Gibbs turned away, feeling fatigued. He’d seen it all before, had watched it grow from nothing but his own drive and that of a few others, the desire to put intelligent machines in humanity’s service. There were now, in the form of artificial intelligences, the equivalent of more than a trillion people alive; the number was increasing all the time. That was the kind of help computers could provide, how much of the burden of drudgery, rote calculation, algorithmic functioning, and information processing they were capable of shouldering for human beings. Gibbs had hoped for nothing less than a grand disencumbrance of humanity. But to the Dillingers, he saw, it’s nothing more than the largest, most profitable business in the world.
And when he asked himself if people were that much better off, he shied away from the question. “Oh, I know all that,” he told Dillinger wearily. “Sometimes I wish I were back in that garage—” The dream had been unalloyed then, unspoiled.
“It can be arranged,” the Senior Executive announced dispassionately.
Gibbs spun; the lined face took on a weathered strength that surprised Dillinger. “That was uncalled for.” He took a step closer to the desk, and Dillinger saw that the dreamer and idealist hadn’t been ground and buffeted out of Dr. Gibbs, as they had been with so many others. “You know, you can remove men like Alan and me from this System, but we helped create it. Our… our spirit remains in every program we’ve designed for the computer.”
Dillinger let no hint of it show through the steely façade, but that touched home, and brought the MCP back into his thoughts. But he forced himself to discard that line of thought.
“Walter, it’s getting late. I’ve got better things to do than discuss religious matters with you. Don’t worry about ENCOM anymore. It’s out of your hands now.” And out of his own as well, came the cutting realization.
Departing the office, slowly retracing his steps down the corridor, slump-shouldered and ignoring its art treasures, Gibbs conceded to himself the truth of Dillinger’s words. He wondered when it had happened.
Slowly, so slowly you never even realized, those few times you looked up from your experiments, it came to him. And if you’d noticed, what would you have done? Thrown aside science? Jumped into the corporate wolf pit, manipulating and maneuvering?
That was how a man became an Ed Dillinger. No; maybe I could’ve found a third way, he thought. There was some consolation in that. Or maybe there still is one?
Walter Gibbs mulled that over as he made his way from the skyscraper labeled ENCOM.
The black van pulled to a stop behind the ground-level entrance at the rear of the ENCOM building, Lora’s parking sticker having taken them that far. Lora, Alan, and Flynn hopped out and stood there before the only entrance where they wouldn’t face a disastrous security check, the shield-door that gave access to the laser lab area.
The door needed no guard, according to in-house and outside consultant security evaluations. It was immune to forced entry, even by someone using a self-propelled fieldpiece, and its locking mechanism was presided over by ENCOM computers.
Flynn let out a chuckle, seeing it: immense, red, marked with the trefoils of radiation warning. Lora inserted her ID card in the slot set in the electronic lock at the side of the massive door. She quickly tapped out a code on the twelve-button touch pad. Nothing happened.
“I don’t think I’m cleared for after-hours entry,” she confessed, and began to worry. Someone from security would be dropping around the laser lab tomorrow to find out why she’d been trying to gain admission in the middle of the night. Their adventure suddenly seemed like less of an inspiration.
“I’m certainly not cleared,” Alan declared.
Flynn smirked, pulled a small device from the pocket of his windbreaker, and drawled, “Move aside; let The Kid have some room.”
They looked at one another, then moved back. Flynn sauntered up to the ID device and held his mysterious gadget, no larger than a handheld electronic game, up to the instrument.
“This guy’s like Santa Claus,” Alan snorted, and Lora giggled. They exchanged smiles; Alan liked making her laugh.
Flynn hunched over his gadget, working with utmost concentration. Alan and Lora began to get nervous; neither had ever considered a life of crime before. Flynn was no more tense than when he’d set the intergalactic record for Space Paranoids.
There was a soft click, followed by the sustained hum of brute servomotors. The three stepped back out of the way as the door began to swing open. Flynn moved to it eagerly, like a cat waiting to get out of the house. But the door continued to reveal its cross section; bevel after bevel of superhard alloy swung past and Flynn’s amazement grew with each moment. Ten feet thick, fifteen, and still it wasn’t open. Flynn began to whistle a casual tune, as if waiting for a bus. Anytime, door, his attitude said. Alan and Lora watched in amusement.
Twenty feet thick, the door finally showed an opening. Flynn stood back and ushered Lora through first, then followed behind with Alan; she would be a familiar face in the subcellar, while neither of them would. Flynn was acutely aware that none of them was wearing ENCOM picture-ID security badges, Lora and Alan having turned theirs in upon leaving the building earlier. He invoked a prayer drawn from The Treasure of Sierra Madre: Bodges? We don’ need no steenkin’ bodges!
They passed down silent stairwells and corridors of ENCOM’s subbasements, hearing only the whisper of the ventilation system. Then they descended a staircase and found themselves face to face with a security guard.
The trio had the presence of mind to keep walking. Lora came to an instant decision that neither of the men with her would be hurt, nor harm anyone else. Alan kissed his career good-bye, and wondered what jail would be like. Flynn congratulated himself for having worn his running shoes.
Lora tried her sunniest smile on the guard; it came out with a tiny quiver.
“Hi,” the guard said casually, not so much to the two men as to that nice young Ms. Baines who worked for Dr. Gibbs. “Working late?” He recognized the fellow in the glasses, and the other guy too, though he hadn’t seen him around in a while.
“Oh—yeah,” Lora replied nervously, and found herself giving the man—she couldn’t quite dredge up his name—a warm look. She’s got wiles she ain’t used yet, Flynn marveled, and Alan was greatly impressed.
The guard nodded as he passed them by, ascending the stairs, on his route. All three wilted with relieved sighs as they went on their way. They stopped in a darkened entrance area, close by the lab proper. Lora said, “Okay, Flynn; I’m gonna put you at my terminal in the lab. Alan and I will be in the control room.”
Flynn rubbed his palms together. “Swell. I’ll log us both on, and Alan can get his Tron thing running.”
She cautioned them both, “As long as we stay off the top floor, Dillinger’ll never know we’ve been here.” Until it was too late, at which time it wouldn’t matter if he flipped his peruke.
Alan looked to Flynn. “Good luck, hotshot.” Flynn nodded; he liked Bradley’s composure. Alan set off for the control room.
Flynn followed Lora toward the laser lab. He was feeling somewhere between an espionage agent and a kid playing hide ‘n’ seek. He tried his best covert-entry gait, but it felt a little ludicrous in the well-lit computer rooms, and quickly devolved into a sort of Groucho Marx burlesque of stealth, a mime burglar. He outdistanced Lora. In a typical Flynn decision to make the most of the excitement and defuse the anxiety, he decided to play a little.