Hyperthought

by M M Buckner

  After hearing this, you’re going to say that I am a deeply witless and gullible fool. You would be right. I wish it weren’t so, but only after I woke up on the bare floor with a pounding hangover did I realize that Matji had been Merida in disguise. She had wheedled out of me every factoid that might possibly be used against me—the names of my friends, my politics, my psychological weak points—she had me cold.

  But why, I asked myself. Why did she allow me to enter her secret habitat so easily? What use did she expect to make of me? Clearly, she had something in mind.

  I didn’t have to wait long for an answer. As soon as I sat up and rubbed my eyes, my cell door opened, and one of the guards appeared with another pot of steaming tea. You can imagine how much I wanted Merida’s tea. The guard also gave me a slice of fragrant seedcake, but I threw that on the floor. I wasn’t going to ingest anything else in this place if I could help it.

  “Jolie, child, you’ll be sorry you didn’t eat” Merida stood in the door, curling her wide lips at me. My kimono had come undone, and I pulled it together fast over my bare chest

  She said, “Your belt’s untied. Let me help you.”

  I backed off and tied it myself.

  “Have your own way.” Her cheerful laugh sounded to me like barking.

  The three cyberguards had entered behind her. I noticed they were low-budget models, built for strength, not intelligence. One of them flipped open a small folding stool and placed it on the floor of my cell. Then he drew from his chest pocket a flat black case, a Net node. I ogled the thing with a covetous heart as he arranged it on the stool. Merida spoke an activation command, and a holographic projection filled the air above the node. It was Luc.

  I held my breath. The image was being recorded by an overhead camera, probably hidden, and I had a wicked feeling it was being transmitted in real time. Luc was sitting in his office at the furniture co-op, searching the Net. I knew he was hunting for me. His favorite silver cybernails gleamed on all ten of his fingertips as he flashed them through a tiny holographic matrix of icons. Luc always preferred the holo-interface. He said it worked faster than voice command. A pretty young boy—not Trinni—was standing behind Luc’s chair, massaging Luc’s shoulders. Luc grinned at the boy and patted his hand.

  When the projection faded, Merida gurgled deep in her throat, an unholy sound. It made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

  “Your cher infant. So fair and delicate.” She spoke with her syrupy Spanic lilt “You see, Jolie, we know his ways. We watch him every instant. The boy with him, that’s Miguel, my agent. Don’t make us angry, pet.”

  “What do you want?” I said. Jin called me “pet.” On Merida’s tongue, it sounded dirty.

  She commanded the Net node to display another scene. I saw my Durban Bee materialize in holographic shimmer. Its camouflage field had been deactivated. It stood naked in full sunlight among the rocks of the Sierra Nevadas, surrounded by Nome.Com troopers. I had counted on the Bee to take me away from this place, once I reached the surface again. I had thought the Bee would be safe.

  “Aren’t those troopers a nuisance? It seems they’ve found your ride.” Merida’s red mouth split in a gloating smile.

  Suddenly, my Durban Bee exploded in an orange fireball. “No,” I breathed. The troopers were spraying it with napalm. My Bee collapsed in the flames like a wad of blackened tissue. Numbly, I watched it topple over and roll down the mountain. My way home. Gone.

  “It appears your stay with us may be longer than you anticipated. Don’t worry, pet. Mi casa, su casa.”

  I snarled.

  Merida circled around me, but I wouldn’t give her the satisfaction of turning to face her. She spoke another command, and the holographic display changed to show Jin lying motionless in a narrow bed. His face was turned away from the light, and his closed eyes were sunken in shadow. I saw tubes dripping liquid into a port in his neck.

  I spoke through clenched teeth. “What have you done to him?”

  “He’s done this himself,” Merida said, circling around in front of me. “There’s no medical reason for this coma. He simply won’t wake up.” She touched Jin’s holographic face and sighed. “It’s psychological withdrawal.”

  “Withdrawal from you!” I raised my fist and sprang at her.

  She laughed as her guard grabbed me and slung me around in its metallic arms. “Jolie, there’s no need for anger. I’m not your enemy.”

  “I’ll kill you, I swear!”

  “You a murderess? No, pet. You don’t have the strength of character for that.”

  I wiped the saliva that had sprayed down my chin and glared at her. I knew she was probably right.

  “Wouldn’t you like to see Jin?” Her Spanic accent thickened. “You can talk to him, sí? He’s fond of you. Maybe you can bring him around.”

  I struggled against the guard’s rough embrace. “That’s why you let me in? To bring Jin out of the coma?”

  She looked me straight in the eye. “Would you rather not?”

  “Naturellement I’ll help Jin!” I shouted.

  Merida smiled, a loose, ugly, quivering smile. She leaned toward me until her stiff black curls brushed my forehead. The guard held me so I couldn’t move away. “I knew you would, pet. You have a generous heart.”

  She turned on her heel, and the guard shoved me after her, out into the corridor. “This way!” she said in crisp Net English.

  11

  Cells Shaped Like Stars

  RIGHT IN THE very next cell to mine, Jin lay unconscious. I couldn’t believe I’d slept all night just a wall away from him. Why didn’t my lizard brain sing out? Merida didn’t stop me when I rushed to his bedside and took his hand. How thin his wrist had grown. No one had cut his hair. His eyelashes were caked with dried tears.

  “Jin.” I touched his shoulder. There was no response. He lay rigid.

  Merida eyed me with an appraising glance and then left. The witch! She hadn’t needed threats to force my cooperation—she should have known me better. I took some comfort in that as I pulled a chair up close beside Jin’s pillow. The room smelled of chemicals. Blank sourceless light reflected from the steel walls.

  “Jin, it’s me, Jolie.” I squeezed his arm to make sure he was real. I couldn’t take my eyes off him. My love, my idol, in living flesh. After everything that had happened, it seemed too much like a dream.

  All day I talked to him, sometimes crying, sometimes kissing him, sometimes stroking his wasted body through the paper-thin hospital wrapper he wore. I told him about my funny trip down the double-headed cliff in Vincente’s old dive sphere. I explained how Jonas had retrieved that last vidmail and how badly it scared me. “Fear the light. What did you mean by that, Jin? You wanted me to come, right? You said you wished I was here. Bien, I’m here now, Jin. I’m right beside you.” He never stirred.

  A digital chronometer hung on the wall, the kind medical suppliers give away for free to advertise their products. Every hour, it played a short, brassy jingle. It was driving me nuts. Near evening, a young man came in carrying a tray of sandwiches and a carafe of water. He was small and delicately made, with olive skin and large brown eyes. His long nose hinted at Semitic roots. He wore a white smock, and though his thick black hair was combed straight back, one springy lock fell over his forehead.

  “This is wholesome food,” he said when I opened my mouth to protest. “Eat it, please. You must stay strong to help Mr. Sura.” He spoke in a soft soothing baritone. I watched him move around the bed and touch Jin’s carotid artery with his finger, checking the pulse.

  “Can you shut up that clock?” I asked.

  He raised his eyebrows and looked at the thing. Then he yanked if off the wall. “I’ll take it away if it annoys you. Please call me Hamad. I am Mr. Sura’s caregiver.”

  “Caregiver!” I sneered at him. “What kind of caregiver works in a place like this?”

  Hamad lowered his head. His thick lashes fluttered on his cheek. “I am here bec
ause I must be. Please don’t ask why. It shames me to explain.”

  What he said puzzled me. I took a seat in the only chair and watched him with a suspicious eye.

  “You’ve had nothing to drink all day, Ms. Sauvage. You must be very thirsty. Please, this water is pure. I promise.” He poured from the decanter.

  My throat tightened as that clear cool water sloshed into the cup. Mes dieux, but I craved it. When he placed the cup in my hand, I gulped it down and poured myself more.

  Hamad nodded, satisfied. Gently, he checked the tubes attached to Jin’s body. Then he pulled a slate from his smock and moved from one monitor to the next, comparing readings. I noticed he moved on the balls of his feet like a dancer. He had beautiful hands. When he sat on the corner of Jin’s bed and looked at me, I saw green flecks in his irises.

  “You’re doing fine,” he murmured in his deep voice. “This may take time.”

  “Tell me what Merida did to him.” I bit into the sandwich.

  Hamad sighed heavily. As he studied Jin’s face, his graceful eyebrows knotted. “Mr. Sura is a troubled man. You know this. He’s troubled by his limited understanding. He feels a duty calling him, but he cannot see it clearly. Mr. Sura suspects that much of what passes for reality is only a dream inside his brain. He wants what no one else has found—Hyperthought.”

  “What no one else has found? You mean Merida never tried this before.”

  Hamad stood up and walked around the bed. His narrow chest rose and fell in another long sigh. “In technical terms, Dr. Merida’s procedure should enable Mr. Sura to perceive the quantum-level input to his brain. We all receive—ah—call them ‘vibrations.’ They come to us through the complex quantum fabric of mass and energy that links the universe.”

  “Huh? The what?”

  “I apologize, Ms. Sauvage. My words are insufficient.” Hamad brushed the lock off his forehead, but it fell right back. “The universe consists of quanta—infinitesimal packets of energy. Each of us, each rock and planet and bead of water, every solid object, every aroma and sound and ray of light, we all emerge from this underlying fabric of interchangeable quantum energy.”

  “Is that where we go when we die?” I whispered, swallowing half-chewed sandwich.

  Hamad didn’t seem to hear my question. Instead of answering, he took a damp cloth from his pocket and began to wash Jin’s face. “These quantum vibrations act on our brains continuously, linking us in a vast trembling web of interaction with every other existence in the universe. Though we’re not conscious of this quantum input, it sways our emotions, our judgments, our actions. It binds our world together in complex patterns. This interplay forms the very ground of our being. Poets and philosophers invent metaphors for it. Ah, but Mr. Sura wants to see it face to face.”

  Hamad paused to refold the damp cloth. Gently, he began to clean the caked tears from Jin’s eyelashes. I thought about what Jin had told me earlier.

  “He said we might dream a different universe with every heartbeat.”

  Hamad seemed to consider this. “Who knows? We humans speak so confidently of our facts and figures. Yet our understanding of perception is staggeringly naive. Anything might be possible. I can understand this young man’s ardent desire to know. Indeed, who hasn’t glimpsed the depths of the night and wondered?”

  I pushed the unfinished sandwich aside. “Merida isn’t sure about what she’s doing, is she? Jin’s a guinea pig.”

  The young man’s brows knotted. He stuffed the cloth in his pocket and sat on the bed, facing me. “Dr. Merida devised a new kind of nanobot, a molecule-sized artificial life-form engineered to evolve and learn the quantum language. Over time, the bot was supposed to recognize the nonlinear patterns of quantum energy, then to translate and boost the signals, so to speak, so Mr. Sura could ‘hear’ them. She—ah—explained the risks.”

  Hamad’s mouth quivered. He seemed so contrite, I felt a pang of sympathy for him. He continued in his soft, sad baritone, “When the doctor injected the nanobots into Jin’s frontal lobe, they replicated much faster than expected. They were designed to spread over the surface of his brain as a living neural net, a kind of secondary cerebral cortex, doubling Mr. Sura’s powers of cognition. But instead, they penetrated deep into the inner cerebrum and began to populate the astrocyte cells.”

  “Astrocytes. Jin used that word before. What does that mean?” I gripped the seat of my chair, not totally sure I wanted to know.

  “Astrocytes are cells shaped like stars. They’re located throughout the brain, and usually, in mature adults, they lie dormant. Asleep, as it were. But with proper stimulus, astrocytes can trigger neurogenesis. That is, they can propagate new brain tissue.”

  Hamad leaned across the bed and slipped a hand under Jin’s cheek. “What Dr. Merida failed to predict was the way her nanobots would awaken Jin’s astrocytes. The nanobots entered the sleeping cells and stimulated a rapid cascade of neurogenesis. But the new brain tissue is—not normal. It’s—we can’t define what it is.” Gently Hamad lifted Jin’s head off the pillow. “Mr. Sura’s brain weighs half a kilo more than it did before the operation.”

  I must have gasped aloud.

  “His brain hasn’t swelled,” Hamad said quickly. “There’s no physical damage, I assure you. The aberrant new tissue has commandeered empty spaces within other cells.”

  I was too shocked to speak. My eyes wouldn’t focus. I couldn’t even begin to process the information he’d given me.

  Hamad exhaled a ragged sigh. His remorse seemed very genuine. He whispered, “Stay strong, Ms. Sauvage. Talk to him. You’re his best hope now.” And with that, Hamad the caregiver left us alone.

  Silently, I prayed to the Laws of Physics that, just this once, they might bend in Jin’s favor. Mes dieux, but I understood nothing! How I regretted my lack of education. And how I regretted the lost Net node that would have helped me download reference pages. Sleeping star cells. Rapid cascades. What on Earth was this aberrant new tissue in Jin’s brain? All I knew was that it must hurt like hell.

  I climbed onto the bed and straddled his chest and began to massage his temples. No doubt, Merida was secretly watching, but I ignored that I just talked to him. Anything that came into my head. The way stars twinkled in telescopic metavision. The clear, clean layer of pure air I’d once found trapped at the bottom of a valley in Argentina. What sunrise looked like from the Karakoram Pass.

  I smoothed his long, silky hair that no one had bothered to cut. Working my fingers down the back of his neck and along his shoulder muscles, I critiqued each of his movies, the early thrillers, the one surprising comedy, the dark later pieces that left me baffled. “You’re lazy, Jin. You pick good roles, but you coast along on sex appeal. Scuzz that. You could do better.”

  Then I started interviewing him like some dippy ezine host, and I made up arrogant answers to put in his mouth, mocking his Pacific lisp, hoping to rile him. “Of course, fans worship me. There’s a reason they call me a star. My movies pull people out of hell and give them a glimpse of heaven. Ninety minutes at a time.”

  This and other nonsense rolled off my tongue till my throat felt raw. Every hour, Hamad brought me a fresh carafe of water. I marked time by the regularity of his visits. Hamad’s encouragement kept me going, but how long can you talk before you grow stupid? I found myself chattering stray thoughts, dreams. I told Jin my fantasies. I confessed that I loved him. None of it did any good. At one point, I grew so frustrated that I hauled Jin up to a sitting position and began to swing him back and forth, yelling, “Wake up! Wake up!”

  Hamad rushed in and made me stop. “Please calm down, Ms. Sauvage! You’re overexcited.” As he checked Jin’s fragile connections to the monitors, he asked me to get off the bed. “You’ve been talking more than 20 hours. Time to rest.”

  I felt a sting on my shoulder and glanced around just in time to see a cybernurse withdrawing a jet spray. “A sedative,” Hamad whispered. My vision blurred. Ça va. Lights out.

&nbs
p; I woke the next morning, groggy from sedation. Hamad brought me a breakfast of liquid nutrient. Then the three cyberguards—I nicknamed them les trois mousquetaires—the three musketeers—they trundled me down the hall to Jin’s bedside, where I began another marathon monologue. We followed this routine for four days. I suppose they were days. Inside that steel room, I couldn’t tell for sure. Since Hamad had taken the wall chronometer away, his regular visits were my only gauge of time.

  The steel walls reflected fuzzy unresolved images, the white blob of the bed, my vague beige form hovering above. Merida must have scrounged her medical apparatus from some bargain fire sale. It looked like surplus junk from the 20th century. The air smelled faintly of saline and skin salve, and after a while, I couldn’t even hear the liquids dripping through the tubes.

  On that fourth day, I asked Hamad, “Do you really think Jin’s doing this by choice? What could be so horrible to make him deliberately withdraw from consciousness?”

  The question upset Hamad. He paced around the room before he finally sat down to face me. “There was pain,” he said at last. “Our medications didn’t help.”

  The tremor of Hamad’s voice stopped me cold. For several long moments, we sat together in silence. Then Hamad checked the monitors and left.

  That day, I tried reminding Jin of his passion to learn the truth. I pandered to his ego. I said he had a special mission, and the whole world was depending on him to choose the right course. I said his brain had sprouted a pair of tentacles with little receiver dishes on the ends, and that he could tune in the music of the universe anytime he wanted. All he had to do was stop dilly-dallying and open his eyes! Bien, his eyelids didn’t even flicker.