The Silence

by Mark Alpert

  I feel sick. Nausea seeps through my wires. I’m looking at a kind of Frankenstein monster, except that it’s not ugly or monstrous. It’s a pretty sixteen-year-old girl. “This is too much. It’s not right. You shouldn’t…”

  My voice trails off. Jenny stares at me, her brow furrowed, her arms folded across her chest. “I shouldn’t what? If I have the power to change the simulation, why shouldn’t I use it? I’m not hurting anyone, am I?”

  It’s hard to put my dismay into words. I devote more processing power to the task, but my circuits are still flummoxed. “Look, I didn’t know what was happening when I started using the surge. I didn’t realize I was messing up anyone’s program, because I had no idea we lived in a simulation. But now we know. So we have to be more careful. We don’t want to do any more damage to the program.”

  Jenny nods slowly and seriously. “So you think if we go back to our old lives and stop altering the simulation, the program won’t bother us anymore?”

  “Yeah, that’s what I’m hoping. You installed defenses against the Sentinels, and they can’t erase us now. So maybe they’ll accept a stalemate and leave us alone.”

  “My defenses won’t last. I’ve managed to keep the Sentinels away so far, but the error-correction system is self-improving. That means it gets more capable and efficient all the time. Sooner or later, the Sentinels will figure out how to break through my firewalls. Then what will we do?”

  My dismay grows. I clench my steel hands. “But you said you had a link to the operating system. You said you could deliver new instructions to the program whenever you wanted to. So if the Sentinels get smarter, couldn’t you just install stronger defenses?”

  Jenny sighs. She raises her hand to her forehead and swipes a stray lock of blond hair back into place. “There’s something you should know about the simulation, Adam. Remember what I said about the archive? How it stores data from the virtual world every year? Well, the archive doesn’t go back forever. It starts on January 3, 1971. Does that date mean anything to you?”

  I check the history databases in my Quarter-bot’s files. Unfortunately, I don’t see anything significant. “Well, the Baltimore Colts won the Super Bowl that month. Everyone called it the Stupor Bowl because there were so many bad plays.”

  “Wasn’t your father born that year? In October, nine months after that date?”

  My circuits clatter. I don’t like where this is going. “Yeah, he was. But I don’t—”

  “Listen carefully. The date is a clue. We’ve already talked about why people in the future might want to simulate our era, because of all the pioneering technological work done in this century. Your father played the key role in that effort, so it would make sense for the programmers of the simulation to focus on him. I think they tried to re-create every detail of his life, to make their program as accurate as possible. They probably had a preserved sample of his DNA, which gave them enough genetic information to simulate his biological development, starting with his conception. That’s why the program begins in January of 1971.”

  I turn away from Jenny. I can’t stand listening to this. “You’re just guessing.”

  “That’s true. But it’s an educated guess. I don’t know who programmed this virtual world, whether it was super-intelligent AIs or super-advanced humans of the future, but either way, I think their goal was to simulate Thomas Armstrong and the world he lived in. Because he’s the one who invented so much of their world.”

  I stride across the empty cockpit to the half dome window, trying to end the conversation. It’s bad enough to know that Dad is a piece of software, but it’s even worse to imagine what the real Tom Armstrong was like. No simulation is perfect, so the real Tom must’ve been slightly different from the virtual one, even if they were genetically identical. Was the real man stronger than the father I know? Was he steadier? Happier? Less frazzled by setbacks?

  And what about his son, the real Adam Armstrong? Did the future programmers also have a sample of his DNA? If so, they probably programmed his genetic code into the simulation, giving me the same genes and chromosomes. So the real Adam Armstrong must’ve had muscular dystrophy too, because the illness is caused by a genetic flaw. But did he handle it better than I did? Did he have fewer tantrums and less self-pity? Did he take better advantage of the time he had left?

  And did he try to escape his death, like I did? Or did he realize how futile that attempt would be?

  I don’t know. I’m so confused. But I do know that something’s very wrong with our world. I see the wrongness in Jenny. And in myself.

  Then my acoustic sensor detects the sound of bare feet padding on the steel floor behind me. Jenny approaches my Quarter-bot and stands beside me. But I keep my cameras turned away from her. If I look again at the body she’s reconstructed, my circuits will clog with disgust.

  “You have to face the facts, Adam. This simulation was built around your dad, and your actions have totally disrupted it. That’s why the Sentinels are trying so hard to eliminate you and put the simulation back on track. And they’re not going to stop trying. Yes, I can keep fighting the Sentinels, but it’s a hopeless effort. The program will eventually succeed in deleting us, or it’ll reset the simulation. It’ll erase our whole virtual world and start over again.”

  I don’t say anything. I’m too distressed.

  Jenny steps closer and leans toward me. “That’s why I want to communicate with the programmers. Even if they’re super-intelligent AIs, I think I can reason with them. Sigma was also super-intelligent, and it gave me some of its abilities. And now that we’ve deciphered the source code, I can speak in the programmers’ language. I can argue for our lives, our world. I can prove that it’s worthwhile to keep running our simulation, even if it’s very different from the actual history.”

  She steps right in front of my Quarter-bot, trying to get me to look at her. But there’s no room in my circuits for hope. “So what’s your plan? Are you gonna write a letter to the programmers? Send them an email? A Facebook message?”

  “The programmers can already see everything that’s happening in the simulation. So far, their only response has been to devote more processing power to the error-correction software. It’s probably an automatic response—if something goes wrong with the simulation, the program immediately sends in the Sentinels. So we have to do something different to get the programmers’ attention. We need to talk with them on a special channel, a communications link built into the simulation for this purpose.”

  “Whoa. You found a link that goes outside the simulation? To the real world?”

  “No, I haven’t found it. But I think you can.”

  I finally give in and point my cameras at Jenny. She’s looking up at me with such eagerness. Her eyes are wide, and her smile is dazzling. It almost makes me want to laugh, because her trust in me is so misplaced. “Are you serious?”

  “Absolutely. Because the simulation is focused on you and your dad, your software has a privileged status in the program, and therefore you can do some unique things. That’s why you can turn your emotions into a surge and propel it beyond whatever machine you’re occupying. Your software can travel to parts of the simulation where no other mind can go. And I think one of those parts is the link to the programmers.”

  I let out a skeptical grunt from my speakers. “I hate to disappoint you, but I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’ve examined my circuits and software a million times, and I’ve never seen any special communications line to the future.”

  “There’s a reason for that. Your software has to be properly aligned with the simulation to activate the link. In other words, you have to be in exactly the right place in the virtual world.”

  “Really? And where’s that?”

  Jenny does a graceful quarter turn and points at the cockpit’s huge window. We’re flying over a desert now, the Great Basin of Nevada. “
It’s about two thousand miles in that direction. We’ll be there in three hours.”

  My electronic brain performs some quick calculations. “On the East Coast?”

  “It’s the part of the simulation where your software made the deepest impression. Where you’ve spent the most time since you were born.” She smiles at me again. “Yorktown Heights, New York. Your home.”

  Chapter

  27

  Jenny keeps her promise. As soon as we finish talking, she removes the restraints on the War-bot, allowing Zia to retake control of her machine.

  Zia flexes her robot’s massive arms and legs, testing each joint and motor. She pivots her turret and points her cameras at my Quarter-bot, then at Jenny’s reconstructed human body. After staring at us for several seconds, she turns on her loudspeakers.

  “I heard everything the two of you said, Armstrong. About what you’re planning to do.” Zia’s voice is strong now. Her software is fully repaired. “And all I can say is that you’re gonna regret this. You’re making the same mistake all over again.”

  Then she strides away, heading for the other end of the cockpit. She halts in front of the glass half dome and stares at the mountains and deserts below. She’s free to go anywhere now, but she just stands by the window, silent and reproachful.

  I’m glad that Zia’s back to normal, but I think she’s being unfair. I’m not willingly siding with Jenny. If I had a choice, I’d never ally myself with her. But our whole world has turned against us. The universal simulation is trying to wipe us off the map. Jenny has a plan that might save us, and I don’t see any other options. So I’m going along with it. Is that so horrible?

  Zia clearly thinks so. She’d rather die than compromise. That’s just the way she is.

  But I don’t want to die. Even if life is just a simulation, I want to see what happens next.

  Jenny leaves the cockpit. She says she has to prepare herself for our communications attempt. Meanwhile, I stand in front of the window too, about thirty feet from Zia, and stare at the scenery zooming past.

  We fly over the Rocky Mountains. We soar past the Great Plains and the Great Lakes. I gaze at the forests and farms and cities and try to imagine what they look like up close. I promise myself that if I survive this ordeal, I’ll visit all those places. The programmers of our virtual world loaded it with wonders. It would be such a waste to let them go unseen.

  Soon enough, the gargantuan plane reaches New York and goes into a steep descent. We glide past the Hudson River and swoop down to the suburbs of Westchester County. The people below can’t see or hear us, even though the mile-long plane soars only a few hundred yards above their houses. Thanks to Jenny’s cloaking software, we’re traveling like ghosts through the virtual world.

  Then we come to Yorktown Heights, my hometown, where Sigma killed twenty thousand people. It’s been ten days since the attack, but the Army still has checkpoints on all the roads, with dozens of soldiers diverting traffic away from the town. There’s no danger anymore from Sigma’s nanobots, which are all deactivated, but there’s a health hazard from the sheer number of dead bodies. The suburban streets are empty, and the homes are deserted. Yorktown High School is in ruins, wrecked by Sigma’s Snake-bots. The only people in sight are National Guardsmen in yellow hazmat suits. They’re going from house to house, removing the corpses.

  So much death, so much loss. Our virtual world has no shortage of agony.

  Jenny’s Flying Fortress decelerates and descends even lower. Enormous rotors extend upward from the plane’s wingtips and start to spin, enabling the aircraft to fly like a helicopter. It slows as it approaches Greenwood Street, cruising just fifty feet above the treetops. Then the Flying Fortress hovers directly above my home.

  Jenny suddenly reappears in the cockpit, standing three feet to my left. She didn’t bother with materializing a door this time; she simply transferred her software from one part of the simulation to another and reassembled her human body. The transfer mussed her hair and clothing a bit, but otherwise she looks the same as before. She inspects her dress and runs her hands over the white fabric to smooth out the wrinkles. Then she looks up at my Quarter-bot’s cameras.

  “Are you ready, Adam?”

  Before I can answer, Zia’s War-bot marches over to us and points a steel finger at Jenny. “I’m going with you. I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

  Jenny shrugs. “That’s fine with me.” Then she waves her hand above her head, making the cockpit’s half dome window disappear. “Let’s go.”

  My Quarter-bot lurches upward, rising several inches above the floor. I feel a strong, steady force lifting my robot out of the now-windowless cockpit, as if invisible cables were attached to my torso. Jenny and Zia glide beside me, traveling in parallel paths to my left and right. Once we’re outside the aircraft, we slowly descend to the lawn in front of my house.

  Jenny has apparently programmed the simulation to smoothly transport us from the plane to the ground. After we land on the grass, I can’t see or hear the Flying Fortress, which is hidden by Jenny’s computational magic. This kind of trick has become routine for her, and she does it without any fanfare. She just folds her arms across her chest and looks at my house. “It’s cute. A little small, though.”

  My family home is a simple two-story structure, with a gray roof and yellow siding, one of the plainest houses in the neighborhood. Although Dad earned a good salary from his job at the Unicorp lab, most of his paychecks went toward the costs of caring for me—the special wheelchairs and medical equipment and physical therapy. Living with muscular dystrophy is expensive. We didn’t have a lot of money left over for home improvements.

  Zia turns her War-bot’s turret toward Jenny. “There’s nothing wrong with this house. You should see where I came from. I used to dream about living in a place like this.”

  I don’t say anything. I don’t really care what they think. The house is precious to me simply because it’s my home. Everything about it is familiar: the tarnished knocker on the front door, the green shutters on the windows, the gnarled oak tree angling its branches over the roof. I pan my cameras across the property, and my circuits retrieve thousands of memories from my files, images of all the things that happened here. Birthday parties on the lawn. Barbecues in the backyard. Christmas lights on the porch. A snowman under the oak.

  Jenny’s right—this is the place where my link to the simulation is strongest.

  But it’s also full of sadness. Dad and I left home six months ago, when I was still human. We were headed for the U.S. Army base where I would become a Pioneer, where I would let Dad euthanize my dying body so he could save my mind. He invented the Pioneer technology for me, but Mom was devastated by my decision to go through with it. She refused to say good-bye when we left. She locked herself in her bedroom and screamed.

  A couple of days later, Mom left too. For her own safety, the Army took her away from Yorktown Heights.

  “Uh, Adam?” Jenny stares at me intently. “Are you okay?”

  I clench my hands and put my memories back into their files. “No, definitely not. Let’s get this over with.”

  Pointing my cameras straight ahead, I stride toward the front door and grasp the knob. Oddly enough, it’s unlocked. Jenny follows me into the house, turning her head to the left and right, surveying the cramped foyer. Zia has to stoop to get her War-bot through the doorway.

  Then I step into the living room and get the happiest surprise of my life. Dad is sitting on the couch. A Model S robot is seated to his left, and a nearly identical machine is perched on the cushion to his right.

  I feel dizzy. I have to readjust my Quarter-bot’s balance control to stop myself from toppling. “Dad?”

  He smiles. His eyes are wet, and his face is etched with relief. He springs from the couch, rushes past the coffee table, and throws his arms around my Quarter-bot’s torso.

>   At first I think one of my old memories has escaped my circuits and found its way into the simulation. It’s too right, too perfect. But if that’s the case, what are the Model S robots doing here? They’re both trying to get off the couch, but their aluminum-tube limbs are so clumsy and underpowered that it’s a struggle for them to climb down from the cushions.

  Did Jenny have something to do with this? Did she instruct the simulation to bring Dad here? Maybe to help me contact the programmers? I point my cameras at her to find out, but I see she’s just as surprised as I am. Her forehead creases with confusion.

  Dad won’t let go of me. He tightens his grip on my torso and presses the side of his face against my armor. “Adam, my God. We were so worried about you.”

  The Model S robots clamber off the couch and waddle across the living room. I feel a twinge of sorrow and anger. Sumner Harris has made them helpless, like robotic toddlers. They both have spherical heads the size of soccer balls, and each sphere has a sheet of paper pasted to its front. A photo of Shannon Gibbs’s human face, taken before she got sick, is fixed to the head of the robot on the left. The one on the right has a cartoon drawing of Superman’s face. This robot slaps its two-finger gripper against my Quarter-bot’s hip joint, which is as high as it can reach.

  “Hey, you big lug. How about some love for the little guys?”

  It’s Marshall, of course. His voice is distorted by the cheap loudspeakers inside his aluminum head, but I recognize it. “Marsh? What are you doing here?”

  “Well, that should be obvious. Your dad said you were in trouble, so we hopped on the first nonstop flight to New York. We’re here to save the day.”

  The other Model S steps forward. “We got your message six hours ago.” Shannon’s voice is distorted too, but she sounds as calm and professional as ever. “That gave us just enough time to fly here from New Mexico.”