“I imagine so. Tell me, have you received any calls regarding actions to remove you from his legal paperwork with the Army?”
I spread my hands. “No phone.”
She shook her head to dismiss the statement. “They would have contacted you through your school if necessary, or a courier. Especially so close to a deployment. He must not have spoken to them, either. Then again, when you and I file this notice, it will begin the process from our end. All he will need to do is sign the form and dominoes will begin to fall.”
Even in my fugue of life suckitude, I thought that was an odd series of statements. A long way around to saying,He’s waiting for you to do what you said you would. That will make it very easy for him to sign a few forms and cut all ties to the husband he doesn’t want anymore.Could be she was trying to tell me that he hadn’t gotten in someone’s face to start this divorce already, and that could indicate I still had a chance, but – why would he?
He just had to wait for me to do it, and all the procedural rigamarole would solve itself to drop a tidy divorce in his lap. No need to chase down the Army’s legal teams for new next of kin declarations, benefits changes, and powers of attorney. A total lack of trips to sign papers or issue requests. They’d tie my request for a marital dissolution up with a bow and put it on his bunk for attention.
“Glad I can make it easy for him,” I said, and tried to swallow the sarcasm. I didn’t mean it. Pain leaks worse than water in a strainer, no matter how you try to contain it. “Will it go through tonight? It would be best if he could sign it all before he deploys tomorrow. If he can’t, he probably won’t see it until his transport reaches Mars.”
Or after. The launch was meant to be a secret. Jackson had told me the week before that once he arrived on Mars, he would be radio silent until command deemed communications safe and not in violation of operational security. He’d noted it would probably be at least a month before I heard from him, so I shouldn’t worry before then. As if that would have stopped me.
Elaine typed a bit more then shook her head. “No. It seems this filing will not go through until at least tomorrow afternoon.”
I blinked. “Why not?”
“Because M4-CH+M4-KR has scheduled himself a major maintenance window,” she said. “The system requires periodic maintenance and self-checks. The larger of these often consume all of the building’s bandwidth as the server downloads patches from our developers elsewhere in the country.”
“Including the systems in your offices and front desk.”
She winced. “Yes. Patching that system requires a tremendous load of processing power. M4-CH+M4-KR sometimes allocates all systems on the network to act as spare peripheral processors to share the load, especially when the system requires a larger upgrade. It’s unconventional, but it works. Doing so has cut down the timeframes for our major maintenance windows significantly.”
Fishy. I narrowed my eyes. “Did you know there was going to be a maintenance window tonight?”
“I knew there would be onesoon, but I don’t always have a good timeline for when it will happen. M4 monitors the status of upgrades, alerts us when one is nearing completion, and then alerts us again when the system needs to go down for maintenance. Let me see if I can- Oh.” The monitor light that had been reflecting onto her face went dark. “It seems I cannot. The maintenance window has opened. I won’t be able to submit anything until one, perhaps two tomorrow afternoon.”
Very fishy. Fishy like a pier market at high noon. “Let me see if I’ve got this right. You allow yourmachine intelligenceto choose patch windows, utilize all your building’s bandwidth, and take overeverycomputer in the office to assist with parallel patching processes. This doesn’t seem like a terrible idea to you?”
“Why would it?” Elaine tilted her head, for all the world looking like an alien ostrich who could not understand silly human concerns. “M4 has very carefully tuned and calibrated subsystems intended to monitor his performance and take steps when it degrades too far. It also monitors the status of remote builds for software upgrades, verifies these upgrades have received testing, and self-installs them when they are ready for the production environment. We designed him to automate upgrades so we could maximize efficiency. These major updates happen perhaps three times a year, so they’re hardly an inconvenience.”
This soundedfantasticon paper. In practice, it made me wonder when a large, naked man would accost me for my boots, clothes, and motorcycle. An excellent excuse to keep my battered SUV for another few years, if you ask me. No killer androids from the future want glorified station wagons.
“Can another of your offices send this through?” I asked, but I knew the answer.
Or I thought I did. Elaine fixed me with a steady, evaluating look. “Perhaps, Sebastian, we should look upon this maintenance window as a welcome reprieve from the emotional turmoil you have experienced over the last few days. So much can happen between now and the time your husband sits down to sign these forms. If I may make a suggestion?”
She would anyway, so I nodded.
“Use this time to search for who Sebastian Sadler truly is. Discover who Sebastian Hendrick will be, should your marriage fail, and plan for that day, even as you come to understand the man you have become since you took your marriage vows.” Her hands rested on the desk in front of her, fingers laced and still. “Should you find that the life you have now, the one you did not want but settled for all the same, does not suit you? Call me. I may have a proposition for you.”
This had taken a turn for the strange. I stood up. “What, you want me to sign up to marry you? Going to sweep me off my feet and say our vows in front of Elvis?”
Elaine laughed. She looked as surprised as I did about this fact. “No! Sebastian, you are a terrible man. No, I simply might have a new career path for you, if you decide you don’t like the other choices available. Let me know.”
“Sure.” Now I was curious, and curious has never led to good judgements or examples of iron self-control in me. More like aluminum foil self-control, bendy and flexible and ending up in a crumpled heap.
We shook hands. Elaine said, “Keep in touch. I know you are temporarily without a phone, so watch your email for more updates.”
“I will. Thank you again.” Time to go. I could head home, finish cleaning up the mess Jackson and Laramie made, and grade papers while I watched reruns of television programs I didn’t like the first time.
I made it to the doorway before I paused. “One more question.”
“Hm?” Elaine stopped gathering up her papers to look at me.
“These major updates and upgrades to the system.Peoplewrite them, don’t they? Humans? Living beings?”
Elaine’s complicated smile would itch at my mind for some time after. “Of course. We could hardly let a system program itself, could we?”