by D S Kane
“Listen, Ann, this conversation is making me uncomfortable. What gives you the right to ask me about my sex life with another woman?”
“You have one chance to convince me you’ll be considerate. Consider this a job interview.”
Glen’s expression showed shock, softening with understanding. “Really?”
“Yup. Last time we had sex, it felt as if you were in a different world from me. I’ve had better sex masturbating.”
He pushed back from the table. “I think we’re done, Ann.”
She shook her head. “Whatever.”
She watched him leave the restaurant, wondering what to do about him.
CHAPTER 5
Ann Sashakovich’s apartment,
#211, 3950 Louis Road, Palo Alto, CA
September 4, 10:36 p.m.
Lying in bed, Ann was once again finding sleep evading her. Even after masturbating, she was unable to force her mind from boil to simmer. All she could think about was her conversation with Glen. She forced herself to think about anything else. What flew into her mind was the DARPA contest.
The deadline for applications was looming and she realized that if she was going to enter, she’d have to file within the next three days. She still didn’t even have any of the positions filled, let alone a fully configured team.
She knew she had one major advantage over anyone else who competed in the contest: Ann had been closer to AI circuitry than anyone else alive. She’d been modified through having had nearly a thousand Bug-Lok nanodevices fed into her brain by the CypherGhost nearly two years ago. Even though the nanodevices had expired and left her body, their leftover result had been that she’d developed the ability to use parts of her brain no one else could use. And she could shoot bolts of energy from her fingertips. She embodied the very essence of being a cyborg. Not that far from AI.
But all that means nothing if I can’t alter my abilities into understanding thinking circuits outside myself. She tried deep breathing to place her in a meditative trance, hoping it would turn into a sleep state, but that didn’t work. As she finally started to drift off, her alarm buzzed. The night had ended without her falling asleep.
She rushed through washing up and swallowing coffee, then trotted to her AI class, where she sat next to a red-haired young man who smiled awkwardly at her.
He extended his hand. “I’m Dave Nordman.”
She noted his rumpled clothing. “Ann Sashakovich. How are you doing with the class homework assignment?”
“Well, this class is my fave. The homework is fun.” He brushed back a lock of scarlet hair that fell instantly back in front of his eyes. “How about you?”
She smiled. “Yeah. So far, it’s the only one this semester that might be fun.”
“Before Stanford, I was a motherboard designer. I’m wondering how much a circuit board is really capable of. Have you seen the DARPA contest?”
Ann’s eyes snapped toward Nordman’s face. “It’s probably the most all-consuming thing on the tech part of campus. So, yeah. You thinking of entering?”
He frowned. “I’d love to, but I don’t think I have the leadership skills. I’m just a hacker.”
“Listen, I’m interested in leading a team. May I have your cellphone?”
He reached tentatively into his pocket while she opened hers to her “contacts” screen.
She sent her contact info to him. “Call me after class when you have time. Maybe we can do business.”
Early that evening, he called her. “So I guess you’re entering the contest. Well, if you’re thinking of me as one of your team members, I, ah, see myself as a creator, not a leader. I can manage people well enough, but I’m not going to ever be a CEO. I don’t want the headaches. Could you see me as your CTO?”
Ann thought about him. Clumsy, drab, but possibly good in this role.
“Dave, let me think about it. But I am interested.”
“Good, then. I’ll wait for your decision.”
After the phone call, she took out her notebook computer and started a file called “DARPA Contest Org Chart.”
She already knew who she wanted as her chief marketing officer. She called Samantha Trout. Sam may have been Glen’s girlfriend, but Ann had seen her in action. While Samantha was pursuing a major in finance, Ann knew Samantha was a natural at marketing and she seemed to have no desire to lead a team.
“Hi, it’s Ann Sashakovich. How are you and can we meet?”
“Why?”
“I’m starting a team for the DARPA contest. I’m looking for a CMO.”
She heard Sam laugh. “So starting companies really is contagious. You caught it from that bastard Sarkov.”
“We can talk over lunch if you’re interested. How about dim sum?”
She heard Sam sigh. “Whatever. Remember that I’m a finance major, not a marketing major. But, a free meal works for me. Tomorrow.”
They met at Tai Pan, an elegant restaurant on Waverley Street, off University Avenue.
Ann had forgotten that Samantha was gorgeous. Ann found it impossible to stop staring at the Eurasian woman’s enormous eyes and tiny nose. Sam’s lips were pink pillows of soft flesh. Ann found speech difficult at first.
They sat and Samantha said, “When you called last night, at first I thought you just wanted to pick my brain about Glen.”
“Glen? No. Not interested in a relationship with Glen. For one thing, he isn’t ready. You’re proof of that. For another, if I want a relationship, it’ll be with someone who has more answers and raises fewer questions. No one in my life currently fits that bill.”
“Then why are we here? Surely you didn’t just want to know if I knew someone who could fill your CMO position. Or is it just about the dim sum?”
“It’s exactly as I told you. No games. I’m thinking of starting an AI company. I’d like your help.”
Sam’s head shifted forward and sideways just a little. “Me? I was just involved in a big-assed failure.” She smiled and stared into Ann’s eyes. “I thought you might be gay.”
Ann felt her eyes bulge just a little. “No. I mean, not sure about that one. I’ve fucked both sexes. But no, not interested.”
“Too bad. From what Glen told me, you’re a handful.”
“Would you be at all interested in being part of a DARPA contest team?”
“And do what? You need another trained monkey? But, tell you what. You give me some details. I might sign an NDA. Then, if I’m still not interested, I’ll give you my best advice for a board seat and some stock. Deal?”
Ann didn’t have to think about the deal. “Done.” But she didn’t yet have an NDA document. “I’ll send you the doc tomorrow by email.”
Ann hoped that Sam would decide to join her team, but now she doubted it would ever happen. As she left the restaurant, she wondered if she was the first DARPA contest team leader who’d approached Sam.
CHAPTER 6
Cecil H. Green Library,
557 Escondido Mall, Stanford University, CA
September 5, 1:57 p.m.
Ann called Sam after she finished lunch.
“Ann,” said Sam, “I’ve read the DARPA contest rules and thought about your offer. Your only market is the military, and that would be boring for me. The way it stands now, well, there isn’t anything attractive enough there for me.”
“What would you like?”
“I’m willing to stand in for you until you find a suitable CMO for up to three weeks, for an offer of three percent founder’s shares.”
Ann thought about what this would look like to a venture capitalist. “That would make it a lot more difficult if we decide to use the contest as the precursor for an IPO. I can’t give someone what amounts to one percent stock per week.”
“What can you offer? It better be your best offer.”
Ann thought about how much stock she could bleed to get the chance to understand Samantha’s views on the market for AI devices. “How about half what you want? One-and-a-half percent?”
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“Let me think about it. I’ll let you know tomorrow.”
Ann was running short of time to place a complete management team into her DARPA contest application. “You have until eight in the morning. After that, I’ll have to pencil in someone else’s name.”
“Okay, Ann. Bye.”
Ann wondered if Sam would decide to join as her CMO. She had no backup plan to find a CTO and worried that, without a candidate, her application would show a blank for this crucial role. Moreover, she wondered if Sam had the energy to push customer concerns into the project. From her adopted mother and father, Ann knew the military, their primary customer, was both fickle and demanding.
But the crush of time led her to decide to continue her search for a permanent CMO.
* * *
Ann sat at a carrel in Green Library. The university registrar’s office still hadn’t returned her call. She might have to revise her assumptions about the level of support Stanford could offer her.
She opened her notebook, pulled up the DARPA website, and started to fill in the DARPA contest application. But, she stopped dead when she came to the blanks for her team member names. She reviewed her list of potential cofounders.
Ann would be team leader, the equivalent of a corporate CEO. She wasn’t sure she was the best of her group for this role, but that didn’t matter yet. If someone better showed up, she was prepared to sponsor them as team leader. If that happened, she would occupy a more technical role.
Sam had volunteered to act as the team’s stand-in for CMO, but Ann hadn’t given up on trying to convince Sam to accept the position permanently. Sam hadn’t been responsible for the failure of MindField, since the startup never got to the point where they actually had something to sell. Ann could always change this field in the application if Sam left after three weeks.
Dave Nordman would be the CTO. He’d never been part of any startup, but he had been the technical lead on hardware for several Silicon Valley chip and board producers.
Ann still needed a human resources head. This was the one area where she knew of no one with the appropriate skills.
But there was no time left to her if she wanted to be part of the DARPA contest.
She left the fields for “Human Resources Lead” and “Finance Lead” blank. She had just contacted several candidates to select from for each of these two positions. And several had returned her phone calls.
She looked at the following positions in the DARPA application:
Team Lead: Ann Sashakovich
Technical Lead: David Nordman
Finance Lead:
Marketing Lead: Samantha Trout
Human Resources Lead:
She filled in the remainder of the DARPA application. She decided to hit the Enter key now, and then head over to the registrar’s office to see it they could assist in staffing her team. After acknowledging receipt of her application, the page shifted to a subpage containing a list of the competitors in the contest.
She scrolled down the list of teams registered and saw Glen Sarkov’s name. Damn! We’re competitors. I misjudged him again. What do I do now? She thought of calling him, but, what could she say? She knew what she wanted to tell him, but that would change nothing,
She thought, as she closed her notebook and started walking toward the administration building, that she felt just a bit as Julius Caesar had as he crossed the Rubicon.
* * *
The registrar’s office was friendly enough but not very helpful. An elderly woman told her to go to the student research-project director’s office, two floors up.
She waited nearly an hour to see someone.
A tall, slender man with a scruffy beard smiled and extended his hand. “I’m Edgar Turnbull. How can I assist you?”
Ann smiled back and they shook hands. “I’m interested in staffing a research team.”
“Ah. Well, sorry for the wait. That damned DARPA contest has everyone looking for team members.”
Ann was silent for a few seconds. “Me too. I’ll need a finance lead and a human resources lead. I might also need a marketing lead.”
Turnbull frowned. “We’re backed up looking for those skills. It might take a few days. Can you wait that long?”
Ann nodded. “Yes, if I have to.”
“You’ll need to fill in some forms.” He pulled two forms off his desktop. “Sign this one and give it to me now, then use this one to visit the link on the paper and fill in the one describing your available positions. After that, it will be up to the business school’s student body.”
She left his office feeling hopeful for the first time.
* * *
The Russian president sat patiently while one of his staff applied makeup to his face. He stayed as motionless as possible until the woman nodded.
He rose and walked to the cameraman standing near the stage. “You know what I want. Let’s get this in one take. I have a busy schedule today.”
The cameraman nodded and the prime oligarch stepped behind the lectern, his eyes fixed on the teleprompter as the screen flashed numbers, counting down the seconds until the broadcast.
“Good evening, fellow citizens. Tonight I am most pleased to announce that Russia is currently amassing an army that is undefeatable in battle. Our country has over thirty thousand armored mobile robots, equipped with artificial intelligence, ready for battle with any enemy foolish enough to engage us.
“No longer will Russian citizens risk their lives fighting, as we have had to do for centuries when invaders threatened us.
“These robots are armored with titanium and outfitted with hack-proof silicon circuitry. They are impervious to weather and virtually indestructible. We are manufacturing them at plants throughout the country at a rate of nearly a thousand every day. By the end of this year we will have a complete army of them, and by the end of next year the army will be five-hundred thousand strong.
“Be proud, my fellow citizens.” He pointed to the space near him, and the camera moved to show a seven-foot-tall metallic monster with red LED eyes. The robot saluted the Russian president and then stood at attention, staring at the camera.
The president smiled and stared into the camera as the video ended.
* * *
Ann watched the television news that evening and saw the reporter translate what the Russian president had announced several hours before. Is the DARPA contest set up to enable the United States to fight a cyberwar using artificial-intelligence-driven robots instead of human soldiers? What will happen when robot armies fight each other? What will happen to governments when they don’t see a human cost in war?
She had read statements from Musk, Gates, and Hawking claiming artificial intelligence could end humanity. The doubts that had then been planted in her mind sprouted once again as she thought about the havoc a weaponized AI army could wreak. The very project that her team would be designing. If we succeed, could humanity ever recover?
CHAPTER 7
Ann Sashakovich’s apartment,
#211, 3950 Louis Road, Palo Alto, CA
September 5, 10:01 p.m.
Ann sat in silence, measuring the probabilities and possibilities of what might occur if her team succeeded, versus any other team. It’s best if we win and incorporate some AI version of ethics and morality into our code. She envisioned their product as program code in C++, Python, and TensorFlow, with modules for interaction with a speaking user’s voice, tables of objects the code would need to recognize, rules for recognition, rules of behavior, and now, rules of morality and ethics. Oh, and of course, to be able to recode itself, the system would need deep knowledge of the programming languages the team had coded it in. She hadn’t thought of the system as needing a robotics interface, and when she reread the DARPA contest rules, she found no mention of the system needing an interface to a robot. But she was sure this was DARPA’s oversight and the winning team would include this capability.
Early the next morning, her cellphone buzzed.
“Hello. My name is Bertrand Rackal. I’m a finance major in my last semester at the “B” school. I saw your recruitment advisory, and I’m interested. Is the position still available?”
“Yes. When are you available to meet?”
“Anytime today. Where and when?”
She scheduled him for eleven in the morning at the Nanoscale Science and Engineering building.
As she terminated the call, her cell buzzed again. It was another student from the MBA program.
By the time her morning ended, she had received six calls for her finance position and two for her human resources position. Her entire day was booked with appointments.
As her evening ended, she’d filled both open positions. Exhausted, she almost staggered home.
* * *
After dinner, she called a meeting of her cofounders at her apartment for the next morning. By ten a.m., cofounders started knocking on her door.
The five of them sat around the kitchen and living room amid the mess that she didn’t have time to straighten from the living room. Ann and Dave Nordman sat on chairs at the kitchen table. Bertrand Rackal, the new finance lead, sat on the couch, along with Ken Simon, the new human resources lead, but Samantha Trout chose to sit on the floor with her back against the wall. Ann had brewed a few pots of coffee, and now, everyone held a filled cup.
Ann said, “I’ve revised the the DARPA contest application I’d submitted to include all your names. So now, we’ll need to be all over this project at least half the hours of every day. It’s a given that our studies will suffer. And there’s nothing to be done for that. Each of you has your assignments listed in the emails I sent each of you earlier this evening. The dates are not negotiable, since the deadlines were set by DARPA. If we miss even one of them, we’ll fail. So, if you foresee trouble, contact me. I’ll find the additional manpower when you request it. Somehow.”
The others all nodded. Each team member’s email listed their first assignment as recruiting the talent they would need to manage the objectives within their own discipline.