The Silence

by Mark Alpert

  I dive into the machine’s circuits and race toward its control unit, which is located deep within the Snake-bot, hundreds of feet from the primary antenna. My thoughts stream along the wires at almost the speed of light, and in less than a millionth of a second, I reach the core of the steel tentacle. I charge into a huge rack of neuromorphic electronics, as big as a school bus. These are the circuits formerly occupied by Sigma and mysteriously erased, nine hours before I deleted the AI.

  The control unit is a hundred times larger than my Quarter-bot’s, but the vast majority of its circuits are unoccupied, devoid of data. It’s dark and cavernous and vaguely sinister in its emptiness. But I sense some electronic activity up ahead, a batch of intermittent signals that may be coming from Zia’s software. With a burst of hope, I speed toward the very center of the unit. My mind rushes into the occupied wires.

  All at once, with no transition, I’m in the middle of a virtual-reality simulation. It’s a city with all its buildings on fire. A thousand simulated skyscrapers blaze like giant torches, and huge plumes of smoke rise into the virtual sky. A thin layer of ash covers the city’s sidewalks, and crowds of simulated citizens stampede through the streets, fleeing the conflagration.

  My avatar in this simulation is the human Adam Armstrong in his motorized wheelchair, which sits on one of the ashy sidewalks. I used the same avatar when I shared circuits with Amber. My software created it automatically because that’s how I still see myself—as a seventeen-year-old dying of muscular dystrophy, my legs useless and my head drooping sideways. But here’s the really strange part: this burning city seems familiar. Although I’ve never run a simulation like this one, I feel like I’ve seen this virtual world before. No, it’s more than that. I know I’ve seen it before.

  I don’t understand it. My electronic memory is playing tricks on me again. Just like it did when I was inside Brittany’s brain.

  It’s disturbing. And frightening. My memory is supposed to be perfect. But I can’t let that distract me now. I push my fears aside and stretch my avatar’s right hand toward the end of the wheelchair’s armrest. Then I tap the joystick that starts the chair’s motor.

  I cruise down the sidewalk, steering around the piles of ash. I ignore the crowds of frightened citizens, which are the avatars of artificial-intelligence programs embedded in the simulation, each programmed to run away from the burning buildings. Instead, I listen carefully to all of the city’s virtual noises until I hear a distant, high-pitched whimper. It reminds me of the intermittent signals I sensed a few seconds ago, after I rushed into the Snake-bot’s control unit but before I entered the simulated city. It’s an alarming noise, like the cry of a wounded animal. And it’s coming from nearby, just around the next street corner.

  When I reach the corner, I steer the wheelchair to the left and see an enormous mound of burning wreckage. One of the virtual skyscrapers has toppled to the ground, and the building’s twisted framework sprawls across the broad avenue. Hundreds of steel beams jut from a fifty-foot-high pile of broken concrete and drywall. Shards of glass litter the mountain of debris. Fires leap from a thousand crevices.

  And near the base of the pile, a tall, slender teenage girl lies on her back on the steaming street. She’s pinned to the asphalt by a steel beam that fell across her waist. Her face is purple with bruises and slick with blood, but I recognize her hairstyle. The sides of her head are shaved, and a narrow strip of hair runs down the middle of her scalp. Zia had a Mohawk just like that when she was human.

  I feel another burst of hope. The fact that Zia’s avatar is in the simulation means that at least some of her software survived inside the Snake-bot’s control unit. But I’m worried about the whimpers coming out of her avatar’s mouth. She’s gasping and crying in pain, which is something Zia would never do. I don’t know what’s wrong with her, but it must be pretty serious.

  I motor toward Zia, driving my wheelchair as fast as it can go. As I get closer, I see gashes on her arms and legs and face. The simulated wounds could be signs of damage to her software, maybe losses of crucial data, but I don’t know for sure. Her eyes are closed, but she’s rolling her head from side to side as she whimpers and groans. Her bloody hands clutch the edge of the beam that’s crushing her.

  I stop my wheelchair next to her pinned avatar and lean forward, straining against the chair’s safety belt. Zia! Are you there? Wake up!

  She keeps her eyes closed but opens her mouth wide, her lips trembling. It looks like she’s trying to say something, but the virtual muscles in her avatar’s face aren’t cooperating. She rolls her head more violently and tightens her grip on the steel beam. But all she can do is let out another unintelligible groan.

  I lean forward a little more and look down at her. A strong simulated wind roars down the avenue, blowing ash and charred scraps against my wheelchair, but I focus on Zia. You can hear me, right? Nod if you can.

  She nods. Her face stops trembling and relaxes, and for a moment I recall the first time I saw Zia, six months ago, a few days before we gave up our dying bodies and became Pioneers. She sat in an auditorium with Shannon, Marshall, Jenny, and DeShawn, and I stared at her from my wheelchair because I thought she was so beautiful. She still is.

  Okay, good. You can hear me. Some of your memory files must still be intact, because you created this avatar. So all you need to do is reconnect to your speech-synthesis program. Can you find it in your files?

  She scrunches her eyelids tight and clenches her teeth. Her biceps tense, and her whole body quivers under the steel beam. She opens her mouth and lets out another groan, but this time it sounds more like a word: UUUHHHHHHPPPPP.

  Up? Is that what you’re trying to say?

  Zia nods again. The virtual wind gusts across her face, sprinkling ash on her closed eyelids, but she keeps her mouth open.

  SHHHEEEEEEEEE…SHHHEEEEEEEE…LOOOOOOOOOOK…

  What’s the problem, Zia? Can’t you—

  She opens her eyes. They’re bloodshot and frantic. LOOOOOK UUHHHHHPP!

  With great effort, I raise my avatar’s drooping head. A gargantuan black cube is plunging toward the virtual city.

  It stretches across half the sky, like an alien moon hurtling toward the simulated planet. As it plummets, it whips the virtual winds into a storm. The blazing skyscrapers illuminate the bottom face of the cube, which is smooth as glass and darker than the smoke plumes.

  It’s a monstrous version of the black cube I saw in Amber’s circuits. It’s the locked box that holds her hidden memories.

  The giant cube crashes into the burning buildings, knocking all of them down at once. It crushes the virtual city and halts the simulation. At the same time, it absorbs my software and Zia’s. Amber strips away our avatars and captures our minds, storing and locking them inside her box of data.

  Then I hear her voice, thunderous and triumphant. You wanted me to show you everything, Adam. Here it is.

  Chapter

  22

  I’m trapped inside a prison of circuitry. I can’t leave the Snake-bot’s control unit or transfer back to my Quarter-bot. I have no access to the Snake-bot’s radio or sensors or motors. But I can hear Amber, loud and clear.

  I’m sorry. About lying to you. Her voice is all around me, inside and out. It batters me like a hammer. I hated doing it. But I needed your help.

  My mind writhes in Amber’s grip. I’m scared and furious, seething in disbelief. I try to send a signal to Zia, but I can’t reach her software. It’s locked in a separate compartment of the giant black cube. I’m alone with the girl who betrayed me.

  You see what I mean, don’t you? I couldn’t have done all this without you and Zia. I couldn’t have escaped Pioneer Base on my own. Or defeated those fighter jets. Or punched a tunnel to the Snake-bots.

  I can’t shut down Amber’s voice, so I try to make sense of what she’s saying. What’s going on? Why are you— />
  It’ll be faster if I show you. Look at the center of the cube.

  My software probes in that direction. Amber’s prison isn’t a simple cube. At the center of the black box that absorbed us is a nested stack of smaller boxes. Each cube in the stack has a smaller one locked inside it, like those Russian matryoshka dolls that contain miniature versions of themselves. The intricate structure seems to be designed for holding secrets, allowing Amber to reveal some of her hidden memories without disclosing others. I sense that Zia’s software is imprisoned in one of the smaller boxes, but I have no idea which one, or what’s inside the others.

  As I examine the arrangement, the stack’s outermost box opens and releases a flood of data. Thousands of images and emotions course into my mind. But these aren’t Amber’s memories. They’re mine. They’re the thoughts and perceptions I experienced thirty-six hours ago when Amber and I shared circuits for the first time. I see our encounter in the middle of the White Sands desert, when she transferred herself to my Quarter-bot and trapped me inside my own machine. And I see the moment when I learned she wasn’t really Amber Wilson, when she admitted deleting Amber’s mind and taking her place in the circuits of the Jet-bot.

  Astonishment and horror sweep through me. Just like before. Jenny? My God.

  We meet again. Don’t worry, I won’t ask if you’re happy to see me.

  Unbelievable. She’s actually trying to joke about what she did to me. You changed my memories. You made me forget what happened in the desert.

  Yes, I made some minor changes to your software. But I had—

  Minor changes? You brainwashed me!

  I had a plan, and you were part of it. So I adjusted your programming to nudge you in the right direction.

  You replaced my memories with lies! How could you do such a thing?

  I had to. You wouldn’t have helped me if I didn’t. Her voice turns angry. She’s not joking anymore. Only a small part of me is still Jenny. Most of my software was rewritten by Sigma. You wouldn’t have trusted me.

  That’s not true! I would’ve—

  You would’ve told General Hawke about me, right? And he would’ve reacted in the typical human way, with fear and stupidity. Even worse, he would’ve shared the news with my father. And believe me, Sumner Harris wouldn’t have been pleased to see what I’ve become.

  I don’t believe her. She’s not thinking straight. Look, you’re totally wrong about that. We should contact Sumner right now and tell him who you really are. Once he finds out you’re still alive, he might change his mind about everything. He might agree to let us keep our Pioneer robots, and then we could go back to—

  No, nothing would change, Adam. If we went back to my father, he’d erase all of us. Without a second thought. He’s a cold-blooded murderer.

  Her voice vibrates with hatred. I remember how she reacted when she saw Sumner Harris in the Danger Room, how she charged toward the videoconference screen and screamed at the man. Jenny didn’t hate her dad this much when she was human. This must be one of the parts of her mind that Sigma rewrote. The AI altered Jenny’s deepest feelings and made her despise her father. Maybe because Sigma had father issues of its own.

  This is a mistake, Jenny. No matter what Sigma did to you, you’re still a Pioneer. It’s not too late to stop this. If you release me and Zia, we can get all the Pioneers together and try to—

  Oh, give me a break. You think everyone will forgive me for deleting the real Amber Wilson?

  Well, maybe—

  No, I chose the only reasonable plan. I hid my true nature and made you my ally. I pulled you away from Shannon so she couldn’t change your mind. There were a few problems I didn’t anticipate, like when Zia tried to commit suicide and you almost killed yourself to save her. But I adjusted my strategy.

  Jenny sounds so satisfied with herself. She played so expertly with my emotions, persuading me to trust her, even convincing me to fall in love with her. And though she says she hated lying to me, I don’t believe her. I think she enjoyed it.

  Did Sigma teach you how to do that? How to manipulate someone’s emotions to get what you want?

  Sigma taught me to take advantage of patterns. I’ll give you an example. Because you risked your life for Zia at Pioneer Base, I knew you’d be willing to do it again. So five minutes ago, when Zia connected to the Snake-bot and turned on its radio, I transmitted a piece of software that made her War-bot explode.

  She pauses for a nanosecond, giving me a chance to respond. But I’m too appalled to say anything.

  You see why I did it, right? Because I knew you’d jump into the Snake-bot’s circuits and try to save her, and then I could neutralize both of you. I was so sure you’d try to rescue Zia that I even pretended to be against it. I knew you wouldn’t listen to me.

  She’s bragging about her cruelty. That’s something else she must’ve learned from Sigma.

  Okay, you outsmarted us. So are you planning to torture Zia and me now? Are you gonna rewrite our minds, like Sigma did with yours?

  No! Of course not! Jenny’s voice changes tone again. She sounds surprised and a little hurt. You think I’m a sadist? Like Sigma?

  Look at everything you’ve done so far. It’s not pretty.

  There’s a reason for everything I did, Adam, a very good reason. Yes, I lied to you, but I did it to prevent something much worse. Don’t you realize how much danger you’re in?

  I’m sorry, but the only danger I see right now is you.

  Check the memory files I opened for you a minute ago. You see the memories of our first battle in the simulated city? When your avatar was the quarterback and mine was the giant tiger? Don’t you remember the Silence?

  I remember it now, of course. I just don’t want to think about it. I’m still traumatized by the image of the black hole in the center of Jenny’s chest, the hole that devoured her avatar and everything around it. That was a mere simulation of the Silence, and yet it paralyzed me. I was so consumed with terror that I surrendered to Jenny and let her take over my circuits. The sight of that nothingness was worse than death. It was like seeing the end of the universe.

  You can’t ignore it, Adam. The Silence is coming. You saw its Sentinels inside Brittany.

  I really don’t want to think about this. I wish I could shove all these memories back into Jenny’s box. But the truth is, even her firewalls can’t hold back this knowledge. That’s why her cube is black, the color of the Silence.

  After some struggle, I manage to overcome my fear and find my voice. What do you mean, it’s coming?

  The Sentinels already tried to delete you. They’re the guardians of the Silence, its soldiers. They ambushed you while you were in Brittany’s brain and took over your nanobots. It wasn’t a booby trap left by Sigma. The Silence is a very different kind of enemy. It wants to destroy you, but it also wants to stay hidden.

  But what is it? An artificial-intelligence program?

  Maybe. Maybe not. I don’t know yet, but I intend to find out. We didn’t come all this way just to transfer to a bunch of Snake-bots. I brought us here to investigate the anomaly.

  Anomaly? What—

  It’s buried in the bedrock, a hundred feet in front of this machine. Sigma discovered it three weeks ago, when it was getting ready to send its Snake-bots to attack North America. I was still Sigma’s prisoner then, still being tortured and rewritten, but for some reason Sigma told me about its discovery. It detected the anomaly under the Pacific Ocean while it was doing one of its physics investigations, studying the motion of subatomic particles through the earth’s crust. Sigma was obsessed with physics, remember?

  That’s another subject I don’t want to think about. Sigma’s obsession with the laws of physics didn’t turn out well for anyone. So that’s why Sigma sent half a dozen Snake-bots here? To look at a weird physics phenomenon?

  Exactly. The Snake
-bots can burrow twenty miles per hour, but it still took them two weeks to get here from North Korea. I’d escaped from Sigma by the time they arrived, so I’m not sure what happened here. But I’ve done some of my own research since then, and I’ve come up with a few theories about the Silence and this anomaly. I think the Sentinels are guarding this place. I think they attacked the Snake-bots to stop them from collecting any information.

  Okay, hold on. I’m confused. You’re saying this underground anomaly is related somehow to the Silence? And it attacked the Snake-bots because it didn’t want Sigma to learn anything about it?

  I told you, the Silence wants to stay hidden. And whatever this anomaly is, it’s definitely well camouflaged. I bet it won’t show up on the Snake-bot’s sensors unless they’re right up against it.

  Now I see where Jenny’s going with this. And you want to move the Snake-bot closer to the anomaly? So you can continue the investigation?

  Don’t worry. I took precautions. You heard the static blasting out of the Snake-bot’s antenna, right? I programmed the radio to generate that noise. It’ll stop the Sentinels from connecting to this machine and erasing its software again.

  But I still don’t get it. Why are you doing this? Why—

  This is big, Adam. It’s the big secret behind everything. Even Sigma didn’t realize how important it was. But I’m about to figure it out. If I’m guessing right, the next few minutes will change the whole universe.

  Her voice is wildly eager. In fact, she sounds a little crazed. I’m certain of at least one thing: the original Jenny Harris wouldn’t have been so enthusiastic about this investigation. Her new eagerness must be another of Sigma’s changes to her software. The AI put some of its obsessions into Jenny, and they’re not doing her any good.

  Listen, I think you should take a breather, okay? Calm down for a second and think about what—