“That’s different.”

“No, it’s not. You say that artificial intelligence is unnatural — but it’s not. The growth of intelligence is part of the process of evolution. When we learn how the mind works there is nothing evil or wrong with making machine models of our work. Dad was one of the pioneers in this field and I’m proud to continue with it. Machines today can think in many ways, perceive — even understand. They’ll soon be able to think better, understand, feel emotions…”

“That’s close to blasphemy, Brian.”

“Yes, it might be on your terms. I’m sorry. But it is the truth. But if you think about it you’ll realize that emotions must have come before brains and intelligence. An amoeba, about the simplest animal you can get, will pull a pseudo-pod back when it detects something painful. Pain leads to fear, which leads to survival. You can’t deny that animals, dogs, have emotions.”

“They’re not machines!”

“You’re arguing in circles, Dolly. And there is no point to it either. When I build the first AI we’ll see if it has emotions or not.”

“I hope you enjoy the cookies,” she said, standing abruptly. “But I think I have to go now.”

“Dolly, stay a bit, please.”

“No. I see that there is no way to stop you.”

“It’s not just me. Ideas have a strength of their own. If I don’t put the pieces together correctly, why then someone else will.”

She didn’t answer him, even when he changed the subject, made a feeble attempt at small talk.

“I’ll have to say good-bye now, Brian. And it’s going to be a while before I see you again. I’ve had a lot of calls from the clinic back home. They were nice about giving me emergency leave at such short notice, but they really are short-staffed.”

“I appreciate what you did to help me.”

“That’s all right,” she said, already distant.

“Can I phone you?”

“If you think it necessary. You have my number.”

Clouds had come up and the balcony was getting chilly. He walked slowly back to his room, no longer needing the wheelchair, and turned on the lights. Took off the knitted cap and ran his fingers over the growing stubble on his scalp, went and looked in the mirror. The scars on his skull were still obvious, although not as red as they had been. The hair was beginning to conceal them. He picked up the hospital cap — then threw it aside. He was beginning to hate this place. Benicoff had brought him a baseball cap that advertised the virtues of the San Diego Padres in large letters; he pulled that on, nodded approvingly at his mirrored image. Poor Dolly, life had not been that nice to her. Well it had not been nice to him either! As least she didn’t get a bullet through the brain. His watch buzzed and the tiny voice spoke.

“Four p.m. Time for your appointment with Dr. Snaresbrook. Four p.m. Time for yo.,.”

“Belt up!” he said, and it went silent.

Erin Snaresbrook looked up and smiled when Brian came in. “I love your taste in hats. It sure beats that hospital-issue beanie that you have been wearing. Ready to go to work? I want to try something new today.”

“What’s that?” Brian took off the cap and settled back in the dentist’s chair, felt the spidery touch of the metal fingers.

“If you don’t mind I would like to hold off on the memory work for this session and see if we can’t do more with your new talent of accessing your inbuilt CPU.”

“Sure. I never thought to ask — but what kind of a central processor is it?”

“It’s a CM-9 parallel processing unit that contains 128 million simple but fast computers. It has a very small current drain and runs very cool — imperceptibly above your body temperature. Uses hardly any current at all. In fact, this computer uses less energy than the equivalent brain cells. And plenty of memory. In addition to sixteen 64-billion-byte GRAMs, your implant contains four thousand million words of B-CRAM as well.”

“B-CRAM. That must be something new I don’t know.”

“Yes, they are new. A B-CRAM is a best-matching content-accessed memory. These were developed for database applications and are perfect for use here, since they can almost instantly find records that match inputs. The B-CRAM automatically does pattern matching of every data entry, in parallel, against a vector of matching ‘weights’ provided to its input. These are the components that store your input-output nerve-reconnection information.”

“Some setup! But even running cool it will still need some electricity. Don’t tell me you will have to open my head again to change batteries?”

“Hardly! Electronic implants, like pacemakers, no longer depend on tricky power supplies that have to be recharged from the outside of the body. That’s all a thing of the past. They are now powered by metabolic batteries that get their energy from blood sugar.”

“Sweet batteries — technology run rampant. So what is it that you want to do now?”

“Run a benchmark sequence. This will take about ten minutes. I want you to see if you are aware of the central processing unit, can tap into it or hear it — or whatever we might call it. You remember that you were aware of the CPU when it was connecting memories. I want to see if you can re-create that awareness.”

“Sounds good to me.”

After a few minutes Brian yawned loudly.

“Anything yet?” the surgeon asked.

“Absolutely nothing. Is it really running?”

“Perfectly. Just started the benchmark run again.”

“Don’t look so depressed, Doc. Early days yet. Why don’t you rerun the session where I did contact it, see if we can re-create the conditions.”

“That’s a good idea — we’ll try it tomorrow.”

“Will I really be able to get out of stir in a week?”

“Physically, yes, as long you do nothing strenuous. No stairs or fast walking, just about the same amount you do here in a normal day. After a while we can increase that. That is the physical side of the trip; your security is another matter. You’ll have to ask Ben about that.” Would the memory bank in Mexico have the records of his AI work? A lot was riding on that.

17

November 20, 2023

“This is it! I bring you Mr. Good News,” Benicoff said, bursting enthusiastically through the door. Brian closed the book he was reading, Introduction to Applied Excluor Geometry, and looked up, at first not recognizing the other man who came in behind Ben. Three piece dark suit, Sulka tie, gleaming black boots.

“Major Mike Sloane!”

“The same. A necessary disguise, since the high-powered Megalobe lawyers sneer with contempt at our country’s uniform — but look with humble respect at this sartorial souvenir of my civilian years. They’ve come around.” He opened his hand-tooled leather Porsche attache case and took out a thick wad of paper. “This is it. And it is my positive belief that it is just the contract that you wanted.”

“How can I be sure?”

“Because I checked it,” Benicoff said. “Not personally, but I sent it on down the line to Washington. We’ve got attorneys there that could eat Megalobe for breakfast. They assure me it’s brassbound, you got the terms you asked for, a better salary than expected. And after overhead, development costs and all the usual deductions, you’ll have something very close to a fifty-fifty split on profits. Ready for a little trip south of the border?”

“You bet. After I read through this.”

“Good luck. It’s tough going.”

Mike guided him through the less coherent and densest legalese clauses, explained everything. By the time the lawyer left two hours later the contract was signed, registered and duly filed in the legal data bank. Along with an archaic paper copy locked away in the hospital’s safe.

“Satisfied?” Benicoff asked as they watched the Yeoman seal the safe. Brian looked at his receipt and nodded.

“It’s a lot better than the first contract.”