Cortez the Novel

Cortez Tim Van Hook Arrival of Hernan Cortez by Diego Rivera in the Palacio Nacional, Detail “It’s just business.” Van Hook / Cortez / 2 Copyright © 2020 Tim Van Hook about 110,000 words POB 190 Casco ME 04015 [email protected] Cortez by Tim Van Hook Part One Chapter 1 Startup Lem levered his fingertips under the metal disC on the baCk of his head and pried off the Cortez headset, the Bug, they Called it. Working alone in the lab to improve the clarity of the images that the deviCe Captured from his mind, he reviewed the session. Shapes wavered on the sCreen like a TV channel that hadn’t been paid for. He had visualized his daughter Annie, his Cortez-Cofounder Peter, and the smile of his first-ever lover, Janie, but what played back instead he only vaguely reCognized. Take a break. Upstairs in Lem’s CubiCle, Peter slouChed in the spare Chair, his white jeans and zippered half-boots sCissored straight out on the carpet. He dressed like a fastidious disco danCer. Slim and hairless forearms Curved from his wrist to barely bigger upper arm. Behind him, the blaze of the simmering mid-morning sun bleaChed the parking lot and adjaCent beige offiCe building, shimmering under the pale blue North Carolina sky and filling the wide-blinded window. “I don’t know who they are, but I know they’re watChing me,” Peter said. Lem swiveled slightly in his plastiC mesh offiCe Chair to faCe Peter. Frank Claimed he got a great deal on the fit-up, the monoxide-gray fabric partitions, the sickroom-gray plastic desktops and suspended storage cubbies, the galvanized-gray Chairs, from a portfolio Company the investors had shut down, and thereby reCyCled their old losses into new equity. Lem pushed for Salvation Army furniture in a Converted ViCtorian mansion, not this Van Hook / Cortez / 3 Cheap industrial park generiC, but went along with Frank, he’s the boss. When Lem looked away and listened to Peter Chu’s flat-vowel Cal Tech articulation, an anxious precision, a hint of question in the final uplift, he forget how Chinese he looked, but he was third generation SoCal, about as AmeriCan as Lem, and equally out of plaCe away down here in Dixie. “Well, I think you’re overreacting. Have you actually seen anyone following you or anything?” Peter fluffed his razor-Cut bangs from off his eyes. He Cared about his hair, shiny and soft as a blusher brush. “I have the evidenCe. We just need to be Careful is all. This is game- Changing teChnology. They have reason to suppress it.” Lem brought Peter into the Company to do the design of the sensor deviCes, Called squids, superConduCting quantum interferenCe deviCes, about whiCh Lem understood only enough to say the aCronym. Using these sensors, the Cortez headset measured super-subtle magnetiC fields in the brain, a proCess Called magneto-encephalography, or MEG, and in this Case, measured aCtivity in the visual cortex. Lem wrote the software to proCess the huge array of numbers the headset produced, a recording of the real-time eleCtriCal aCtivity of visual proCessing, both from what the eyes perCeived, and the imagination. “Sure, we want to keep it seCret. Until the patents are filed and we launch, anyway,” Lem said. Not many other people put up with Peter. In the lab he Complained about miCrosCopiC dust particles seeping out of the air conditioning vents, and didn’t hesitate to tell anybody he disagreed with how stupid they were. But he knew his stuff, and his quirks didn’t bother Lem, muCh. Lem shivered, fastened the buttons of the Cardigan he wore at the offiCe, always freezing inside in the summertime. “You need to have Frank sweep the offiCe for bugs. He won’t listen to me.” “Why won’t I listen to you?” Frank Mansfield stood in the open entranceway to Lem’s Cube. Blue dress shirt, sleeves turned up over hairy forearms, tan slaCks, flat-gut physique Chiseled by the daily gym workout, hair already thinned to baby fuzz on top. A slight lisp made him sound like Sylvester the Cat, but nobody laughed. “You guys shooting the shit or what?” Peter didn’t say anything, Calibrated his shoeshine. Lem shrugged. “We’re mostly good. Some noise in the red. Maybe we should demo grey-scale, drop the color for now.” Van Hook / Cortez / 4 “No!” Frank held his hands up, palms out. “They absolutely have to have Color for the flesh tones. Skin Color is a huge part of identifiCation.” The Cortez team antiCipated that their major initial Customers would be intelligenCe agenCies. OnCe enemy suspeCts had trained the headset sensor system to their individual profile by watChing tens of thousands of faCes for tens of hours (not that they had muCh ChoiCe while held in Custody, drugged awake, eyelids Clamped open, like CloCkwork Orange), an interrogator would tell them to think of their assoCiates (or, just as effeCtively, tell them not to think of their associates, sinCe not thinking about what you’re told not to think about is nearly impossible). The resultant activity in the visual cortex would then statistically correlate what the suspects imagined with all their previously reCorded faCial perCeptions, and reConstruCt images of the people the suspeCts brought to mind. Mind reading. Similar visualization teChniques measured CortiCal blood flow with funCtional MRI sCanners, but Cortez teChnology promised to be Cheap, portable, and more aCCurate, the kind of device to deploy in an interview room or an enemy detention Center or even on a remote battlefield. “Well, right now people look kind of green,” Lem said. “The gain is a lot higher in green anyway.” Frank poked a thick finger at Peter. “What’s wrong with your sensor?” Peter’s Chin settled into his Collar. “I believe engineering is performing further testing.” “Engineering?” Frank’s voiCe rose. “What are you? What exactly is your job?” “I reran all the simulations and verified the design. The analysis is correct.” Peter looked up at Frank, pushed his glasses up his nose. “In theory” “Theory? We not selling theory! You need to get down into the lab and figure out what’s wrong.” “I think I Can remap the higher frequenCies and shift the speCtrum toward red,” Lem said. “Faces will look better. Outdoors scenes will look a little burnt, but people are less sensitive to false Color there anyway. I Can bring up the blue a little to Compensate.” “Well, get on it.” Frank punChed his fist into his palm and turned to leave. “Let’s get this show on the road, boys.” Van Hook / Cortez / 5 After Frank left, Peter and Lem sat in silenCe. Peter straightened up in his Chair, leaned forward, and hung his hands between his knees. “I’m going to quit. He hates me. I Can’t do this anymore.” Lem stared at his friend, but Couldn’t see his eyes, turned down, staring at the darker and lighter speckles in the industrial carpeting, a slab of grey noise. “Man, don’t do that. It’s just Frank, the way he is. He doesn’t mean anything by it. Besides, how about all your stoCk? We’re only halfway vested.” Lem got five perCent, finagled two for Peter, while Frank kept twenty, after first-round funding with Raptor Capital on the lead took two thirds of the Company. Peter shook his head slightly, the perturbation quiCkly damping down to stasis. “Hey, it’s not like we’re Chained below deCks in the slave galley. It’s just a job.” Lem waved his hand across the extent of the cubiCle. “StiCk it out for a couple years. Maybe we’ll do something really Cool, make some money, maybe not. We Can always do something else, get another gig. Why not give this a shot?” Peter’s device physics skill set Complemented Lem’s own software expertise. Lem had lured Peter away from UniCom, where they had worked on teChnology similar to what they developed at Cortez, by promising him freedom from the Committees, Consensus, and proCess of a big Company, and a ChanCe to do something great. Lem wasn’t sure Peter Cared about the startup equity, but he seemed delighted, as muCh as he ever showed positive emotion, to esCape UniCom team-building exerCises and projeCt reviews. At Cortez he did indeed design something extraordinary, a sensor mesh ten times the previous density and sensitivity, in a flexible CirCuit that fit the back of the head like a skullCap. A breakthrough, if they Could get it to work Consistently. So good an innovation that UniCom had sued Cortez for theft of trade seCrets, employee poaChing, breaCh of Customer Confidentiality, non-Compete violations, anything they Could throw in front of a judge. Wouldn’t stiCk, though, Lem and Peter had started with a blank sheet. Mostly blank, anyway. “No.” Peter straightened and folded his arms aCross his Chest. “He wants to get rid of me. He’ll see, I Cannot be insulted like this.” “Look, why don’t you Come down the lab with me? I don’t think you’ve run the headset sinCe my last update, have you? It’s really Cool, you Can pretty muCh reCognize people you think of.” Van Hook / Cortez / 6 “I can’t do that. It’s not safe.” “What? Of course it’s safe. We wear it every day. You wore it.” “How do you know it’s not generating thoughts inside your head?” Lem sat up, gripped the armrests of his Chair, grinned at Peter.

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