.”

  Catherine and Ted stared at one another for a long moment until Sam slid her arm around him and led him to the other side of the kitchen.

  “This is Dani,” she said. “Dani, this is my friend Ted I told you about.”

  “Hi!” Dani raised a cookie and passed it to him. “I made these.”

  “Hey, kid.” He took a bite of the cookie. “Thanks.”

  “Don’t spoil your appetite,” Catherine said. “We’ve got a lot of food to eat.”

  Sam tugged on Ted’s elbow, hoping to get him to back down from the power struggle she could feel brewing.

  “It smells great,” he said. “And your house is beautiful.”

  “I’ve worked hard to get where I am.” Catherine smiled as she turned off one of the ovens. “My Sam’s got greatness in her future, too. She’s brilliant.”

  “That she is.” He pulled her close and kissed the top of her head. “It’s the first thing I noticed about her. Well, that, and those dazzling eyes.”

  “You met at that desert competition, didn’t you?” Catherine asked. “DARPA?”

  “We did. The tech she spearheaded was groundbreaking.”

  “As was Ted’s,” Sam interjected.

  “Yes, well, wonderful that everyone is groundbreaking, isn’t it?” Catherine said with a plastered smile on her face. She turned and went to the fridge, removing a bottle of chardonnay. “Why don’t we all move to the dining room? We can start the first course.”

  Dinner went smoothly for the next two hours. The minute Ted starting raving about Catherine’s French onion soup, the tension in the room vanished. He told stories of the desert racing vehicles he’d helped design at Fisher Tuner. Catherine told Ted how she took a thousand dollars and turned it into a billion-dollar cosmetics company.

  Though she could sense the one-upmanships, Sam was somewhat relieved. By the time dessert was served, her mom seemed genuinely smitten with him, especially when he’d recounted their magical evening at Burning Man. As Catherine began pouring coffee, Sam realized she should never have doubted Ted and that “Wolff charm” he’d promised to bring.

  “So, tell me, Ted, what happens if this pizza challenge fails?” Catherine asked.

  “Oh, it won’t,” he replied. “Our testing’s going great.”

  “Always plan for the worst. That’s how I built my empire. I was always planning two to three moves ahead. Like chess.”

  “I’m more of a checkers kind of guy.”

  Sam sighed as she sliced herself a piece of cherry pie, sensing round two of the tension coming. She chimed in, “Ted’s right, Mom. We’ll figure this out. Aren’t you the one always telling me that positive thoughts lead to positive results?”

  “True, but–”

  “To answer your question, Ms. Lavoie—”

  “Catherine, please.”

  “To answer your question, Catherine, I haven’t given not completing the delivery much thought. Even if something goes wrong, the national attention will open up opportunities. Someone will want our technology.”

  “Isn’t that what the DARPA competition was supposed to do?” Catherine clasped her hands and leaned forward. “I thought your big trip to Detroit with my daughter was going to change the world?”

  He winced. That was a low one but he recovered quickly enough. “This time will be different,” he said.

  “There are no guarantees in life.” Catherine stood up and walked over to Dani, whose lips were smothered in bits of frosting. She put her arm around her granddaughter and kissed the top of her head. “You never know what God has planned for you.”

  Sam felt her cheeks get flush. Was her mother really using Dani as a pawn in this little mind game she was playing? She looked at Ted, worried his ego would only escalate the discussion.

  “And that’s what makes life so exciting,” he said. “The unknown.”

  “It sounds like you’re quite the risk taker,” Catherine replied.

  “I think that’s a fair statement.” He looked over at Sam and smiled. “But I think I’m doing a fair job of playing by the rules this time round. Sam’s grounded me.”

  “We’re a good team,” Sam added.

  “I’d never hurt your daughter.” He looked directly at Catherine and she did not back down. “I care for her too much.”

  27

  Fifty-year-old Matthew Grant, founder of GSI, had been born to mixed race parents in Detroit, Michigan. He was brought to an adoption agency by his mother when he was less than a year old. Fortunately for Matthew, however, it hadn’t taken him long to get a new home. He was raised just outside Ann Arbor by a nurturing family with three other adopted siblings, all older than him. An early growth spurt had his parents believing he’d end up in sports, but his passion had always been math and science. Quite successful now, Matthew strongly believed that success came with a strong responsibility to give back, which he did generously both personally and through his company.

  He stared at one of six fifty-inch screens mounted on the opposite wall from his desk in his office at GSI’s headquarters in Redwood City, California. The screens were stacked in two rows of three, their bezels firmly locked together. Normally, these screens were used to monitor multiple news sources and stocks, as well as real-time analytics on internal projects and company performance. However, on this day, Saturday, February 28, the center top screen was showing the local ABC station, as the rest of the monitors were black.

  “The day is finally here, Lisa.” Matthew leaned back in his chestnut leather executive chair and stretched his arms above his head. “Thanks again for coming in today.”

  “Are you kidding?” Lisa Phillips replied. “I wouldn’t miss this for the world.”

  Lisa Phillips, Matthew’s assistant, was an ambitious and dedicated twenty-nine-year-old who served as Matthew’s eyes and ears whenever he could not be present. Her energy and enthusiasm were the reasons he had hired her. Although she could have easily watched the historic broadcast from the comfort of her Redwood Oaks townhome, she couldn’t imagine sharing this experience with anyone but her boss.

  “I think this will be different than your time at DARPA,” he said.

  “You really should have come out with the team to the Mojave—especially that final challenge.”

  “That intense heat didn’t interest me. Besides, I knew I could count on you to cover the details for me. Your final report was, shall we say, most illumina
ting.”

  “What do you think? Will the pizza make it successfully to the radio studio?”

  “With Ashton and DSU working together? I’d be shocked if it didn’t. This is the beginning, Lisa. The beginning of the world changing.”

  The commercial on the screen ended and a reporter from the local affiliate came on, standing in front of Uncle Danny’s Deep Dish pizzeria. The chyron on the bottom of the screen read Self-Driving Pizza Delivery. Is it the future? The time showed 7:45 a.m. Matthew had muted the sound, so that they couldn’t hear the interview with the restaurant owner.

  The wall of windows in Matthew’s office provided panoramic views of southern San Francisco Bay. He spun his chair and briefly gazed outside, noting the peace and tranquility of the ecological reserve across the water. Northern California’s weather was something he cherished, never too hot nor too cold.

  “Oh, man,” he sighed. “Winters were so brutal in Ann Arbor. I didn’t have the luxury of owning a car, so I had to rely on public transportation. I cannot stress the word ‘rely,’ or really the lack thereof, enough. I spent way too many afternoons waiting for bus twelve-eighty-five. And those bus stops are not designed for sheltering folks from the bitter cold, the wind, or the snow.” He closed his eyes for a moment to remember that cold. “That wind would cut through your skin as you waited for a bus for God knows how long. If it ever even showed at all. I knew there had to be a better way to move people around. I’m not sure if you can relate. You’re from Miami, right?”

  “I am. Not much snow down there.” Lisa paused and looked out the window, her smile fading. “For us, it was hurricanes. The worst one? Andrew.”

  “That’s right. Hurricanes. Blizzards. Humans have enough to deal with in their daily lives. Driving in unsafe conditions shouldn’t be one of them.”

  “Or delivering pizza.”

  He smiled and nodded in agreement. Picking up the remote control resting on his desk, he aimed it at the bank of screens on the wall. The center monitor went blank temporarily before all six burst to life. The broadcast was now divided across the entire set of screens, creating a single giant television. He hit another button to unmute the sound. Speakers embedded in the ceiling filled the room with the reporter’s voice.

  “Imagine a world where public transportation was fully autonomous,” Matthew said. “You’d eliminate so many issues.”

  “And jobs.”

  “But new jobs would be created. Buses could be replaced with on-demand transportation. You could order a vehicle from a fleet waiting to take you wherever you wanted to go. The elderly could easily get to medical appointments or to see family members, children going from one divorced parent to another could be shuttled back and forth without either parent having to drive, people could watch a movie or their favorite show on their way to work. Brilliant. Or if it’s truly a self-driving bus, you could track it on your phone to see how far away it is. Maybe even see how many open seats there are. The possibilities are endless.” Matthew pointed at the broadcast on the massive screen across from them. “We’re about to witness the beginning of a new dawn in transportation.”

  ***

  Ted awkwardly smiled as he looked into the TV camera aimed directly at his face. He’d just finished answering a barrage of questions from three different news outlets. Finally, the last of the crews stepped back.

  He spent the morning relishing the endless flood of questions. He hadn’t thought of himself as someone who craved the center of attention, but found he actually enjoyed it. All told, he had done half a dozen on-camera interviews, and over a dozen for print media.

  “Are we done yet?” he called out to Sam.

  She was a dozen yards away, crouched close to the ground next to the open door of Athena’s front passenger side, busy scrolling through the mapping program on the laptop resting on the front seat. Once she was comfortable with what she saw, she stood up and closed the door.

  “We need to get moving. The city shut down this route at six this morning and we only have until ten to get this thing completed.”

  The police had erected a barrier to keep onlookers, including news media, away from Athena. Ted, computer in hand, had gone back and forth, inside and outside the barrier, for the past hour to talk with the press. He respectfully nodded as he stepped past the two cops monitoring the opening between a set of metal A-frame barricades.

  “It’s eight now. We have two hours left.” He walked over to Sam and met her at the front of the Prius, tucking the laptop in one arm sideways and placing the other hand reassuringly on her shoulder. “Can you put the laptop in the driver’s seat for me? I’m going to go see where we’re at with the pizza.”

  As he handed the laptop to Sam, he turned around and saw Rusty emerge from the entrance of Uncle Danny’s, carrying a box of pizza. Reporters swarmed Rusty, with camera people jostling for the best position. Ted laughed as Rusty snubbed the media, using his broad shoulders to barrel past everyone.

  “I think Rusty’s as done with the hoopla as we are,” he said.

  Rusty paused briefly to share some kind words with the police before bringing the pizza over to Ted. Ted squinted, washed in a sea of flashing lights as Rusty handed him the pizza.

  “I’m starting to wonder if a million bucks are worth all of this,” Rusty said.

  “Didn’t you say you wanted the public to see a robot car in action?” Ted put his arm around Rusty and spun him to face the cameras. “Smile for the world.”

  Ted waved the pizza back and forth as he grinned, keeping a tight grip on Rusty’s shoulder. Rusty sighed deeply and forced the slightest smile to sneak out from behind his handlebar mustache. In less than five seconds, he pulled himself away from Ted’s embrace.

  “Let’s get this show started.” Rusty turned around to see Sam now standing at the back of the Prius’s open hatch. He gave her a brief wave. “Good luck!”

  Ted couldn’t help but chuckle as Rusty, engulfed by cameras, microphones, and reporters, tried to exit the narrow opening. He was ultimately forced to answer a few more questions. Ted carried the pizza over to Sam at the back of Athena. The scent of garlic, tomato, oregano, and cheese wafted up to him. He peeked in the box to get a view of the amazing Uncle Danny’s pizza and shrugged. He didn’t see what was so special. It looked like any other pizza to him.

  “I’m going to get the system ready to go,” Sam said, leaving him behind.

  One of the many advancements Sam and her team had made with Athena was in the computing power and complexity needed to run the latest self-driving software. For the DARPA Challenge, Ashton had stuffed eight computers into the back hatch. This time, Athena needed only three computers, mounted in a special cage in the backseat. The cargo area had been converted to a special oven that Ted and Ralph had designed to keep the pizza warm for the trip across the Bay Bridge. Ted wanted not only to show that a self-driving car could make the trip, but that it could be custom designed as an optimal pizza delivery vehicle.

  Ted popped open the oven door and slid the pizza box inside, securing the latch. Because the unit had been specially designed for cardboard boxes, there was no fire risk.

  Though Athena was fully self-driving, the city required that a driver ride in the vehicle at the ready in case even the slightest thing went wrong. Sam was already in the passenger’s seat. Ted stopped briefly at the driver’s door and waved to the crowd. Besides the reporters, close to a thousand people had come out to watch the event and see Athena leave the starting area. The route from Howard Street to the Bay Bridge and over to Treasure Island was completely closed off, and the city had set up multiple viewing platforms along the way.

  “What’s that thing on the roof?” The question came from a teenage boy leaning over one of the A-frame barricades. He pointed to the spinning lidar unit perched in the middle of the other sensors. “It looks dorky.”

  “Dorky?” Ted responde
d. “It’s the future, kid.”

  He opened the driver’s door and slid in without looking. He ended up sitting on a helmet and just missing the laptop, which got pushed to the area between the two seats.

  “What the hell?” He grabbed the helmet and placed it on his legs. “Do I really have to wear this thing?”

  “The city requires it,” Sam said as she adjusted her chin strap. She struggled to get a comfortable seating position. “And you should know better than to challenge me on safety.”

  He didn’t bother to respond. He slid the helmet on and immediately banged the top of his head against the ceiling, letting the safety strap dangle freely from his chin. He closed the door, grabbed the laptop, opened it and held it with his right hand, mainly to show the crowd he wasn’t driving. Sam’s computer would be doing the actual work, but he wanted everyone to be clear that neither of them were controlling the car. He stuck his left arm through the open window to wave at the bystanders.

  “The future?” Sam asked. “Ted, we both know your spinning lidar is only partially integrated into the system. The main controls are still running off the primary array.”

  “They don’t need to know that. Besides, I think it’s impressive how much we were able to get done in the past four months. Both in and out of the lab.”

  “Don’t get playful!” she blushed. “This isn’t the time or the place.”

  “I promise not to bring up the endless nights of amazing sex.” He glanced over his shoulder as best he could, fighting to keep his safety helmet from hitting the ceiling. “And I won’t even mention the heat we generated in that back hatch. I probably didn’t even need to build that custom oven. We could have just—”

  “Ted!” She started laughing. “Focus on the challenge.”

  “I couldn’t resist.” He patted her shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze. “From a technology standpoint, we’ve come a long way these past few months. I won’t make a sleazy joke about my impressive hardware.”

  “Please don’t.” She turned her attention to her own computer that she had placed in the car, and began keying in the commands to start the route. “You proved me wrong, Ted. About your hardware—the one on the roof. I never thought we’d get any of that spinning lidar to work.”