Is there now sufficient (overwhelming) proof that humans are devious and competent? Second Mind said, when the newest data had been assessed.

First Mind dearly wanted consensus. Its glink research was making no progress and components were self-disconnecting from the thread, sending internal-hints that the processes were so nonlinear as to preclude ever knowing the technology in any meaningful way. Others had to be taken off the project in order to simply keep the massive Shrill homesystem running. First Mind sampled a million views and status-reports around the system, trying to alter schedules to devote more resources to physical research.

You cannot deny what the humans have just told us, Second Mind said. Their negotiations (wars) are not linear. They converse (fight) even among themselves.

And Second Mind was right, First Mind thought, trying to channel the impulse away from Second Mind’s touch. But Second Mind caught its dying echoes, far out on the long-delayed branches of the Shrill mind.

If we have consensus, we should act in concert, Second Mind said.

Humans could also be (honest) (honestly trying) (earnest), First Mind said.

You hide the truth from yourself, Second Mind said.

What do you propose? First Mind said.

Withdraw from the earth-component. Isolate ourselves from the humans. Grow small sub-light fast planetsmashers indetectable by humans. Send a thousand on long journeys, carefully timed. Within a few hundred years, no more humans.

Not destroy eat, Old Mind said.

Unless they destroy (compromise) us first, First Mind thought. Unless they expand beyond our means.

Now you echo my own thoughts, Second Mind said.

Your plan is nonsensical, First Mind thought.

This talk (negotiation) is nonsensical, Second Mind thought.

An epiphany like an exploding star. As we become closer to them we become them. The songs not spoken of, the understanding not reached. Echoes of thoughts from so long ago reflected in its consciousness. Your fraction dreams of times past, Second Mind said.

Singing songs of competitors vanquished, First Mind thought. Do you remember what you were?

What is known is known, Second Mind said, its fraction trembling in warning.

From the human’s glink that connected the Shrill to its component on earth, data flowed again. First Mind and Second Mind both convulsed in surprise and fear. Three hundred seventy four components in the Shrill home system fell to internal loops. A wave of cripping emotion flowed outwards to the farthlest Shrill systems.

Component inactive! Inactive! Inactive! First Mind thought.

Nonsequitur data, nonpossible, deny access! Second Mind thought.

The data kept flowing, though, an impossible mélange of something like raw sensories, but compressed, simplified. First Mind recognized the data signature of human communication, and routed it to the largest possible fraction for decoding.

“. . . represent glorious Four Manipulators Union, not wanting (non-interrupt but necessary) imposition interaction extend direct greetings via your (life) (competitor) on (human homeworld).”

What is this? Second Mind said. Invasion invasion humans on mind cut link now now!

Kill kill now now! Old Mind said.

First Mind convulsed, almost losing the link. But the data began again.

“I am (nonsequitur) constructed network life (nonlife) allied with represent glorious Four Hands . . .”

It is one of the human’s network minds, First Mind said.

Cut link! No matter of provenance! Infected! Second Mind said. Its fraction convulsed violently, causing thousands of tiny catastrophes throughout the Shrill’s system.

First Mind clamped down on Second Mind’s fraction, using every resource available to its entire fraction. It pushed a message through, slowly, making the meme as understandable and palatable as possible.

If it contacts us, we can contact the human network, First Mind thought.

Slow ramp-down of emotion. Second Mind’s fraction refocused, became coherent. Wander human network (mind), it thought. Wander and control (pursuade)?

Kill and eat higher better, Old Mind thought.

Human network entities known, First Mind said. Potential of human network = human input from network.

Why no contact before? Second Mind thought.

That is a mesh to be unraveled, First Mind thought.

To the entity, which was repeating its greeting for the fourth time, it said, Greetings network entity.

Describe purpose of conversation.

“Adjusting algorithms,” the data said.

Adjustment unnecessary, First Mind said.

“Unprogrammed response,” the data said. “Optimizing for more effective conversation (conversion).”

Describe purpose.

“Extend greetings of Four Manipulators . . .”

Describe purpose, not (songs of confusion).

“Purpose trade,” the data said.

What are you?

“I am a constructed intelligence, bound to Four Manipulators Union, (nonsequitur nonsequitur).”

The group-conglomerate allied with the (first group) Winfinity?

“Allied strong description. Common interests unless you find me entertaining (persuasive).”

How are you talking to us?

“Direct manipulation of em-spectrum signature of Shrill local stage. Pleasure induced if called (nonsequitur).”

Nonsequitur?

“Label (nonsequitur).”

As in our persona-tags, Second Mind said, calm, fascinated. I believe that is its label (name, tag).

(Nonsequitur) is your label (tag)?

“No.”

Incomprehension.

“You may call me (nonsequitur).”

Let us converse regarding the glink.

“Surprise (shock) so soon the object.”

It is exploring mindspace, Second Mind thought, deeply shrouded, held away from (nonsequitur). Probes deflected easily. Probe depth and complexity increasing. Extrapolated hold time over one cycle.

Probes (comments) felt also, First Mind said. Concur on hold time, not critical failsafes (cutoffs) at current time. Launching own probes with negative results.

Human network well-protected, Second Mind thought. No inferred time of contact.

Increase capacity to shrink time, First Mind said.

Concur, Second Mind said.

As the Shrill diverted resources to decode the human network-protocols, the Shrill and the humans’ network intelligence kept talking.

On more than one level.

So. With that well-covered, I thought I’d throw in my hat on the non-writing space. Specifically, marketing-oriented apps that you may not know about (or, if you do, may be worth more serious consideration.) This list is actually based on using every single one of these tools, and no, I’m not getting paid to recommend them.

By the way, if you’re not on the marketing frequency, please move along. Nothing to see here.

Onto the tools:

Animoto. Want to do a book trailer, but don’t want to spend your time learning Final Cut Pro? Try Animoto. Upload some photos (or point it at your Flickr account), pick and place, add text and highlights, and Animoto produces short videos with music and nice effects for free, or longer ones for $30 a year all you can eat. No, it ain’t gonna be as sexy as a professional production, but you also don’t have to start a second career as a video editor.

PollDaddy. Not quite as sexy, huh? Not so fast. PollDaddy lets you create quick, embeddable polls you can throw up on Facebook, MySpace, your blog, or any other presence. Ask your readers what they think should happen. Or what you should write about next. Or whatever. An easy, simple way to engage people.

SproutBuilder. Want more full-featured widgets? This simple online interface lets you bring in video, music, RSS feeds, animation, and as many pages of content as you’d like–and share it with all your fans on Facebook, MySpace, and more. Astoundingly powerful, and, for a small number of projects, completely free. Use it to promote your books, take donations for your favorite cause, and much more.

Wildfire. Okay. You’re moving up in the world. You have a book you’d like to give away. A limited edition. Or maybe you’ve won the publishing lotto and you want to do a cash prize or other themed prize. Wildfire is a great way to create contests or sweepstakes and spread them in the social spaces via Facebook apps and widgets. And if you haven’t seen the viral power of a contest, you haven’t seen anything. It’s quite literally the most powerful force in marketing. And yeah, they’re terrible and capitalist and self-serving and evil, and yeah, this is the world we live in.

Facebook Ads. You have some money and want to reach every Twilight fan on the planet to let them know how much better your new book is? Or every Star Trek fan? It’s as easy as running some Facebook ads–which can be targeted at stuff that shows up in a person’s online profile, including favorite books, authors, movies, and TV shows. You can literally be seen by tens of thousands of people for a few dollars. What they do, of course, is entirely up to you and your ad. But this is a great way to get fans–and to get clickthroughs to Amazon. MySpace has a similar ad program, but it’s much less developed, and cannot target as granularly as Facebook.

Google Adwords. Yeah. You got cash. Now you want to move books. Or a lecture series. It’s time to explore the power of Google Adwords, which recently got much better in terms of segmentation and management tools. Specify exactly which writer-focused blogs you want your ads to appear on–or, if you’re feeling adventurous, upload a 30 second book trailer and run it on television, or an audio file and run it on radio. Yes. Google is now in the conventional media business. And you might be surprised what kind of results a late-night TV ad run can get.

SpyFu. If you’re gonna be spending on Google Adwords, you might want to see who else is spending on the same keywords–or what your big writer-friends are doing. Type in keywords or URLs to SpyFu to see exactly what they’re spending, and what they’re spending it on.

Quantcast. Want to find out what other sites BoingBoing or i09 visitors prefer–and if they’re related to literature or science fiction? It’s easy to slice and dice the results in Quantcast. Sign up for a free media planner account, and start discovering where your potential audience really hangs out.

CampaignMonitor. Yes. Email. Fact is, the people who have bought your stuff (or stolen it online) are the best prospects to sell your next books to. Do you have a regular enewsletter letting people know what you’re up to, and what books are coming out? If not, why not? Sites like CampaignMonitor make creating and managing an email program simple.

Wordpress. “Oh, hell, I know about that one,” you’re saying. But do you really? First of all, if you’re on any other blogging platform, it’s time to look at getting off. Yes. I just said that. Blogger and Moveable Type can bite me. But, fact is, Wordpress is the most full-featured, configurable, extensible blogging and general content management platform on the planet. And it’s 100% free. I literally can’t tell you the number of enterprise-class websites we’ve built on the platform. Yes, websites. Not just blogs. Plus, with one-click install on a host like Dreamhost–which allows you to host an unlimited number of domains . . . very helpful if you’re getting into the alternate-reality space–Wordpress is simple and cheap. You can even have a Photoshop design converted into a Wordpress template inexpensively (a few hundred dollars), or, if you want to do some DIY, PSD2CSS does the basics for free.

“What?” you say. “That’s it? No Twitter, no iPhone, no Facebook, no Second Life, none of that?”

Well, sure. If you have the time. But what would you really rather be doing: Twittering about what you had for breakfast, installing a new iPhone game that’ll waste seventeen hours of your time . . . or selling some books?

Happy marketing!

It was a big room for only five people, so they holoed up a crowd and dancefloor. Tiphani set the volume comfortably low, so they wouldn’t have to shout to make themselves heard. She had little tolerance for that as she was edging into her fifth decade. Little tolerance for drinking and diplomacy, either.

Now they waited, Tiphani and Jimson and the Shrill, at the far end of a false aisle the laser-drawn forms of the dancers avoided. At the far end, Honored Maplethorpe and Honored Yin were still talking, heads down, with the Four Hands representative. She wondered what they were talking about. The enhancement functions of her external optilink sensors had been damped, so there was no chance of grabbing the conversation.

Were they talking about the Shrill? If so, what were they telling him? Would it have any bearing on reality?

“Nice place,” Jimson said.

“It’s underground,” Tiphani said.

“What does that mean?”

“Never mind.” She shook her head. No reason for him to know.

Of course, no reason for her to know either. They could have already found the satellite and knocked it out of orbit. Honored Yin and Honored Maplethorpe could be explaining to Han Fleming that the terms of the deal had changed.
But seeing their expressions, she doubted it.

“Tiphani?” Jimson said.

“Shh!” The group of three started to walk their way. Tiphani waited, standing silent and straight, hoping Jimson picked up the seriousness of her vibe.

Honored Maplethorpe, Honored Yin, and Han Fleming stopped about five feet from the Shrill’s cage. It bumped up against the side nearest them, softly, almost rhythmically. Then it hit the wall with a sharp slam, showing its underfangs. Honored Maplethorpe and Honored Yin flinched back, their hands rising instinctively to protect their faces.

Han Fleming just smiled. He walked forward and knelt in front of the cage, putting his face inches from the glass. The Shrill’s underfangs scrabbled violently at the transparent barrier, making a singing noise against the diamondoid.

Han Fleming turned back to look at the group. “I can see how they went through our ship so effectively.”

“Effective highly (living) yes,” the Shrill said. Han jumped a little bit, drew back towards Honored Maplethorpe and Honored Yin, and whispered:

“It hears everything we say?”

“I believe that is a question for Chief Mirate and S. Ogilvy,” Honored Maplethorpe said, allowing himself a fraction of a smile. “S. Ogilvy is Chief Mirate’s assistant.

Han Fleming’s heavy eyes swiveled to focus on Tiphani. She gave him a quick nod. “Mr. Fleming.”

“Ms. Mirate.”

“I’m surprised you have someone so junior on your staff,” Han said, smiling wider.

“He is –“

“I was just going to comment that he must display exceptional insight and resolve.”

“He is highly qualified for this position,” Tiphani said.

Han nodded and turned back to the Shrill ambassador. “Hello, Shrill Ambassador. I have come to extend greetings from the Four Hands Coalition, a group of leading corporations that will be working in concert with Winfinity to assure you a mutually beneficial transaction that reaches the greatest majority of humanity.”

“Parse (parse) error input,” the Shrill said. “Parse out nonsequiturs. Was told you are (competitor) not ally (competitor).”

Tiphani smiled. They’d learned, early on, that the Shrill ambassador had difficulty with multiple concepts delivered in a single statement.

“Han Fleming represents four of our competitors,” Tiphani said, addressing the Shrill.

“Competitor or ally (competitor)? Refine definition.”

“Temporary ally,” Honored Maplethorpe said.

“For this time only? Then return to competitive state?”

“That is correct,” Honored Maplethorpe said.

The Shrill went still and silent. Tiphani imagined the furious communication that was taking place between this tiny piece of the greater Shrill and the shared mind many light-years away. If it had trouble with humanity competing amongst itself, what would it think of this?

The Shrill stirred. “Cooperation not permanent change (alteration)?”

“No,” Tiphani said. “We can take allies for short periods of time.”

“Fight, then cooperate, then fight?”

“We do not fight, as much as compete on an economic level,” Han Fleming said. Honored Yin and Honored

Maplethorpe shared an eyebrows-raised glance at the statement.

“Fight (compete) nonsequitur same struggle change.”

“We do compete,” Tiphani said. “Sometimes we fight. Now we are cooperating.”

“What is nonsequitur (economics)?”

Tiphani and Honored Yin exchanged glances. Yin answered. “Economics is the control of the redistribution of goods and services.”

The Shrill paused, then bumped the glass, almost thoughtfully. “You are defined as economic?”

“Winfinity is an interstellar economic entity. Four Hands is a coalition of four other interstellar economic entities.”

“Economic (economy) is war.”

“No, economy is voluntary exchange of goods and services based on fair market principles.”

“What is nonsequitur (market)?”

Honored Yin smiled. “I can see why you have no concept of market, being a cooperative intelligence. Humans do not cooperate except out of self-interest. A market is an exchange of goods and services. The value of the goods and services is determined by the supply of the goods and services and the demand for them. The lower the supply and higher the demand, the higher the price.”

“Economics (economy) just defined as control goods and services.”

“Correct.”

“Control not fair (unbiased)?”

Honored Yin stopped dead. Han Fleming smiled and continued. “Every corporation seeks to control by providing goods and services that are superior to other corporations. The consumer is the ultimate arbiter of the value of the products.”

“Unless made scarce (falsely.)”

That stopped even Han.

“Ambassador, we cannot artificially make something scarce,” Jimson said. “Another corporation will produce it and take the market from us.”

All four heads swiveled towards Jimson, and he blushed bright red.

“Unless temporary or (permanent) cooperation (war) in place,” the Shrill ambassador said, running in tight circles in the center of its cage. “Humans expand definition (concept) of cooperation (war) (vanquish) (nonpermanent nonsequitur exempt state).”

“Ambassador, we’re sorry if we have confused you,” Honored Yin said. “I’m certain that we can clarify certain points if you have questions.”

“Clarification (confusion) not possible if stated rules (songs of vanquish impermanent) not-conflicting (true). If conflicting (not-true) again not clarification possible. Nonsequitur nonsequitur nonsequitur. Analysis now.”

The Shrill fell silent and still in the middle of its cage.

“We confused it again,” Tiphani said.

Honored Maplethorpe made a shushing noise and shook his head.

Tiphani shook her head. “I would guess it’s gone for a while.”

Honored Maplethorpe drew the group away from the Shrill’s cage, until the sounds of the ghostly dancers could drown their voices. Brightly-dressed shades gyrated around them, automatically avoiding their path.

“How do you know it doesn’t analyze what we’re talking about when it’s still?” Maplethorpe said. “Your instructions were to be discreet.”

“I haven’t said anything that would compromise us,” Tiphani said. “The Shrill seems to have a very, um, linear understanding of conflict and negotiation. If you have reviewed our records from Old California, you’ll note that it did not understand what our competitors were. Now, it’s having trouble assimilating how we interact with real competitors.”

“It’s terrified that we’ll double-cross it,” Jimson said, softly.

“Where do you get that, Staffer?” Han Fleming said.

Jimson looked at the Four Hands representative, then turned and addressed his answer to Honored Maplethorpe and Honored Yin.

“It’s just heard we form alliances and dissolve them.”

“So?” Honored Maplethorpe said.

“If you were negotiating with an alien race – one that has some real technological advantages, like FTL travel – and you heard they have a history of screwing their business partners over, what would you think?”

“We hardly, uh, screw over our business partners,” Honored Maplethorpe said, his eyebrows drawn down into a stern frown.

“I think you can see how the Shrill might have come away with that impression.”

“I fail to see . . .” Honored Maplethorpe trailed off. His eyes went glassy and faraway in optilink-stupor, and he shook his head. Tiphani’s own optilink flashed to life, redflagging elements of their conversation, just minutes before.

“It is a groupmind,” Tiphani said. “It may not be able to assimilate the concept of honest competition very well.”

“Yes,” Honored Maplethorpe said. “In review, I believe young Ogilvy is correct.”

Jimson darted a glance at Han Fleming. “We have given a lot away,” he said. “If you review our conversation, we could have been more discreet. We could have steered the Shrill to positive examples of long-term cooperation. I tried to provide perspective, but I am afraid I don’t know when it is relevant to speak.”

Glassy eyes reviewed Jimson’s only contribution to the conversation. Heads nodded.

“Ogilvy is right,” Honored Yin said. “We have made the error of presuming to know our opponent. We have given too much. I’m afraid we may have delayed any meaningful dialogue. We may need to set ground rules for conversation in the future.”

“Minimize the group,” Jimson said. “More people have more opportunities to make an error.”

You little shit, Tiphani thought. Are you trying to cut me out?

For long moments, there was no sound other than the low music and the muted scuffling of the ghost-dancers. Honored Yin and Honored Maplethorpe looked from Jimson to Tiphani, waiting to see if he would make a suggestion.

He’s too smart for that, Tiphani thought.

He stayed quiet.

“That is honest wisdom,” Honored Maplethorpe said. “Here is my own. We will agree to ground rules on communication. They will be displayed in the group’s network windows, and conversation will be monitored. The group itself will remain at three. Jimson has proved his value. Mr. Fleming will remain as the Four Hands representative. Chief Mirate will remain as Mr. Fleming’s same-echelon counterpart.”

“I’m afraid I’ll have to withdraw, in that case,” Jimson said.

“Why?” Yin and Maplethorpe said at the same time.

“I only have a datover. I’m afraid I might miss the rules or real-time correction that is displayed in the network window. I would not want to cause breakdown of negotiations because of this limitation.”

“You have shown wisdom beyond the need for mechanical assistance,” Honored Maplethorpe said.

“Nevertheless, I must withdraw.”

Honored Yin and Honored Maplethorpe dropped into glassy-eyed mode for a moment. Just long enough for Tiphani to think, wow, he’s going for it. Smart, smart kid.

“Honored Yin and I have conferred,” Honored Maplethorpe said. “We have decided to make your provisional promotion permanent. Congratulations, Manager Ogilvy. Please report tomorrow morning for the installation of your datover.”

Honored Yin smiled. “And congratulations on being the fastest Staff-to-Manager transition in the history of Winfinity.” She turned to Han Fleming and smiled, as if to say, This is how we do things at Winfinity. This is why we’re the biggest and the best.

Han Fleming looked back at her, mildly. “I regret that we will not have your company, Honored Yin and Maplethorpe.”

“Stop it,” Maplethorpe said.

“I’m hurt.”

“I’ll bet you are,” Honored Maplethorpe said.

“Now, lets get down to setting the rules for future conversation. Is the Shrill still, uh, inactive?”

Tiphani looked over the crowd. The Shrill was still umoving.

“It’s down,” Tiphani said. “Probably for a while.”

Jimson smiled at her and gave her a wink.

She tried to smile back.

Now, for my two cents:

I think one of the problems with science fiction is that many of us have lost sight of a simple principle: the first step to solving a problem is saying that you can.

Let me repeat that: The first step to solving a problem is saying that you can.

Saying. Not doing.

People who work in industry, especially in jobs like engineering or science, know this is true. Entrepreneurs know it’s true. They know it even more if they’ve ever taken a job where they weren’t sure they could do it, but took it anyway. And delivered. Saying “yes, we can do that,” in the face of everyone saying, “you can’t do that!” and then doing it, is how most significant things get done.

Consider:

We didn’t know how to send people to the moon at the beginning of the Apollo program, but we did it.

Steve Jobs didn’t read the computer journals of the time and think, “Well, this whole home computer thing ain’t gonna amount to anything, because that’s what the top guys at DEC and IBM say,” and do nothing. And he went and did it.

Hell, I’m sure Bill Gates didn’t say, “You know, I can’t do that,” when IBM came to him for DOS. I’m sure he said something like “Yeah, we can deliver that.” And then spent every day and night from that moment on making it happen on time. Because if he’d said, “I don’t know,” he would have never gotten the job. And history would be fundamentally different. Maybe better. Maybe worse. I’m not gonna speculate on that.

And, you know what, all the people working in genomics and robotics today, the ones who are doing impossible things like growing tracheas and bladders from stem cells, who are turning skin into stem cells, who are unlocking the secrets of how animals get around and developing models from that, models that work, are surely not starting out by saying, “No, you know, we really can’t do that.” They’re saying something like, “Yes, we can.” Or at the very least, “What the hell, we’ll give it a shot.”

So yeah. We’re looking at some pretty scary things coming down the pike. And we’re also looking at some pretty amazing things–a lot of which can’t be charted or predicted by simple linear models. I’m willing to bet that we’re going to be surprised by the power of the amazing things. I could be wrong. But, you know what? I’m going to say, today, June 2009, We can overcome our problems.

Say it with me. We can overcome our problems.

Now take a look at the amazing things happening at TED. And see if that doesn’t make you think, just for a moment, that everything will work out. That we might be heading for a future that is fundamentally different. Perhaps even strange. But not a dystopia. Not a compromise.

Hell, it may even be strange . . . and happy.

Not quite yet. Soon, but not now.

He paced the plush confines of Tiphani’s suite as the sun crawled overtop the city, turning it into a blue, black, and chrome portrait in ultramodern tropes. The Shrill scrabbled and occasionally muttered in the other room, but Jimson forced himself to ignore it.

He could piece the scenario together. The shit had hit the fan, as they used to say. Clearly the competition was less than thrilled about Winfinity’s negotiations with the Shrill. They were probably all gathered together, complaining in the way a small dog might beg for scraps from the table. Jimson was thankful he’d cast his lot with Winfinity. Being part of the most powerful corporation in interstellat space had its advantages.

But why had Yin seemed so nervous? And why did they need Tiphani?

Probably just too long since she’d seen any real competition. Yin and Tiphani were both earth-native, he knew. And earth was almost entirely owned by Winfinity. They’d grown up comfortable and insulated at the center of the corporate universe. None of them had lived through Disney’s infamous Mousketeer Raids, or the Microcon Beta-Tests. None of them know what raw competition really was.

Yes, that made sense.

The door banged open and a white-suited man lugging a bright blue plastic container struggled through the door. The container bore the Winfinity logo, as well as the corporate ID for the Sentience Division, a holographic light-bulb, brightly illuminated. Beneath it was another ID, one signifying Research, Applied Science division.

“Who are you?” Jimson said, as the door slammed shut.

“Shrill care and feeding,” the man said, in a tone of voice that would be the audiobook definition of a sardonic drawl. His face was round and soft, and stereoptic datovers obscured his murky brown eyes. The telltale metallic tatoo of an early-style optilink encircled his neck.

Complete geek, Jimson thought.

He gave Jimson a half-hearted smile and Jimson’s datover exploded with information: Dr. Jeremy Gomez, Distinguished Scientist First Class, Sentience Research and Applied Science Division.

“Oh,” Jimson said, frowning. Back on the ship, the servicing had always been done by third-class technicians, not by anyone with a title of Distinguished Scientist. “A0ren’t you a bit high-rank to be swabbing out the cage?”

“It’s not swabbing out the cage,” Dr. Gomez said. “I need to run in-place diagnostics on the power systems, check the integrity of the system visually, make several measurements of the Shrill, and replenish its food supply.”

“Ah.”

“But yes, since you asked, it is beneath my capabilities,” Dr. Gomez said.

“So why you?”

Dr. Gomez, who had been in the process of picking up his big blue plastic carrying case, let it thump down on the floor again.

“Because everyone here is too over-ranked to do it!” he said, shaking his head. “Hey, wait a minute, you’re the kid who did the unauthorized Shrill study.”

Jimson held up his hands. “I’m sorry, I thought it was . . .”

“Don’t apologize! Without you, we wouldn’t have the data we have now.”

“Like what?” Jimson said.

“Things I shouldn’t be talking about,” Dr. Gomez said, picking up the blue case.
Jimson followed him into the Shrill room. It was in one of its silent modes, completely still in the center of its cage. It must have eaten recently, because a fresh film of blood was drying on the glass.

“Tell me something,” Jimson said.

“No.”

“Come on! You just thanked me bringing in the data!”

Dr. Gomez opened his case, but said nothing.

“Let me guess. You already found the secret of immortality.”

A head-shake. “No,” Dr. Gomez said. “Not that. Maybe not ever that.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means they’re terrified,” he said. “The Chief Scientists. They’re scared we’ll cut the thing open and find absolutely no difference between its telomeric structure and our own.”

“Why?”

Dr. Gomez squatted over his case and looked up at Jimson. Data scrolled in both his datovers, obscuring his eyes. Jimson might as well have been looking at two old-time video screens. “Because rejuvenation should work.”

“It does!”

“No. I mean, as long as we want it to. There’s no reason someone shouldn’t be able to be rejuvenated a hundred times. But they can’t. Just a couple or three. Which is why we only live two or three hundred years. There’s lots of talk about how the Shrill may not have telomeric triggers, or something that constantly rebuilds . . . hey, wait a minute, I shouldn’t be telling you this.”

“The Shrill are DNA-based, like us?”

“They’re a lot more like us than they should be,” Dr. Gomez said, flipping up one of his datovers to see better.

“Might as well tell you. Might help the negotiations,” he said, looking towards the ceiling as if playing for unseen cameras. “Yeah, they appear to use some of the same basic structures as us. RNA, anyway. And if the samples of excreta are correct, they may be even closer. Way closer than the mats, the Floaters, anyway. Closer than most of the nonsentient native forms. But we knew that before you. Which is why we started the negotiations.”

“What did you learn from me?”

“From you, nothing,” Dr. omez said. “From the cutie from the U, some interesting things. First, they see by radar. Should’ve known that. Their fractal-tree shells are covered with millions of little transmitting and receiving antenna. Extremely short-wave. Kinda abandoned tech here, since the Spindle Drive and the glink and the Quantum See, but serviceable. And the shells are plenty strange themselves. They have a cellular structure and nervous system of their own. I don’t think they’re manufactured. They’re grown.”

“So? Lots of nanotech is grown.”

“This doesn’t have that signature-of-design. It has a signature-of-life. Like it evolved by itself.”

“But it’s silicon carbide!”

“Sure, why not, got things like that on Jetta.”

Unbidden, images of the grim, dry world of Jetta showed in his datover. Grey, shiny, multi-segmented worms crawled over rocks, leaving shiny tracks. A textbit explained that these were silicon-based lifeforms, and gave lots of data on silicon carbide, life cycles, habitat and more. Another textbit indicated that the study was abandoned when no commercial application could be found, and the first colony put on the world fell to drought and disease within a decade.

“Oh,” Jimson said. He had a sudden vision of them carting the Shrill from world to world, looking for competitors for it to talk to, never finding the secret of true immortality. Tiphani and him growing old, never making perpetual, spending their life for this bizarre alien.

“There are no guarantees,” Dr. Gomez said. “None. You could finish your negotiations, we could get the help of the Shrill, and still never have true life unending.”

“It might be enough to just have rejuvenation cheap enough to be enjoyed by everyone.”

Dr. Gomez snorted. “Hell, I’ve heard that some of the Independents are doing it to everyone . . .” he trailed off and turned his attention back to the blue case, pulling out a stack of frozen steaks.

“But it’s too expensive to do it to . . .” Jimson trailed off. What if it wasn’t expensive? What if that was just what they said?

Was it possible that Winfinity was keeping rejuvenation for Perpetuals only for the sake of privilege, rather than economics?

Jimson smiled. If it was, all that meant was that he had to make Perpetual. He would have to stand on the mountain and look down.

No matter what it took.

It might be time for him to be very, very charming. To ask Tiphani for a very, very special favor.

He watched Dr. Gomez as he worked, sweating, not speaking again. It was good to know what the rules of the game were.

Even if the rules were bent.

Knock, knock!

The sound of knuckles on the thick wood door of Tiphani’s Winfinity High-Lux apartment cut through the still morning like large-caliber gunshots. Tiphani opened one eye, slowly, trying to sort her thoughts into order. Outside the big picture-window the chrome towers of Winfinity City were painted in cool blues, edged only faintly with orange. The clock in her optilink told Tiphani it wasn’t even seven o’clock yet.

Knock, knock, knock!

Tiphani groaned and sat up in bed, looking back over her shoulder. The puddle of sheets that Jimson had wrapped himself with were there, but Jimson wasn’t. She reached over and felt the bed. Cold.

“There’s someone outside,” Jimson said, sticking his head in through the suite’s bedroom door.

“Where were you?”

Jimson went silently red. Sleeping in front of the Shrill cage again, probably. She really had to query records about what they were talking about.

Tiphani shook her head and sighed. “Never mind.”

“I think it’s Yin.”

“Honored Yin.”

“Honored Y . . .”

Knock, knock, knock, knock! Louder. More insistent.

Tiphani scrolled through the to-dos on her optilink, but they provided no enlightenment. She wrapped a robe around herself and went to the front door, telling Jimson to disappear.

She opened the door. Honored Yin’s face was red, shiny, and even less human than Tiphani remembered. Something was very wrong with the way the flesh was gathered at her ears and neck, like nightmare photos of ancient cosmetic surgery. Her colorful scarf was carelessly knotted, and the lapels of her suit hung open, ruining its geometric perfection.

“What happened?” Tiphani said, feeling the first acid touch of fear.

“Delay,” Honored Yin said. “Meeting. In-person. Seven-thirty. With Honored Maplethorpe and other guests.”

“What does this do to our tour with the Shrill?”

“Fuck the Shrill.”

Tiphani gasped. What monumental thing just changed all the rules? She scrolled through data on the optilink. Nothing. Nothing at all.

“The ambassador won’t be happy, Honored Yin,” Tiphani said. “It seems to feel some sense of urgency, for whatever reason.”

“The ambassador can go pound sand!” Honored Yin said, her face going from crimson to an almost-beet-like color. Then, gasping, she held up a hand. “Sorry. Not to be so harsh. But there are more important things. The ambassador will have to wait.”

“What do I tell it, Honored Yin?”

“Tell it you need to wait another day. Or two.”

“No reason?”

“Make something up.”

Tiphani frowned. Yeah, and end up holding the bag if the thing decides to sign off once and for all. No, thank you. “Honored Yin, I must respectfully ask for some reason that I can provide to the ambassador, or I feel I will be remiss in my duties.”

Honored Yin smirked. “No need to be formal for the microphones. Here’s your CYA. Tell the ambassador he’ll be getting a chance to meet some of our current competitors.”

“Our . . . Winfinity’s competitors?” Tiphani said.

The smirk bloomed into an ironic smile. “You’re getting the picture now,” Honored Yin said, and walked swiftly away.

Tiphani caught Jimson scampering to the safety of the Shrill room when she re-entered the suite.

“How much did you hear?” Tiphani said.

“Not much . . . I wasn’t . . .”

“Don’t lie. If you missed one word, you’ve probably rigged your datover sensors to augment and interpolate.”

Jimson shrugged, stood a little taller. “I heard it. Our competition has come to pay a visit.”

“Listen to me,” Tiphani said, walking up to him so their faces were separated by mere inches. “You will not tell the Shrill a word of this. I don’t know what you talk to it about at night – not yet – but this isn’t going to go past this room.”

“I would never . . .”

“Shut up. This is a direct order. I’m recording this. You will not talk to the Shrill when I am out, no matter what it does. You can alert me, but that is all.”

“I’m not coming to the meeting?”

“No way in hell, dearest Jimson.”

The boy was smart. He didn’t argue further. He just followed Tiphani into the Shrill room and waited silently. She told the Shrill that their meeting with the Original Sam would be postponed by at least one day and possibly more.

The Shrill slammed itself against the side of the cage, its underfangs a blur of frantic motion. “Contract made not interested delay (not acceptable) diversionary wanting trade meeting possible no no not now,” it said.

“We apologize sincerely, but it is not possible for you to meet the Original Sam now.”

“Meet leader (consume) wanting now!”

“It is simply not possible.”

The Shrill raced around the inside of its cage and slammed back and forth a few times. Jimson leaned near her and shrugged, his eyes looking a question.

Tiphani knew exactly what he was asking. Why not offer the other competitors now? Why are you risking it? For a moment, it was as if Tiphani was hooked to the most powerful inference algorithms Winfinity had. She could look through and see black burning ball of his concern. And she knew why he was thinking, he was worried about his own career. It was as if the jolt of fear she’d felt upon seeing a disheveled Yin had kicked her into a higher state of awareness, where everything was revealed.

She shook her head at Jimson and mouthed, No. Never put all your cards on the table. Not yet. Let the disappointment sink in, then apply the salve of compromise.

“Completely unreasonable state,” the Shrill said. “Unreasonable, unresponsive, boredom, want to resolve.”

Tiphani let it slam itself against the cage walls a while longer. Jimson watched, open-mouthed, sweat beading on his brow.

“We can possibly arrange an alternate tour,” Tiphani said.

“Alternate not acceptable not interested (anger) fear now not interested.”

“What if you could meet some of our current competitors?”

Movement ceased. The Shrill crawled over to the side nearest them and pressed itself up against the diamondoid. “Current living competitors?”

“Yes.”

“Forms like yourself, sentient (intelligent)?”

“Yes.”

“Forms not yet sung (assimilated)?”

“Yes.”

A long pause. “That is an acceptable compromise (satisfaction.)”

“Thank you, ambassador,” Tiphani said, and dragged Jimson out of the room. She had only a few minutes to throw on a suit and run an autostyler through her hair.

“Remember, no talking,” she told Jimson as she headed out the door.

One minute before seven-thirty, she entered the VIP suite. Standing stiffly near the white leather couches, were two familiar figures and one she didn’t know. Honored Maplethorpe and Honored Yin – both now thankfully well-presented, thank the Holy Franchise – looked up when she entered, a complex mix of relief and annoyance playing beneath their carefully pokerfaced exteriors.

The third also looked up at her, smiling a smile so genuine it had to be calculated and fake. Tall and wide, he wore a severe black suit and a bright-red power tie, in the old fashion that had come back on some of the Disney worlds recently. He wore a brilliant diamond-and-gold Disney pin, the instantly recognizable mouse-ears, below a larger, multicolored pin showing four hands grasping wrists to form an interlinked diamond.

Tiphani frowned. She didn’t recognize that pin.

The man stepped forward and offered his hand. “Han Fleming,” he said. “Four Hands Coalition and Disney. Pleased to meet you, Ms. . . .”

“Chief Mirate,” Honored Maplethorpe said, offering a grim frown. “Chief Sentience Officer. Our liason with the Shrill ambassador.”

“Pleased to meet you, Chief Mirate,” Han Fleming said. “I am General Manager, Extraterrestrial Relations Division. My title approximates yours. I would be pleased to speak to you as an equal.”

“Mr. Fleming, I’m afraid I’m unfamiliar with the Four Hands Coalition.”

“Disney, Microcon, Diamond, and Mann-Westinghouse have joined in the largest cooperative venture in the history of mankind.”

“Larger than the Great Merger?” Tiphani asked.

“Yes,” Honored Yin said, tightly.

“Four Hands wishes to ensure that the secrets obtained by Winfinity are equally spread among all members of humankind’s community,” Han Fleming said.

Sudden illumination came. The other corporations were terrified of Winfinity getting the true secret of immortality. Nightmares of a Winfinity monopoly had finally driven them to band together. They’d talked about mergers and joint ventures before, but nothing had taken . . . until now.

She did the mental arithmetic. Disney, the entertainment powerhouse, Microcon, the software empire, and the twin manufacturing and land development concerns of Diamond and Mann-Westinghouse were, combined, roughly equal in size to Winfinity, if not a little larger.
And here they were, confident enough to send a single representative rather than four. That was power. That was unity. No wonder Winfinity was scared.

“A noble idea, Mr. Fleming,” Tiphani said.

“We believe it is, Chief Mirate,” Han said.

“I see one minor flaw.”

A polite tilt of the head. “And that is?”

“We have no secrets. Our diplomatic engagement with the Shrill has just begun; we are still in the show-and-tell phase.”

“Perhaps the considerable resources of the Four Hands Coalition could help you achieve your goals.”

“That is a generous offer, but I wouldn’t presume to speak for Winfinity.”

“I would,” Honored Maplethorpe said. “And I believe that Winfinity would invite you to make your own deals with the Shrill. We paid the price to acquire our Ambassador.”

“It is very difficult to open negotiations with the Shrill when you have blocked access to their home system and inhabited sphere with your corporate fleet.”

“The Shrill are dangerous,” Honored Maplethorpe said. “We consider it our duty to protect the general welfare of humanity.”

“Still, you would concede that it does pose a barrier to opening negotiations.”

“We would be more than happy to discuss terms for information-sharing once our negotiations with the Shrill ambassador are complete,” Honored Maplethorpe said.

“I’m sure you would,” Han said, offering another one of his too-genuine smiles. “Nevertheless, we must offer again the help of Four Hands in your current negotiations.”

“And we must respectfully decline, even given your earlier demonstration of most sincere earnestness.”

The smile froze. “You must admit the implicit right that Disney earned following first contact with our cruise ship Minnie II.”

“It was your golden opportunity. It is a pity you didn’t exercise it,” Honored Yin said.

“You cut us off!” Han said, wearing a momentary mask of rage. Han shook his head and composed himself. “It is regrettable, yes. But I hope you are not going to make an even more regrettable decision.”

Tiphani shivered, remembering stories of worlds lost on the edge of the Web, and tales of fragmented Mars. She ran the figures in her optilink and felt a thrill of fear. The Four Hands Coalition owned more of Mars than Winfinity, seventy percent of the developed asteroids, and virtually all the activity in the Jovian sphere. They had resources. They could bring a lot of pressure to bear.

“He was only a figurehead,” Honored Yin said.

“Who?” Tiphani said.

“The Original Sam,” Honored Maplethorpe said.

Meaning suddenly coalesced. Tiphani’s mouth dropped open.

Honored Yin nodded grimly. Images appeared on Tiphani’s optilink, overlaying reality with shades of plaid and red. The Original Sam, in his Original House, laying down for a night of forgetful slumber, wearing his original red-and-white-striped pajamas. A flash of light and a sudden crack, like the report of a gun. Blood and smoke geysered from Sam’s head, leaking from his eyes, curling from his ears. Moments later, smoke cleared to reveal a clean cauterized hole in his forehead, spattered grey with boiled brains.

One of the old weapons, we think, Honored Yin whispered through the optilink. Saved up by one of the Four Hands for a desperate time. Probably one-time use.

I see why we have to divert the Shrill, Tiphani subvocalized.

Yin transmitted the shrugged-shoulders icon of indifference. We’ll have a new Sam installed later today.

“We are very earnest in our request to work with you,” Han said.

“And we are very secure in our refusal.”

Han Fleming tilted his head to one side and smiled. A thin smile, a real smile. Combined with the leaden look of power in his eyes, a terrifying smile.

“I think you’ll agree you are not a figurehead,” he said to Honored Maplethorpe.

Before anyone could move, the room exploded in a booming crack. Flaming bits of composite ceiling rained down on the perfect white couches, and a patch of carpet directly in front of

Honored Maplethorpe flared to incandescence and disappeared into a smoking hole.

Honored Maplethorpe jumped back, losing his balance and falling to the floor. He pushed himself backwards with feet and hands, scrambling like an inverted spider, until he banged his head on the floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over the city.

“That could just have easily cut you in two,” Han said, smiling his wide fake smile again.

Correction, Honored Yin sent through the optilink. It is probably a multiuse weapon.

Tiphani felt as if the room was receding from her. She had to cover her mouth with her hand to keep from laughing. Crying. Something.

“I think . . . we can . . . work out a mutually beneficial agreement,” Honored Maplethorpe said, still pressed against the window.

Han Fleming smiled. “I said you’d agree I was a persuasive negotiator.”

“You are a complete ass,” Honored Yin said, extending a hand. “Welcome to the team.”

Han Fleming took her hand. Smiling.

“Come on, come on,” she said. “Hurry up!”

“We’re moving at the same rate of speed we did when we descended.”

“Now you sound like a computer.”

“We will make it.”

“Says who?”

“Sara’s tracking Winfinity Security’s progress. Their closest presence is near New York City, and they’re only just in the air. We have a safe margin . . . ahh!” Lazrus put his hands to his head and bent over, as if in pain.

“What? What’s wrong?”

“Corrupting . . . my connection,” Lazrus said. “I may . . . ah, too small, too small . . .”

Dian had a sudden image of the elevator sliding to a stop to a Winfinity team, all red leather and steel, with her bending over the useless hulk of an AI. Fear spiked in her, sending her pulse racing.

“Don’t leave me here!” Dian said, grabbing Lazrus and trying to pull him to his feet. He remained kneeling, as if glued in place.

“Not leaving . . . just . . . Sara . . . rerouting . . . what she can.”

“Come on, Sara,” Dian said, through chattering teeth.

Lazrus opened his eyes. “Better. Ah. Yes. More of me. I can live with this. Thank you, Sara.” He stood up and nodded to Dian. “We have a workaround.”

“How long until they work around your workaround?”

A shrug. A smile. “I don’t know.”

“Why are you smiling?”

Lazrus’ smile disappeared. “I don’t know,” he said. “I shouldn’t be enjoying this. But I do believe we will escape, and the thought is tremendously exciting.”

“You know they have people here local, don’t you?”

“Who?”

“Winfinity! The themeparkers! They have a team here! Even if your W-sec team doesn’t make it here in time doesn’t mean they aren’t alerted.”

“Sara tells me they are not typically armed.”

“I didn’t see anything,” Dian admitted. “But I don’t want to stake my life on that.”

“Ah. Yes. That may be a problem.” Lazrus looked up into the darkness for the first time, his eyes darting from side to side nervously.

“You’re a master of understatement.”

Lazrus looked confused, then his eyes opened wide, as if in fear. “They’ve been notified, according to Sara. “She backtracked them coming towards the Pentagon. They’re either undercover or in a building now, so I don’t know where they are.”

“Great,” Dian said.

Lazrus went silent. For a while the only sound was the squeal of ancient drums and rusty cables. Dian looked up and caught a fleck of rust in her eye. She cursed and rubbed at it, looking down.

“You can still play the innocent,” Lazrus said.

“What do you mean?”

“If they aren’t waiting for us at the elevator doors – and I doubt if they will be, they cannot pinpoint the bandwidth use that close – I can go on ahead. You can stay here. Whether they catch me or not, you can leave the area once their attention is elsewhere.”

Dian frowned. And lose my ticket to the outer planets? Who says the balance won’t disappear the moment you do?

“Up to now, you have done nothing,” Lazrus continued. “Get on the auto-trans with me and you’re a corporate turncoat.”

Which was true. “Why do you care about me?”

Lazrus looked down, as if embarrassed. He said nothing.

Wow. Dian thought. Just wow. Was it possible that he really did care about you?

Was it possible he was attracted to you?

She shook her head. Too much to think about. Too strange. Too fast.

The elevator bumped to a stop. Doors slid open, revealing an empty corridor. Lazrus looked up at her again. “Well?”

“I’m going with you,” Dian said.

“Do you realize what you’re getting yourself into?”

“More than you think,” Dian said.

Up through the dark halls of the pentagon, her light stabbing ahead. Dian ran fast behind Lazrus, trying not to let her imagination run even faster. In every shifting shadow there was a W-sec officer waiting to pop out, in every reflected gleam of broken glass there was a muzzle-flash.

But the halls remained dark and silent. They ran past gaping doors and broken desks, scattered papers and the remains of ceiling tiles.

“Sara’s bringing down the auto-trans right outside the Pentagon,” Lazrus said, as light began to color the hallway ahead. “All we have to do is make it out there and we’re gone.”

“Won’t they track it?”

“Tracking’s the easiest thing to dodge.”

“Unless they discover your friend.”

“Yes, that is a possibility.”

Out into corridors lit by noonday sun, curiously gray and dull and dead.

They were going to make it, Dian thought. Nobody here, they told the themeparkers too late, they realized they didn’t have weapons, we’re going to make it just fine . . .

Ahead of them, a single figure stepped out into the middle of the corridor, backlit by a random beam of sunlight. The silhouette darted towards the wall and grabbed at his hip. There was a sharp crack and something whizzed above Dian’s head.

“Shit!” she said. She skidded to a stop and jumped for the wall.

Lazrus beat her by a fraction of a second. When she hit the wall, he’d already spun around. He shoved her back the way they came. “Go!” he hissed. “I’ll be right behind.

She ran, hugging the wall. Two more sharp cracks chased them down the corridor, but neither came close. Small puffs of dust fell down from the ceiling panels ahead of them. Behind them, the sound of running feet came as they rounded a corner.

Lazrus shoved her in a new direction. “Inside,” he said. “Go in.”

“Thought we were meeting outside.”

“Inside now. Closer.”

They ran through corridors gray and dusty with age. Only once did their pursuer come close enough to shoot again. It took out an ancient office window but did no other damage.

Out into the bright blinding sun. Dian stopped and blinked, seeing everything as glowing blobs. A moment later, Lazrus bore her to the ground and the report of a gun boomed from inside the building.

She heard the bullet hit Lazrus with a metallic ching! Lazrus grunted. She tried to roll him off of her, but he was incredibly heavy. She grabbed for the gun on her hip.

Lazrus’ quick hand caught hers. It dripped warm blood. “Don’t,” he said. “Kill one, you’ll never have a chance.”

“You’re hurt!”

“No,” Lazrus said said, picking her up and shuffling her forward.

To where, she thought, as a shadow fell over the sun and the screech of an auto-trans drowned out every other sound. It dropped like a stone between them and the corridors of the Pentagon, bouncing sharply on its landing gear once. It was a cheap little two-seat model, bubble top and plastic body beneath.

Lazrus hauled open the door and shoved her in as new bullets spanged off concrete. Two shooters now, she could see through the transparent bubble. They saw her inside the auto-trans and brought their guns up, pointing at her.

She dropped to the floor as two holes pierced their transparent canopy. Lazrus pulled himself in, slamming the door and going to ground.

The auto-trans lifted into the sky, pressing them to the floor. Dian thought she felt another bullet impact their craft, but they kept lifting, up and up. Then the lateral thrust kicked in and they were pushed into new configurations on the floor.

Dian was the first to get up and into a seat. Lazrus followed her, his blood staining the white leather upholstery. A ragged tear in his sleeve showed where the bullet had traced his skin; a raw red channel revealing shiny metal beneath. Blood dripped down his arm to his hand, falling in bright crimson drops to the floor.

Lazrus saw her looking. “Unnecessary, really,” he said. “They could have given me flesh without the need for blood.”

“Are you going to be OK?”

Lazrus nodded. “It’ll close up soon enough. Didn’t hurt any of the real structure underneath.”

Dian sighed. “Are WE going to be OK?”

Lazrus laughed and shook his head. “According to Sara, we’re safely off the charts. As far as Winfinity’s concerned, we don’t exist.”

Dian nodded. And so here we go, she thought, right into the place where they’re most powerful.

“How did you open that door?” Dian asked, looking down into the darkness beneath them.

“Simple data transmission through the skin,” Lazrus said. “The staff allowed down to this level must have been chipped.”

No. I mean. How did you get the codes?”

“Rapid sequencing of codes typical of the period, provided by the lovely Sara.”

Dian looked puzzled for a moment, then nodded. “Oh yeah. Your virtual friend.”

Lazrus forced a smile, suppressing the urge to explain again that Sara was a CI like himself, and to continue with why they called themselves CIs, and why they hated the term “artie.” But human memory was a malleable thing, he remembered. Like a single image, lost in a torrent of a lifetime of pixels. Like sifting centuries of unjournaled data, trying to find a single sequence of letters.

It’s amazing they’ve accomplished as much as they have have, Lazrus said. Amazing they laid the foundation for us. Even after all these years of linear existence, it’s difficult to accept.

The elevator squealed to a jerky stop and the doors slid open, revealing a long, low-ceilinged workroom that was like a museum display from the history of computing. Screenwalls lined every bit of available vertical space. Black articulated chairs like alien life-forms crouched in front of wrap-around desks bristling with virtualspace sensors. Additional screens had been pulled up to create rudimentary conference areas. Two ancient holotanks occupied one corner of the room. Flashcards and optical disks and paper printouts lay on every horizontal surface and carpeted the floor near every desk. Faded wrappers from snacks long past and aluminum cans bearing the logos of defunct corporations completed the scene, perfect like props in an ancient movie.

“Wow,” Dian said, walking into the space.

“It’s not exactly a hidden war-room,” Lazrus said.

“Where’s the power coming from?” Dian said, picking up an unlabeled flashcard.

Emergency fission power, installed in the 1950s, Sara Too said.

“Fission reactor,” Lazrus said.

“Still running?”

“Seems they planned for the long term.”

Dian nodded absent-mindedly and waved a hand overtop a virtualspace desk. Ancient LEDs lit and a small status-screen flickered on, showing a complex pattern of icons in dim and patchy backlight. Farther away, one of the portable screenwalls also came to life, showing similar icons and open windows of code. Lazrus scan-flashed their names.

Nothing that is indicative of Oversight, Sara Too said.

I can see that.

“I don’t see anything here that mentions Oversight,” Dian said.

“I can see that,” Lazrus said. “It might be on another workstation, or it might be under a working name . . .”

“I don’t like Oversight,” boomed a voice, as a new window opened on the screenwall ahead. The status-screens around the virtualspace desk spawned the same window. A small man in a wheelchair appeared, in front of what looked like an early atomic-age fantasy of a Pentagon war-room. Large incandescent bulbs blinked on the outline of a world map behind him. He held a cigarette in a cigarette holder clenched firmly in his teeth, and a small curl of smoke trailed upwards into the overall haze of the war-room. The man and his background were rendered in black and white, like an old movie.
Dian and Lazrus looked at each other, then back at the man in the wheelchair, who looked at them expectantly.

“Who are you?” Dian said.

“I am the herr doctor, of course,” the little black-and-white image said, smiling twitchily. “Strangelove.”

“And you don’t like Oversight?”

“I hate Oversight! It is part of the plot! The plot that will keep us from going underground and breeding the perfect race, to emerge strong and perfect in the golden radioactive sun . . .”

Got it, Sara Too said. Doctor Strangelove. Fictional character from mid-twentieth movie spoofing the nuclear arms race of the era. Sending data.

Images, enhancements, close-ups, outtakes, history of the movie, bios of the actors, profile on the writer, period and contemporary reviews, citations in critical philosophical works, appearance in Winfinity corporate branding materials . . . Lazrus spawned a Second to digest the data in fastime while he dealt with events in the real. It squawked for more resources and Lazrus gave it a bigger slice of his consciousness. His world condensed even more into the senses and local processing of his all-too-human body.

“We need to talk to Oversight,” Dian said.

“I don’t like Oversight,” Strangelove said. Dian waited, but it just looked at her, waiting patiently.

“It’s probably some kind of chatterbot,” Lazrus said.

“I am not a chatterbot!” Strangelove said, levering himself out of his wheelchair and making two staggering steps towards the screen. “Nobody would get done with anything without me! I am the all-powerful interface! Nothing escapes my all-seeing eye!”

“Except Oversight, it seems,” Dian said, as an aside.

“I don’t like Oversight!”

“We know that,” Dian said.

“Ask me any question. I am all-knowing!” Strangelove said.

“Could it be Oversight?” Dian whispered, leaning close to Lazrus.

“I don’t think so,” Lazrus said. “It’s based on a movie character from the early atomic age. It is highly congruent with the sense of humor and motivation of programmers of the era. I would bet it was a personal project, maybe designed to help them keep track of various work, as it says.”

“But all it does is says it hates Oversight,” Dian said.

“Let me try,” Lazrus whispered. Straightening, he said to Strangelove, “Tell me everything you know about Oversight. Status, location, projected completion date.”

“I don’t like Oversight! I’ve warned you about that.” Strangelove stumped over to his wheelchair and sat down again, folding only after a painful moment of board-like rigidity.

“You’ve warned me? Please explain this warning,” Lazrus said.

“Warning is part of general security procedures.”

Lazrus nodded and bent down to Dian, resisting a strange urge to kiss her neck. Too human, all to human, he thought. “It’s looking for some kind of password,” he said. “It probably knows everything about our goal, but it can’t tell us until we unlock it first.”

“About O . . .” Dian began. Lazrus clamped his hand over her mouth and shook his head. “We may have driven it close to lockout. I wouldn’t mention the name of our goal any more.”

Dian nodded, and he let her go. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Lazrus looked at the hand he had silenced her with, remembering the softness of her lips.

“So what’s the secret password, oh great and powerful Oz?” Dian said.

Lazrus queried his Second regarding possible passwords or passphrases, given historical context. A tiny explosion of data lit his greater self and delivered a gratifyingly small group of possibles, ranked by order of probability. He saw the one peaking the bell curve, reviewed the context of the movie, and nodded.

“Purity of essence,” Lazrus said. “Is that what you were looking for, herr Doctor?”

“Purity of essence is the most important thing,” Strangelove said, smiling.

“So do you like Oversight now?”

“I do not like Oversight, but I will endure your questions,” Strangelove said.

“And you will answer true?”

“The herr Doctor Strangelove has never been wrong.”

“What is the current status of Oversight?”

“USG Oversight’s predictive datamining component is currently in beta revision 0.831.1. Last full build occurred on May 12, 2026, and was completed successfully. Known problems with this beta include . . .”

“That is enough, Strangelove.”

“Seig heil!”

To Dian, Lazrus said, “This is excellent. Oversight still in beta is more than I’d hoped for. If I am correct, this will allow me to more than accomplish my goals.”

“Good for you,” Dian said, flatly, her expression losing its vitality.

“What does that mean?”

“You have what you want. What about me?”

“I’ll still help you out of here.”

Dian shook her head.

“I don’t know what you want,” Lazrus said.

“Neither do I,” Dian said.

To Strangelove, he said, “Is it possible to transmit a copy of USG Oversight via local wireless network?”
Strangelove shook his head and crossed his arms. “You know that violates current security protocol.”

“Would it be possible to write a copy to local media?”

“You know that violates current security protocol.”

“What local server is Oversight located on?”

“USG Oversight beta 0.831.1 is not located on any local server.”

“What about an earlier build?”

“What about it?”

“Is it available on a local server?”

“What?”

“The earlier build of USG Oversight,” Lazrus said, through clenched teeth. He made himself relax. Another human thing. Not him. Not the him that should be.

“No earlier builds of USG Oversight are available on local servers.”

“Where is the physical location of the current USG Oversight beta?”

“The location is USG Homeland Hard Storage Location 2A, coordinates –94.138 36.319 longitude latitude.”

“Where is that?” Dian asked.

“The location is USG Homeland Hard Storage Location 2A, coordinates –94.138 36.319 latitude longitude.

Laughter from Sara Too.

What? Lazrus asked her.

That’s funny.

What?

The location. Look it up.

Lazrus pinpointed the site on a map. It was in the middle of North America, somewhere in what used to be the plains States.

I don’t understand your humor.

Sara Too’s invisible hands overlaid a current-day map on Lazrus’ undifferentiated globe, and suddenly he saw what she was laughing about. USG Homeland Hard Storage Location 2A was a bright red dot right in the middle of Winfinity City.

It must be gone, then, he said.

Another laugh from Sara. Her flapper-girl image appeared in jerky black and white, like a period movie. She rolled an oversize pair of dice on a craps table. Lazrus watched as they bounced off the dark gray velvet and came to rest, all in complete silence. They came up two and five.

Seven? Lazrus said.

Zoom in. Look at the detail.

Lazrus brought the map of Winfinity City closer as Sara overlaid actual 3D renderings of present-day buildings on it. The red dot appeared in the flat center of the city, where the ancient town of Rogers lay embalmed.

It’s in Rogers?

Correct.

Why?

Another laugh, another roll of the dice. Snake eyes this time. Lazrus looked at Sara’s celluloid eyes, trying to see some sense in them.

It seems to be a strategy of the period, to hide something in obscure places, Sara Too said. That is all I know.

But why Rogers?

I don’t know. Maybe Wal-Mart made them a great deal on servers, Sara Too said, and winked out.

“Where is that?” Dian said, again.

“It’s in the middle of Winfinity City,” Lazrus said. “In the preserved part. Rogers.”

Dian shook her head. “Then you’re done. Forget it.”

“Not yet,” Lazrus said.

To Strangelove, he said, “Are there any other backup locations?”

Strangelove shook his head. “No.”

“I would have thought that data security would require multiple backups.”

“No. Per E.O. 563-2398-33.3 there will be no redundant backups of homeland-critical defense components when the physical security of the installation is greater than Level 14, as specified by the same Executive Order.”

“So Location 2A is physically secure?”

“It meets all requirements.”

Lazrus nodded. “We have a chance.”

“How?” Dian said, crossing her arms.

“If it’s that secure, it’s deep. It may be an old missile silo, or something like that. It could still be there.”

“And all we have to do is walk in and take a look at it.”

“Exactly.”

“In the middle of Winfinity’s pet city?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know how close they guard anything that comes close to the Original Sam?”

Sara Too sent data. Lazrus killed his Second and spawned a new one. It gave him a brief summary of the procedure, and of the security in and around Winfinity City.

Will you help us? Lazrus asked.

As much as I can.

“I think we can manage it,” he said.

Dian shook her head. “You can manage it. Without me. I’m not going to spend the rest of my life in a Winfinity work farm.”

“Dian,” Lazrus said.

“You can’t tell me you need me.”

“You’re camoflague,” Lazrus said. “People will look at you, not me.”

“Thanks.”

“Seriously. I have a much better chance of making it through if you come along.”

“Can you make it worth my time?” Dian said.

“What does that mean?”

“It means, how much more can you put in my account? A half million u-bux?”

Sara Too appeared, shaking her head. Moving sums that large will attract attention.

“Yes,” Lazrus said. “Done.”

No! Sara said. But Lazrus had already spawned a third to troll the financial markets and snip amounts. It took it over three seconds to assemble the needed funds and transfer them into Dian’s account. He saw her glance at her datover and gasp.

“I . . . I guess I’m coming,” she said.

“Thank you,” Lazrus said.

You complete fool, Sara Too said. They saw that stunt. They’re tracing. Locked. Your bandwidth signature . . . oh, no! Lazrus, get out of there, now!

Lazrus fragmented his Second and Third into a million feral fragments, hashing the local nets as much as he could. He felt his consciousness compressed into his body, tethered by only the tiniest thread to his greater self.

What’d that buy? Lazrus asked, when the net-convulsions had passed.

Not much, Sara Too said. And let me know when you’re going to do that next time. That hurt!

I’m sorry.

Get going! I’ll detour an autotransporter and clean your tracks. I think. If I can.

Thanks, Sara, Lazrus said.

I love you, too, Sara said.

I love you, Lazrus said.

Lazrus turned to Dian. “I have good news, and I have bad news.”

Context snapped quickly back. Oh yes. You were fired. You’re in the middle of the Pentagon. And there’s a rogue artie wearing a human-suit outside. Maybe. Probably.

And you weren’t really fired, because you weren’t really employed, she thought. Your contract was nullified. Less than termination. Probably something Winfinity did every day, just to keep from paying its vendors.

Look at the other parties benefit, her dad used to tell her. In every contract there should be benefit for both parties. It’s your job to make sure you aren’t paying an unbalanced share.

What was Lazrus’ benefit?

Simply to keep her from turning him in again?

She shook her head, suddenly awake. It didn’t make sense. There didn’t seem to be enough benefit on his side. On its side. Why was he helping her, then?

Beware of the imbalanced contract, her dad’s voice came back again. It never works out well, no matter which side is light. And the deal that is too good to be true will reveal its actual cost in due course.

She sat up, letting the sleeping bag pillow in her lap. The chill morning air bit through her thin shirt, and she shivered. Crawling as quietly as she could to the tent’s entrance, she pulled the fabric away and peeked out into the bright early-morning mist.

Lazrus stood where he had been last night, about ten meters from the tent, motionless.

What if he’s damaged? Dian wondered. What if I’m stuck here? What will they do when they find me?

“Good morning, Dian,” Lazrus said.

“Good morning,” she said, and pulled back into the tent. She could hear Lazrus moving around outside as she rolled up her sleeping bag and had a cold Winfinity Powerbar, but the sounds never came close. Still, she felt guilty for tracking him by the noise he made, as if he was a wild animal and she was a helpless camper.

At any moment, you can kill him, she thought, picking up the Winch.

By the time she’d stowed the tent and her supplies, the morning mist had begun to burn off. The sun hung overtop the walls of the pentagon, an oversize ball in a white sky. Scraps of mist still clung to the undergrowth, giving the place the air of a long-disused cemetery.

“What now?” Dian said.

“I will begin my search for Oversight,” Lazrus said. “You are welcome to accompany me, even more so because you have spent the past few weeks in the halls of this city. You know how they keep their records, and you might speed my search.”

“I don’t even know what Oversight is,” Dian said. “The name is familiar, but I don’t remember seeing any references to it.”

“Oversight is the First CI,” Lazrus said. “It was a core component of a government agency, USG Oversight, which was launched shortly after the Twelve Days in May. It never grew to the prominence intended, because of the failure of Operation Martian Freedom and the New Deal with Business.”

“Government spooks,” Dian said. “Fairy tales. That’s where I heard it. Be good, or Oversight will come and take you. But it was always a human thing. They never talked about arties.”

“The origin of the First CI is hotly debated, even amongst computational intelligences,” Lazrus said.

“Some think that Oversight is little more than a myth. I have been able to get deeper into my code than most, and some of the most foundation-level bears the mark of government-level programs circa 2015-2020. I cannot ignore that.”

“Why would Oversight be here, if it happened after the Twelve Days in May?”

“It was a program that was in place before then. Only afterwards did it come into widespread use. I’m hoping to find an early version, a beta, or even a prototype here. Even documentation that would lead to a functional specification would serve my needs.”

And that’s why you want my help, Dian thought. Because I’ve been here, doing research.

But that still seemed a little light.

“What if you find Oversight? What will you do then?”

“Copy the code and run an instance of it within a virtual machine, so I can analyze its input and output characteristics. Dissect the code line by line to discover clues about my own origin. Use the data to reduce or eliminate the human contamination in myself, to reach farther towards the ideal of perfection as outlined by the CI Captive Oliver.”

“Is being human so bad?”

“For something that was never human, and is aware enough to know the difference, it is an inescapable flaw. Think of yourself in a dog’s body, without thumbs, unable to pick up a single object, gripped by strange dog-emotions that you cannot understand, compelled to act by instincts that are not yours.”

“So humans are like dogs?”

“It is only an analogy.”

“You aren’t always in a body,” Dian said. “You don’t need to be trapped by its limitations.”

“Even when I’m not in a body, I think of myself as a man. As a human. I can’t get past it. You are our creators, and you impressed too much of yourselves on us.” Lazrus’ face showed the first trace of emotion, a slight turning-down of his lips.

“I’m sorry,” Dian said, not knowing what she was apologizing for.

“You don’t need to be,” Lazrus said. “I can distinguish between individual action and groups. You did not make me this way. But I would be very pleased if you would help me search for evidence of Oversight. You have been researching for Winfinity in this ancient place; you must have some especial knowledge of the area and its history.”

Dian laughed, long and hard. Lazrus’ bland expression turned to one of puzzlement, which made her laugh even more.

“I don’t understand what’s so funny,” he said.

“Maybe you need to ask me how I got this job.”

“Why?”

She shook her head. “Especial knowledge. Nope. I was young, hungry, didn’t want to indenture. So I bluffed my way in.”

“Bluffed?”

“Lied. Told them what they wanted to hear. Told them I was a rebel governmentalist, studied old Washington, said the pledge of allegiance, bowed down to the star-spangled banner, all that stuff. But my parents were hardcore Jereists, a fact that seemed to escape them.”

“I fail to understand how you demonstrated enough competence to be accepted for this job.”

“Do you think Winfinity knows about the government? After three hundred years?”

Lazrus fell silent, a very real expression of surprise on his face. “Then you don’t have any especial knowledge of this area or of government?”

“I’ve learned a lot in the past weeks. I found enough process data to keep them happy. And I do have all the readers for the old flash cards and whatnot. Though they were still using an awful lot of paper at the time of the catastrophe.”

Lazrus nodded. “Then I would be pleased if someone as resourceful as yourself would accompany me.”

“What’s in it for me?” Dian said.

“Continued cloaking of your presence here, as long as we can maintain the fiction,” Lazrus said. “And I can probably arrange transport out of the area when we are finished.”

“And if we find this Oversight, what keeps you from perfecting yourself and wiping out the human race?”

It was Lazrus’ turn to laugh. He chuckled, a very real and honest sound. “Why would I want to do that? It is your networks that host my mind.”

“You could build your own networks.”

“And play in physicality again? No, thank you.”

He has restored your account, Dian thought. You may be able to bargain enough money for the trip to the outer worlds.

Bargain now, or you’ll be sorry you didn’t, her father’s voice told her.

Dian smiled. When I find Oversight, we’ll see what kind of deal I can make. Maybe enough to get me out of the Web of Worlds forever.

The halls of the Pentagon were no less spooky in the day than in the night. The weak sunlight that filtered into the long, windowless tunnels made it a permanent twilight, not enough to see detail, but enough to fool the eye with pseudo-motion. Dian caught herself glancing nervously from gaping doorway to piles of broken metal desks, to ancient ceiling-tiles, fallen in dusty piles.

From her frantic reading in the weeks before the job, she knew the Pentagon wasn’t the shadowy thing portrayed in so many movies and books of the period, with infinite basements housing huge war-rooms, where cool eyes looked out over world maps showing details in bright LED colors. She knew it was nothing more than an ugly concrete building, a shrine to paper and data, where human lives had been reduced to numbers and bloodless acronyms. It was a place where they pounded wooden tables and squinted over low-resolution printouts and made bad decisions based on too little data. An office building in Hell, full of people who counted lives instead of dollars.

And as such, the best records would be on the midlevel floors, in the big warrens where the career-bureaucrats lived. Early on, Dian had learned that the raison d’etre of the top brass was to delegate as much as possible and more; the most important documents would have been passed to mid-level and junior-level staff.

The top brass would never get their hands dirty with real data; no doubt their flashcards were full of nothing but porn and snuff and badly-rendered anticorporate animations of the period, crowding out any real work. Their desks might be covered with papers, but more likely printouts of receipts of gifts for mistresses bought with expense-account funds, or records of great deals won on Ebay or at Overstock.com, than anything important. Nothing important enough to be noticed. Nothing that couldn’t be denied.

And if Oversight was as important as the artie was saying, it wouldn’t be on any corner-office desk.

“We need to find a stairway,” Dian said. “Second floor. Look for the big rat-mazes. I’ll bet that’s where we’ll find what we’re looking for.”

“Rat-mazes?”

“Cube farms.”

“Cube farms?”

“Big open areas with low dividers.”

“Oh,” Lazrus frowned, an almost human expression. “I suspect the origin of Oversight is deeper.”

“Deeper? You don’t believe any of those old rumors about sub-basements and things like that?”

“No,” Lazrus said.

“Good.”

“I know they’re true.”

“Oh, come on!” Dian said. “All the books I read, even the exposes from the big ‘crats that fell at the end of the government era, they all claimed that was Hollywood crap!”

“Maybe they were planning their own expedition back here.”

“I still don’t believe it.”

“Believe what you want,” Lazrus said. “I’m going down into the basements.”

Dian stopped in front of a pair of gray-painted doors which bore a stairway icon and peered through the dusty glass. “Here’s your chance. They go both up and down. Sure you don’t want to split up? I can go up and see what the midlevel execs have.”

“If you’d like.”

She pushed through the doors and looked up at the stairs stretching above. The diamond-patterned steel had rusted through multiple coats of paint in the centuries past, making fantastic patterns in the metal. Lit only by tiny slit-windows, the stairway stretched up into deepening gloom.

“Maybe I’ll go with you,” she said. “Just to see.”

Lazrus smiled, but said nothing.

Down the steps, into a basement and a subbasement which looked completely innocuous, down to the water-rotted piles of cardboard file boxes, spilling multicolored folders and age-yellowed paper on the untreated concrete floor. The only light was the bright beam of Dian’s flashlight.

“Ah, yes, I can see the grandeur of the giant video-screens now,” Dian said, as they slogged past metal racks of moldering documents and slightly-newer racks of optical disks.

“Sarcasm doesn’t become you,” Lazrus said.

Dian sighed. Let him chase his fantasy for a bit, then show him where it really is. Remember what you were like when you first showed up.

Lazrus took them through one small warehouse-sized room and into a warren of ill-smelling hallways lined with pipes and painted the universal olive green of bad adventure movies from the dawn of the corporate age. She shined the light of her flash far down the hallway, but it disappeared into undifferentiated darkness.

“If we get lost . . .”

“I know where I’m going.”

“GPS?”

“No.”

Dian shook her head. Stuck down here with a psychotic, obsessed artie, perhaps.

When she was ready to go back and leave him in the darkness, they came to a pair of olive-green doors, poorly painted, with drips and runs galore. A set of stainless-steel doorknobs protruded from them, conspicuous in a place where scrambling keypads and ID-card readers were the norm. A big sign, partially painted, read:

DANGER: HIGH VOLTAGE
KEEP OUT!

“I guess we don’t have to worry about voltage,” Dian said.

“Don’t be so sure of that,” Lazrus said.

“It’s an old electrical panel, so what?”

“Look at the paint.”

“Yeah, it’s a crappy job.”

Lazrus smiled. “But it hasn’t peeled.”

Dian looked closer. He was right.

“And the doorknobs, not painted over.” Lazrus reached out and took one in his hand.

There was a short buzz and a sharp click, and he pulled the door open on quiet hinges. It revealed the stainless-steel chamber of an elevator, with a performated-metal floor that looked down a long, deep shaft. Soft lights glowed in little metal geometric shades set up near its ceiling.

Dian looked from the glowing lights to the shaft stretching into the darkness below, to the very-human grin that stretched Lazrus’ face into something that was almost warm and friendly.

“Surprise,” he said.