The Infinite Evolution - Conversion (24 page)

“
It is C0-A8-01-6C, now let us see what Jade’s
MAC address is for her PIC.”

“
What are you going to do, hack into her PIC?”
asked Reece.

“
Calm down.”

“
Don’t tell me to calm down and don’t you dare
hack into her PIC!”

“
Why not? What is the big deal? Nothing bad is
going to happen. Did you forget I designed the security for these
things?”

“
I know, I trust you, there is no
need to. I can tell you that MAC address does belong to
Jade.”

Telmar still wanted to confirm, “Thanks for the
honesty, but I always say better safe then sorry. It will only take
me a few seconds.”

As Telmar punched in a series of
keys on the holoscreen, he soon realized this was going to be
tougher then he thought. He tried almost every quick hack he knew,
including the back door he had programmed on the standard PIC.
Their five minutes was nearly up, so he realized he was going to
have to wait, and this infuriated him. This was the first time he
failed to complete a successful hack since his undergraduate work.
Telmar hid his frustration and simply said, “Has Jade added any
additional security to her PIC?”

“
Why? Having problems?” asked
Reece knowing she did so last week.

Jade decided to add additional
security measures because she was concerned someone may hack her
PIC in order to gain knowledge on Adam.

“
I am. For some reason I cannot
get in and we are running out of time. The briefing starts
soon.”

Reece mentally disciplined
himself after realizing he had failed to give Jade the benefit of
the doubt when it came to her ability to secure her personal
electronic equipment. He now recognized he should have kept his
intelligence about Jade’s PIC to himself.

“
I just added additional security measures to
Adam’s firewall. Whoever executed these hacks will not gain access
in the same manner,” said Telmar confidently as he stood up and
walked back to the conference room with Reece.

“
It’s good to see you’re still open minded
about Jade,” said Reece.

“
Do not get your hopes up. She is
still the number one suspect and we will be talking to her,”
replied Telmar.

“
Understood,” responded Reece as
he started to think of ways to protect Jade.

“
If her PIC was being used by
someone, as the conduit to complete the hack, then it might be
easier to track the true hacker if she stayed on the compound.
Removing her from Central Circuit might look suspicious,” thought
Reece as his instincts to protect her were saying
otherwise.

“
Ah great, the last two team
members,” said Dr. Anderson as Reece and Telmar entered the
conference room.

“
I was just reviewing Adam’s security logs,”
replied Telmar.

“
Anything out of the ordinary,” asked one of
the team members.

Reece looked at Telmar with a face that screamed,
“Please, don’t say anything.”

“
Nothing to report on yet,” explained
Telmar.

Reece felt a huge sense of relief knowing that
Telmar could have easily made it a lot worse and realized he better
change the topic before anyone tried to define “yet.” As Reece
finished his thought he heard Dr. Anderson say, “Let’s stay with
the agenda shall we. There’s a lot of work to be done.” This was
the first time Reece was happy to hear Dr. Anderson speak.

“
Who hasn’t yet received a copy of Adam’s
malfunctions?” asked Dr. Anderson, pausing for a moment in order to
look around for responses. “Good, then we can start the briefing.
Dr. Richardson are you there?”

A three dimensional image
appeared on the holotable, of a short skinny man wearing a white
robe and glasses. “Afternoon everyone, I’m sorry I was unable to be
there in person. Dr. Anderson and I will be performing the
operation on Adam’s matrix. I asked the entire team to be present
so they could monitor their specific areas during this procedure.
We’re not anticipating any issues, but it is imperative if any
issues arise they be reported immediately, regardless of how
insignificant they may seem.”

Reece looked over at Telmar to see if he was getting
ready to report what they had learned and surprisingly there was no
indication.

Dr. Richardson continued, “The
operation will commence at 1500 hours. This gives everyone two
hours to review Adam’s current status and run their diagnostics. We
have not yet determined why the proteins that connect the neurons
to the silicon electronic chips broke down, but we do know these
proteins lasted for at least three years. We plan to replace the
proteins, then modify the electric impulses between the neurons and
the electronic chips. This will decrease their electronic current
output.”

“
Will this reduce Adam’s reaction times,”
asked one of the team members.

“
Yes. Unfortunately, Adam will not be able to
react to mental or physical challenges as quickly as he once
did.”

“
What will his reaction times be reduced to?”
asked Reece.

“
We don’t know, but we’re
optimistic it will not be considerable. Before we proceed with
further questions I would like the team to read the briefing,”
advised Dr. Richardson.

Reece was relieved he now had time to notify Jade,
so he excused himself by noting he needed to use the restroom. Once
he was out of the conference room, he found himself a secure
workstation and quickly bypassed the security protocol for limited
outside communication. He unlawfully reactivated his PIC and
wirelessly connected it into the unsecured network he had just
created in an attempt to contact Serafina. Reece knew there was no
way to avoid having his transmission recorded, but this was the
only way he could get the information to where it needed to go.

“
Please answer,” said Reece to
himself.

“
Hello.”

“
Serafina is that you?”

“
Yes, is this Reece?”

“
Yes, I need to ask you for a very important
favor.”

“
Sure, what is it?”

“
Can you come to Central Circuit and pick up
Jade at the tourist kiosk? I need to stay late at work.”

“
Does this mean you are not going to
Vermont?”

“
No, we still hope to make the trip; we will
just have to leave later. In the meantime, I don’t want Jade
loitering about all day, it’s not fair to her.”

“
Ok, you want me to take her back
to my place?”

“
Yes.”

“
Will do, I should be there in about three
hours,” explained Serafina.

“
Three hours! Is that the best you can
do?”

“
Sorry, I am out of the state.”

“
I just saw you this morning,” replied
Reece.

“
Yes, and then I left. Now I am
willing to come back as a favor.”

“
I’m sorry, thank you, I owe you
one.”

“
No problem.”

“
Bye.”

“
Bye, Reece, take care of
yourself.”

Once Reece disconnected from
Serafina he notified the security officers and explained that in a
few hours Jade’s Aunt was coming to pick her up, and to please have
Jade meet her aunt at the tourist kiosk. Reece also asked to make
sure they told Jade they were still heading to Vermont, but now
they would be leaving in the morning. The security officer
acknowledged and relayed the messages.

Reece proceeded back to the conference room where he
sat down and started pawing through the briefing, amazed by the
amount of data. After three cups of French dark roast coffee and an
hour and a half of his time, Reece felt he was up to par on all the
necessary intelligence. Lucky for him he had been reading status
reports on Adam twice a day, even on his days off, giving him an
advantage. As Reece was making his third restroom visit, he had an
unfortunate run-in with Telmar.

“
Who is Serafina? Is that really Jade’s Aunt?”
asked Telmar who already knew the answer.

“
What?” asked Reece.

“
Serafina, she is coming here to pick up
Jade.”

Reece was going to act dumb, but decided against it,
so he simply said, “How did you know I called her?”

“
You really think I was not going to find out?
Please, Reece how long have we been colleagues and most important,
friends? You know I am aware of every piece of information that
comes and goes from this facility, even your calls.”

“
You didn’t know about the hack, until I
brought it to your attention.”

Telmar paused took a breath and said, “No offense,
but you know so little. I do not think you are in a place where you
can afford to be smart with me.”

“
Sorry, so what are you going to do?” asked
Reece.

“
I do not know. What would you do if you found
out your friend’s daughter may have hacked one of the most
important inventions in human kind?’

“
Truthfully, I would bring her in for
questioning,” replied Reece.

“
Then I guess that is what we need to
do.”

“
Are you going to inform Dr.
Richardson?”

“
I do not know. It seems unlikely that this
hack has anything to do with the biological issue of the proteins
breaking down, and thus there is no evidence the hack would
jeopardize the surgery,” explained Telmar.

“
I hate to ask, but how can you be so
certain?”

“
Because I am.”

“
So when do you want to speak with
Jade?”

“
Well considering the surgery is in thirty
minutes, we will report this issue afterwards. It is needless to
make this more stressful for the doctors.”

“
Can it wait until we get back from
Vermont?”

Telmar looked at Reece with a
disapproving face, one a father would give their child when a
foolish question came to be, and inquired, “What do you
think?”

“
No?”

“
Correct,” said Telmar who proceeded to send a
verbal order to security advising them to detain Jade.

As the conversation between Reece
and Telmar finalized, Adam was in the beginning stages of
preparation. He was lying on a rubber table, wearing a blue static
resistant robe with his arms and legs strapped down. They had
fastened Adam’s head down between two vice grips specifically
conformed to his cranium, with rubber padding on the inside. A
plethora of wireless electronic equipment was also connected to
Adam. Dr. Anderson was in the prep room making sure these necessary
devices were operational, including the robotic surgical device,
which Dr. Richardson would be controlling remotely.

“
I will be right back Reece,” advised
Telmar.

“
Ok.”

Telmar walked back over to his
terminal where he pulled up a variety of encrypted files. This time
he was successful in hacking into a portion of unallocated space on
Jade’s PIC, which was less secure than the areas he had tried
earlier. Once in Telmar uploaded the encrypted files to her PIC,
and camouflaged them with a
steganography
program he
personally wrote. He was confident there was no way the Central
Circuit security checkpoint was going to detect this data for what
it really was and Jade was none the wiser. Once finished, Telmar
deleted the data he uploaded from the Central Circuit database,
wiped any trace of his activities from the terminal, and notified
security to belay his last order regarding the detention of Jade’s
movements.

Approximately ten minutes before
the operation was to begin, Adam’s team was frantically going over
every spec, making sure there would not be any complications. Then
one of the younger and most promising team members, Ryan,
identified a possible glitch in Adam’s mechanized cerebral cortex.
According to the diagnostic report it appeared to be active. Adam’s
perceptual awareness and consciousness seemed to be operating. Ryan
wanted to make sure his information was correct so he ran the
diagnostic again and was amazed with what he found. Adam was
dreaming. Ryan immediately forwarded his data to the rest of the
team and asked if this was influencing any of Adam’s systems. Dr.
Richardson called the team back in order to review these new
finding.

“
Thanks to Ryan’s thorough exam
it has been confirmed Adam is in REM sleep,” explained Dr.
Richardson via his holographical display, while also presenting a
holographic live representation of Adam. Dr. Richardson directed
the group’s attention to Adam’s eyes, and pointed out how they were
fluttering underneath his eyelids.

“
An electroencephalogram is
showing brain activity similar to when Adam is awake. His neurons
are firing. Can anyone here explain how this is possible? There are
no foolish hypothesis people, we need to figure out what is
happening,” directed Dr. Richardson.

“
Are we sure Adam is completely shut down?”
asked one of the team members.

“
The power supply that connects to Adam and
his back up have been completely disconnected,” replied another
team member.