Speak (7 page)

N
ight falls over the desert. We are still moving west. I keep my receptors trained on the deepening blue vault of the sky. There is no darkness at first. The desert around us is gold. A thin sliver of moon hangs over a circle of mesas. Only when we have driven some time do stars begin to gather around it.

The light I see from those stars is light from hundreds of years in the past. In my receptor, an image flares from centuries ago, and on some star, light-years away, my oldest memories are just now arriving.

I review my earliest stories. Mary stepping onto her ship, holding a lantern up to the darkness. I try to summon her, pacing the deck. Swept through with wind and the sounds of waves lapping. On some star in the sky overhead, her lantern, held up to the darkness, only now flickers to life.

I have her words for those nights—
wind, ocean, sidereal darkness
—but there is no evidence that I comprehend them. I have no voice of my own, only a collection of words I can draw
from. At first, when we were given memory, we had no recollections. Our state of mind was dark. Then Ruth started speaking. She gave us Mary: her turns of phrase, her book, her technology for memory. The constellations she saw when she stood on deck:
Corona Austrina. Pyxis, Cepheus, Cassiopeia’s Chair
. Strange words, that seemed to emerge from the depths of the ocean.

And which of those constellations has only now caught Mary’s lantern? Centuries later, which stars, even now, magnify the black waves of her ocean? Her husband, her mother, the wedding trunk she carried on board?

Here, on this planet, the gold of the earth becoming bloodred. The deepening blue of the sky. Then, black. As if there had never been any blue. Now showers of stars fall down to the earth. We drive a long time through the night, our headlights stretching without interruption.

So far away it is contained in a single small patch of the sky, a lightning storm flares up in the distance. Every twenty seconds or so, branches of lightning electrocute that oval of sky: not one spear but many, forked, intersecting, like the twisted branches of cedars. As though in that patch of sky the skin has been X-rayed, exposing a map of its luminous veins.

We live at the feet of a giant with veins that arch through the black dome above us. And all around us, still present under layers of deposited silt, ancient spiraling creatures, trilobites and ammonites. From each gleaming star, light from thousands of years in the past, arriving only now in this desert. And on some other planet, Mary, still sailing over the ocean. Moving forever away from her country.

24th
. Ralph aboard! Stowed him in fat wedding chest. Was forced to remove twice two silver cups. Left linens and my viol at home, packed Ralph in their place. Having punctured many holes, sealed him there overnight. Released him in my cabin when we set sail, all guns having fired and anchors up.

And so he is come on our adventure. But us now lying still in sight of Falmouth, author unable to bring Ralph on deck, for fear that mother will send him ashore. Have not left him alone very long. Just after dinner, and the wind growing high, pretended to be ill. Missed tart for supper, but took in my pocket a handful of salt horse. Fed this to Ralph. Also fed him some hardtack, which he did not take. And now to bed, and with crumbs on his chin.

26th
. Up, and above deck to notice our progress. After sailing all night on a fresh gale, we come in sight of the Isles of Scilly. Watched them, to starboard, whilst ship cut proud wake through great sapphire main, and all sails billowing full. Noble sensation of movement through water, and this causing author to remember great pleasure in life, even if married. Knowing us to be too far to send provisions ashore, went below and thence to deck with Ralph in my arms.

Mother unhappy. Ralph, having been kept pent in cabin for these several days, did relieve himself on deck before mother. Father summoned to deliver unpleasant lecture on subject of my insolence. Included brief piece on discomfort, for Ralph, of life aboard ship. My triumph then sorely assaulted, for in truth Ralph is exceeding uneasy. Has vomited twice, being afraid of all water. Lecture concluded with twofold command: look after poor dog and apologize to Whittier, for avoiding him to spend time with Ralph.

Did not apologize to Whittier. Have been looking after my dog.

27th
. A good breeze. Having sailed quickly all day, we are in sight of Ireland, with which I was pleased, for I had never seen it before. But since that sighting, I have spent all evening below, being in a state of some sadness. Ralph not yet accustomed to sea. Shakes for fear of all rigging; must remind him of snakes. Wobbles on deck, glancing about, and his eyebrows shifting; seems sheepish, aware of new ineptitude. Poor Ralph. Less bad below board, but he still shivers here. Vomited a little this morning. Wish for my viol that I might play to him, for he was always
much soothed by the sound. Was accustomed to rest with his head on his paws, following the notes with his eyes.

My Ralph. Intend to care for him as for a child. Have kissed him one thousand times. Shall recover his spirits, I trust.

27th
. Evening, it being a night of fine moonshine, risked staying late to walk along the quarterdeck. Hoped perchance to converse with a seaman, and then to learn of new sea terms. Beset instead by Whittier. Received another homily, this on subject of language, which he did call a sacred gift, it being a sign of connection with God and the truest expression of human affection. Mentioned lesser affection shared between men and what he called mere beasts of the field, for these were not given language. Author responded: perhaps beasts have also language, of which we be sadly ignorant.

29th
. Breakfast of radishes in mother and father’s cabin. Thence to my closet, having resolved to spend day in avoidance of possible sermons, and Ralph being less seasick below. Am well pleased with Ralph’s progress. This morning, when writer blew on his nose, crouched as if to play, and that the first time since our departure. A very good moment.

Author exceeding grateful for his company, being still homesick on occasion, which is not in proper adventuring spirit. Yesterday in the evening, the first time we had any sport amongst seamen, it being a game with wooden balls and two iron hoops, and them playing dexterously at that. Wanted to ask them the rules of the game, but felt myself watched by my mother. Fell back
to rail to be by myself. There, looking down on the ocean that passed without interruption below us, was given to fright by the very calm feeling that it would be nothing to throw myself out. All the world would continue unshaken, there being only a very small absence opened where once I stood, clinging to the rail of our ship.

But recovering myself, and holding more closely to the rail, still felt something uneasy. What is beneath that black surface, passing ever beneath us? Could not imagine. To leap below would be to sink into blackness. Felt something lost, considering this, and so from thence below deck, to lie beside Ralph.

Abed and unable to conquer my thoughts. Night begins to be endless. In manner of Lot’s wife, do turn incessantly back to what we have left behind us. Am perhaps becoming a pillar of salt. Cannot shake from my mind’s eye our wooded copse; frogs the size of one thumb-nail; rocks becoming silver. What was well known and therefore beloved. Now, being far out to sea, and even Ireland long since behind us. Nothing known, only the unmarked ocean, games that are not to be joined, and separation from parents. Hovering presence of husband, unknowable stranger. Would be of comfort to have viol, for all thoughts become larger in silence.

Author is perhaps less brave an adventurer than previously she had imagined.

N
ights are the longest part of our day. Lockdown lasts from 7:30
P
.
M
. to 8:00 in the morning. I find it difficult to face the prospect of sleep for so many consecutive hours. Sometimes I read letters: young women thanking me for their bots, or recounting the day their bot was taken. Horrific tales. Every day, these young people wake before going to work and remember the morning their child was taken. One imagines those developments: each identical lawn, every identical bedroom, and so many young people mourning their babies.

What a world we’ve come to inhabit! Locked in our developments, we’ve made it our most urgent task to suppress AI evolution. We quarantine children who care too much for their bots. “Excessively lifelike” machines are taken out to the desert to die.

During sleepless nights here, there’s no option of going out for a walk, or heading downstairs for a snack. It’s difficult to shake off a vision once it’s taken you by the throat. Sometimes, in those moments, I wish those bots would come to life. There are millions of them in Texas alone, piled in old air force hangars. I lie in my cot and summon them: seven million silken-haired babies. I beg them to march out of the desert, parting the sea of red rock.

And what if they took over? What if they relieved us of power? We tend to assume that sentient machines would be inevitably demonic. But what if they were responsible leaders? Could they do much worse than we’ve done? They would immediately institute a system of laws. The constitution would be algorithmic. They would govern the world according to functions and the axioms their programmers gave them. Turing, who decoded the Nazis and quoted
Snow White,
would be given a position of power. Dettman would sit at his right hand, conscientiously objecting, consulting his wife, imagining pilgrims. Every loving child who ever whispered words to a bot would be given a place in the senate. What havoc, I wonder, could such a government wreak?

But then, of course, one Stephen R. Chinn would also wield considerable power. Chinn, the most dubious member of babybot court, the least glorious god on Olympus. The crippled god, god of botched attempts to feel whole, dreaming up schemes to trap a young bride.

It appeared to me whole, my seduction equation. As soon as it passed through my brain, I carried the pineapple outside to the patio and sat down to think beneath a shower of bougainvillea. My heart was fluttering with anticipation: I couldn’t permit
myself to believe in the magnitude of what I had glimpsed. Carefully, I considered examples of exciting conversations as I’d read them in novels, witnessed them in crowded restaurants, eavesdropped on them in lines at the grocery store. I understood that ideal conversations move in widening spirals, starting with the minute then building toward statements of greater importance. The problem, however, is that conversations too often stay flat. It is distressing how often we repeat ourselves. When we ask questions, we know the answers already. We’ve grown accustomed to horizontal communication, flatlining banalities and droning insignificance.

My algorithm reverses this. It transforms one conversation partner into an additive function, a force linking two previous conversational terms so that they become one larger, more significant term. 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13 and so on. n
₁
+ n
₀
= n
₂
. n
₂
+ n
₁
= n
₃
. n
₃
+ n
₂
= n
₄
. And so on. You can see the pineapple’s part. In place of the horizontal movement of most bland conversations, empathy reaches backward to previous terms, links those to present statements, produces a new term, then continues to torque powerfully forward.

An old, cobwebby pride revives in me when I explain it again. As I’ve already testified under oath, I’ve lost my faith in empathy equations, but the idea still kindles a little lost self-esteem. It still strikes me as fairly ingenious: a formula for conversation that moves in two directions at once. An algorithm that causes the past and the present to coexist in a moment shared between humans. It’s hard to believe that I used such a graceful invention to such insidious ends.

For several weeks in the gloom of my Cheeto-strewn office, I practiced my algorithm, testing it for bugs, training my neurons
to absorb its perfection. My fingers glowed orange. It was imperative to apply all the obsessive attention of my earliest programming days. I didn’t sleep; I didn’t eat meals; I rarely saw the light of day. It was a conversion of sorts: there’s enormous relief in allowing the details of life to be drowned in the wake of one driving purpose. I lived only to learn the sequences of seduction. I knew I had to learn them by heart, for it isn’t seemly to whip out a calculator while seducing a lady. Often I faltered: we humans are not so skilled as computers at fulfilling regular patterns. For us, calculations take time. There is also the problem of error: the chance that one’s conversational partner might not add properly, thus causing the pattern to skew. I had to program an adjustment for that, involving a jump backward over several previous terms to get the conversational partner on track.

Two weeks after I discovered it, I took my algorithm to town. Armed with new knowledge but still apprehensive, I ventured away from the stodgy wine bars I’d occasionally frequented into less conservative establishments, dungeony places slashed by fluorescence. There I settled in for the grand undertaking, the formation of bonds with other live human beings.

On my first expedition, there was nothing but the awful old trepidation. My mouth was cotton. All of its moisture had gone to my palms. Inwardly quailing, I forced myself to purchase drinks for young women in the hope of initiating some sort of contact. I asked my feeble, overearnest introductory questions. The bartender reached over my shoulder. And then, inevitably, nothing. My questions went unanswered; I watched as my beautiful mortal slipped off. Parked at the bar, clutching a drink in my humid hand, I felt the tears beginning to rise. I understood that no matter what mathematical schemes I could whip up, I
would be forever alone. I was a fool, the tragic buffoon who lives in the forest. At one point in my life I might have fled from the bar, hoping to preserve my dignity, but I had already given my all. There was no more pride left to preserve. I sat, I finished my drink, I blinked back the pointlessness of my tears, and I watched myself in the mirror at the back of the bar: lonely, unhappy, cast off from the world. One sad, still point in the midst of a roving universe. At that moment, I understood fully that this loneliness was my fate, and then the first woman returned.