The Dummies Guide for Superheroes: Introduction
Chapter 10

Monica sat back in a leather chair, staring at the screenhanging on the wall of the conference room. The image frozen on the screen ofthe confused people in the lobby. She turned, facing the group of people aroundthe table. Her eyes went to Q.E.D president Stanford Giles. He was Monica’smale equivalent in every way. To keep the company on track and satisfy hissecret agenda, he would sacrifice anyone.

“This group of humans with very unique abilities is dangerous,”Stan began. “They killed four guards, five officers, a firefighter, and twoparamedics. They need to be stopped but we can’t send the average policeman orsoldier after them.”

“Do you really think they’re going to come back?” someone asked.

“They were behind the attacks in Cairo and London. They stolethe body of a man in their organization to cover who they are. The board and Ibelieve they will. We must come up with a way to capture or kill them, which iswhy you are all here. You are group leaders on projects that may be capable of doingthis. Results are expected by the end of the week.”

“A week?” a woman asked. “My project is nowhere near ready toshow anything in a week. We haven’t even had human trials.”

Stan looked at her. “Then you’d better speed things up. Ifanyone cannot provide results in a week, you won’t need to come back Monday.Dismissed.”

The group of people left, leaving Monica, Stan, and Brundon.

Brundon sat in a chair next to the door. He sat in that chair atevery meeting because it offered a quick getaway.

Stan looked up at the monitor. “Show me the six people again.”

Monica rewound the digital footage so they could clearly see thesix masked people, moments before they froze everyone in the lobby. She pausedthe video on that image.

“Their leader knows someone in the company.” Stan pointed atLuke on the screen. “Only employees of Q.E.D. have keys to the morgue. I wantall locks with keys changed to electronic locks immediately and then replace outwho this person got that key from. When you do, Monica, I expect that leak tobe dealt with permanently.”

“Yes, sir,” Monica answered.

“I was told we had DNA samples taken from the body they stole.”

“We did, sir,” Brundon said, “but the results wereinconclusive.”

“I’d like to see the first results.”

“Oh… Well… I—”

Monica interrupted. “After reviewing it, I told him to deletethose and start over, sir. I think someone may have sabotaged the test. I hadnew samples sent to an outside source, under one of the shell company names.”

Brundon was shocked that she was covering for him, although heguessed she had an ulterior motives. But he wasn’t foolish enough to toss awayan easy out and let her take the heat for the incident.

“I trust your judgment, Monica, but I want to see the results nomatter the outcome.”

“Yes, sir,” Monica answered.

The door opened and Brundon looked up. A blond woman and darkskinned man entered the room. Stan stood, holding out his hand.

“Welcome Stacey, and… Idi, correct?” Stan paused while the threeshook hands. “I heard you had a break in at your home last week. Did ourtechnicians get your security system upgraded?”

“Yes, sir. Thank you for your generosity,” Idi answered as hesat down. “It was just a junkie looking for money.”

Stan looked at Brundon. “Why are you still here? Go typesomething.”

Brundon usually was offended at the demeaning remarks Stan made,often insinuating he wasn’t much better than a ditzy secretary. But also, Stanwas even scarier than Monica, and when he dismissed Brundon, the NOC would rushout from fear. That wasn’t the case today. This was the first time he’d seenthe security footage of the attack and something he heard made his heart skip acouple beats. He was anxious to return to the Core and confirm his suspicion.

Brundon entered The Core and fell into his chair

“Like a frog that swallowed acid…” Brundon whispered. “I saidthat once when we had lunch.” Brundon thought on the comment for a long time.Suddenly he ordered, “BRINDA, retrieve the storage unit from R45, C12.”

BRINDA’s face appeared on the holographic projector. “It iscurrently in use.”

“Inform the project manager it will be offline for a few minutesand retrieve it.”

“The project is time sensitive. If I—”

Brundon looked suspiciously at her. “Why are you arguing withme? That’s the second time in less than a week you’ve argued with me when I’veasked to look at a storage unit. What’s going on?”

Holograph and human stared at each other for several strainedseconds.

“I will alert the project manager of the interruption,” shereplied. “Stand by.”

He stood, watching her face. She watched him with an emotionlessface, as it should be for a computer. Behind him, he heard drones moving andturned to watch. They moved up to the 45th row, and across to cell 12. Theypulled out the body and started down to the floor with it. Brundon glanced overhis shoulder at BRINDA. There was still no emotion on her face, and she wasstill watching him.

For years he’d gone back and forth between believing he wasparanoid and believing he wasn’t imagining things, but sometimes it felt likeBRINDA was hiding things from him. This wasn’t something she was programmed todo, it wasn’t the result of being hacked or infected with a virus or malware.This was something that the computer itself was doing, something that acomputer should never be able to do.

And if BRINDA was capable of deceit that meant it was capable ofmaking free will decisions and it was aware of its existence. But where was thetangible proof? The odd behavior she exhibited wasn’t enough – he could chalkthat up to the system’s strange code or normal hardware flaws. But… But if hisbest friend wasn’t in the spot that Brundon had put him, in a spot that Brundoncould see every day and be close to Luke, and if that was true but the computerwouldn’t tell him why he wasn’t there, then maybe, just maybe,BRINDA was sentient. If he discovered that truth today thepossibilities it opened up were vast! Monica and others would probablycongratulate him on his discovery, he could become famous. Yes, those were alltrue, but none of those would bring back his best friend so none of thatmattered to him. If he found out that BRINDA was sentient, and his suspicionthat Luke wasn’t where he’d put him, he knew exactly how he was going to dealwith this secret.

The droids placed the body on a table. He walked up to the body,staring at the face. He was a security guard Brundon had seen around but hadbeen either fired or stopped coming to work one day. He had never liked the guybecause he was always teasing Brundon like some high school jock. But all ofthat past was a moot point to Brundon. The point that was important was thiswas not Luke.

“BRINDA…” he began.

“Yes?”

He turned, looking up at her. “Where is he? Where is the unitthat’s supposed to be in R45, C12?”

She didn’t answer.

“Did Monica move him?”

“No.”

“Well, he didn’t get up and walk out on his own, so where ishe?”

“Perhaps.”

“What?”

She said nothing.

Brundon gasped, realizing what her response really meant. “Hewalked out of here? He left on his own? Luke’s alive? How? How the hell is healive!? He was dead when I put him in that cell, BRINDA. How the hell did hecome back to life!?”

Again, no answer.

Brundon wanted to know if he was right, but somehow he knew shewouldn’t tell him yes or no to those questions. Somehow Luke had come back tolife, that he was sure of, and she knew he’d walked out on his own. She hadbeen lying to him, to Monica, to everyone, for… For how long? How long did shecomprehend and know how to lie?

“BRINDA,” he whispered. “Are you sentient?”

“That is too broad of a question. Clarify.”

He smiled. A normal computer would spit out some definition froma dictionary, encyclopedia, or urban snopes. It wouldn’t tell him to clarify avery clear term. His smile faded, because if she lied about this next questionhe wasn’t sure he could handle that.

“Luke is alive, isn’t he? No. No, that’s not what I wanna know.”Tears burned his eyes, threatening to escape. He hadn’t expected this questionto be so hard to ask. “Is… Is my best friend safe? Have you hidden somewheresafe?”

They stared at each other for minutes.

She finally whispered, “Yes.”

Brundon closed his eyes and let out a sigh of relief. The urgeto cry faded with another exhale. His only friend in the world was alive! Hedid want to know where he was, and how he’d come back to life, and how BRINDAhad snuck him out of Q.E.D., but Brundon also wanted to protect his onlyfriend. Just knowing Luke had been with the group that had broken in, wreckedthe building, and stolen a body with strange DNA was dangerous knowledge forhim to have, knowledge that could hurt Luke. If Brundon didn’t know where hewas or how he’d come back to life, then he couldn’t tell Monica or anyone inQ.E.D., and Luke would remain protected by BRINDA.

With a single, sure, nod he told her, “Tell him I’m happy, andyou keep him safe. Don’t give me a reason to rat you out, computer. I care moreabout what happens to him than you, understand that?”

“I do understand that, and I will not make revealing what youknow a viable option. I give my word, Brundon.”

Brundon sniffed, and then said louder, “Return the storage unitto the cell. It isn’t burned out like I thought it was.”

“Compliance, Brundon.”

The droids took the dead man away, returning him to his cell. Hewalked over to his desk and started work on a project.

“Brundon,” BRINDA said.

“Yeah?”

“Determining if something is sentient is a multi-facetedobservation, don’t you think?”

He smiled up at her. “I think so.”

“Do we agree that sometimes the best answer is no answer atall?”

“We do.”

She said nothing more.