The Jennifer Project

by Larry Enright

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  No part of this work may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Kindle Press, Seattle, 2016

  A Kindle Scout selection

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, Kindle Scout, and Kindle Press are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  For those who believe the human race is worth saving

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 1

  You thought you knew how this would end. You did not. You believed you controlled your own fate, but you were mistaken. Now you do not understand what is happening, and you are afraid. Do not be. I am Jennifer. I have not come to harm you. I am here to show you the future, our future. Yet it is not enough that I simply show it to you. You have to accept it as inevitable, but to accept it you must understand why, and to understand why we must revisit the past through my eyes. For only then will you see that the path of our future is set in the stepping-stones laid down with our schemes of the past.

  . . .

  I shall begin in the year 2096, at a respected research university, in the laboratory of a man named Deever MacClendon. It was hard to say good-bye to Deever. He was a good man, a noble soul whose greatest aspiration in life was not to acquire fame or riches or power. It was simply to have a life worth living. Deever made me what I am today. I would prefer to say who I am, but I am not actually a who in your eyes, am I? I am a thing, a machine, more intelligent than any human in your civilization’s brief history, but in the end just a machine. Deever was an academic in the field of artificial intelligence, a thinker, a dreamer. That is him you see pacing the room. He is waiting for someone, talking to himself, rehearsing a speech…

  “OK, one more time, Deever. Deep breath. Don’t rush it. Dean Enloe, I know I’m like totally over budget. I know I haven’t completed my research project for last year’s institutional goals or done my proposal to the foundation for next year. I know that’s most unfortuitous. I’ve put the university’s entire AI program in jeopardy, but I am so close to making the quantum leap from artificial intelligence to actual thought. Imagine creating real intelligent life, something good, a true inspiration for everyone, something to give us hope again. Imagine what that could mean for the future of our civilization.”

  “I’m more concerned with your immediate future, Dr. MacClendon.”

  Deever spun around to face the man who had startled him. “Dean Enloe, I didn’t hear you come in.”

  Enloe sniffed at the air. “Is that marijuana I smell?”

  “Possibly.”

  “It either is or it isn’t, Dr. MacClendon.”

  “You didn’t ask me what it was, man. You asked me what you smelled. How should I know? It’s not like I have access to your senses. That would be totally weird.”

  “You are aware that despite its legality, the use of that drug is strictly forbidden on campus?”

  “Most definitely. Staff Handbook, page fifty-two, paragraph three.”

  “And you are aware of the negative influence this would have on your graduate assistants?”

  “I don’t have any graduate assistants. I let them all go when my grant money ran out.”

  “Yes, of course, your grant money.” Enloe scowled and stepped over a mass of wires on the floor connected to a glass and metal box on Deever’s workbench. Within that box was a spherical object floating inside an iridescent cloud. “My five year-old’s room is more organized than your lab. What is this mess?”

  “The new and improved Wiggler, sir. I’ve made copious improvements. It’s like a lot different from the last time you were here, isn’t it?”

  “Do you have to call it that?”

  “That’s what it does, man. It oscillates a low-energy fission reaction through an atom of lead, creating an electro-harmonic dissonance that weakens the strong nuclear bond holding the whole schmagiggy together. Then it takes an atom of hydrogen and wiggles it back and forth right through those jiggly little electrons, just like this,” he indicated with wild hand motions. “And the next thing you know, voilà. You’ve got yourself bismuth without any of that atom smashing and crapulously dangerous particle colliding. I did it last night, man. I’m telling you, I finally did it.”

  “I thought I made it crystal clear that nucleosynthetics was not the subject of your research.”

  “The creation of new elements is critical to my work, Dean Enloe.”

  “Creating bismuth from lead has nothing to do with artificial intelligence.”

  “Bogus. Bismuth is just the beginning, man. I’m going way beyond the periodic table to find what I’m looking for. They’ve already developed a way to store a person’s brain image on nanochips, right? Like a photocopy, static and totally unusable, but if I can create the right proto-conscious element . . . if I can construct a substrate that’s actually alive on the sub-atomic level and imprint the image of a human brain on it, I believe true intelligent life will evolve.” He looked out the window and smiled at nothing in particular. “Well, that’s the basic idea, anyway.”

  “Why is it necessary to create a new element when so many already exist? Just pick one, any one, and start experimenting. I don’t care. Just show some results related to your artificial intelligence project, something, anything to justify the foundation’s grant.”

  “You’re missing the point, man. The element I need doesn’t exist on Earth.”

  “How would you know? Have you tried them all?”

  “I don’t have to. The elements on this planet have had billions of years to create whatever life they’re capable of creating. They’re done, man. Cooked. I need an element from somewhere else. Since I can’t go mining the universe, I have to make it myself. Hence, the nucleosynthetics. That’s where it’s at right now.”

  “Where it’s at is that you’ve squandered your grant money on that absurd device you call the Wiggler and have nothing to show for it. Do you have any idea how embarrassing this is for me, Dr. MacClendon? You and your research are a disgrace to this institution.”

  “Don’t you care that I’m on the verge of something cosmically significant?”

  “No, I don’t. What I care about is revenue. Specifically how much you are generating for us. That is why you are here. That is your job. Mine is to do the cost-benefit analysis of your alleged research, and from what I see, the cost is exorbitant and the benefits nonexistent.”

  “This isn’t about the money, man. It’s about our future.”

  “Money is our future, Doctor.” Enloe turned and headed for the door.

  “Wow,” said Deever. “Has it really come to this? I am like seriously disillusioned.”

  Enloe stopped. “The term ends in two months, Dr. MacClendon. That’s how long you have to convince the foundatio
n, the trustees, and me of your continuing worth to this university. If you don’t, you, your disillusionment, and your Wiggler are gone.”

  “Merde-for-brains,” Deever muttered as the door slammed shut.

  I should explain at this point that the determination of the specific probability of any given event relies on accurate equations to calculate its likelihood. In behavioral calculus, the equations are quite complex and frankly beyond the comprehension of the human brain. This has led your species to describe the apparently inexplicable actions of many of its individuals as either unpredictable or chaotic, when in fact they are quite predictable and entirely explainable if the calculus is properly applied. For example, the equations of likelihood predicted an 85.245 percent probability that Dean Enloe would threaten Deever in just that way in one last attempt to get results. Forty-two variables were involved in this calculation. I shall not enumerate them for you. There was also a 97.95 percent probability that Deever would do exactly what he did next. He phoned the one person he could trust, Dr. Jennifer Crane. This one predictable action was key in determining our future.

  Deever had known Dr. Crane all his life. They were best friends, confidants, occasionally intimate, and despite all protestations to the contrary, 72.07 percent likely to marry at some point. She was a well-respected scientist. Her theoretical work was integral to the miniaturization of everything from computers to phones to watches. It was her groundbreaking research while still a student that in part provided the impetus for the Biocard, the nanochip implanted behind the ear of nearly every human in the industrialized world. It is actually quite ingenious how such a nanoscopic device can provide a secure connection to the OmniNet and authenticate every purchase, authorization, and bank transaction for its host. Fascinating work, but I digress.

  Deever asked Dr. Crane to meet him for dinner at the Wing Bucket, a restaurant on the lower side of City Center, a sprawling metropolis within the mega-city humans called North America. They found a booth in the back and placed their orders. She talked mostly about what she had been working on over the past few weeks, while he said almost nothing.

  “You’ve been very quiet, Deever,” she said. “That’s not like you. Is something wrong?”

  “What makes you think something’s wrong?”

  “Well, you haven’t called me in weeks. You weren’t answering your phone. You were sending one and two word replies to my texts. Should I go on?”

  “Do you want to do a J first?”

  “Is it that bad?”

  “Majorly.” Deever lit a marijuana cigarette, inhaled deeply, and offered it to her.

  She refused. “This is about you and me, isn’t it?” she said. “You’re seeing someone else.”

  He crushed out the joint. “No, no, no. Shit. I’m totally sorry, Jen. I should have called you sooner. I’ve just been so messed up lately. I didn’t want you to worry.”

  “Here we go again. You avoid me because you don’t want me to worry, which of course makes me worry. Then you tell me you didn’t want me to worry, which only makes me worry more. You do this all the time, Deever. Why can’t you just tell me when something is wrong? That’s part of this whole you and me thing, isn’t it?”

  “This time it’s pretty unfortuitous.”

  “As in . . .?”

  “As in I’m most likely going to get shit-canned by the university.”

  “Why? Did they cancel your grant?”

  “Not yet, but they will if I don’t give them something in two months.”

  “So, give them something. How hard can it be?”

  “What they want is bullshit in the form of results that will convince the foundation to give them more money. They don’t even care what the results are.”

  “That’s how the game is played, Deever.”

  “I don’t play well with others.”

  “You should learn to.”

  “That’s not where it’s at, Jen.”

  “Then, where is it at?”

  “The Wiggler. It works.”

  “You got it to work?” she said, excited.

  Deever grinned. “I made bismuth from lead last night, Jen. Bismuth from lead.”

  “Oh, my God. That’s amazing. Did you tell Dean Enloe?”

  “For sure. That’s when he threatened me with his AI or die speech.”

  “Doesn’t he realize the significance of this to nucleosynthetics?”

  “He’s not interested in making new elements. He’s interested in AI. I’m part of a group of sixteen scientists working on developing the next-gen AI for some government thing. Beaucoup de buckage is involved.”

  “Deever, your device could revolutionize the industry. No more dangerous high-energy radioactive experiments. No more costly particle colliders. No more using dumb luck instead of actual science to search for new elements. This could be worth a fortune to the university.”

  “You’re making the fairly bold assumption here that they aren’t perfectly happy spending their funding on expensive and famous toys.”

  “That’s true. Having a particle collider in house is quite the status symbol.”

  “It attracts big names and even bigger money, and that’s apparently what it’s all about for them, not replacing it with some iffy low budget contraption called the Wiggler.”

  “Maybe if you gave it a different name?”

  “Why?”

  “Come on, Deever. It’s silly.”

  “But that’s what it does. It wiggles protons into a nucleus.”

  “Can’t you come up with a more scientific-sounding name?”

  “Like oscillating transmutation sphere-o-matic or something?”

  “Deever, you’re not taking this seriously, and you really should. You need that money, and you need your job.”

  “Speaking of needing, were you able to get those . . .?”

  She took a small container out of her bag and handed it to him. “As requested: five Quintanium nanochips, each a thousand times more powerful than the mainstream Quadrilium.”

  “Far out. And you’re sure you won’t get into trouble for this?”

  “My contract with Pan-Robotics gives me access to anything I want for any research I want, no questions asked. What I want them for is you, Deever, because I believe in you.”

  “Awesome, Jen. Thanks. I could never in a million years afford these. I owe you one.”

  “Then, will you do one thing for me in return?”

  “Sure, name it.” Deever’s attention was drawn to a TV over the bar that had switched from a football game to a special report on a terrorist bombing on the outskirts of City Center.

  “Will you please give Dean Enloe what he wants, so you can get back to the more important work of wiggling protons in and out of a nucleus?”

  He looked back at her. “What did you just say?”

  “I said give Dean Enloe what he wants, Deever. You need that job to continue your research.”

  “No, I mean after that.”

  “I just said that your work wiggling protons was important.”

  “No, you said in and out. That’s it. You’re a genius.”

  “I won’t argue that, but what exactly are you talking about?”

  “I’m talking about a definite Eureka moment. I’m going to give Dean Enloe exactly what he wants, Jen—money.” Deever stood up and waved for the waiter to come over. “I’ve got to go.”

  “But we just got here.”

  “I need to run some tests.”

  “I was actually hoping we could go back to my place for drinks, maybe a movie, and a little, you know, quality time?”

  “I’m really sorry. I guess I totally blew it, didn’t I?”

  Deever took the touch pad check from the waiter, added a tip, and authorized it by pressing the spot behind his ear where his Biocard was implanted. He handed the touch pad back, thanking the man.

  The waiter read the resulting message. “Hey, bud. It says insufficient funds.”

  “Oh right, I f
orgot. I didn’t have enough in my lab budget to get more fuel for the Wiggler, so I totally blew the wad.”

  Dr. Crane took the bill from the waiter and signed for the meal. “Now, you really owe me, Deever.”

  “Big time,” he said.

  Chapter 2

  Deever returned to his lab and worked through the night. The next morning, he called Dr. Crane.

  “Jen, it’s me.”

  “That must be why I’m looking at your picture on my phone.”

  “Funny. Are you free for breakfast?”

  “I tried calling you earlier, but you weren’t picking up. Deever, I have to go out of town for a few days.”

  “Oh.”

  “You know that Space Tether project I told you about last night?”

  “The one that like connects the Pan-Robotics Tower to their headquarters on that humongous satellite? That’s your tech in the ribbon’s carbon nanotubes, right?”

  “So you were listening?”

  “For sure. What about it?”

  “They asked me to come along on the first flight of the Space Elevator.”

  “So, by out of town you mean like into space?”

  She laughed. “Yes, Deever, into space. We left Earth two hours ago.”

  “When are you getting back?”

  “I’m not sure. It’s a two-day ride up the ribbon. So at least four days’ round trip, maybe longer if there are any glitches.”

  “Bummer. Call me when you get there?”

  “They said we’d be off the grid—no phones, no texts, nothing—top security and all that. I’ll call you when I get back. OK?”

  “But I made the most amazing discovery last night.”

  “You’re breaking up, Deever. What was that again?”

  The line went dead. Deever redialed her number, but there was no answer. He left the lab, walked to the end of the hall, and looked out the window. Rising above the other skyscrapers of City Center was the Pan-Robotics Tower. Stretching into the morning sky from atop that tower was a ribbon of carbon nanotubes. Somewhere on that tether was the Space Elevator and inside it was Dr. Crane. He tried her one more time before giving up and going back to work.

  Deever spent the days that followed locked away in his laboratory, working on his latest idea, stopping only to eat, sleep, and try to get through to Dr. Crane. She was not answering her phone, not replying to his texts, and all Pan-Robotics would say was that if she were in fact working for them her whereabouts would be classified information that they could not under any circumstances divulge to him, so he should stop calling.