Frank sighed at the wait. As though his credentials could be faked. He felt the worn leather of the briefcase under his palm, the thread protruding slightly from the handle a familiar and comfortable irritation. Just as he took a sip of coffee, the AI unlocked the forward door.
“Good morning, Mr. Nelson” the flat voice said. “Please come in.”
He nodded to the building, gripped his briefcase more firmly, and stepped out. As he exited, the security vestibule cycled, allowing an android into the chamber behind him.
The human security guard nodded, his bald head gleaming. “Good day, Mr. Nelson.”
“Good morning,” Frank said, nodding back. He liked the man’s crisp British accent. He walked across the marble expanse to the elevators, where one waited with open doors, and pressed the button for five. The antique car rumbled to the top floor, and the doors slid open, groans muffled by thick layers of grease. He walked past his secretary’s desk, still empty, into his own office, the knob turning as it read his fingerprints. The door swung back to reveal two men sitting on his desk, the antique mahogany piece that had been his father’s and grandfather’s. Frank dropped his coffee in surprise, yelping as the hot liquid splattered his leg.
“Hello, Mr. Nelson,” the heavy one said. “Nice to meet you. I’m Tony, and my colleague here is Slim.” Both men wore suits, but neither looked accustomed to it. The thin one, Slim, had slicked back hair and tattoos peeking out from under his sleeves. Neither one made a move to give up their perch on the desktop.
Slim chuckled and pulled out a metal box with two antennas from a brown leather bag. “Now, this won’t hurt a bit.” He set the box on the desk and flipped a switch.
Frank never even had a chance to protest. As the device turned on, his vision doubled, and the two men faded away, replaced by the same room twenty-five years earlier. He was an eight-year-old boy, and his father was behind the desk.
“Come here, Frank, I want to show you something.” He hesitated. His father didn’t like to be bothered at work. Frank came a little closer. “Come on, boy, I’m going to show you what I do. Someday you’ll be an important investment banker.”
He walked the rest of the way over. His father wrapped one arm around him and started explaining the symbols on the screen. He loved the scratchy feel of his father’s shaved face, the smell of his cologne. Frank peered at the display, trying to understand.
The memory faded, and suddenly Frank was older. Now he was sitting behind the desk, reviewing paperwork, the investment accounts for Senator Watson. He scanned through the account history. Then it passed and he switched to another memory, his first date with the woman who would become his wife.
The two men sat on the desk and watched Frank Nelson, crumpled on the floor, oscillating through emotions. Smiles, tears, and fear alternated so quickly that his face tried to display them all at once.
“OK, so maybe it’ll hurt a little bit,” Slim said. “But there was no reason to alarm you, was there? No, sir.”
They waited about ten minutes until the machine finished with a double beep.
“Let’s go,” Tony said.
Slim picked up the machine and put it in the bag. They carefully stepped over the dead body of Frank Nelson. Tony closed the door behind him and calmly hit the button for the elevator.
“We need to send these memories to Adam,” Slim said. “He’s been waiting for something special from this guy. Then we got another list of people to go get.”
“How many more?” Tony asked.
“Eight. The next one’s in San Diego.”
“What? We gotta fly across the country again?”
“Nope, it’s the bus this time.”
“Jesus.”
“Quit complaining,” Slim said. “I guess you’d rather go back to selling smack off the back of our rusted-out bikes? Remember that piece of crap I was riding and the freaks we had to deal with?”
Tony just shook his head, frowning.
“This is good stuff,” Slim said, smiling. “We got the easiest job in the world.”
9
Mike waited, turning his face up to the sun. He glanced over at Leon, who was hitting on a college student. There was nothing to be done but be patient when Leon took a fancy to someone. Mike wondered, not for the first time, if he should be following Leon’s lead. He looked around at the busy sidewalks, a mix of office workers and students, all hurrying somewhere.
He glanced over at Leon, who now had one hand on the woman’s arm. Between the boy’s sandy hair, strong Eastern European cheekbones, and friendly manner, he was a natural magnet for women.
He grunted, thinking about his own brown hair and plain face. When he looked in the mirror, he still saw the same teenage boy who’d spent all-nighters playing Civilization, except now fifty years old, with knees that hurt when he climbed stairs.
His life hadn’t left time for romance. For ten years he’d been the sole caretaker of ELOPe, the first AI, whose existence he’d fought to keep secret. He couldn’t sustain a relationship then. Maybe there were some who could have a deep personal relationship while maintaining a deception about who and what they were, but not him. And merely knowing ELOPe had been all-consuming.
Then for the last ten years, he and Leon had been the architects of human-AI society, evolving an entire set of social norms and rules to keep the balance of power equal and prevent a runaway AI from destroying humanity. No surprise there that he hadn’t found the time for a woman.
Yet the last ten years hadn’t stopped Leon. He shook his head, uncomfortable with his thoughts, and turned back to watch the street with arms crossed. Exactly what was he doing with his life now? Was he going to spend it alone?
Across the street, a mixed crowd of older adults and college-age kids approached, yelling to each other. A man up front carried a sign and egged the group on. “No Altered Intelligence,” the sign said, echoing the crowd’s chant. Great, now they were opposing neural implants and AI? Thirty, maybe forty people passed by. A mother carrying a baby in a backpack trailed the group with her own sign reading, “No Rights 4 Robots.”
Mike scowled until they were out of sight and the street returned to normal. A few seconds later, Leon came up. “Well?” Mike asked, trying to put the protesters out of mind.
“We’re going out Friday. Want to come? She’s got a roommate working toward graduate degrees in English Literature and Philosophy.”
Mike shook his head. “Unless it’s her mom, no way. She’s got to be twenty years younger than me.”
“That stuff doesn’t matter. Nobody cares.”
“I don’t have time for a relationship.”
“It’s just a date. That’s all. I know you have time for dinner, because we’re going to dinner now.”
Mike reflected on his earlier thoughts. What the heck, he had nothing to lose. “Alright, I’ll do it.”
“Hell yeah! It’s about time.” Leon closed his eyes for a second. “It’s done. We’re set for Friday at eight.”
Well, how about that. He was going on a date. What did people wear on dates these days?
Leon gave him a shove. “Let’s go. I’m hungry.”
They headed a few blocks over to their usual izakaya restaurant.
“Hello Leon-san, Mike-san,” the hostess greeted them.
“Konbanwa, Keiko-san,” Leon replied.
“Ni desuka?” Keiko asked. “No Rebecca-san?”