From the Shadows: The Complete Series

by KB Shaw

  The picture split to show Howard Nash on the left and Meagan Fletcher on the right. She was standing alone in a rather small, nondescript room.

  “Yes, Howard?”

  “We just received word that we still have a few minutes before the start of the conference. As I was saying, our viewers expected you to be in Oslo but, in reality, you’re in a small conference room on the fifth floor of our headquarters here in Phoenix. What’s going on?”

  “Well, Howard, as you know, two weeks ago, GundTech alerted the world news media they would be making a major announcement today. However, they told us not to send anyone to the GundTech headquarters where these announcements usually take place. Rather, they said they would bring the conference to us.”

  Nash looked skeptical. “Do you have a video or audio feed in the room?”

  “No, Howard, we don’t.”

  “Well, then, it’s a mystery to me how they can bring the news conference to us.”

  “As you know, GundTech has always wrapped its announcements in secrecy.” Nash nodded in agreement. “However, the conditions laid down by the company this time were even more mysterious than usual.”

  “How so?”

  “About four days ago, we were asked to make an empty room available to a GundTech representative one hour before the conference. The room was to have a multiCom connection and no furniture except for a table and two chairs. One WBN reporter and a camera operator would be allowed in the room five minutes before the scheduled conference time, which was 4:30 p.m. Eastern. We would be allowed to broadcast from the room beginning at the scheduled time. Stranger yet, my cameraman and I had to sign a release form stating we’re in good health and have no heart or back problems.”

  “You had to sign a medical release form?”

  “That’s right, Howard—both my cameraman and I.”

  Nash was incredulous. “Is the GundTech representative in the room with you?”

  Meagan motioned to someone just off camera. “Yes, Howard. This is Pieter Olsen from GundTech.”

  “Welcome, Mr. Olsen,” said Howard Nash.

  “Hello, Howard,” answered Olsen in flawless English. He tapped the small, wireless communications device in his ear. “As you are no doubt hearing on your audio feed, the conference will begin momentarily.”

  “Mr. Olsen...”

  “Yes, Howard?”

  “Why all the secrecy? Why did our people have to sign medical releases?”

  “You will find out shortly, Howard. All I can say is, not since the announcement of GundTech’s revolutionary multiCom Artificial Intelligence technology have you seen anything as stunning as what you will witness today.”

  “How can we witness anything, Mr. Olsen, with no video or audio feed into that room?”

  “Ah, but I have brought and installed everything we need. As you see, the installation is simple. I arrived here at the World Broadband Network building just a little more than an hour ago. If your camera can swing around to give you a look at the IHT setup, you will see that it is literally a small black cube approximately six inches square attached to your multiCom wall port. Now, if you will direct the camera to any corner of the ceiling... ja, that’s good. You will see one of the four IHT transmitters.”

  “IHT?” asked Meagan. “What’s that stand for?”

  “It is not my place to say, Ms. Fletcher. That is why we are having the news conference,” said Olsen, a wry smile on his face. He pulled what looked like a brooch from his pocket and handed it to Meagan. “So, Ms. Fletcher, please put this pin on.” After Meagan fastened the brooch to her blouse, the man from GundTech asked her to be seated at the table; he then placed the second chair about three feet behind her and turned to the cameraman. “You can sit or stand, as you please, for now,” he said, “but when you’re asked to sit, please do so immediately, ja? And now, Howard, I will leave the room and let the conference begin.”

  The camera followed Mr. Olsen as he stepped out of the conference room and shut the door. The cameraman then swung about and focused on Meagan, who sat in her chair, then twisted back toward the camera, looking puzzled.

  “Frankly, Howard, I’ve never...”

  She was interrupted by a flourish of trumpets. Cameron recognized it as “The Fanfare for the Common Man” by a twentieth century American composer, Aaron Copland.

  “Ladies and gentlemen of the world press,” came a voice that seemed to fill the room, “please prepare yourselves for an experience like none you’ve ever had before. This may be disorientating at first, so those camera operators who wish to remain standing are asked to move to the back wall of the room and brace yourselves. We will begin in five... four... three...”

  Two seconds later, the room began to wobble like a gelatin mold, then the walls seemed to dissolve. The camera showed Meagan looking around as an auditorium filled with reporters took shape. From the WBN camera’s viewpoint, Meagan was the only part of the image in color. As realistic as the rest of the auditorium looked, it was in shades of gray.

  “Phillip!” said Meagan as she noticed a colleague from another network materialize to her left.

  “Meagan?” inquired a female voice from her right. It was Michelle Michaels from a French network. Ms. Michaels looked past Meagan and saw Phillip. “And Phillip North!”

  Meagan reached out and swiped her hand through the air, expecting it to pass through the black and white image of Phillip North. “Ouch!” cried North as her hand struck him squarely in the jaw.

  Michelle Michaels laughed out loud. “As I recall, Phillip, you deserved that. Good for you, Meagan!” She stood up and leaned toward Phillip’s image. “Here, let me try that, too.”

  “Ouch,” yelped Phillip again.

  The hall was pure pandemonium.

  “Here, here,” came a female voice. The WBN cameraman swung his camera toward the auditorium’s stage. “Please control yourselves,” said a woman standing at a podium located center stage. By the smile on her face, you could tell she had expected this reaction. The woman pressed a control on the screen embedded in the podium. Once again, the room turned to gelatin and dissolved. The cameraman was not prepared for this shift and nearly lost his balance until the room re-formed. It was now a small office with Meagan seated in a chair positioned in front of the woman speaker’s desk. “Hello,” said the woman directly to Meagan. “I’m glad you could attend our conference.”

  Meagan looked confused, but, before she could reply, the woman held up her hand as if to say, “Please hold your questions.”

  “It looks as if I’m having a one-on-one chat with you, while, in fact, I’m having almost 1,200 personal chats at the same time. Let me introduce myself. I’m Gwen Johanssen, VP of Marketing and Director of Communications for the GundTech Corporation. You’re experiencing the power and wonder of GundTech’s new IHT technology. I’m sure you all have questions, so now that you have had time to orient yourselves, let’s return to the auditorium.”

  Gwen Johanssen tapped the screen that was embedded in her desk, and the room once again dissolved into the auditorium. “Please take a minute to get settled, then I will try to answer as many of your questions as I can.”

  Meagan Fletcher glanced to either side and saw Michelle Michaels and Phillip North sitting next to her. Phillip North quickly raised his hand in defense. “Okay, ladies. Truce?”

  “Truce,” said Michelle.

  “Truce,” echoed Meagan.

  “Meagan? This is Howard in the newsroom. May I interrupt?”

  “Sure, Howard.” Meagan twisted in her chair to face her cameraman. She could not find him, so she just stared straight ahead. The cameraman repositioned himself so she appeared to be looking into the camera.

  “Can you describe what you’re seeing?”

  “Well, it’s indescribable, Howard.” Meagan spoke in hushed tones, as if she were an announcer at a golf tournament. “Other than being in black and white, this whole auditorium seems utterly real. And as you witnessed with my d
istinguished colleague from BNB, it is quite solid.”

  “Meagan...”

  “Yes, Howard?”

  “I assume that the other news organizations were also allowed a camera operator, but I don’t see any.”

  “To be honest, Howard, I don’t even see my own cameraman, Kenny. I have to assume he’s here and can position the camera to get me on screen.”

  “Yes, he’s got you just fine. Kenny, I know you aren’t wearing a mike, but can Meagan hear you?”

  Kenny’s voice could be heard faintly through Meagan’s microphone, “Meagan, can you hear me?”

  “Yes, Kenny.” She smiled when she realized her cameraman was a few feet in front of her. “Come closer so the viewers can hear your perspective on this amazing event.”

  Meagan was startled when Kenny started to speak about a foot away from her right ear. “It’s really weird. Right now I’m standing in the middle of Mr. North. He may be solid to Meagan, but he’s a ghost to me.”

  “Or perhaps you’re the ghost, Kenny,” the anchorman quipped.

  “Ladies and gentlemen of the press.” Gwen Johanssen’s voice boomed through the hall. “If I may have your attention please.” The room became quiet. The WBN camera, like every ghost camera at the conference, focused on the woman at the podium. “I’m sure you have many questions. Let me anticipate some of them as best I can. Because you’re each viewing us from your own location, it may not be apparent that you’re all hearing me in your native languages. To some, it is obvious the movements of my lips don’t match the words coming from my mouth. But you’re all hearing translations in a real-time synthesized voice that matches my natural voice up to 98 percent.

  Michelle Michaels turned to Meagan and Phillip North. “I’m speaking to you in French right now. Are you hearing me in English?”

  “Yes,” replied an astounded Meagan Fletcher. “And you sound just like... well... YOU!”

  Gwen Johanssen was speaking again from the stage. “By now you have also noticed that your camera operators don’t seem to be present at the conference even though they are in the same room as you. You’re probably wondering how.” Ms. Johanssen smiled as a murmur of agreement swept through the room. “Well, I can’t tell you,” she said. “It’s a trade secret! Let it suffice to say that before the conference you were each handed a GundTech pin. At this time, please remove those pins and hand them to your camera operators.”

  The reporters removed their pins and held them out so their invisible camera operators could take them. One-by-one, the reporters disappeared and were replaced by men or women holding video cameras, standing where a seat once was. Soon the auditorium was filled with rows of camera operators broadcasting pictures of each other.

  “Now, if you will please hand the pins back to your talent.” Within moments the auditorium was again filled with reporters.

  “The pin serves as your personal IHT identifier. It is what we call an IDO or ‘Identifier Object.’ This IDO can be made to look like any object—a watch, eyeglasses, or even a key. Imagine the possibilities for corporate conferences, conventions, and the entertainment industry.” After giving the reporters a few moments to consider the possibilities, she continued, “At this time, I ask that all the camera operators take a seat in the chair the GundTech technician set directly behind your talent. You will have ten seconds to get yourselves in place.”

  3-D numbers appeared, floating in the room. 10... 9... 8... When the countdown reached 3, the room wobbled and began to dissolve. Meagan Fletcher was seated in the front seat of an old-fashioned wooden roller coaster. The camera was looking over her shoulder. A safety bar lowered snugly into her lap.

  “Since they don’t carry IDOs, the camera operators will not feel the physical effects of the ride,” the lady from GundTech informed her audience. “In fact, once you camera operators become settled in the environment, feel free to get up from the chair and move about. Now hang on tight, the ride is about to begin.”

  Meagan Fletcher gripped the safety bar tightly as the car launched toward the first hill. Her body was pressed hard into the seat as the car engaged the chain lift and was towed up the steep incline. The rattle of the chain and clatter of the car over the wooden-slatted tracks filled her with intense anticipation. Her heart raced as she approached the crest of the hill. For a second, there was nothing but blue sky before her. She hung briefly, as if weightless, before the horizon swept into view and she began to plummet down the other side. Her stomach lurched. The rush of air forced her face taut. She screamed with delight as she raised her hands high above her head in defiance of the coaster’s onslaught.

  After several bumps and hairpin turns, the car reached another chain lift. The camera moved from behind Meagan. It was now shooting her from the side. Kenny had gotten up off his chair and was moving about the conference room, apparently untouched by the physical effects of the simulation. By the time the car reached the top of the second lift, the camera was in front of Meagan, showing the gleeful terror on her face as she crashed down the other side. The camera continued to move about until the car came to a stop at the station and the room wobbled back into the auditorium. Kenny panned the camera about the hall, showing hundreds of unflappable reporters straightening their ties and trying to manage their mussed-up hair.

  “Any questions?” asked the GundTech spokeswoman.

  “What does IHT stand for?” came the first question.

  “Interactive Holographic Transmitter.”

  “Why are the images black and white?” asked the reporter from the London Times. “It’s peculiar to see yourself in color when the rest of the world around you is in shades of gray.”

  “This is a beta version of the product. Beta 0.5, to be exact. Color is just a matter of bandwidth, and that should be solved within four to six months.”

  “Did the unidentified creator of the AI technology, upon which GundTech was built almost 15 years ago, have any hand in the development of the IHT?” asked Michelle Michaels.

  “It was his concept and groundbreaking work with a select team within GundTech that developed the IHT.” An expression of regret flashed briefly on Gwen’s face.

  Meagan Fletcher caught it immediately. “So the creator of GundTech AI technology is a man—a boy, rather?”

  “I didn’t mean to imply...” Gwen started.

  “To be exact,” interrupted Meagan, “you said ‘it was his concept and groundbreaking work.’ Will GundTech finally reveal this man’s identity? After all, he is no longer a boy prodigy needing to be shielded from the public eye.”

  “The person likes his or her privacy. I was just using the word ‘his’ in a general sense. He or she will remain in the background.” Ms. Johanssen took a breath. then said, “Another question?”

  “How much does all of this cost?” asked a man standing in the shadows at the back of the hall.

  “IHT technology is not for sale.” Ms. Johanssen’s answer was cut off by the roar of 1,200 reporters asking the same question. She held up her hand to silence the crowd. “As I was saying... IHT technology is not for sale. GundTech will lease the technology on a project-by-project basis for major events, amusement rides, motion picture production, etc.”

  “Why is that?” asked a reporter from the far side of the auditorium.

  “As you have witnessed, the physical effects of the IHT experience are very real. For this reason, GundTech must maintain complete control over all IHT applications. This means from program creation to 24/7 monitoring of the finished project.”

  Someone shouted, “Are you saying the technology is dangerous?”

  “If done properly...”

  “Please answer the question,” said Phillip North. “IS THE PROGRAM DANGEROUS?”

  “There are potential dangers. But with GundTech’s oversight, it is perfectly safe,” the GundTech Vice President answered. “Furthermore, GundTech will use all profits from IHT leases to create an IHT learning environment and an international academy, which will c
ome on line next fall.”

  “A potentially dangerous learning environment,” said a reporter from the far side of the hall.

  “We will be in full control at all times,” assured Ms. Johanssen.

  “How?” asked Meagan Fletcher.

  “We will monitor every movement within the environment.”

  A woman in the front row spoke up. “Doesn’t that raise invasion of privacy issues?”

  Before Gwen answered, the man in the back of the hall shouted, “The tuition... How much will this international academy cost?”

  Gwen Johanssen smiled again, “Free. It will be absolutely free. Details can be found on a new site, which is being posted as we speak. The multiCom network address is mcn.IHTAcademy.sch. That concludes this conference. However, the GundTech representative in your studio will be available to answer all of your questions. Thank you for attending this demonstration of the revolutionary new IHT technology from GundTech. Goodbye from Oslo.”

  The image wavered and the screen showed Meagan Fletcher sitting alone at a table in a conference room at the WBN headquarters.

  Chapter 4:

  The Red Tape Blues

  CAMERON COULD HEAR Rosa’s comments as they replayed the video of the rollercoaster simulation. “¡Mierda! Look at that,” she said, letting slip one of her father’s favorite expletives.

  “Yeah, the first hill must be 200 feet high,” Cameron replied.

  “No, not that. Her hair! Look at her hair.”

  After a few seconds of staring at the screen, it finally struck Cameron. He knew that Meagan Fletcher was sitting in a chair on the floor of a conference room at the WBN headquarters, but her hair was falling back toward the camera as she climbed the steep slope of the virtual rollercoaster. “Dang!” exclaimed Cameron, matching Rosa’s excitement, if not her colorful language.

  “Make Rosa full screen please, Sam.”

  Part of the GundTech AI (Artificial Intelligence) programming required politeness and respect from a user. MultiCom personalities simply would not respond to rude orders or demands. “Power” was the only command that didn’t require a “please” or a “thank you.”