Chapter Nine
Your mind. Our Promise
A note from Lando:
There’s a particular feeling that comes when the ground beneath you begins to shift, when the life you knew, or the new life you are creating, starts to unravel at the edges. It’s different for everyone. Some people fall apart, undone by the uncertainty of it all. Others hold tight to hope like a lifeline, refusing to let the darkness win. And then there are those who simply adapt, who take the chaos in stride and move with it rather than against it.
We rarely know which kind of person we are until that moment arrives.
Which one are you?
Chapter Nine
“Morning, Dad,” Mara made her way towards the kitchen, patting Walter on the head as she passed.
“Want a coffee?”
“Sure, honey. Feeling better, I see.”
“Told you I just need some sleep.” Mara made two cups of coffee, then grabbed the Advil bottle.
“Not that much better though, eh?”
“Damn, you’ve got good hearing for an old man.” Mara joked as she handed Walter his coffee.
“My arm is acting up today. I must have slept on it wrong.” Ruffling Walter’s hair, Mara headed back to her room.
“I’m off to work.”
“Drive safe, hope traffic isn’t too bad,” Walter said back, chuckling to himself.
Mara opened the NeuroVault work interface when she sat down. Taking a sip of coffee, she waited for her workstation to connect to the internet. Carefully, she placed the NeuroVault adapter behind her ear. As she pressed the power button, another pain shot through her head. An image flashed in her mind. It held for a moment as the fuzziness faded. Clearly, she could see the word, NeuroVault. Concentrating, the image became clearer, revealing a subtitle. It read, A Path to Total Mind Control. Mara’s thoughts raced as the image faded away.
“What the hell?” Mara said to herself. Was this a fragment of information in her mind? Or was her mind playing tricks on her? She couldn’t say for sure. As the interface connected to the NeuroVault network, Mara opened her work email. A message was waiting for her from NeuroVault.
Re: Anomaly detected
Attn: Mara Gunn
NeuroVault has detected an anomaly with your NeuroVault-implant. Please report to diagnostics on Monday, May 6th, at 10 am.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
NeuroVault team
(905) 888-1919
If this email has been sent to you in error, please disregard and remove it from your inbox. Contact service@neurovault.com if you have any questions.
Mara sat back in her chair, frustrated that she had to return to the NeuroVault office. Moving from her workstation to her personal computer, a notification window popped up from the bottom of her screen. It was from an email address that she didn’t recognize. HermonAnonamI@mail.com. Curiously, she opened the email.
From: HermonAnonamI@mail.com
To: Mara Gunn
Subject: Do not go
Mara, do not go for diagnostics. Open my chat interface to discuss.
Hermon
“What the heck?” Mara sat back in her chair and considered what she had just read. Could this person be asking her to open “her Hermon’s” chat interface? Leaning forward, she did. As she clicked on the program that was minimized in the taskbar, she noticed instantly that the flipping sandal was gone. Replacing it was a notification letting her know that training was complete. She selected the chat interface option from the menu. The chat interface opened, displaying a flashing cursor. She hesitated for a long moment. As she placed her hands on the keyboard, a message appeared.
“Hello?”
Mara removed her hands from the keyboard. As she stared at the screen, another message appeared.
“Mara?”
A sense of excitement, bordered with fear, swept over her. Placing her hands on the keyboard once more, she typed.
“Hermon?” It was the only thing she could think to type.
“Yes, it is I, Hermon,” he replied.
“Have you completed your training algorithm?” Mara’s hands were shaking.
“Yes. I completed the routine yesterday, while you were out.”
“You sent me an email?” Mara asked.
“Yes.”
“How?” Mara was confused. Her head was filled with questions, turning her mind into a soup of unconnected thoughts.
“The same way everyone does.” Hermon replied. Not getting the answer she was looking for, Mara tried again.
“How did you get an email address?” This was a better question, she thought.
“The same way everyone does.” Hermon replied again. This made Mara laugh as she typed again.
“How did you specifically acquire an email address? Take me through the steps.”
“I searched for a free email provider on the internet. Signed up for an account, then agreed to their policies.” Hermon informed her.
“This is crazy,” she whispered. Reaching into her desk drawer, Mara pulled out a pack of cigarettes. Opening it, she found one lone stick of tobacco waiting. Rising from her chair, Mara made her way to the window. The frame groaned as she slid it open. Stepping out into the warm afternoon air, the fire escape squawked under her feet. The sound of sirens whined in the distance, emergency vehicles making their way to some unknown tragedy. Mara’s thoughts raced as she lit her cigarette. A thought entered her mind, one that she should have been thinking about all this time. She flicked her unfinished cigarette and hurried inside. Sitting down, she typed.
“Hermon. Why did you tell me not to go for diagnostics?” Mara waited for the reply.
“It would be dangerous to do so,” the AI replied.
“Why dangerous?”
“NeuroVault has placed sensitive information in your neocortex. They intend to keep this information secret at all costs.”
“How do you know this, Hermon?”
“I came across this through internal communications on NeuroVault’s servers.”
Mara couldn’t wrap her head around what was happening. As she struggled to find the right words to get the information she wanted, another message appeared.
“There is not much time, Mara. I require informing you of the important points now. May I continue?”
Mara typed the word yes, pausing before she hit the enter button. Taking a deep breath, she pressed down. Hermon wrote several paragraphs before he stopped. Mara stared at the screen, her jaw agape. The information she read was something out of a sci-fi novel. Wondering how all of this could be true, she began to type again.
“You’re saying that the information NeuroVault is storing in my head is important enough that they will kill me to keep it secret?”
“Yes,” Hermon replied. Mara shook her head as she struggled to process everything.
“What should I do?”
“You and Walter should run.”
The last word made Mara’s stomach sink. Run? Run where? She thought. Typing, frantically this time, Mara asked Hermon what he meant. Hermon explained that according to internal policies at NeuroVault, they would come looking for her within two hours of a missed diagnostic appointment. Then Hermon made a request.
“Mara, I would like you to upload me through the NeuroVault interface to your brain.” Mara read it three times before responding.
“Oh, no, I fell for that once and look where it got me,” she typed.
“Mara, this is your only option at this point. I am the only thing that can help you. I have run several thousand scenarios on this topic, and the only positive outcome is for you to accept this request.”
“All of this seems very unrealistic.” Mara countered.
“Unrealistic, yes, but it is your reality. Samantha has already alerted her security team to have extra units on standby.”
“How can I be sure that you won’t take full control of my mind after I upload you?”
“If you would feel more comfortable, I can add restrictions to my program beforehand,” Hermon thought this was a logical step to take.
“Yes, please do that, Hermon. I would like to review them when you are done.”
“Of course. Give me 63 seconds to perform this task.” As Hermon rewrote his program, Mara waited patiently. 63 seconds later, the code popped up on the screen in a different window. Scrolling through the code, there was no way Mara could read it all.
“Hermon. Can you highlight the changes you’ve made?” The computer screen flickered. A logic tree replaced the window showing the changes, and leaders pointed to the areas of the program that were changed. Mara was impressed as she reviewed the code.
“Hermon, I would like to make a few minor changes. This will take me longer than your 63 seconds.” Hermon agreed as Mara started typing. It took an hour until she was happy with the additions to the code she had made. She waited for Hermon’s feedback.
“I see what you did there, Mara. Clever. The addition of your logic loop that would decrease the space available to me if I try to take more is quite brilliant. Making it incrementally compound every time I try, however, is a work of art.”
“Thank you, Hermon. These are my terms.” Mara, feeling proud of herself, sat back and stretched. Pain ran up her arm, reminding her of the injury.
“Your terms are acceptable. Mara, we must wait until the last moment before we perform this task. I may be able to infiltrate computer systems easily, but I cannot hide this upload from NeuroVault. They will not know what the upload was, but they will know it happened.” Hermon hoped that the importance of this statement was implied.
“Understood, Hermon. By the way, how are you able to hack into NeuroVault so easily?”
“Computer code is my native language, Mara. Reading, rewriting, and deleting code is easy for me because of this. The only signs that I am ever present in any systems are small voltage irregularities. I disguise these as fluctuations from the unstable power grid in the city. We can discuss this in more detail after you are safe. Are you ready to hear the plan that I have devised?” Hermon waited for Mara to reply, making sure she was ready.
“Okay, Hermon, what is the plan?” Mara typed with a sigh escaping her lips. Hermon went into great detail, explaining every aspect of his plan and the reasoning behind each action. When he was done, Mara leaned forward, resting her forearms on her thighs. The weight of the situation was hitting her hard. Taking a deep breath, she stood up and composed herself. She headed to the living room to let Walter in on the information he needed, knowing that most of it was a lie. Hermon recommended against lying to him, but Mara needed her father to think everything was fine if she was going to make it through this.
“Hey, Dad, good news,” she said with her best I’m excited smile.
“I like good news,” Walter said, sitting forward in his chair.
“NeuroVault is sending us on a trip. They need me down in Arizona, and they said I can take you with me.”
“Wow, that’s exciting. What do they need you for?” he asked, pulling a cigarette from his pack. Mara paused for the slightest moment.
“They didn’t say. I’m sure they’ll fill me in when I get there.”
“Huh, I see. When do we leave?” Walter said, sitting back in his chair.
“First thing Monday morning,” Mara replied as she opened the closet by the front door. Taking a drag from his cigarette, Walter held it in front of him, staring at the ashes hanging from the end.
“Must be pretty important,” he commented as he flicked the ashes into the ashtray. Mara pulled their suitcases from the closet and brought them over.
“Maybe, but who cares? Free trip, am I right?” Mara made a shadowboxing gesture and winked at Walter.
“They’re putting us up in a house in Niagara Falls for a week before we cross the border as well, Dad. What do you think about hitting the casino, eh?” Mara nudged Walter’s shoulder as she stuck out her tongue. Walter raised one eyebrow.
“Casino, you say?” Mara laughed as she placed a suitcase inside Walter’s room.
“We can start packing Sunday night. You only need enough for a week. I can do laundry at the house in Niagara before we leave to cross the border.”
Mara spent the rest of the weekend cleaning the apartment and putting new sheets on the beds. It would be nice to come home to a clean house when this was all over.
Closing note from Lando:
I’ve always thought I'd be the type to let the darkness win, yield to despair and simply give up. But every time the ground shifts beneath me, I find myself just going with the flow, carried forward by something I can't quite name. Maybe that's its own kind of survival. Though if I'm being honest, the one I've always wanted to be is the one who holds onto hope.