Chapter 6 – Help or Supervision

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Water spread across the field and reached the road.

A delivery truck approached the narrow bridge, its headlights barely visible through the rain. Water rushed beneath it, rising toward the roadway.

The truck kept coming.

On the opposite side, a school bus approached the intersection. Beyond it, the school was preparing to open. At a construction site across town, a crew waited for materials that hadn’t arrived.

The water reached the bridge deck.

The truck’s brake lights flashed.

Too late.

Its front wheels struck the flooded section. The truck lurched sideways, tires losing their grip. The rear wheels swung toward the guardrail.

Then the current caught it.

The truck slid toward the edge.

Inside the cab, the driver grabbed at his seat belt, fumbling for the release. The truck tilted farther. He pulled at the buckle again.

The world stopped.

Then it rotated.

The truck lifted from the road, sliding backward through the rain. The water retreated beneath the bridge. The bus returned to the intersection.

Everything settled back into place.

The truck was approaching the bend again.

This time, it slowed before reaching the bridge. A moment later, it turned onto a side road.

Across town, the bus changed course. The school delayed its opening. At the construction site, the expected delivery time jumped forward forty minutes.

“But they’re all using your answer,” Ortega said.

“Most of them are using some part of it.”

Naomi rested her hand on the glass rail.

Below them, the miniature town continued its morning. Projected rain swept across its rooftops, and a blue line illuminated the truck’s new route.

“Flooding will close the eastern approach,” the demonstration’s recorded narrator said. “The delivery has been rerouted.”

The visitor center had not opened to the public. Beyond the demonstration, the film room was dark, and a wall of photographs lined the corridor.

Elena had asked Naomi to give General David Ortega, their new Military Liaison, the tour while they waited for the allocation meeting to begin. Ortega had been assigned in case the decline proved to be sabotage. He had spent yesterday with Security. Naomi understood that part. Elena hadn’t said whether he would be reporting on the investigation or directing it. Today, Elena wanted him to see what they were protecting. They had twenty-five minutes.

Ortega watched the delivery time change again.

“The construction crew knows its delivery will be late.”

“And can arrange another one,” Naomi said. “Or move the crew to another job while they wait.”

Naomi had watched groups of children follow this demonstration, each choosing a moving vehicle and objecting when it disappeared behind a building.

“None of those decisions belongs to us,” she said. “We give them forecasts. They decide what to do.”

He stood back to let her move along the model. He was broader than his appointment photograph had suggested, with a square frame and a gentle face. When Elena had introduced them, his hand had nearly enclosed hers, but the handshake had been light.

“Will you be with us for long?”

“I haven’t been given an end date.”

Naomi looked back at the model.

“We haven’t had someone in your role before.”

“I gathered.”

“If you thought we should be doing something differently—how would that work?”

“I’d talk to you about it.”

She nodded, then asked, “And if we didn’t agree?”

“I’d want to understand why.”

She wanted to ask whether he could overrule her. But she didn’t want their first conversation to sound as though she expected to need overruling.

He nodded.

“They’ve asked me to find out what you need.”

“We haven’t worked that out yet.”

“Then I seem to have arrived at the right time.”

Naomi wasn’t sure whether that meant help or supervision.

Naomi pointed to the illuminated paths beneath the model. Lights from the town gathered at the regional data centers, then continued toward the prediction center.

“Here, forecasts undergo a final check before release,” the recorded voice said.

Ortega followed the delivery truck until it reached the construction site.

“Ma’am,” he said, “what happens if the delivery doesn’t arrive?”

“They use what they’ve got. Call someone. Delay something.”

“And everything that depended on it?”

“That depends on what else they can arrange.”

Ortega turned toward her.

“How far has the accuracy fallen?”

“It normally averages about 99.65%. Yesterday’s completed score was 99.32%.”

“What happens if it keeps falling?”

“We only know it had a bad day after the day is over. By then, it’s too late to warn anyone. But if this keeps happening, we’ll have to issue a notice. People will need to know.”

“Even if you don’t know whether tomorrow’s forecasts will be wrong?”

“We’d have reason to expect more of them would be. We just wouldn’t know which ones.”

Naomi rested her hand on the model’s rail.

“The measured score hasn’t been below 99% in more than ten years. Before I worked here.”

“But people still need tomorrow’s forecasts.”

“Yes.”

He looked back at the town. The demonstration had reset. The truck was approaching the road again, and the hills were clear.

“Four hundred million people. One percent. That’s four million people having a surprising day.”

“It doesn’t divide up evenly like that,” Naomi said. “It might be four million small surprises. It might be fifty thousand people having horrible days.”

“What makes the difference?”

“Which forecasts are wrong. And what happens when people act on them.” She watched the rain begin. “And it happens again the next day, and the next. Different people, different problems. Some of them still dealing with what went wrong yesterday.”

“We can’t predict how those mistakes might collide.”

For a moment neither of them spoke.

Then Ortega checked his watch.

“Are we keeping them waiting?”

“Not yet.”

On their way out, Ortega stopped beside a model of Weatherford, the vast residential building that had toppled shortly after it opened. The model’s tiny windows were lit. In the photograph beside it, the building lay across the surrounding streets, its floors crushed together.

“We were on vacation,” he said. “My wife and I. We watched it happen on the television in our hotel room.”

He looked at the photograph.

“We kept waiting for them to show something else.”

In one of the exposed rooms, a kitchen cupboard still hung above a stretch of counter. The floor beneath it was gone.

“What did they miss?”

“The systems kept making adjustments,” Naomi said. “Each one made sense on its own. They weren’t sharing enough information to see what the changes did together.”

“And nobody was responsible for the whole thing?”

“People were responsible. They couldn’t see enough of it.”

On the adjoining screen, Jedediah Ford addressed a congressional committee.

“We can make the computers watch what no one person can,” his recorded voice said.

Ortega looked from the recording to her.

“And that became the Lattice?”

“Part of the argument for it.” Naomi glanced at the time. “They’re expecting us upstairs.”

Naomi checked the time as they left the visitor center. Her phone showed a photograph from Ellie.

The baby had one hand beside his face and the expression of someone who had been interrupted.

Naomi enlarged it. Ellie had sent three since six that morning. In the first he was asleep. In the second he appeared to be considering it.

Can you come today?

Ellie had given birth two nights ago. The only time Naomi had held Miles, he was asleep.

She wanted her comparison approved for tonight. Once the records were ready, there would be hours before anything could run.

I’m going into a meeting. Hoping to come afterward. I’ll text when I know.

She sent it and enlarged the photograph once more before putting the phone away.

* * *

Arun had tonight’s allocation on the meeting-room screen. Marcus sat beside the window with a coffee and two phones.

Naomi introduced Ortega. Arun moved his bag from the fourth chair.

“We’ve got one substantial comparison,” he said as Naomi sat down. “Assuming the primary rendering finishes on time.”

“And nothing more urgent needs it,” Marcus said.

“Yes.”

“When do you need the decision?” Ortega asked.

“Before noon,” Arun said. “After that, tonight’s run is committed.”

“And if you haven’t chosen?”

“We lose another day,” Naomi said.

Their teams had proposed nine tests. Naomi, Arun, and Marcus had each brought one they wanted to run first. Tonight’s available processing time would cover only part of one.

“Use the last saved state before the decline,” Naomi said. “See whether it does better on the failures we’ve already reproduced.”

Arun adjusted the proposal on the screen.

“We could start with a few. The rest would have to wait.”

Ortega opened his notebook.

“Saved state?”

“What it had learned at that point,” Naomi said. “We give it the same information about the same day, but have it calculate with what it knew before the decline. If that version does better, we have somewhere to look.”

“And possibly something to restore,” Marcus said.

“Possibly.”

Arun opened his own proposal beside hers.

“Unless we’re comparing learned states through an evaluation process that no longer matches the system’s internal representation.”

Ortega looked at him.

“Forgive me. Can you say that in English?”

“We changed how it works. We should check that we’re still measuring it properly.”

“The deliveries were late,” Naomi said.

“Some were. But we calculate a forecast, turn it into advice, and score the advice against what happened. We changed the first step. I want to check the other two.”

“You think the score is wrong.”

“I think we should test it.”

Naomi glanced at Ortega before moving the proposals again. She hadn’t meant to look to him.

Naomi moved her proposal out of the available window and put Arun’s there. The full comparison exceeded the window too.

Marcus leaned forward.

“And if the change is in what we’re giving it?”

“We’ve checked the input records for those cases,” Naomi said.

“Individual records. I want the pattern. Which sources changed before the decline? What’s arriving earlier, or later, or in greater volume?”

“You’re still looking for interference.”

“I’m looking for a change. It doesn’t have to be deliberate.”

He pointed to the third proposal.

“A report can be genuine and still be different from what came before it. If something changed outside the machine, your old version needs to see that too.”

Naomi opened the proposal. They had followed individual failures back through their records. Marcus wanted to widen the comparison until they could see changes that disappeared inside any single case.

She could already think of two analysts she wanted on it.

“That needs processing time too,” she said.

“Put it on the list.”

“It’s on the list. We’re choosing what runs next.”

“Which one of these is most likely to find something?” Marcus asked.

“Mine could give us something we can restore,” Naomi said.

“If it works. I’m asking which one is most likely to tell us what’s wrong.”

Arun looked at the three estimates.

“We don’t know that yet.”

Ortega set down his pen.

“You have several things you want to test. Why can’t you test all of them?”

“Computing capacity,” Arun said.

Ortega glanced through the glass at the occupied desks outside.

“These are computers. Don’t we have rather a lot of them?”

“The Lattice has slightly more computing power than the rest of North America combined,” Arun said.

Ortega looked back at him.

“And it’s occupied,” Naomi said. “Most of the day and much of the night. People still need tomorrow’s forecasts while we work out what’s wrong with them.”

“Can’t you run the tests on something smaller?”

“We can,” Arun said. “Given the equipment and the spare time we have, we could get through the current list in a few months.”

“Three,” Naomi said. “On his more cheerful estimate.”

“That assumes we don’t add anything.”

“Hopefully the first test gives us something to follow,” Naomi said. “Then we can narrow the investigation instead of running everything on that list.”

“Are there any guarantees of that?”

“No.”

He looked at the proposals, then back at Arun.

“The upgrade. Did you replace the equipment?”

“A great deal of it.”

“What happened to the old machines?”

“Some were dismantled. Some sold. There’s equipment in storage, equipment waiting for transport.” Arun paused. “Quite a lot waiting for transport.”

Naomi looked up from the allocation sheet.

“How much here?”

“I’d have to ask.”

“Enough to add to the development system?”

“If the right units are still intact.”

Marcus put his coffee down.

“Those were running the country a few months ago.”

“Between all sixteen Centers,” Arun said.

Arun replaced the allocation sheet with a map of America that filled the wall. Sixteen numbered Centers glowed across it, connected by bright green lines. The largest markers were in Virginia, Texas, and Utah.

“These are all the Centers?” Ortega asked.

“All sixteen,” Arun said.

Ortega followed a line from Texas toward Virginia.

“Why spread them so far apart?”

“Most of what comes in is useful close to where it happens. Texas processes its local information, then sends the other Centers what they need. They don’t all need every frame from every camera.”

“But they work as one system?”

“Yes. The connections let them share the work.”

Marcus looked from the map to Arun.

“But they worked.”

“Yes.”

“Could we put them back together?”

“The inter-Center connections are in use. We’d need separate links with the same timing and coordination—”

“Would ordinary connections be too slow?” Ortega asked.

“Too slow, and they wouldn’t keep the work coordinated. We can send files between them. We can’t make them work as one machine just by plugging them into the internet.”

Naomi looked down the list. Most of the comparisons needed the same preserved records. They didn’t need to speak to one another while they ran.

“What if they stay separate?”

Arun turned toward her.

“A small Lattice at each Center that still has the equipment. Give each one different tests.”

“So a case 1/16 the size at each Center?” Ortega asked.

“Smaller than that,” Arun said. “We can’t recreate the whole Lattice. We’re using only whatever old equipment is left.”

“Keep the outside conditions in the records,” Naomi said. “Don’t recalculate them.”

“Some of these might still be too large,” he added.

“Then those wait for the main system,” Naomi said. “The others don’t have to.”

Arun copied the same case into two columns.

“Same day. Same factual inputs,” Naomi said. “Mine changes the learned state.”

“Mine checks how the answer becomes advice and gets scored,” Arun said. He put Marcus’s input comparison in a third column, then moved the columns apart.

Naomi sat forward. Yes. Her hand was already reaching for the tablet. They could hold the surroundings steady and change one thing inside the case. The comparisons didn’t need one another’s answers.

Why hadn’t she thought of it sooner? They’d spent the morning choosing what had to wait. She looked down at the other six proposals. Several of those could start too.

“We’d need power and cooling. People to check the equipment. Some of the old rooms have been converted.”

“But a test doesn’t have to keep up with tomorrow morning’s release,” Naomi said.

“No.” He moved another proposal. “It just has to finish.”

Marcus stood to see the screen more clearly.

“How quickly could we get through the tests?”

“I don’t know what’s available.”

“If most of it is?”

“With the tests running concurrently across the Centers, perhaps a week or two for this first set. Once we’ve got the equipment running.”

“Instead of three months?”

“Yes. Some of the individual tests could finish in days.”

Naomi looked at the separate columns. Her comparison and Arun’s no longer occupied the same space. She marked the cases still too large for a local system. They would have to choose among those before noon; the smaller tests no longer had to wait for that decision.

“And yours can start without waiting for either of us,” she told Marcus.

He nodded.

“Who asks the other Centers?” Ortega said.

“I do,” Arun said.

Ortega nodded and wrote something down.

Arun opened a message to the site directors and copied Elena. Equipment still on site. Engineers available to check it. Space where it could run. He asked them to hold scheduled disposal and collection until they knew what remained.

Then he sent the technical requirements to his engineering managers.

“We’ll need people to connect it,” he said. “Some of the parts may have to come from other sites.”

“I’ll see if I can find some money,” Marcus said.

He left with his phone at his ear.

Naomi began adding the test records they would need.

“If the old system gives you a different answer,” Ortega said, “how do you know which one to trust?”

“We know what happened in these cases. We can compare both answers with that.” She added the records from before the decline. “First we check that the small systems can reproduce results we already have. Otherwise we might just be testing how badly we put them back together.”

Marcus came back, picked up his other phone, and left again.

Arun watched the door close.

“I’ll have the engineers meet us at Center One.”

“Today?” Naomi asked.

“Now, if they can.”

Naomi took out her phone.

Something’s come up. Don’t wait for me for lunch.

She sent it and waited a moment, but Ellie didn’t answer. Then she collected her tablet.

“We’re going on a field trip?” Ortega asked.

“Field trip,” Naomi confirmed.

* * *

They waited at the elevators while Arun finished his call.

“How far is Center One?” he asked. “Are we taking a car or a plane?”

“Actually, we’re taking an elevator,” Naomi said. “Center One is about a hundred feet below you.”

He looked down at the floor.

Arun ended the call.

“The engineers can meet us in the development lab,” Arun told Naomi. “They’re checking the retained units now.”

The elevator arrived. Naomi pressed her badge beneath the floor buttons. A second set appeared. The car passed the parking levels and continued down.

Arun’s tablet vibrated. A site director had acknowledged the request and asked how urgently they needed the inventory.

“Today,” Arun said as he typed. “Preliminary counts as soon as available.”

Ortega watched the floor indicator.

When the doors opened, they stepped into a wide corridor. It was cooler than the offices above. Air pressed steadily from the vents. Beneath it ran a low, continuous rumble Naomi scarcely noticed anymore.

Ortega slowed.

“Is that the machinery?”

“We’re not in the hall yet.”

Arun led them through a pair of doors onto a raised walkway.

Ortega stopped.

The hall opened beneath a ceiling of bare concrete carried on enormous square columns. Dark rows of machinery spread to either side of a central aisle, their upper surfaces webbed with fine conduits. Blue indicators dwindled into the distance. Ortega stepped to the rail and looked down.

Two engineers emerged from behind a cabinet below. Ortega watched them walk to the next row. They were still walking when he looked toward the far end of the hall.

He had mistaken another line of columns for the back wall. The rows kept going.

“Oh,” he said. “I hadn’t imagined anything this large.”

His hands settled on the rail. Naomi let him look. He took in the hall again, more slowly this time.

“And this is one Center?”

“One,” Arun said.

Arun gave a quiet laugh. After years of working above it, Naomi still sometimes stopped on this walkway.

A narrow bridge led to the glass control room suspended above the center of the vast hall. Ortega followed them across.

Inside, the view opened in every direction. Rows of machinery stretched beneath the enormous concrete columns, their dim blue lights diminishing into the distance. Far below, an engineer crossed an aisle and disappeared between the cabinets. Beyond him lay another aisle, another rank of columns.

Ortega walked to the glass.

Naomi let him look.

After a moment, Arun opened a door on the other side of the room.

“Development is through here.”

They followed a service corridor around several turns into a laboratory that looked more like a machine shop. Tools hung above crowded workbenches. Open cabinets stood among coils of cable, loose components, and wheeled equipment.

“Development and testing,” Arun said. “And, increasingly, storage.”

He pulled back a heavy curtain. Beyond it, older cabinets crowded a long storage section, their removal labels still attached. A loading bay opened at the far end, with a row of freight elevators along its back wall. One stood open.

A forklift was bringing a cabinet out of storage. Arun held the curtain aside as it passed, then followed it into the lab. The driver lowered the cabinet into a cleared space beside a workbench. It stood taller than the engineer guiding it, with dark mesh doors and a removal label taped across one corner.

“We can check one here,” the engineer said. “To run all of them, we’ll need to bring in more power and cooling.”

Naomi looked past the curtain at the waiting cabinets.

“How much more?”

“Depends how many.”

The engineer signaled the driver back. As the forks withdrew, Arun crouched beside the cabinet to inspect the connections.

“Has this one been checked?”

“Passed this morning.”

“And the other?”

“Same.”

Arun straightened and looked at a second retained cabinet beside the workbench.

“Good. We’ll use those two.”

The engineer brought a smaller unit over on a cart.

“That one?” Arun asked.

The engineer nodded.

“Put it between them.”

Naomi stepped closer.

“Is something wrong?”

Arun held out a hand for a cable. The engineer passed it to him. He connected it to the smaller unit, checked the port, then moved around the cabinet.

“Second one first,” he said. “Wait until it sees the controller.”

A light appeared behind the mesh. Arun checked the engineer’s display.

“Not yet,” he murmured. “There. Now the link.”

The engineer attached another cable. Arun moved to the first cabinet.

“Is it going to work?” Naomi asked.

“Bring this one up.”

The cooling fans started with a low hum. Arun leaned toward the monitor. For a moment, only the fans answered.

Then a brief tone sounded. On the monitor, a familiar screen appeared.

“There it is,” Arun said.

He watched another line populate, then looked up.

“Yes. It’s possible.”

He turned the monitor toward her.

“Our first mini-Lattice. We’ll want to connect more than two units, of course. But this will work.”