The Infinite Evolution - Conversion (9 page)

Reece ran up to Spencer and
screamed, “Someone call for help, don’t just stand
there!”

Quickly a nearby pedestrian
dialed 911, stumbling over his words, “Um, yeah, there was an
accident, help, we need help! Come fast, we’re right outside the
health market.” The crowd of people had doubled in size, which
increased the number of digital cameras all focused on recording
the atrocious aftermath.

The occupant of the vehicle that
struck Spencer jumped out and screamed, “Oh my god, I’m so sorry, I
didn’t see him. I had my auto driver on and I don’t know what
happened.” As soon as the occupant looked over and saw what
condition Spencer was in, she quickly dropped to her knees, then
passed out from the pooling blood.

Reece was now on the ground
holding Spencer’s hand, begging him to hang on. “Please Spencer,
stay with us, please. Just keep listening to my voice. You’ll get
through this.” The sounds of the ambulance, fire trucks, and police
cars grew closer with every second that passed, while Reece
continued to reassure Spencer everything was going to be
ok.

As Spencer lay on the ground, he
did not move a single bone in his body. His breathing was becoming
extremely shallow as he thought to himself, “This is the end isn’t
it?” As he considered this, his peripheral vision faded away and he
started seeing what looked like a dark narrow tunnel with blue and
white streaks of light.

The emergency vehicles arrived on
scene while Reece watched in disbelief. The Emergency Medical
Technicians (EMT) exited the ambulance, ran towards Spencer’s
motionless body, and quickly realized there was no longer blood
exiting his wounds. This indicated that Spencer’s heart might have
stopped beating. One EMT started to temporarily seal the head wound
with medical bio-foam, while the other removed an automated
external defibrillator (AED). The Police Department had pushed back
the spectators and closed down the roadway as the Fire Department
made sure the vehicle that struck Spencer was not going to cause
any more issues. They accomplished this by cutting the vehicle’s
power from its battery and confirmed there were no fluid
leaks.

After the EMT finished placing
the pads to the AED on Spencer, it ran itself. First, it advised it
was charging, then gave a five second count down and stated,
“Clear.” A bolt of electricity ran through Spencer’s body, making
him twitch slightly. The AED indicated it did not detect a pulse
and it was going to deliver another shock. Again Spencer’s body
jolted, but nothing happened. A third shock was delivered and
nothing. The EMT again checked for a pulse and a heartbeat, looked
up and said, “It’s too late, he lost too much blood. I’ll call it.
Time of death, 1327 hours.”

Friendship

It was going to be a small crowd
nothing too extravagant. Three rows of chairs with two in front
marked, "
Family
only.
" Off to the right facing a small
pond overrun with lily pads, stood a small glass table with a blue
and gray ceramic urn, with the name “
Spencer Cade
” stenciled on it.
There were two large cobalt blue vases with an assortment of Calla,
Stargazer, and Daylilies flanking the right side of the glass
table. Facing the row of chairs was a solid black mahogany podium
that looked like it had seen its fair share of gatherings. The
weather was barely cooperating by holding back the rains it so
greatly wanted to let loose.

Three jet-black limousines pulled
up alongside the stone path that led to the ceremonial site. Three
chauffeurs exited their vehicles and walked to the passenger side
rear simultaneously. As they opened the doors the occupants who
exited wore nothing but black, except for Jade who decided to wear
a turquoise tanager shawl with a border marked up with leaf shapes,
draped over a charcoal dress. A clergy led the small group up the
path until they reached the area where Spencer’s ashes laid. No one
had spoken a word and even mother nature kept her normal daily
woodland sounds to a low murmur, as if she too were being
respectful of Spencer’s death.

Jade and Reece took their seats up front in the two
chairs that were reserved for family. Once they were sitting the
rest of the group sat as well. Jade looked at Reece as she wiped
away her tears and said, “There is something familiar with this
clergy, have we seen her before?”

“
I don’t recall, but if you have,
I’m sure it will come to you,” replied Reece.

“
Yeah, I guess,” said Jade.

Reece followed up with, “That’s
certainly an interesting robe she is wearing. I have never seen
that pattern before, they look like silver figure eights…” as the
clergy interrupted.

“
Let us please have a moment of
silence.”

Everyone as a whole somberly dropped their heads and
the only sound, which sprouted from the group, were the quiet tears
of a thirteen-year-old orphan.

Once the clergy felt enough time
had passed, she walked over to the podium, positioned herself
directly behind it and spoke, “Spencer lived an intriguing life,
albeit short. Spencer was a great friend and an outstanding
father,” as she directed her full attention towards Jade. “He was
the kind of person that stood by you when you needed someone to be
there. What is it that we remember when we think of Spencer? I
think everyone who knows him very well would agree with me on this.
It was his sense of humor and his ability to question our society
and its technology with conviction and tenacity. He was the kind of
person who made people laugh and at the same time he could drive
all of us to the point of hysteria with his well known conspiracy
theories.”

There was a slight pause in the
clergy’s voice as a number of people looked at her amazed with what
she had just said and were trying to decide if she was being rude
or funny.

She continued, “Spencer’s death
was sudden. When I heard the news I simply could not believe it.
Spencer was too young. But it slowly occurred to me as I reviewed
his accomplishments, Spencer indeed lived his life
fully.”

As the clergy continued to speak Reece leaned over
to one of Spencer’s co-workers and whispered, “You think this
clergy was good friends with Spencer?”

“
I don’t know. Have you ever met her
before?”

“
Not that I know of,” replied Reece as he
re-directed his attention towards the eulogy.

“
Spencer was well-loved and accomplished so
many wonderful tasks on this planet. I know somewhere in the great
beyond he will do so much more. We all should be forever grateful
to have known Spencer. All the memories we have shared with him
will forever be cherished and remembered in our hearts.”

Reece looked over towards Jade
and noticed her despairing face staring off into the pond. He put
his arm around her, hoping to give her as much comfort as
possible.

“
Spencer has gone back to his
beginning. This is not the time for us to grieve his death, it is
our time to celebrate his life. Spencer never wanted to see people
cry; he wanted to see them laugh. Therefore, at this moment, when
we are about to spread his ashes, let us all think back and
remember how Spencer touched our lives. How he made us laugh and
what a good person Spencer was. We should all be thankful we knew
the man named Spencer Cade.”

Reece looked over at Jade and asked, “Do you still
want to do this?”

“
Yes, it’s what he would’ve
wanted, this was the place he enjoyed the most. This was the place
where we would always go when we were happy or sad. This was the
place where he told me who I really was.”

“
Who you really were?” asked Reece with a
confused look.

“
Yeah.”

Jade stood up, walked towards the
urn, and never broke eye contact with it. In this one moment,
everyone in Jade's presence became utterly fixated on what she was
about to do. As Jade’s vision grew closer on her father’s ashes,
she fought with all her being to prevent a flood of tears from
exploding within this one moment in time. She knew what needed to
be completed and prepared to do it in the most respectful way she
knew how. Jade slowly reached for the urn, picked it up, and
carried it over to the pond as delicately as possible. Once there
she felt as if she was in her own world and she completely forgot
about the small group of friends and family behind her. Jade slowly
lifted the lid and dumped her father’s ashes into the water,
letting go of everything she held dearly, including her own
emotions. Soon a flood of tears followed and in return, this became
contagious, as there was not one person who was able to hold back
their emotions.

Thirteen weeks had passed since
the funeral and Jade continued to go about her daily life, but with
the emotional level of a stump. She had moved in with Reece, who
had took full guardianship of her, and chose to finish out her high
school years, mostly because that was what she thought her father
would have wanted. Jade’s social life had taken a hit, she rarely
would go out unless it was for some new piece of technology. If
anything had improved, even though it was not needed, it was her
studies. It seemed Jade had become obsessive with cybernetics. Of
course Reece allowed this interest to blossom since he shared the
same one, but nothing to the extent that Jade had shown, and he had
made it a career choice.

“
Come on Jade I need to take you somewhere,”
said Reece.

“
For real? I don’t feel like going anywhere,
it’s Sunday.”

“
Yeah, for real - I think you’ll enjoy this.
It took me a lot of convincing to allow this to happen. They don’t
allow just anyone into my lab you know.”

“
Your lab! Are you serious? I get to go to
your lab at Central Circuit?”

“
I wouldn’t joke about that, yes.”

Jade showed levels of excitement
that Reece had not seen in a long time and asked, “Do I get to see
Adam?”

“
Yes! Absolutely,” said Reece happily as he
realized his idea was succeeding.

“
Oh, thank you! Thank you, thank you, I’ll be
ready in a sec,” repeated Jade.

“
Ok, I’ll be downstairs waiting,” smiled
Reece.

Ever since the death of Spencer,
Jade had been meeting with a psychologist once a week and one of
the recommendations given was to get her to socialize more. It was
determined if Jade did not want to speak to humans then the next
best thing would be an android.

Within seconds Jade was downstairs, as promised, and
in the car within minutes. All she talked about on the way to
Central Circuit was Adam and his specs.

“
So is Adam the first android whose matrix has
been stable for this long?”

“
Yes,” replied Reece.

“
I can’t believe I’m going to see
him,” said Jade.

“
Believe it. Just think what you
can tell your friends tomorrow at school.”

“
Ah, they wouldn’t care, they’re
too tied up with who’s going to prom.”

“
Are you going to prom?” asked
Reece, hoping Jade was going to say yes.

“
No, why would I want to do that.
And who cares anyway. Let’s talk more about Adam.”

Reece agreed and knew not to push
it, for this was the first time since Spencer’s death that Jade had
shown any real interest in anything tangible. As Reece and Jade
arrived at Central Circuit, they headed towards the Hex tram and
wasted no time. Jade continued to spit out technical jargon and
statistical information, as Reece sat there and thought how Jade,
now fourteen, knew more about Adam’s make up than all his interns
combined, possibly including certain engineers and programmers he
worked with. As the Hex tram arrived, Jade quickly jumped off and
pulled Reece with her.

“
Come on, let’s go.”

“
Don’t worry, he’s not going
anywhere and remember, when you have a question, direct it towards
Adam, no one else, ok?”

“
I know, I know.”

As Jade arrived at the entryway
to Reece’s lab she waited impatiently as her PIC was deactivated.
She walked in, turned, and saw a tall light-skinned man standing
with his eyes closed.

“
Go ahead, introduce yourself,”
instructed Reece, “I’ll be in my office only a few feet away.”
Reece sat down at his desk and pretended to work online, as he
increased the volume on the internal lab microphone so he could
eavesdrop.

“
Um, hello my name is Jade, it’s a real honor
to meet you.”

As Jade stood there with anticipation, Adam opened
his eyes slowly and responded.

“
It is a pleasure to meet you Jade, my name is
Adam. Reece has told me a great deal about you. I understand you
are somewhat of a fan. Is this a correct conclusion?”

“
A fan is a modest way of putting
it,” laughed Jade. “I’m much more than a fan. I think what you
represent is the next step in human evolution.”

“
That is a lot to live up to, thank you. I
would like to give you my condolences on the loss of your father. I
had the pleasure of meeting him before he passed away; he seemed to
be a kind man. I unfortunately did not spend a great deal of time
with him because both Reece and your father seemed to have been in
a rush that day.”