The File Read online



  The File

  by

  Michael D. Britton

  * * * *

  Copyright 2011 by Michael D. Britton / Intelligent Life Books

  The twins were only a month old when Lauren’s File became infected.

  Within hours of the intrusion, she was gone, her neural pathways irreparably damaged by the hostile programming that had been downloaded into her mind. After the initial shock, or perhaps, before the shock had worn off, Kyle White made two life-changing decisions: he would have his own File removed, and he would never allow a File to be implanted in either of his babies.

  ۞

  Kyle closed his leather-bound journal and tucked the pen in the gap between the outer binding and the spine. He wiped at the tears that had dried on his deep brown cheeks, and rubbed his cramped hand. In 2087, writing by hand was becoming a lost art, but it was not his sore writing hand that caused his tears – it was his sore heart.

  Today’s journal entry commemorated Kyle’s twentieth wedding anniversary.

  At least, it would have been twenty years of marriage, if Lauren were still alive.

  Writing about Lauren had brought back the memories for Kyle, freshened the wound, and made it hard to believe that it had been sixteen years since he’d seen his wife’s bright eyes and smile, held her close, or heard her whisper in his ear the words, “I love you.”

  Words he would never hear again.

  They had been high school sweethearts. Now forty-three years old and used to being single, Kyle knew that he could never love again.

  At first, the joy of fatherhood was swallowed up in the loss of his companion, but Kyle knew that, if only for the sake of those two helpless infants, he had to muster the strength to go on after the virus took Lauren.

  The worst part was the guilt.

  Although his mind told him it was irrational, Kyle’s heart harbored a gnawing sense of responsibility for his wife’s demise. Kyle had tried to tell himself that even if he’d never been employed by Neuralinx Corporation, someone else would have helped develop the File-GPS interface. But he’d never know if such a platitude were really true.

  The GPS interface was only one of many File applications. For years, people had been using the File for real-time access to the New Internet, or NI. The File had been integrated with wireless communications, allowing constant, in-mind audio-visual contact with any other File user or group of users worldwide.

  The File utilized fully interactive multi-media, giving File users non-stop access to all the world’s data and entertainment, displaying data feeds in the user’s visual cortex and feeding audio directly to the tympanic membrane. File users did their banking, their shopping, their working and their playing through the NI, using the File that had been implanted in their head at two months of age.

  The economy had undergone a dramatic shift, as libraries, bookstores, music stores, video stores, telephone companies, and television and radio stations had all been transformed by the NI revolution. Now everything went straight from production to the NI, and from the NI to the minds of billions of people worldwide.

  Privacy was carefully guarded for all citizens, through strong legislation that was tightly enforced. However, there were sometimes breaches in security, and even viruses that could be debilitating or fatal to someone with the File. Companies made huge profits in the virus-protection business, and virus insurance had become mandatory in 2064, following a spate of deadly virus attacks.

  Kyle’s contribution to this technological revolution was the development of the seamless GPS interface. A File user need only think of a location, and the GPS interface would calculate the path of least resistance and guide them directly there. When a complex web of high-orbit satellites was launched to eliminate any gaps in wireless NI coverage, Kyle was inspired to develop the GPS interface. The new satellite web would provide the perfect delivery system for GPS data to every individual on the planet.

  Following the unveiling of the GPS interface, Kyle got a swift promotion to department head. With the newfound success, Lauren and Kyle decided it was time to start a family. Less than a year later, Kyle felt like he’d been struck by a train when he was left alone with a tiny boy and girl. Kyle wished he had been struck by a train when he found out that the virus that had left his children motherless had found its way into Lauren’s brain through a security weakness in the GPS interface upgrade that she had installed just six months earlier.

  Kyle fell apart.

  He took a leave of absence from Neuralinx and took the twins away to a cabin in the Rockies. He was still there when the twins turned two months old – the typical age for getting the File implanted. Kyle stayed at the cabin, despite frequent calls from the children’s pediatrician indicating they were overdue for the surgery. It was as standard a procedure as circumcision for newborns to get the File at two months. Eventually, Kyle simply blocked any inbound communications in his File that came from the doctor. After a while, he blocked everyone else, too.

  After six months of peace and quiet, Kyle noticed that he had been gradually deactivating File applications, until he was barely using the File at all. The last piece of news he downloaded was from the tech industry. It indicated that the next generation of File being developed would be ten times more powerful, enabling total recall of personal memory for users. But it would also be impossible to remove without causing death. With the realization that man was becoming slave to his own inventions, he decided he wanted the infernal device out of his head forever.

  Over the previous few months he’d made friends with an old veterinarian in the nearest town, a small mountain community where he’d go to stock up on supplies once a week. After much pleading, he’d managed to convince the old man to remove the File from his head.

  Once the headaches dissipated, the freedom Kyle had felt was exhilarating. Alone with his little ones, he knew he could never return to Neuralinx. In fact, he could never return to life as he knew it. He’d be an outcast. He would have to join the Underground. His new life brought him out of the mountains and into the city of Grantsville, Utah, where an Underground cell took him in.

  Now sixteen years had come and gone, and his babies were adults. The official age of adulthood in the U.S. had been lowered to sixteen back in 2037. This was significant now, because adults could choose for themselves whether they would remain with their parents in the Underground, or receive a File and make their own way.

  Unfortunately, Kyle’s son Devin had chosen to leave the Underground and obtain a File. He wanted to be like “normal” people and live a “normal” life. Thankfully, his sister Mikayla was of a different mind. It was Mikayla who entered Kyle’s room and disturbed his reverie.

  “Dad, are you alright?”

  Kyle faked a smile and nodded. “Yeah, sugar, I’m fine.” He took a shaky breath that betrayed his words.

  Mikayla sat next to him on the bed, put her arm around him and leaned her head onto his shoulder. “I know what today is, Daddy. And it’s okay to feel sad.”

  Kyle’s lips formed a thin line. “Thanks.”

  Mikayla changed the subject. “Did you see the latest news on the holo?”

  “I did. So they’ve rounded up more Underground members as part of the latest crackdown on violators of that blasted File Commerce Act.” Kyle slapped his hand down on the bed in frustration. “The FCA is an unconstitutional law, and ought to be struck down, but the Supreme Court is stacked with fascists these days!”

  Kyle glanced over his shoulder to ensure that the door was secure. News like this always made him nervous. Now more than ever, since Devin had decided to leave.

  “I worry about Devin, too,” said Mikayla, saying the words that Kyle di
dn’t want to say. “But don’t worry, he won’t stay mad at you. He knows you didn’t mean the things you said. You were both upset when he left.”

  Kyle smiled a real smile this time. “I know, sweetheart. And thank you. You’re a good girl. Now, how ‘bout fixin’ us some dinner?”

  ۞

  Doctor Nathan Matheson stood hunched over his patient, who was lying facedown on the table in the small operating room of the San Bernardino clinic. The lights attached to his glasses cast yellow light into the small crevasse in the back of the woman’s head. Blood kept filling up the hole, making his job difficult.

  “Can I get more suction?” he said with exasperation. The nurse vacuumed out the excess fluid, revealing a tiny computerized device that was wired into the woman’s cerebral