Ramez Naam - Crux

Did he and Alice dream together even now? Was his infant mind enveloped in the caressing thoughts of one of his mothers?

How could this be wrong? How could anyone look at this tiny, precious, helpless baby, and see anything but sweetness?

Oh, there were so many good reasons to embrace Nexus. The progress against Alzheimer’s, the incredible strides with autism, the scientific breakthroughs that Nexus-enhanced researchers – their minds deeply intertwined – might make.

But there was no reason as good, as heartfelt, as true , as the touch of the ones she loved.

Lisa pulled herself away from the bedroom by force of will. In the kitchen, she emptied a shelf of the refrigerator, reached into the back, and slid away the hidden panel, retrieving the vial stored there. Carefully she put everything back the way it had been, and then padded into the office.

She slid the illegal connector card into her home slate, navigated its interface to find her most recent backup. Her finger hovered over the button. How long could she keep this up, backing up her data and purging herself every time she traveled, putting up with the aches and confusion and disorientation as the Nexus nodes decoupled from her neurons and broke into their component parts, smelling the metallic tang of Nexus each time she pissed for days, then spending hours redosing herself and restoring from backup each time she came home?

It was frustrating. It was time-consuming. It was a risk.

I could stop, Lisa Brandt thought. Give up Nexus altogether.

Then she thought of the minds of her wife and her son in the next room, of the solace of touching them, and she knew she’d keep doing this as long as she had to.

Lisa Brandt tilted her head back and poured the metallic silvery liquid dose of Nexus down her throat. She entered the command that told her slate to restore her Nexus apps and data from before this trip. Then she leaned back, closed her eyes, and waited to touch the ones she loved most.

6

Q & A

Thursday October 18th

Rangan Shankari flinched as the door to his cell burst open. The first light he’d seen in ages flooded in, backlighting the burly guards. He blinked at the intensity of it. Then they jerked the hood over his eyes, and the world dropped to muted grays.

They wheeled him from his cell on the gurney, arms and legs strapped down. He heard doors open and close, felt turns, and then they stopped. A door closed behind him.

The gurney tilted abruptly backwards, so his head was a foot lower than his feet. He wasn’t surprised. The liquid diet of the last few “meals” was a giveaway. This always followed, as sure as day had once followed night.

He could feel his pulse racing. His breath came fast. But they wouldn’t break him. Rangan went Inside.

[activate: serenity level 10]

Code modules activated in the Nexus nodes of his brain. Fear signals through the neurons of his amygdala were suppressed. Serotonin levels rose throughout his brain. Nodes in his medulla oblongata seized control of his pulse and respiration and stabilized them.

Calm descended, slicing through Rangan’s fear like a knife. Confidence rose. I can do this, he thought. I can do this.

A voice spoke into his ear.

“Mr Shankari. I know it’s been rough on you in here. We can make your life a lot more comfortable. Or a lot worse. So I ask you again. How do we activate the back door into Nexus 5? What’s the code?”

“Fuck you,” Rangan spat out through the muffling hood.

A fist slammed into his guts, and all the air rushed out.

His diaphragm spasmed and he couldn’t breathe. His dark world turned red. Then something unclenched and sweet air rushed back into his lungs.

“Towel,” the voice said.

Something heavy and soft landed on his face. The world went from merely dark to pitch black. He knew what came next. He was ready for it.

The water came down on the towel. He felt the pressure a second before he felt the wetness on his face. Then it was in his mouth and his nose and he couldn’t breathe. He was being suffocated. His body jerked and spasmed on the table, reacting involuntarily, trying to free itself from whatever was smothering it.

He felt it all from a distance, buffered by the serenity package.

They’re not gonna kill me, Rangan told himself. Just a trick, a bluff, a head game.

And then the water was gone and the weight of the towel was gone and Rangan forced himself to gasp, like any normal person would, like anyone who didn’t have a piece of code controlling his reactions would. Gasp. Breathe. Fill up on oxygen. Breathe.

Stupid fuckers, he thought. You’re not gonna break me.

Then he heard another voice. Female this time.

“Pulse sixty-five. Galvanic skin resistance… unchanged. He’s suppressing.”

What?

Then the first Voice. “Naughty naughty, Rangan. But we’ve figured out how you’re holding up against us.”

What?

Then his shirt was being tugged up, and something cold and hard was pressed into his side and then

AGGGHHGHG!

Electricity coursed through him. His body jerked again, spasming and straining.

AGGGHHGHG!

They shocked him a second time. A third. Garbage scrolled across his mind’s eye as Nexus nodes were disrupted and Nexus OS suffered critical faults. The serenity package failed with the rest of Nexus 5. His shield against fear was gone. Sweat beaded on his brow instantly. His pulse raced again, his stomach knotted up inside.

“Pulse jumping,” the woman’s voice said, emotionless. “Suppression eliminated. Clear to proceed.”

No. Oh no. No no no no no.

Then the wet towel was on Rangan’s face again. He held his breath, instinctively, terrified now, and they punched him. He gasped as the air left him and he couldn’t breathe couldn’t fucking breathe and when he could he gasped in again – but it was water not air, choking him, filling up his nose and mouth and lungs and he was coughing it out, his whole body convulsing and his arms and legs pulling so hard he was cutting himself on the straps and the water kept coming down and he couldn’t breathe and his heart was pounding and he panicked and tried to breath harder and oh my fucking God I’m going to die .

Then the water was gone and he was coughing and coughing and thought he was going to puke into the mask and the towel and then finally sweet air between the coughs.

“You like that, Rangan?” the Voice said. “Because I can keep doing this all fucking day.”

Fuck you.

He tried to say it through the fear and the water in his lungs but all that came out was a long fit of coughing. The Voice laughed. Rangan gasped for air. He reached through his terror for some witty insult and they punched him again and the air rushed out of his lungs and when he sucked back in it was only water and he was fucking drowning again and please God, please, fucking God, please motherfucking God .

And then he was coughing, and coughing, and coughing and then he retched and the awful chocolate drink they’d been feeding him came back up with the sick taste of bile and he was drowning in his own fucking chocolate puke.

They ripped off the towel and mask and he retched and convulsed again, puking to the side into a bucket and squinting his eyes against the intense white of the bright, clinical room. And before he could turn his head to see, finally see , the face of the Voice, the mask was down over his face again, smelling of chocolate and bile.

He lay there panting for a while, the vomit buying him a reprieve.

They’re not gonna kill me, he told himself again as he panted. He tried to cling to that, even without the serenity package. Motherfuckers want me alive. Won’t let me die. Just hold on, hold on.