The Clean Slate Accord (2 page)

Chapter 2

A soft sound broke through Alexa's meditation and she opened her eyes. He was there again, intruding on her privacy. “Jonas, I've told you not to come into my room unannounced.”

“What's it like?” He was kneeling by her bedside, staring at her through his oversized frames.

“You ask me that every time. Sleep is not something I can explain so easily on a non-biological level. Your body doesn't require sleep, just rest each day. You know that. Besides, I wasn't sleeping. Is there something you need?”

“I don't feel well.”

Whenever Jonas admitted illness, Alexa paid attention. She'd been with him his entire life and only on two occasions had he become sick. “All right, let's take a look at you.” She got out of bed and escorted him to a chair beneath a recessed light.

“Director, I feel strange right here.” He pointed to his abdomen. “And I have a headache.”

She felt his forehead and gently probed his stomach. “There's no fever and no tenderness. When did this start?”

“For a while now. But the headache started about an hour ago.”

Alexa glanced at the clock on the wall. “It's nearly ten minutes to midnight. Why didn't you come to me right away?”

Jonas wiggled in his seat and rubbed his temples. He leaned forward and started to rock back and forth slightly, holding his stomach and making a tiny groaning noise. “I don't feel well.”

“Jonas, you've never acted like this before. You know you can come to me with any problems, even if you think I'm asleep.” She placed her hand under his chin and lifted his head up. “Is there something else wrong?”

Before he had time to respond, Alexa's wrist communicator console lit up. She pressed the incoming message button.

“Director, this is David in the control room. There's something you need to see.”

“I'll be there in a moment, David.” She turned off the communication line and stared down at Jonas. “We'll have to finish this conversation later. If you still don't feel well, you can lie down for a while, but I don't want you wandering off.”

Jonas nodded slowly and mumbled, “Yes, Director. I'll be in my room.”

She watched as he jumped up and shuffled from the room. Perhaps she'd spoken too harshly. After all, his psyche was extremely fragile, an unfortunate trade-off for the increased intellect. Had she known about the problem, she could have adjusted his DNA during his creation.

She checked the clock again and sighed. Only nine minutes to go before the Accord would be official in the United Continents. Once the implants were activated, there'd be some loss, as expected, but a sharp decline as any malfunctioning implanted hosts were removed from the population.

“Lights and mirror activation,” she called out to the interior comfort system. The lights came up brighter and the frame around the large mirror on her closet door illuminated. Staring at her reflection, she touched the fine lines around her eyes. “I look old.”

“No, you don't. You look exactly how you should look,” the mirror's voice replied.

Alexa pulled up slightly on the skin around her eyes. “Of course you'd say that, you're programmed to report facts. Which means I look my age, lines and all.”

“Very true, but I can still add compliments. You have beautiful skin tone, a light spray of freckles and the color of your hair is still mostly a delightful shade of blonde. Hardly any gray at all. See? I've learned that much. I can also see that your brow is furrowed. You have a problem?”

She pulled a chair in front of the mirror and sat down. “Yes. It's my sweet Jonas. He's acting strange. He says he's sick, yet I see nothing wrong. In the past, he's whined about ill feelings, but this time he waited for an hour to tell me about a headache. It's not like him.”

“What is it you want from me, Director?”

“I'd like to have a sample of his DNA analyzed. If there's a breakdown in his genetic matrix, I need to find out. He's useless to me unless he's one hundred percent operational.”

“He's a human being, Director. You treat him like he's a machine. He's not a computer. You should be showing him compassion.”

“I didn't mean it like that. Anyway, I have to go to the control room, but I'll bring back a biological sample for analysis.”

“I'll prepare everything and wait for your return. Oh, before you go, I have a nasty smudge in my upper left corner. Would you mind?”

With a roll of her eyes, Alexa got up and used her sleeve to wipe away the smudge. “Better?”

“Much.”

She checked the clock again. It was five minutes to midnight. “Mirror lights off, but maintain activation.”

The lights around the mirror flicked off, but a small blue light embedded within the frame and almost concealed by the decorative scrollwork stayed on. To anyone else, it looked just like an ordinary mirror. It was always best to hide things in plain sight, Alexa thought with a smile.

She headed off to the control room. The crew members were busy. They were studying the millions of global transmissions from the implants.

A few heads turned when she entered the control room. David, with his wiry red hair twisted into tight curls that sprung from his head like little spiral-shaped maggots, leaped up from his chair. “Director.” He nodded abruptly, which made his hair-springs bounce.

“What's so urgent, David? Has something gone wrong?” Alexa went to David's monitor and leaned down. “What are we looking at?”

“An unnatural flux in brainwave activity from both the Northern and Southern continents.”

Alexa watched rows of scrolling data rolling by. There were millions of transmissions from the population's implants on David's screen, but they went by so fast, she wondered how David could compute it so fast. “How unnatural? I expect numerous removals within the first day until the implants and Serum A settle down, so what makes these unnatural?”

“Look at the spikes. See, right there?” He pointed to a blur on the screen.

“I can't see that fast, David.”

“Of course you can't. My eyesight is far superior to yours. My digitalized iris is capable of capturing the minutest differentiations between data lines.”

Alexa sighed and straightened up. “I know, I created you as my analyst. I think now that I should have instilled a little humility. So what is it you see?”

David moved his eyes from the screen and cocked his head to the side. “But I appear human. I even changed my hair to look more human.”

“Don't get insulted, David, looking human is overrated. And your hair looks fine.” Sometimes she wished she hadn't messed around with synthetic intelligence at all. “So?”

“The spikes, the ones I just told you about, there are far more than Jonas predicted. Far more.”

“Explain.” Alexa grabbed a chair and sat down.

“At this rate, one fourth of the global population will reach MB pulses of 25,000 in less than an hour and if the MBs continue to rise at the same rate, then they'll reach the critical 26,000 by the following day.”

“One fourth of the population? That's incredible. It must be a mistake.”

“Not a mistake, Director. My equipment cannot make errors.”

“All right. Then what's happening?”

David stared at her with his black orbs. “I don't know that yet.”

“Then find out.” There was a knot in the pit of Alexa's stomach. How could so many implants have failed? There was no way to shut down the implants once they'd been activated, except for using Serum D. But then Clean Slate would be completely undone after twenty years in the making. She paced around the control room, staring down at the ground, thinking. On her third circuit, she bumped into Jonas.

“Oh, sorry, Director,” he cried out, jumping backward.

“Jonas? I told you to wait in your room.”

His eyes darted around, finally settling on his clasped hands. “I just wanted to see the start of the Accord.”

“Oh, well, all right.” Alexa felt his forehead with the back of her hand. “You feel better?”

“Not really, but I wanted to be here.” He hesitated and then blurted out, “Have any implants fired yet?”

Alexa saw a trace of perspiration on his forehead as he wrung his hands nervously. She took his arm and pulled him to the side. “You expect removals already?”

“Well, no, but I'm preparing an analysis of the responses to the removals once they begin. I'm curious what the reaction will be if people start disappearing in public.”

“That's pretty morbid. I don't think many people will notice. You said only one in five hundred thousand.”

“I was just wondering if it'll cause panic once the population finds out about the failsafe. What do you suppose it would be like to live like that, never knowing from one minute to the next if you'll die,” he paused, took off his empty frames and wiped his sweaty face with his hand, “You didn't give me an implant. I'll never be like everyone else, will I? I'm too smart and I don't have an implant. Oh, I don't feel well. Do you think people don't want to be my friend because they fear my intellect? I'd be a good friend. I really would.”

Alexa nodded. When Jonas started one of his rambling rants, she knew she had to calm him down. “Yes, you would, Jonas. I'm your friend, isn't that enough?”

She watched him carefully. Body language was a good subconscious indicator to a person's feelings and she was attuned to reading Jonas' more than anyone else's. She could tell, without asking, that he was hiding something, which would explain his mysterious illness. He was prone to stress headaches, usually due to working too much without remembering to eat, but this seemed different.

“I want more friends,” he repeated.

Alexa needed to speak to him alone. “Ah, David, why don't you continue monitoring the transmissions while I speak to Jonas?”

“But didn't you want to discuss the spikes?” David pointed to the monitor.

“Later. Jonas, come with me.” She physically turned Jonas around and guided him into the hallway. “Do you have something you'd like to tell me?”

Lowering his voice to a barely audible whisper, Jonas asked, “Can David hear us? He doesn't like me. He's never liked me.”

Alexa placed her hand on his shoulder. Jonas was insecure, but he'd never been paranoid. “He has computerized eyes and a brain, not super hearing. Talk to me.”

He chewed on his lower lip and grasped his stomach. “I don't feel well.”

“You're doing this to yourself, Jonas. Tell me what's wrong and you'll feel better.”

“I was afraid to tell you before. I made a small mistake.”

Alexa studied him. “A mistake? You? How can that be?” He'd never made a mistake, not even the slightest error in tabulation. Now she knew something was amiss.

He whimpered. “Don't get mad at me.”

“I will if you don't talk to me.”

“I miscalculated the error rate in the implants.”

“You what?” Alexa tried to remain calm. “How could you…”

“I'm sorry.”

“Jonas, just tell me the error.”

Staring down at the smooth, marble tiles of the hallway, Jonas said softly, “The malfunction rate is a little worse than I predicted.”

Did he just say what she thought he did? She must have heard wrong. “By how much, Jonas?”

“I had the decimal point in the wrong place. Instead of one in five hundred thousand, the failure rate will be one in five.”

Alexa's knees felt weak. “What?” She placed her hand on his shoulder and took off his eyeglass frames, staring into his rapidly blinking eyes.

He tried to take the frames back, but Alexa kept them out of reach. He soon gave up and again stared at the ground. “I said I was sorry.”

“Sorry? You're sorry? I never would have proceeded if I'd have known the loss would be that great. What's wrong with the implants? I designed them. What did I do wrong?”

“Oh, you don't have to feel so bad, Director. It's not entirely the implants, because the problem lies in the mitochondrial DNA. There's a peculiar mutation that seems to happen on the MT-ATP6 gene in the mitochondria in about one in five people. The slight amount of nuclear radiation in the implant apparently causes the mutation and creates an increase in Megaburst activity when MT-ATP6 makes the wrong protein which causes an unregulated synaptic jump in the brain.”

Alexa crushed the frames and let them fall from her hand. “You never told me about any of this. You said there was a manufacturing error that would only affect one in five hundred thousand. Don't you know what you've done?”

“Stop yelling at me!”

“You're the one yelling, Jonas. I want you to explain why you chose to lie to me. You've never lied before and this lie might have destroyed any chance of New Earth. What am I supposed to do now, use the Serum D and undo everything I've worked so hard for?”

Jonas swallowed and looked down at his broken frames. “You told me to dispose of the Serum D.”

“I didn't think you would have done that so soon. Go and wait in the lab. I want to run some tests on you right away. I need to find out what's wrong with you. I need your enhanced intellect to help me fix the implant mutation. I'll go to the lab in a minute.”

Alexa waited while Jonas shuffled down the hallway, then she turned and went back to the control room to see if David had any good news at all. There had to be a way to stop the implants from firing, there just had to be. But she'd need Jonas' help. His brain worked more like a living computer than a human brain and he could usually find things she missed. If there was a problem with him, though, she'd have to fix him first.

Chapter 3

After ordering Jonas to the lab, Alexa stayed in the control room for another hour. It was a terrible hour. Every few minutes, another spike in brain Megabursts showed up and David's calculations indicated that almost fifteen million people already had increased MB readings, some almost in the danger range.

Leaving David to continue monitoring, she went to the lab and found Jonas peering intently through a microscope. He didn't look up until she cleared her throat and said his name in a firm voice, “Jonas.”

“Oh, dear.” He sat up straight, perched on the stool with his feet balanced on the supports between the legs. He had a new pair of black eyeglass frames beside him on the counter. “Was I supposed to just sit and wait? I thought it would be all right for me to work until you came. I'm running a test on…”

“Not now, Jonas. We need to talk.”

He picked up his frames and slid them on his face. “Are you mad at me?”

“Yes, I'm mad at you. I was elected as Global Director by every world leader because they trust me to make sound and effective decisions. If we can't stop the impending removals, I'll be solely responsible for killing off most of the population. Don't you think I'd be a little angry?”

Jonas clasped his hands together in his lap. “I said I was sorry.”

“A simple ‘sorry' doesn't count much in a case like this.”

Jonas rocked back and forth on the stool. “I can figure it out, Director. I think I was distracted when I ran the initial tests on the implants. It was during that time I had all those headaches. I can fix it. I know I can. Just leave me alone.”

“You're speaking back to me? I think I'd better run those tests on your genetics right away.”

Jonas glared at her. “I'm a few intelligence points above you. Are you scared that I'm smarter than you?”

“Jonas!”

His mouth gaped open. “I don't know what came over me, Director. I don't feel well. I told you that.”

“Just stop it. If you say that one more time, I'll have you mopping up the bathrooms and helping the galley chef prepare meals. Is that what you want?”

“No. No, it's not. The galley chef once called me a bookish dweeb, whatever that is. What's happening to me, Director? I'm afraid.”

As much as she hated it, she would have to take a sample of his DNA. He'd complain, she knew that, but it had to be done. “I've been noticing a change in you lately and this only exemplifies my fears. I need you, Jonas, but not in the state you're in right now.”

He seemed to sense what she was going to say and curled up on the stool, bringing his legs to the seat and hugging them with his arms. “Is my genetic structure at risk?”

“I don't know yet. I need a small sample from your medulla oblongata. You won't feel it.” She was lying, he'd feel it and he'd probably cry from the pain. There wasn't much worse than seeing him cry.

“Isn't that what you said when you withdrew cells from my cerebral cortex?”

Damn, he hadn't forgotten the last time. “It's different this time, Jonas. The cortex was difficult to access. And I can get away with fewer cells from the medulla. It'll be no more than a pin prick.”

“We should wait for a while. What if something goes wrong and you paralyze me or damage my brain altogether, then I won't be able to help with the Accord.”

He was grasping at anything to delay the inevitable and as Alexa watched his eye twitch, she felt a moment of pity for him. “I think you've done enough
helping
. I'll be extra careful so there're no lasting effects.”

Alexa opened a drawer and took out a long syringe. She tried to hide it, but Jonas saw it and yelped. “Please, Director, I'll work very hard at controlling my behavior. I'll double check, no, triple check all of my calculations from now on. If you just leave me alone for a while, I can come up with a solution.”

He looked like a small, frightened animal. His eyes became glassy and the frames slipped down his nose. “Jonas, it's not just about this…miscalculation, but about your general attitude. Even the crew are starting to notice and we can't have that, now, can we?”

“You mean David. But I'm a good worker. Nobody else knows the system like I do. I'm just trying to fit in, I really am. Does David hate me because I'm human and he's not?”

“Of course not, and he can't hate. You know that perfectly well. Just close your eyes and I'll take the sample as quickly as I can. We may need to make a few adjustments to your DNA. If we do, you can help me with that, too.” Alexa knew how much he liked being included in genetics, whether or not it was his own.

“But I'm afraid, Director. My brain is different. What if you poke the syringe in the wrong place?”

He was on the verge of hysterics and trembling so much that his feet were tapping the metal of the stool. Alexa kept her voice calm and soothing, “Hold still. I know your brain better than anyone. I designed it, remember?” She waited until he shut his eyes and then circled around behind him. “Keep your eyes closed.”

She examined the base of his skull and positioned the needle tip carefully, then applied enough pressure for it to puncture his skin and slip into the area above the spinal cord where the lower portion of the medulla was located. She did her best to tune out his cries and concentrate on extracting the smallest amount of cells necessary.

With a small push on the plunger, the cellular extractor extended from the syringe tip and scooped a sample of cells. Alexa made one smooth motion and withdrew the syringe. Jonas quivered and sniffed. She came around and placed her hand on his shoulder.

“All done, Jonas.”

His eyes fluttered open and he wiped away his tears through his empty frames. “I cried. I should not have done that.”

“Why not? It hurt and you cried. That's a natural reaction. Now, relax while I run some tests on these cells. If there's something wrong, we'll fix it.”

After packaging the syringe into a protective case, Alexa paused and watched as Jonas rubbed the back of his neck and scooted his stool closer to the microscope. He was her little anomaly. Turning away, she went directly back to her room.

After locking the door, she called out, “Lights. Mirror, activate.” She stood before the mirror and took out the syringe.

The mirror lights brightened. “You look lovely, Director.”

“Stop it.”

“Every woman likes a compliment.”

“And men don't? You're being a bit gender biased, aren't you? Here's the cellular sample.” Alexa held up the syringe.

“What tests do you want first?”

“Check for genetic breakdown, spontaneous mutations, anything that might explain increased independent behavior, paranoia and carelessness.”

“If you'll allow me, I'd like to comment on Jonas' change.”

With a sigh, Alexa took a few steps back and looked at her own reflection. “You don't even know him. How can you possibly tell me anything I don't already know?”

“I have access to every record and database throughout the world. I don't think you need to test his DNA, Director.”

Alexa took a step forward to within a few inches of the glass. “You have a better suggestion? You think you can solve this puzzle better than me?”

“Yes, I believe I can. As hard as it might be for you to admit, he's just a boy. You've engineered his brain, but you never did anything to his hormones. He's a twelve-year-old boy. He's in puberty.”

Alexa looked at the syringe. How could she have missed the signs? How could she not see the obvious? “All right, it's a viable possibility, but how did you figure it out?”

“I researched data about the human body. Such a fallible structure it is. Jonas' behavior matches that of any other adolescents his age.”

“He mentioned equality and keeps on about why he doesn't have any friends. What do you make of that?”

“I have no idea, Director, unless he's lonely. But I'm only an artificial intelligence, not a ‘people person'.”

“Very funny. Test his DNA anyway.”

“Anything you say, Director. Just remember, as intelligent as he is, he's still a child. A very intelligent child who's growing up.”

“I know.” Alexa pressed a button on a panel to the right of the mirror. A small door slid open. She discharged the contents of the syringe into a Petri dish and closed the door. “Run the tests right away. And make sure nobody finds out. If they knew about Jonas' artificial DNA, they might lose confidence in his work with Serum A.”

“Like you have, Director?”

“Why do you say that?”

“You're getting worry lines, Director.”

“Just run the tests.” She walked to her bed and called out, “Mirror lights off, but maintain activation.”

She sat down on her bed and tried to think what would happen if the constructed part of Jonas' DNA began to conflict with the natural part. It would be like a battle, a full-scale war waging inside him. She lay down and stared up at the ceiling. He was her son, in a manner of speaking, yet half of his genetic make-up came from the lab. He'd been an experiment twelve years ago when she found she couldn't have children.

All it took was one of her ova, a vial of chemically altered virus nucleotide and a nano-microscope. Everything went perfectly. The treated nucleotide no longer exhibited any viral characteristics and was spliced with enhanced genes to promote intellect. It bonded as it should to her contributed DNA. Jonas developed as any fetus would, only outside the womb in an incubating chamber. He was talking and performing simple equations at a little over a year and more complex mathematics at two. He had been a stellar example of what science could accomplish.

She closed her eyes. Had she made a terrible mistake? Was her quest for the perfect child arrogance or an over-active maternal instinct? No matter what it was, she had to make sure Jonas wasn't a danger to himself, or others. Even if it meant tearing down his genetic matrix and rebuilding it.