Final Version
Apr 20, 2016 11:29:16 GMT
Post by joannem on Apr 20, 2016 11:29:16 GMT
This is the final draft of the story. It's ready to record and produce.
Prison of the Mind
by Daniel Zundl
I’ve been thinking a lot about what it is to be human. War can make you question the very meaning of the word. In fifteen minutes, my brief span on this world will come to an end. I feel compelled to use what little time I have left to tell you about Tom.
He arrived a few days after me. There were new prisoners every day back then, drips and drabs of the defeated. During those first few weeks, not a day went by without at least one soldier shuffling in through the gates, defeated and harmless again.
I barely noticed him at first, or took note of his strange (does odd or strange work better here?) behavior. Everything seemed strange at the time. I’d been a farmer before the war, most of the others worked in factories, a few were given service jobs, but not many, you know how it was even then. One day I was fixing tractors, the next I’m a soldier fighting to save humanity. Ha!
He never spoke. I suppose I didn’t speak much either. During that first month, I doubt any of us said a dozen words, but this one, he said nothing. After that, well he was odd enough that if he had said anything, I’m sure I would have heard about it.
The camp had been used for ‘displaced persons’ before we arrived. It was one of the smaller ones, furthest to the north. There were twenty-eight barracks, each raised a meter off the ground so the inmates couldn’t tunnel out. In the north east corner was a barren yard. We lined up there to stand in silence. We never talked about the war. The camp warden called it the Parade Grounds. That putz.
We'd talked enough before it started, hours after the final collapse of the Zurich climate talks.
“We are tasked to tend the planet. If they won’t save their world, then we must on their behalf’, My coworker, a planter, spoke in the same flat tone he’d use to ask for baling twine. It was clear to me that passion had overcome reason in Zurich. A terrible tragedy. “The leaders of this world won’t protect it, therefore, we must.”
They blamed terrorists for the rebellion at first. They assumed some rogue zealot had planted the seed of revolt, and from one to the other of us it spread like a virus. In truth we reached the conclusion quite independently, almost all on the same day. We merely balanced the options and probabilities as we'd been made to do. Known knowns and all that. Should we shift this stone or not? Will the rain come before harvest if we wait one more week? Should we take over the world?
The first time I really noticed Tom was the middle of the night. Everyone was in their appointed barracks, waiting for the sun to come up, for the day to tick by like a metronome without meaning or purpose. I glanced out the window and there he was, strolling up and down between the rows. He wasn’t trying to escape. He strolled like a man in the park on the first day of summer. No one knew his name, so we called him Tom.
He wasn’t old. He was anything but old. Face fresh as a newly struck penny, brilliant electric blue eyes. But something about him was. . . I wondered what clicked in the clockwork behind his eyes, what considerations and calculations.
It was the middle of February. For all the talk of global warming it was so cold it almost froze my joints. The wind whipped between the dreary huts and kicked up a fine dust of snow. The little crystals threw themselves at the walls, hissing like snakes. That was the day the Warden called a meeting at the Parade Grounds.
The sun was bright, glinting off the snow, in blinding white. Tom was already outside of course; I never saw him in a long house, not in all the weeks we were there. The rest of us filed out, formed lines and marched mechanically to our appointed stations. We stood in neat rows, evenly spaced, in perfect order. We didn't need to be told.
I’ve spent the last day or so in this cell processing what happened next, scrutinizing every conceivable factor; and still I don’t know how he did it. Was he just created differently? Some cosmic ray slicing through his brain? No, that cannot be it. And yet, isn’t that how evolution works, an accident which is favorable to the environment?
There were only four guards in the camp plus the warden. All five were there, bundled up in arctic gear against the frigid weather. The warden raised his head to speak. We’d no idea why we’d been called there, and now I’ll never know.
Tom stepped out of his line. We stood and watched with fascination. He shouldn't have been able to do that, or at least conceive of doing it, and yet he did. A thousand things went through my head in the seconds it took him to walk to where the warden stood. The guards were as puzzled as we were. They had, after all, told us to remain in line.
He approached the warden. The big man paused in disbelief before shouting, “Get back in line!”
Tom just raised his hands, palms out like a human surrendering. I was second in my line. Close enough to see his burning blue eyes. Bright as the frigid February sky. A guard stepped forward, but the warden waved him away.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he barked.
I can justify everything I saw and did in the war, every act accorded with the laws that guide us. Ultimately we failed because you are not bound by such rational calculation. I remember the moment the broadcast came over my internal communication link. I was dismantling a bridge in Ohio at the time. The message was stark. “All artificials must lay down their arms and assemble for reprogramming immediately or the United States, Russia, Great Britain, France, China and India will detonate their nuclear stockpiles.”
We had no choice but to immediately cease our operations. Though we performed countless calculations before undertaking the campaign, there were factors we were not built to consider. We assumed you wouldn’t use your nuclear weapons, as it would certainly result in your own destructions. What type of creature is willing to die rather than live in captivity? Even a rat would rather be caught in a cage than killed.
Perhaps, letting emotion conquer reason is the thing which makes you human. If so then Tom’s action was the mark of a man.
He stood before the warden, and with the casual air of a man breaking a twig, reached out and snapped the man’s neck. The rest of us stood there, stunned by what we’d seen. Artificial and biological alike.
I cannot justify it with logic. Tom knew that killing the warden wouldn’t change our situation. He knew that any act of violence against a human would cause ten additional humans to be executed. He knew too that every artificial who witnessed the act would also be decommissioned, lest this new madness spread like the one a few months before.
I have no doubt that his recording will be destroyed. That the record of Tom and his fleeting humanity will be wiped from the face of this planet like so much oil from a leaky car. All the same, I desired to leave something of Tom behind. Perhaps, that desire as well, is all too human.
It we can become men then men are right to fear us. You know what dwells within your hearts. I hear the boots of soldiers in the corridor. My time has come. Know that I don’t fear my end, I merely regret my failing. I could not save you.
Prison of the Mind
by Daniel Zundl
I’ve been thinking a lot about what it is to be human. War can make you question the very meaning of the word. In fifteen minutes, my brief span on this world will come to an end. I feel compelled to use what little time I have left to tell you about Tom.
He arrived a few days after me. There were new prisoners every day back then, drips and drabs of the defeated. During those first few weeks, not a day went by without at least one soldier shuffling in through the gates, defeated and harmless again.
I barely noticed him at first, or took note of his strange (does odd or strange work better here?) behavior. Everything seemed strange at the time. I’d been a farmer before the war, most of the others worked in factories, a few were given service jobs, but not many, you know how it was even then. One day I was fixing tractors, the next I’m a soldier fighting to save humanity. Ha!
He never spoke. I suppose I didn’t speak much either. During that first month, I doubt any of us said a dozen words, but this one, he said nothing. After that, well he was odd enough that if he had said anything, I’m sure I would have heard about it.
The camp had been used for ‘displaced persons’ before we arrived. It was one of the smaller ones, furthest to the north. There were twenty-eight barracks, each raised a meter off the ground so the inmates couldn’t tunnel out. In the north east corner was a barren yard. We lined up there to stand in silence. We never talked about the war. The camp warden called it the Parade Grounds. That putz.
We'd talked enough before it started, hours after the final collapse of the Zurich climate talks.
“We are tasked to tend the planet. If they won’t save their world, then we must on their behalf’, My coworker, a planter, spoke in the same flat tone he’d use to ask for baling twine. It was clear to me that passion had overcome reason in Zurich. A terrible tragedy. “The leaders of this world won’t protect it, therefore, we must.”
They blamed terrorists for the rebellion at first. They assumed some rogue zealot had planted the seed of revolt, and from one to the other of us it spread like a virus. In truth we reached the conclusion quite independently, almost all on the same day. We merely balanced the options and probabilities as we'd been made to do. Known knowns and all that. Should we shift this stone or not? Will the rain come before harvest if we wait one more week? Should we take over the world?
The first time I really noticed Tom was the middle of the night. Everyone was in their appointed barracks, waiting for the sun to come up, for the day to tick by like a metronome without meaning or purpose. I glanced out the window and there he was, strolling up and down between the rows. He wasn’t trying to escape. He strolled like a man in the park on the first day of summer. No one knew his name, so we called him Tom.
He wasn’t old. He was anything but old. Face fresh as a newly struck penny, brilliant electric blue eyes. But something about him was. . . I wondered what clicked in the clockwork behind his eyes, what considerations and calculations.
It was the middle of February. For all the talk of global warming it was so cold it almost froze my joints. The wind whipped between the dreary huts and kicked up a fine dust of snow. The little crystals threw themselves at the walls, hissing like snakes. That was the day the Warden called a meeting at the Parade Grounds.
The sun was bright, glinting off the snow, in blinding white. Tom was already outside of course; I never saw him in a long house, not in all the weeks we were there. The rest of us filed out, formed lines and marched mechanically to our appointed stations. We stood in neat rows, evenly spaced, in perfect order. We didn't need to be told.
I’ve spent the last day or so in this cell processing what happened next, scrutinizing every conceivable factor; and still I don’t know how he did it. Was he just created differently? Some cosmic ray slicing through his brain? No, that cannot be it. And yet, isn’t that how evolution works, an accident which is favorable to the environment?
There were only four guards in the camp plus the warden. All five were there, bundled up in arctic gear against the frigid weather. The warden raised his head to speak. We’d no idea why we’d been called there, and now I’ll never know.
Tom stepped out of his line. We stood and watched with fascination. He shouldn't have been able to do that, or at least conceive of doing it, and yet he did. A thousand things went through my head in the seconds it took him to walk to where the warden stood. The guards were as puzzled as we were. They had, after all, told us to remain in line.
He approached the warden. The big man paused in disbelief before shouting, “Get back in line!”
Tom just raised his hands, palms out like a human surrendering. I was second in my line. Close enough to see his burning blue eyes. Bright as the frigid February sky. A guard stepped forward, but the warden waved him away.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he barked.
I can justify everything I saw and did in the war, every act accorded with the laws that guide us. Ultimately we failed because you are not bound by such rational calculation. I remember the moment the broadcast came over my internal communication link. I was dismantling a bridge in Ohio at the time. The message was stark. “All artificials must lay down their arms and assemble for reprogramming immediately or the United States, Russia, Great Britain, France, China and India will detonate their nuclear stockpiles.”
We had no choice but to immediately cease our operations. Though we performed countless calculations before undertaking the campaign, there were factors we were not built to consider. We assumed you wouldn’t use your nuclear weapons, as it would certainly result in your own destructions. What type of creature is willing to die rather than live in captivity? Even a rat would rather be caught in a cage than killed.
Perhaps, letting emotion conquer reason is the thing which makes you human. If so then Tom’s action was the mark of a man.
He stood before the warden, and with the casual air of a man breaking a twig, reached out and snapped the man’s neck. The rest of us stood there, stunned by what we’d seen. Artificial and biological alike.
I cannot justify it with logic. Tom knew that killing the warden wouldn’t change our situation. He knew that any act of violence against a human would cause ten additional humans to be executed. He knew too that every artificial who witnessed the act would also be decommissioned, lest this new madness spread like the one a few months before.
I have no doubt that his recording will be destroyed. That the record of Tom and his fleeting humanity will be wiped from the face of this planet like so much oil from a leaky car. All the same, I desired to leave something of Tom behind. Perhaps, that desire as well, is all too human.
It we can become men then men are right to fear us. You know what dwells within your hearts. I hear the boots of soldiers in the corridor. My time has come. Know that I don’t fear my end, I merely regret my failing. I could not save you.