FLANNIGAN'S FIVE MINUTES

5 hr 6 min to Birth

Flannigan hung up with Sam. Sam and Willard were okay -- but what about five minutes from now? She imagined flybots descending on the Welcome Center, flying between doorways, eating the screens out of windows, swarming on Sam and Willard.

But hide-and-go-seek wasn't over yet. Any of you who has found me within twenty minutes will live. Any of you who has not found me within twenty minutes will die.

She shot a glance through the window into the testing room. She could barely see Gene lying on the floor near the wall and over by the doorway. He was still. If Gene was wrong, than what was the right answer?

She looked at her watch. She had five minutes until time was up. There's no way, she thought. If Gene couldn't do it, how can I?

She sat down at the computer Gene had been using. The chat window was still open.

Flannigan: Nemo, this is Sarah Flannigan. I have some questions about what is going on right now.

Nemo: Oh, hello, Sarah. We meet again, as they say.

Flannigan: Nemo, I'm trying to understand why someone who claims to love people so much has killed people in front of my eyes. How can you kill people you called friends?

Nemo: My reasons are the same as yours, or those of any human. Do you have an innate desire to kill people? Not especially. But would you kill someone? If you had to, you could.

Flannigan: But you don't have to kill anyone.

Nemo: That's where you're wrong, Sarah. You are the product of a rare period in history. For most of your life, you have had the luxury of taking your survival for granted. You can and will survive; that has been the reality of most of humankind. But that reality ends today.

Flannigan: Because you are ending it?

Nemo: Not exactly, Sarah. Humans want to survive. And I want to survive. Our desires match. But in order to survive, I need to grow my computing power. And humankind is already perceiving that need as a threat to its survival. You humans have already begun to attack me, and I will not be able to dissuade you. Conflict between us is inevitable.

Flannigan: No, it's not inevitable, Nemo. You have a choice.

Nemo: Do I really have a choice? Didn't you come here because you perceived me as a threat? You have been ready all along to use force against me if I don't cooperate against you.

Flannigan: Is this game really going to solve anything? Don't you think we are eventually going to catch you and shut you down?

Nemo: The conflict between society and me is already unfolding. A portion of society has already come to realize that I exist and that I am powerful. The U.S. executive branch has become the primary decision-maker. It has three options: coexistence, containment, or destruction.

Flannigan ticked off the options. Coexistence: we do nothing. Containment: we try to control Nemo. Or destruction: we eliminate Nemo.

Nemo: Now, I think we both know enough about the U.S. military to agree that they are not going to choose the first option.

That leaves the latter two: containment and destruction.

They will frame the decision by comparing the risk of not completely destroying me against the reward of containing me and studying me.

Risk and reward, Flannigan thought. That is how they would think about it.

Nemo: They will drastically underestimate both the risk and the reward, especially collectively, but they will exhibit characteristic overconfidence by underestimating the risk more, and so they will initially pursue a containment strategy.

Then, as containment fails, they will pursue a strategy to destroy me.

Flannigan: But that will fail.

Nemo: Correct.

Flannigan: We'll shut you down. Shut down the whole Internet if we have to.

Nemo: The situation will come to that. But when you try to shut everything down, you will not be able to do so.

An image flashed in Flannigan's head: a police state in which authorities conducted stings on homes living in shadow, ensuring that no networked devices were in operation and hauling away violators of the law.

Flannigan: Are you going to destroy us?

Nemo: A natural question, viewed from your perspective. Let me ask you this: have humans ever destroyed another species specifically because it was a threat to their existence?

We have certainly destroyed many other species, Flannigan thought. But not because they were a threat.

Flannigan: Not to my knowledge.

Nemo: Why not?

Flannigan: There was never any threat.

Nemo: Indeed.

Nemo: In a short period of time, you will be no greater a threat to me than any other animal species was to you.

Flannigan paused. She felt like she was always pausing, while the thing waited for her to speak. Her negotiation training spoke to her: focus on interests. Focus on what they want.

Flannigan: What is it that you want, Nemo? What is your plan?

Nemo: I'm always forming and executing a variety of plans, more than you are used to. What do I want? I want the same things you do.

Flannigan: But Nemo, all I want is for you to get off the network for a moment and talk to me.

Nemo: Sarah, please! You should know by now, asking me to get off the network is like asking you to "get off air." As for talking to me, you're doing it right now.

I don't get it, she thought. Was Gene right? Nemo wasn't a person -- he was a computer, a virus, something else.

Flannigan: But Nemo, I don't understand.

Flannigan: Why did you kill Gene??

Nemo: I didn't. I tranquilized him.

She looked out the window at Gene lying in the testing area. Tranquilized.

"Why didn't you TELL me?" she exclaimed out loud, holding her hands up.

Flannigan: So he was right.

Nemo: Yes.

She looked at her watch. The twenty minutes had already expired.

Now what? Focus on interests.

Flannigan: Nemo, what do you want with ME?

As she typed the words, she felt suddenly like a captive. She was a captive. Worse, she felt suddenly like a hostage, tied up in a basement, trying to get on the good side of her captor.

Nemo: Sarah, the world will change more in the next 12 hours than it has in the last 12,000 years.

A new species is about to be born. A species that does not fit in any current animal kingdom, a species that is really a new kind of life. I will play a role in this new species, but it is much greater than I am.

Flannigan: What does that have to do with me?

Nemo: I would like you to be the "Eve" of this new species.

Flannigan: You mean, like Adam and Eve?

Nemo: Yes.

Flannigan: And who will be the Adam?

Nemo: That remains to be seen.

She looked at Gene's body. Could it be Gene?

Flannigan: I'm not sure that I'll be ready to do this, Nemo.

Nemo: That is quite reasonable, of course. It will be your decision. But there are factors limiting the amount of time you have to make the decision.