Startled awake, David realized this was the solution he had been looking for. By the following morning, he had booked a flight to Russia. He spent the next several months traveling around Russia, China, and Southeast Asia. He hung around Internet cafes and tracked down people on message boards. He met some of the most skilled virus hackers around the world, cultivated relationships with them, and learned the tricks of their trade.
David had been sitting in an Internet cafe in Shenzhen watching kids farm gold in online games when he got the email from Christine. It was a simple one page form, sign here, fax back, you’re divorced. He signed the document, and fell back into a deep depression for a week. Then he poured himself ever more deeply into his mission. He spent a few weeks in Japan, then a month wandering around the Scandinavian countries.
After he learned what he needed, he came back to the States, and holed up in a tiny apartment in Southeast Portland, around the corner from a burrito shop, coffee house, and grocery. Everything he needed in a one block radius. He told no one he was back.
Over the course of many more months, he laboriously crafted an email virus using his specialized knowledge of ELOPe’s core algorithms. In what appeared to be innocuous plain English email text, he had hidden the virus. That virus would be intercepted by ELOPe. David had created a message which, by the very act of being analyzed by ELOPe’s natural language processor, would cause it to behave erratically. First ELOPe would spuriously generate other emails containing the same email text, sent to random recipients. Then the AI would try to optimize the received email, endlessly expanding upon the text. When it exhausted the memory of the computer, it would start to swap bits of the message out to the hard drive, with the side effect of gradually erasing the data stored there. Over the course of hours, the computer would slowly be wiped of operating systems, programs, and user data, until suddenly the computer would stop functioning. Sending the email would destroy every copy of ELOPe it encountered, and because it replicated endlessly, that meant it would find and destroy of every copy of ELOPe in existence.
David had iteratively tested and improved the virus on an isolated cluster of thirty computers spread across folding tables in his apartment. Using a salvaged copy of ELOPe, he ran trials of his virus until he could consistently wipe out every trace of ELOPe on the computers. Then he would restore the computers, make improvements, and try again. Now, a year after the failed attack on ELOPe, he was ready to release the virus. No combination of virus scanners or evolved variations of ELOPe he had on the isolated cluster of computers had been able to detect or stop his virus.
As he ate the microwaved dumplings, he thought about telling Gene about the planned release. Gene was the one person he still kept in touch with occasionally and trusted. In fact, if it hadn’t been for Gene’s newsletter, with his tips about how to live without being monitored by computers, he surely wouldn’t have made it this far. On reflection, he decided not to tell Gene. He had worked in isolation for the last four months, and he wouldn’t risk what he had done in the last few hours just for the comfort of an old friend.
After dinner, he decided there was no point to waiting. After all, he thought, he might get cold feet like the crew of the Enterprise. He had a directional wireless antenna waiting for just this occasion. The directional antenna was a modified Pringles can, the granddaddy of wifi hacks. It would allow David to pick up someone else’s wireless signal at distances of up to two miles. David used the antenna to find a neighbor a few blocks away with an open wireless network. He connected to their network, and used an otherwise clean computer to send the virus to a few hundred email addresses he had from a year ago. He then immediately shut down the network connection. He checked the clock, and saw that the elapsed time he was online was less than a minute. He was probably safe. Hopefully untraceable.
He poured himself another glass of wine. He smiled. The first time he could remember smiling in a long time. He waited. If everything went well, then by morning ELOPe would be gone.
To: WellingtonHospital.intranet.admitting_form@email-to-web-bridge.avogadrocorp.com
Body:
Patient-Name: David Ryan
Admittance-Type: Transfer
Patient-State: anesthetic/general
Procedure: AvoOS implantation / version 1.0
Laura Kendal stared in shock at the patient. She glanced at the name tag. David Ryan… Scheduled for AvoImplant. Checking her handheld computer, she saw that it matched the schedule for the day. All normal, except never in her history as a nurse had she ever seen an anesthetized patient left alone. There were no conditions under which it would be considered acceptable.
“Who admitted this patient?” Laura yelled sternly, looking around the department. She was the senior nurse on duty at the new AvoClinic. “Who allowed the transfer of an anesthetized patient?”
The other two nurses on duty shrugged their shoulders.
“When I got back from rounds, he was here, prepped for surgery,” one nurse answered. “His records are in order, the procedure was scheduled. I checked with Doctor Thatcher, and he has this patient scheduled for an implant. The paperwork says he was anesthetized by one of the staff anesthesiologists from the main hospital. I don’t why he would have left the patient alone, unless there was an emergency.”
“Doctor Thatcher is already prepped, and waiting for the patient in surgery. Can I take him back?” the other nurse asked Laura.
“Yeah, I guess so,” Laura responded. “Go ahead. I’ll contact the anesthesiologist, and if there isn’t a damn good reason for what he did, I am filing a complaint with the anesthesiology board.”
David woke up. He felt groggy, as though he had overslept. His mouth was painfully dry. He glanced around. The blue and beige walls were unfamiliar. It looked like a hospital. As he continued puzzling over the unexpected vista, a woman entered through the doorway, and walked up to his bed.
“Mr. Ryan, I’m Laura. I see you’re awake. Can you see me alright? Please follow my fingers.” She waved two fingers in front of his eyes, to see if he could track them.
Involuntarily he followed her fingers.
“Very good. Now, the procedure went well. How are you feeling?” she asked.
“Wait… Where am I? What happened to me?” David replied.
“Don’t worry, Mr. Ryan, a little disorientation is normal after the procedure. You’re at the AvoClinic at Wellington Hospital. We just completed the Avogadro brain implant procedure. Doctor Thatcher says the surgery went perfectly. It will take a few days for your brain to become acclimated to the computer interface.”
“What? Brain implant?” David struggled under the drug induced mental fog to understand.
“It’s OK, Mr. Ryan. Please relax. You chose to have the Avogadro implant. You’re so lucky. Your brain is directly connected to the Internet. It takes a few days for your brain to begin interpreting the neural inputs. As soon as you adjust, you’ll be able to read email, use the web, control computers — all directly from your brain!”
“No!” David cried weakly, struggling to get up. “No!” He tried to pull the IV line out of his arm.