The Lucinda Simulation by Craven Andrew

Author:Craven, Andrew [Craven, Andrew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-11-06T00:00:00+00:00

Eight

Like Advance Notice , One Nation has an opening introduction with flying letters and dramatic music; unlike Advance Notice , it looks and sounds professional. Its four guests are positioned behind podia which extend diagonally from O’Caffery who sits on a stool in the middle. These five people, however, are not necessarily in the same room together—or in the same building or even in the same time zone. They’ve been holographically spliced into a single, seamless shot. Behind them stretches a cityscape which is also not physically there and may not be a real city anywhere at all.

During the credits, both host and guests are dark silhouettes. This lends the program an air of mystique and confrontation, something akin to a game show—with the goal of being just as entertaining. When the music ends, the camera zooms on O’Caffery. He’s somewhere in his forties; his hair is feathered, swept to the side, and carefully dyed to conceal all but a distinguished trace of grey.

He jumps right in: “Welcome to the show, everyone, a One Nation special edition. We have with us Abbi Rondo, a name you’ve probably been hearing a lot lately. She’s the presumed target of the horrendous Triple-Tech Bombing, just outside Atlanta.”

The screen cuts to a recap of the bombing: a highlights reel containing quick-cuts of the explosion, aftermath footage from attendees’ personal recording devices, and miscellaneous sound-bites—screams, sobs, chaos—accompanied by O’Caffery’s doomsday voiceover.

“Here to speak about her horrific ordeal, in her first network appearance—a One Nation exclusive—is Miss Abigail Rondo.”

The camera pans to Abbi. Her podium activates, glowing a pale white, and stage lights bring her out of the shadows. She’s almost unrecognizable. A few blocks away at ZMG’s local studio, the on-site crew has completely made her over: no glasses, hair down—trimmed, lowlights, highlights, styled—and professional makeup. She looks stunning. But I wonder if she feels stunning. Does the makeover give her confidence or does she feel clownish?

She says, “Thanks for having me, Ellis.”

“We’re going to start with the basics: Who is Abbi Rondo?”

Abbi smiles, sheepishly. “Wow, that’s a big one—how much time do we have?”

“Well, I have a quick bio here: A.I. engineer at Solipsystems; enrolled at MIT at just sixteen years old; undergrad contributions to public transit recognized by the Federal Department of Transportation—obviously a brilliant mind. Maybe a bit of an overachiever?”

Abbi shrugs. “Maybe.”

“Nothing wrong with that. I was top of my class, Yale—I won’t say the year. Were you active in student government or politics in general?”

“No, not at all. I had a heavy course-load.”

“And what about now.”

“I have a heavy workload.”

“Nothing wrong with that, either. Let’s pivot to Atlanta; I’m going to read a quote here, one people are probably familiar with by now.” O’Caffery’s eyes drift to an off-camera prompter; what he reads appears as text on the screen. “[…] these are machine minds we’re dealing with, not human beings. To a human being, inevitability might—” These are your words from just before the blast. What were you about to say? And give us some context.

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