Lock In (Lock In, #1)(44)

“At the moment, compiling code. Which I can tell you about but which I don’t imagine you care about,” Tony said.

“Nonsense,” I said. “I am endlessly fascinated.”

“I’ll take that as a challenge,” Tony said, and then the data panel popped up a button. “That’s a door code. Come on over.”

Tony was offering me an invite to his liminal space, or at very least a public area of it.

I hesitated for a second. Most Hadens were protective of their personal spaces. Tony was offering me an intimacy of sorts. I hadn’t known him that long.

But then I decided I was overthinking it and touched the button. It expanded into a doorframe and I stepped through.

Tony’s workspace looked like a high-walled retro video game cube, all black space with the walls defined by neon blue lines, off of which branched geometric patterns.

“Don’t tell me, let me guess,” I said. “You’re a Tron fan.”

“Got it in one,” Tony said. He was at a standing desk, above which a neon-lined keyboard hovered. Beside that was a floating screen with code, with a toolbar slowly pulsing, marking the amount of time until Tony’s code compiled. Above him, rotating slowly, was a swirl of lines, apparently haphazardly connected.

I recognized them immediately.

“A neural network,” I said.

“Also got that in one,” Tony said. His self-image was, like most people’s, a version of his physical self, fitter, more toned, and stylishly clothed. “If you really want to impress me, you’ll tell me the make and model.”

“I haven’t the slightest idea,” I admitted.

“Amateur,” Tony said, lightly. “It’s a Santa Ana Systems DaVinci, Model Seven. It’s their latest-released iteration. I’m coding a software patch to it.”

“Should I be seeing any of this?” I asked, pointing at the code in the display. “I would guess this is all supposed to be confidential.”

“It is,” Tony said. “But you don’t look like much of a coder to me—no offense—and I’m willing to guess that the DaVinci up there looks mostly like artfully arranged spaghetti to you.”

“That it does.”

“Then we’re fine,” Tony said. “And anyway it’s not like you can record anything in here.” Which was true. In personal liminal spaces, visitor recording was turned off by default.

I looked up at the model of the neural network hovering over Tony’s head. “It’s strange, isn’t it?” I said.

“Neural networks in general, or the DaVinci Seven in particular?” Tony asked. “Because confidentially speaking the D7s are a pain in the ass. Their architecture is kind of screwy.”

“I meant in general,” I said, and looked up again. “The fact we’ve got one of these sitting in our skulls.”

“Not just in our skulls,” Tony said. “In our brains. Actually in them, sampling neural activity a couple thousand times a second. Once they’re in, you can’t get them out. Your brain ends up adapting to them, you know. If you tried to remove it, you’d end up crippling yourself. More than we already are.”

“That’s a cheerful thought.”

“If you want really cheerful thoughts, you should worry about the software,” Tony said. “It governs how the networks run, and it’s all really just one kludge after another.” He pointed at his code. “The last software update Santa Ana put out accidentally caused the gallbladder to get overstimulated in about a half a percent of the operators.”

“How does that happen?”

“Unexpected interference between the D7 and the brain’s neural signals,” Tony said. “Which happens more often than it should. They run all the software through brain simulators before they upload it into customers, but real brains are unique, and Haden brains are even more so because of how the disease messes with the structure. So there’s always something unexpected going on. This patch should fix the problem before it causes gallstones. Or at least if gallstones happen, they won’t be traced back to the neural network.”

“Wonderful,” I said. “You’re making me glad it’s not a Santa Ana network in my head.”

“Well, to be fair, it’s not just Santa Ana,” Tony said. He nodded at me. “What do you have in there?”

“It’s a Raytheon,” I said.

“Wow,” Tony said. “Old school. They got out of the neural network business a decade ago.”

“I didn’t need to hear that,” I said.

Tony waved it off. “Their maintenance is handled by Hubbard,” he said.

“Excuse me?” I said. I was momentarily shocked.

“Hubbard Technologies,” Tony said. “Lucas Hubbard’s first company, before he formed Accelerant. Hubbard doesn’t build networks—another Accelerant company does that—but Hubbard makes a lot of money off of maintaining the systems of companies who left the field after the first gold rush. He did a lot of the early coding and patching himself, if you believe his corporate PR.”

“Okay,” I said. The sudden intrusion of Hubbard into my head, literally as well as figuratively, had thrown me off.

“I’ve done work for Hubbard, too,” Tony said. “Just a couple of months ago, as a matter of fact. Trust me, they have their issues.”