Fugue in a French City    

  A svelte business like man stood at the entrance to the Art of Science museum and lecture hall, in a long dark coat. Inside, a gathering of bright young adults were engaged in casual conversation, speaking in soft tones, many of the females trying to get the attention of the few young men who had signed up for the class. The professor was rigid in her manner, hair done up in back, wearing a knee length skirt and spiked heels. Her classified profile indicated that she had been raised in a small agricultural town, and the fact that she spoke with a convincing upper class accent was a result of vigorous education. Twain saw inconsistent nuances of behavior though, and wondered if it might having something to do with her father having been a simple farmer who had died not long after being conscripted as a factory worker during the transition to the Unified State... At least that's what the files indicated. Agent Twain found her to be quite repellent, in spite of the fact that she was intelligent and had an attractive face and slender figure.


  "Okay, now let's get started people," she began. "Today we're going to cover Set Theory and it's relation to GÖdel's incompleteness theorem and in turn, the implications that these concepts may have with regard to emerging Fullerine Quantum Computing machines."
  Two of the most self conscious young women on the front row yawned conspicuously, one of them glancing back slightly to admire a handsome, pert young man, muscular and square jawed, bur cut and a pencil tucked behind one ear. He had one of the latest artificially intelligent information companion/recorders cupped over one eye, input/output electrodes gripping his head like a mock spider. Intuitively, he noticed the young woman and winked with his uncovered eye, smiling a little.
  "Not that it has been confirmed that consciousness is indeed a phenomenon based on a quantum Strange Attractor, is artificial intelligence simply a matter of implementing such computation machines as we have previously discussed in this class, or are there other limitations to quantum computing, physical obstacles which will have to be overcome before such a machine is actually realized?" The teacher seemed pleased, and appeared to take pause to feel good about her self. She frowned slightly, however, when the handsome and virile young man in the front row, who she knew to have a perfect grade point average, raised his hand. "Excuse me Doctor Culveer, but didn't your thesis mention something about a distinction between artificial intelligence and artificial consciousness? I mean, the computers we already have are intelligent, even though they're more like a massively complex abacus than the typical biological mind system," the young man said in a tenor voice, conveying a certain benevolence in his remarks by his soft tone and non-threatening body language.
  "Yes, of coarse Rez you're correct. As minds often do, I tend to lump consciousness and intelligence together," the teacher responded, now directing her penetrating stare, while maintaining a subtle, tight lipped smile, to the young women adjusting their tight sweaters. She continued:
  "As we all know from having downloaded the assigned memory units, the distinction between these two qualities in the context of what may be characterized as mind is a significant one, and the behavior of matter at the quantum level is of particular interest when it comes to this difference." The class was silent. A phased gravitational hover jet passed over, powerful waves of energy penetrating the hall and tickling the insides of everyone there. "Can anyone tell me what the textbook files say about why humans are so compelled to imitate the organic mind? To construct machines that perform or simulate what are considered by some experts to be the meta-physical outcome of simple sensory looped brain function? If you've developed any of your own ideas on the subject, this would be a good time to share them with the class," Miss Culveer offered in a more relaxed manner, and to some degree having lost her fake accent.
  Twain made eye contact with the instructor, and though she continued, the words that followed were marked with a subtle hint of tension. Had she noticed the gray and black badge on the lapel of his coat, the triangular symbol denoting affiliation with the Agency? Ignoring the class and doing his best not to create any distraction, Twain produced a small device from his shirt pocket and approached a waste cylinder at the back of the hall. He probed the contents with a modulated thread of monopolar light, looking for telltale holographic artifacts that would be produced if any amorphous matrix simulations might be hiding there. A young female student sitting nearby straightened her sweater to make sure it was following the contours of her newly implanted breasts. Twain noticed briefly, but offered only his professional, emotionless mask in response. He smiled inside and there was an inner dialog, something like: "Cute, but if that young woman were my daughter, I wouldn't be so amused at her using subtle sexual gestures toward older men and observing their reactions as a way to practice the art of attraction." At the end of his parental line of thinking, a glance back down to the trash container revealed an astonishing and odd thing: The outer casing of his laser pen was splintered and charred. When he surreptitiously tossed the faulty device into the waste can, it seemed to produce a deep and unnatural silence. Several students turned around, flashing indignant looks in his direction.
  "What the hell?", Twain found himself muttering, but not quietly enough since the instructor stopped and glanced in his direction as well. He sensed ill regard, since a few students were no longer following the program material, perhaps distracted by the prospect of police action in their midst? Or even the possibility of something really disruptive, the pursuit of a mind manipulating rogue simulation that would certainly try to escape capture or deactivation if detected, perhaps using deadly force to protect itself? The professor again pointedly glanced at Twain, but without missing a beat in the discrete flow and rhythm of her lecture. It was as if she were confirming that yes, there was one of those clumsy agents, wearing an unjustifiably dangerous corporate issue acid gun... Twain looked down at the charcoal gray handle, raw metal showing through chipped green at the end. Professor Culveer became secondary, her mind shifting, as a wave of singular, yet shared volition surged through her body. Onlookers might have thought her embarrassed for a moment, confused, having exchanged glances with the broad shouldered agent, their eyes clearly focused on one another. Twain departed from the lecture hall and decided to examine the perimeter. Outside he reviewed data from his pocket transponder, to double check the identity of the complainant, but it was no help. Someone had reported a potentially hostile simulation in the area, but their com ID had been unreadable, which was unusual. Could have been a prank, he considered, but continued his sweep of the area. Across from the great hall and museum was an automated play ground/child care facility. A plain looking, almost anorexic young woman was seated in the mandatory observation bubble, high above the playground, looking in a tiny mirror and appearing to fiddle with her make up. Even though the child care center was automated, a human chaperone was required by law. Ridiculous arrangement, Twain thought, realizing that he'd never put his kid in one, although he did consider the facilities to be excellent. He noticed a smiling girl, skipping past, followed by a string of yelling boys who went tumbling to the ground, laughing at their own clumsiness, having collided and lost their balance.
  There was a rumble, an energy field whose point of origin was deep within the bowels of the earth. Twain contemplated the source of the quake and remembered that a Unified Corps security bulletin had warned of this, that illegal subterranean particle experiments might be taking place, and that although the military was trying to stop them, they might continued for some time as the perpetrators and financiers had yet to be identified. Such experiments were potentially dangerous, as there was a possibility, that high energy byproducts might be produced that would result in the alteration of underlying structures of physical law and behavior of matter. Such fears were considered superstitious and unwarranted by official sources however. Most shrugged it off.
  Just then, an odd, violet luminescence shown around some of the buildings and structures across from the child care complex, on the other side of the long self propelled pedestrian ribbons that interlaced all intra-suburban zones. Everything was still as great lime stone walls of the lecture hall dissolved into nothing. Unbelieving, Twain rubbed his eyes and reached into his trench coat pocket for his data companion.
  "What's this," the agent asked, pointing his intelligent data companion at the scene before him.
  "No reference," it replied.
  "This is the university lecture hall and museum, named after Allen Turing, the walls have just disappeared," he said, calmly.
  "Insufficient data for ID. Strange phenomenon though. Stand by, will search current data networks for coincidental data and any possible related events," the companion's soothing, mock female voice offered.
  "Just plug into the network and convey what we're seeing to central security, they'll be interested if they don't already know about it. Maybe it hasn't happened anywhere else?", the agent continued, placing the intelligent device on the end of a telescoping mono-pod which he stuck into the ground, so as to offer it an uninterrupted vantage point of the affected building while he continued his investigation on foot. "Gotta complete my sweep for illegal simulations in this zone and get my report back in. If anything else as crazy as this happens, I don't know what... You think there's any danger to those people in there? Hell, I don't know what I was thinking, I'll go over and tell 'em to evacuate first, you just relay what's happening to central." The agent walked briskly, back to the lecture hall. "I'll continue monitoring," the little intelligent data box said, but the agent in the long coat was already too far away to hear.
  Before Twain could cross the pedestrian freeway, however, he felt a tremendous pressure in his ears, and all sound was vanquished. Like a vacuum, he imagined. The tall holographic screen at the front of the lecture hall exploded in a noiseless, violent display of scattering debris, an untangling of once organized material structures. A long metal section, shredded from the meseum/lecture hall in the explosion, advanced like a rocket, heading straight towards the play ground. Twain's stomach sank. He tried to yell out, turning just in time to see the massive structural beam shooting past, missing the kids, and landing in an empty adjacent quadrant. When Twain spun back around to look at the lecture hall was, to see if anyone was injured, he was shocked to see the big holographic screen intact, teacher standing calmly in front with fifty some odd students listening quietly as if nothing unusual had happened. Twain walked over to the data box.
  "Did you just record an explosion? Over in the adjacent block? Over there…" he pointed in front of the device's lens so there was no question what he was referring to.
  "Negative, nothing unusual, just the Turing museum with some walls missing. Still conveying data to central security. They've offered no explanation, though appropriate staff and computational elements are working on the matter," the synthetic female voice articulated.
  "That's weird," Twain said.
  "What's weird?" the intelligent device inquired.
  "There was an explosion…"
  "I didn't see anything. Maybe you had a hallucination. Perhaps the same phenomenon that caused the outer structure to vanish has affected your mind as well? Recent tremors indicate possible sub-terranian particle experiments in the area."
  "Or maybe it's messed with your circuits and that's why you think you didn't see it?"
  "A valid possibility," the artificial voice replied.
  "Send that to security, that I just saw an explosion over there, but you didn't see it, and now everything appears to be normal, except for the walls missing of coarse," the agent insisted.
  The machine, perched on the end of it's pole responded: "As you wish." Agent Twain crossed over to the museum/lecture hall once again, and entered. This time everything appeared to be normal.
  "What?" Twain uttered, as he realized the walls had returned, just as it had been when he first came on the scene to search for illegal simulations. He entered the main lobby, but instead of continuing to the auditorium, he went to the exhibits. It looked pretty empty. He kept his senses tuned for possible anomalies. It was a long translucent vestibule. There was a window labeled "French Town." Breathing deeply, Twain touched the wall to activate the three dimensional projection. It started out as a low resolution sequence, in which the observer had a sense of hovering above the earth. There was a slow descent, then acceleration toward a great city. As the details emerged, roads and buildings, energy conduits, waterways, became more resolute, the image zoomed in at an alarming rate, veering to a small suburb on the outskirts of a grand metropolis. A monorail was it's main conduit to the little peripheral town. A legend appeared above the town grid, detailing prominent landmarks. The Turing Art of Science museum was at the center of the holographic projection as agent Twain shifted weight to his heels, tucking his chin and trying to stay relaxed, though his legs were tiring a little from standing perfectly motionless so as to not disturb the integrity of the visual illusion. Suddenly, the images were indistinguishable from the real thing.
  Twain found himself standing across from the Turing Museum again, and the walls slowly dissolved into nothing. First they became translucent, then vanishing altogether. Again, there was a silent explosion in which jagged structural debris could be seen to flower, mostly from the center of the lecture hall with it's main screen, spreading outward in all directions. A sizeable girder shot over head, just missing the child care center behind him. Strangely, the children seemed not to notice and continued playing. It was reassuring to see their smiles in the midst of such a disaster, Twain thought. When he turned back toward the Art of Science museum, again, it was as if nothing at all had happened. No explosion, walls intact. Twain reached into his pocket and produced a miniature intelligent data transponder. He activated it by depressing a yellow bladder on top.
  "What do you make of this?" he asked the device, pointing it toward the building complex. "The Turing Museum," the data device's soothing female voice responded.
  "Anything unusual about it? Anything odd going on at all in the vicinity? Try a broad band spectral scan if you don't mind," Twain said.
  "Nothing unusual. It'll take a few minutes to complete a broad band scan with comprehensive data analysis," the data box said.
  "That's fine," was Twain's reply. He walked back over and through the main entrance, past the lecture hall and into the exhibit gallery. At the end was a familiar holographic frame. He stopped in front and activated the illusion by touching the outer envelope, then moving as close as possible so that his field of vision was completely filled.
  He saw the Art of Science museum from the outside again, and watched as the fossil scarred limestone block walls slowly vanished, revealing the myriad rows of seats within, as well as a labyrinth of holograms in a gallery off to one side. An attractive, though conservatively dressed women was standing at the front of a large class, giving a lecture. Abruptly, all sound was vanquished and a terrible explosion took place. Fragments of the larger holographic screen behind the lecturer could be seen as they sailed through the air, mangled girders and chunks of debris spinning outward, obliterating everything in their path. Twain winced as he saw rows of students eradicated by the seething, outpouring of energetic matter, healthy organisms instantly transformed into the constituent elements from which they had been born. Having seen this terrifying event, Twain felt paralyzed, as if in shock. In spite of the destruction, he wondered if anyone had survived and found himself sweeping through the rubble, looking for signs of life. He was relieved to see that some students were already helping one another, climbing out from under the wreckage. Though injured, some had miraculously survived.
  Twain's mind went blank; he stood at the back of the lecture hall, the instructor's melodious voice exerting it's influence, but her lungs were empty. Looking down at his coat and badge, Twain felt that something was terribly wrong. Gripping his gun in the wetness of his palm, he closed his eyes. If only he could identify the threat... But the mind was clouded. "Why am I here?", he heard himself saying, but as from the vantage point of an observer, another Twain descending a waterfall of stone blocks, reaching the brightly illuminated exit. No one in the class noticed. Everything outside was pure white.
  "Are you here to see the explosion?", a soft deep voice asked from behind.
  Twain's doppelganger turned to see that it was a young man and a girl, standing in an archway. Twain tried to speak, but was trapped in a psychogenic paralysis.
  A long line began to form behind the first students, people gathering in the outer corridor.
  "C'mon, let's go up front where we can see the stuff flying over toward the day care center," a young woman blurted, leading a boy friend by the hand. Surrounding walls began to shimmer.
  "It's almost time," someone whispered nervously.
  "I wanna see the kids in the back of the class get crushed," a young woman giggled, while someone else objected to her remark.
  "That's morbid," they said.
  "Well, it's reality. You might as well face it," she retorted.
  "We shouldn't be celebrating other people's suffering," someone countered, with a hint of irritation.
  "You're here, aren't you?" a young man shouted.
  Twain looked out over the rows of seats, beautiful, promising young men and women. He scanned for anything out of the ordinary, but no flags went up. Something about that trash receptacle at the back of the room seemed of interest.
  As the holo-screen exploded again, Twain could see more clearly than before, that the teacher's body was obliterated, becoming a smear of tissue and fluid, a silent blur. Their were a few gasps, sudden breaths, and fearful onlookers behind him reacting in a way that they hadn't anticipated. All this destruction yet no sound. "Very strange, and sad", Twain thought as others looked on in horror.
  Agent Mirco aimed carefully at the insidiously conscious insect like automaton, slicing it into two distinct halves with his acid gun, then flattening the remains of each section under the heel of his boot.
  "Look at that damned thing," Mirco said with malevolence.
  "It's sick," his partner echoed.
  Twain laid on the floor, a long twisted metallic stalk drooping out of an oozing cavity that had been drilled into the back of his head. At the end of the quivering simulation wire was the mangled, partially obliterated carcass of the bisected simulation bug. Twain's eyes remained wide, glassed over; he appeared relaxed.
  "Is he still alive?" Mirco asked, as his partner leaned over to see.
  "Breathing. His brain is really messed up though…" the other agent offered.
  "Those jerks. Twain was sharp. Musta been multiple simulations," Mirco growled.
  "Guess we keep our head gear on from now on..." his partner observed.
  "We need to cordon off this whole quadrant indefinitely. Even then we might not be able to shut down all the simulations. Hard to cut through multiple sims and get through to reality..." Mirco looked over the hall with it's still occupants. "Call in the sniffers from central, and don't let anyone or anything move. Nothing leaves." He gestured to an incoming stream of uniformed officers. The teacher stood perfectly still, staring at Mirco. There was a flicker of something soft, a trace of ultra-violet picked up in his head gear. Mirco looked up and around to see if it could have been a reflection. Then he looked back at the middle aged lady, prim and proper, adorned in her anachronistic garb... Not breathing. There was a sudden, intuitive flooding with a feeling of synchronicity.
  A tremendous blast occurred. The front of the lecture hall was it's epicenter. Another AI terrorist attack. An exploding woman this time, and very convincing. There were few survivors. All were interviewed at Central after Med rehab, some suffered permanent brain damage. Mirco lost his eyesight and all four limbs, but was fitted with prosthetic implants and remained on staff, coordinating investigations from the command post. Twain became the subject of extensive war effort research. He continued to walk and breath, stumbling from time to time. He never again responded to words, or any other outside stimulus.

Copyright 2005 Schuyler Hupp All Rights Reserved

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