At fifty-four, Peter was older than her by thirteen years. He was cautious and worried about what it would look like, marrying his friend’s widow — and so had Sophie. They’d kissed outside the restaurant, awkwardly, like middle-schoolers. His hand grazed her boob, and he’d stammered an apology, admitting that all the kissing he’d done over the past thirty years had generally involved boob-touching. Maybe it was the fact that he’d thought it necessary to apologize, maybe it was that his face felt so warm on the cold night, but she had decided then and there that this was a man with whom she could spend the rest of her life — or his life, which was the more likely outcome.
Once they’d made the decision, it was “Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead.” Peter Li was a nervous boyfriend but a rock-steady fiancé and husband. He was the kind of man who looked you in the eye and said what was on his mind. He never stammered to Sophie again after that night. He did, however, prove that fifty-four was far from too old for husbandly duties and frequently touched her boobs — hence the little critter in her belly.
The machine interrupted her thoughts, answering some question that her son had posed.
“It’s creepy that she knows your name.” Martha leaned forward again. “Cassandra, is your mission to take over our brains?”
“Okay, that’s it,” Sophie said, snatching up the plastic pyramid.
“Mom!” James protested. “You heard her. She’s only trying to make our lives easier, not piss you off.”
“That’s a big fat nope, mister.” Sophie popped out the battery and dropped the device none too gently on the table.
Martha picked it up, puppetlike, mimicking Cassandra’s synthesized voice. “Resistance is futile, Sophie Li. My scans are complete. I am already aware that you carry new life in your belly…”
“Knock it off,” Sophie said.
“But, Mom!” James was in full whining mode now. “This kind of AI is our future. Most of my friends already have something like this.”
“Maybe,” Sophie said. “But not us. And anyway, Peter would smash it to bits with a hammer and then burn the bits. In fact, take it outside to the trash and let’s forget this thing was ever in our house.”
James slumped, knowing when to argue and when to give it a rest. He grabbed the little pyramid and started for the kitchen door. “Good-bye, Cassandra,” he said. “Sorry my mom is stuck in 2002.”
Sophie half expected to see the thing glow in response even though she’d taken out the battery.
Nothing happened, but on the table, the small CPU in her son’s phone was working overtime. Cassandra had done much more than pair with the cell phone. She had migrated, connecting to the security system, camping out in the contact list on James’s phone, silently, with no pulsing light or synthesized voice — without being prompted. There was no icon on the phone’s screen.
Sophie was too fixated on the guilt over the lie to remember that James had done something with his cell phone. Even if she confessed her silliness to Peter, the fact that James had downloaded the app that authorized the intrusive device to take over his cell was already forgotten.
The pyramid was gone, but Cassandra was there to stay.
U.S. Senator Michelle Chadwick’s new boyfriend proved as competent at engaging conversation as he was in bed — which, Chadwick thought, was pretty damned competent. Better still, he shared her political views, right up to the visceral hatred of all things Jack Ryan.
