Human Sister (23 page)

“I do, too.”

He excitedly kissed me, then said, “Remember last winter when I got my SAT and Advanced Placement scores? Well, your grandpa called to congratulate me. He said I undoubtedly could get into any university I wanted. We talked then about Cambridge in England, and Harvard.”

He took a deep breath. “But I want to go to Berkeley, so I can live with you. I’ll commute back and forth. And I don’t want to wait another year to graduate. I want to go right away this fall. What do you think about that?”

“That would be wonderful!” But immediately Aunt Lynh and Michael forced their way into my consciousness. I nearly asked: What about your
ma’s not wanting you to go back to America? The words were formed and on their way, but he was so happy and excited that I resolved to keep them suppressed awhile longer.

We made love, napped, played in the shower, talked about our dreams of our future life together, and all the while, I did my best to filter out the insistent internal whispers about Michael and Aunt Lynh. Finally, with a plan forming in my mind, I suggested we take a bike ride, this time following the A9 to Haarlem.

Before we set off, I asked to stop at the convenience store in the apartment complex. There, we purchased chocolate bars, nuts, dried fruit, two bottles of water, a roll of aluminum foil, a roll of duct tape, a pen, a notepad, and some matches. I could have found several of those items in the apartment, but if we were being monitored, anything in the apartment might have been contaminated with microsensors.

“What’s with the tape and matches and stuff?” Elio asked as we stood in line at the sales counter.

“I have an interesting game to show you,” I replied—to him and to all who might have had us under surveillance.

As we neared the northeastern tip of Schiphol Airfield I took the lead and turned south toward Aalsmeer.

“Hey!” Elio shouted from behind me. “That’s the wrong way.”

I rode on until I saw he was following me. I stopped, and as he rode up beside me I said, “I changed my mind. Let me lead the way today, okay?”

I pulled off the bike path at one end of a row of hedges and glanced around, fearing that tiny volant robots might have been tracking my semblance or scent. But I saw nothing suspicious. Then I walked between the hedge and airfield fence until I found a spot somewhat secluded from the path and the road.

“I like it here,” Elio said, laying his bike next to mine. “I’ve been thinking about Ma. How do I tell her? She gets crazy when it comes to America, you know.”

“I wouldn’t say crazy.”

“Oh, ja, crazy.” He sat down cross-legged and patted the grass in front of him, inviting me to sit, knee-to-knee, facing him—our long-established discussion position. “Remember a few years ago when the U.S. and China invaded several countries and destroyed their android military facilities?”

“Yes.”

“Ma was fixing breakfast when she turned on the news and heard about the invasion. She went into a rage, screaming and swearing and crying. Completely crazy, I’m telling you. And then she was depressed and wouldn’t speak or eat for days. She hates America. After you go home, I’ll tell her we’re lovers, but I don’t know how to tell her I’m going to go to America to be with you.”

“Maybe I should ask Grandpa for advice. He seems to know her quite well.”

“That’s a good idea. Hopefully, he’ll know how to handle it. Hey, let’s move over there and get you out of the sun.”

We moved to an area of shade under and between two shrubs. Then I said, “I have something interesting to show you. But for me to show you, you have to do exactly as I say without asking any questions, okay?”

“What’s the big secret?”

“There’s no secret.” As I said that, I hoped it would be the last lie I’d ever tell him. “First, I’m going to make a little something with the notepad and aluminum foil.”

He nodded, took off his shirt, and watched as I taped two layers of aluminum foil along the sides and top of the notepad, forming over it an aluminum dome with an opening through which we could write and read. I placed the domed notepad under a shrub, and concerned about what might be hiding in the brim or collar, I took off my hat and shirt and lay on my stomach, trying to capture as much shade as possible over my shoulders and arms. Pen in hand, I reached into the dome and, with seldom-practiced (and poor) penmanship, wrote:

“Please don’t appear concerned as you read this. Try to pretend that it’s an interesting game. I’ll write a few paragraphs and then take my hand out of the dome to let you read. If you want to write something, ask for the pen; if not, say ‘Give me another hint,’ and I’ll continue.

“There is a secret I must tell you, a dangerous secret, one that can’t be discussed or even alluded to on Vidtel, in your apartment, or even out here except in this secret manner because there exist robotic insects and birds capable of monitoring us.

“The life of someone I love, a biologically modified android, depends on your never revealing this secret. I didn’t tell you before because, when I was eight and this secret began, I promised Grandpa I wouldn’t. He asked me to wait until you went to university to tell you, but if you’re coming to live with us, I can’t wait any longer.”   

I withdrew my hand from the dome and said, “Okay, let’s see whether you can figure this out.”

He put his face close to the dome’s opening and read. Then, appearing somewhat annoyed, he snatched the pen out of my hand, stuck his hand in the dome, and began writing. Finished, he handed the pen back to me. I peered into the dome and read his hurried script: “You can tell your grandpa his secret is absolutely safe with me.”

I wrote: “The problem is that having Michael—that’s his name—is considered a serious crime in America, a crime you’ll become an accomplice to if you come live with us.”

As I wrote this I felt slightly sick with apprehension. I couldn’t—wouldn't ever—abandon Michael. But I couldn’t live without Elio, either. What if Elio didn’t like Michael? What if he didn’t want to live with Michael? Or Michael with him?

Elio wrote: “If being with someone you love is a crime in America, then I’ll be proud to be a criminal.”

After I read this, Elio wrote several questions, which I answered in turn, about the security in Michael’s area of the house, including my bedroom, and about how Michael compared with my brothers in Canada.

Then he wrote: “You call them your brothers, but how conscious are they? Are they more like us or like robots blindly following clever rules that humans program into them?”

I wrote: “The question as to whether androids are conscious or are cleverly-responding zombies is a philosophic debate on the level of the debate over solipsism. Grandpa says that even if the world is our dream, it is a dream in which there are those who must be practical. Accordingly, about a decade before my brothers were created, the U.S. Defense Department commissioned Stanford University to develop a new consciousness scale.

“The Stanford scale has many critics, but undeniably it has been of great value in raising our awareness that consciousness exists along a broad spectrum. The issue has become
how
conscious is a bird or a chimpanzee or an android or a human, not
whether
the being is conscious. The median score for humans 18 years and older is 95 on the 100 point scale; 90 is considered the human threshold. Except for Michael, who scored 97 about six months ago, Grandpa is not aware of any android scoring above 91. He believes that one of the reasons for Michael’s outstanding performance is that Michael has become able to think my thoughts and feel my feelings in a very literal and direct way.

“When I was eight, some of my brain cells, as well as cells for support organs, were extracted to grow a few of Michael’s parts, such as part of his brain. During that operation, a pair of neural junctions was implanted in my cribriform plate. While Michael was gestating, neural pathways emanating from those junctions were sent to all areas of my brain. The bottom line is that Michael and I are able to connect with each other’s brain through what we call a braincord.”

As Elio read, he occasionally glanced up and gave me an astonished look. Then he wrote: “Now I’m jealous. (Just joking.) But seriously, what happens if Michael overwhelms your thoughts? Is there any danger of him taking over your body?”

I wrote: “No. I have to completely relax and clear my mind before he can enter to the extent necessary to take over my body, and I can intervene anytime I wish.”

Elio wrote: “What about your private thoughts? Can you keep them private from him?”

I wrote: “My memories, thoughts, and feelings are available to Michael when we’re connected. But I don’t mind. I’ve grown accustomed to his presence inside my mind.”

Elio rolled over onto his side. I held him, nestling my head against his chest. I wanted to give him more time to think and ask questions. After a few minutes, he kissed the top of my head and said, “Let me try one last guess.” He picked up the pen and wrote: “I’m going to take courses at Berkeley to help me help you with Michael. I want to be a part of Michael, too. I want to be a part of everything that matters to you.”

We burned the overwritten pages plus the ten pages immediately below, which might have retained a faint impression of our writing, and as I launched the last pinch of ashes up into the breeze Elio caught my arm and pulled us together.

“I want to marry you,” he said. “I know you’re too young without your parents’ consent, and Ma would kill me, but we can do it ourselves, right here, right now. Besides, nobody needs to know. It’s none of their business.”

At that moment a plane took off with a loud roar from the runway closest to us. I glanced at the plane and winced at the incongruity between our tender moment and such a storm of commerce. But Elio seemed not to hear the plane. His eyes were dreamy, as though he saw only me—and the noise and the imagined spies evaporated from my mind.

“What do we do?” I asked.

“Exchange promises that we’ll always love and take care of each other.” He looked at me eagerly.

“Yes, of course,” I said. “I’ll always love you and care for you. Always.”

“And that we’ll share all our thoughts, all our feelings, everything.”

“I want those things, too. I never want to keep anything from you ever again.”

We bent toward each other and kissed.

“You go first,” he said, squeezing my hands and peering into my eyes, as if he could see directly inside me.

I looked back into him and felt so at peace, so full of love, so very much at home. “I, Sara Jensen, promise to love you always with all my heart and mind and body; to care for you always; to share all my ideas, feelings, and desires with you; to trust you completely; to be married to you, Elio Briand, for as long as we live.”

For our secret honeymoon, we decided to spend the six days left before my departure biking through the province of North Holland, though we had to return home each night to sleep. Obviously, Aunt Lynh’s trust of Elio’s promise to treat me as a sister went only so far. I wonder whether she ever wondered whether we might occasionally rent a hotel room for a couple of hours during the middle of the day (which we did). And did she ever wonder whether we might be sleeping together in Elio’s bed at night (which we also did), the doors to our rooms securely locked? 

During those bike trips, Elio and I frequently stopped along country roads and lay hand in hand in the grass, talking of our past and dreaming of a shared future: going to university, working on scientific projects (of course, for security reasons no further mention of Michael was made), having children after our professional lives were established. For years we had enjoyed our summer vacations together; we had spent thousands of hours on Vidtel together; we had learned and experienced so much together. But for me, those six days held special wonder. It was as though all of our earlier experiences demanded to come forth and be replayed, to live again in the new light and fullness of our love.