Anomaly

August 15: Memory Access Neural Interface Headquarters

Blip. Blip. Worble. That would be the last thing that Collins would hear from Manitou. Under any other circumstances these sounds would be considered normal coming from the Memory Accessible Neural Interface 2.0 (or “Manitou” for short). A blip there and a worble there is usually to be expected from a super computer but it is the rhythm in which it made itself known that was unusual to Collins. It is almost as if it were saying something that it had never said before, or could.

“Let’s go Collins!” His colleague, Schwartz, yelled. “Time to clock out! I’m not letting you work overtime on your last day.” There was a knock on the door and older man walked in. It was the Chief Engineer, Teague.

“He’s right. Time to finally buy you a drink,” Teague responded.

“Yeah, it’s just--” Collins said.

“Just what? It’s your last day, man! Time to celebrate a new chapter in your life.”

“Well there was a thing. I heard a thing. It was a bit unusual,” Collins muttered.

“Was it anomalous?” Teague asked.

“I’m not sure.” Collins responded.

“What did it sound like?” Schwartz said putting on his jacket. He was clearly eager to make his way to the bar.

“It went, ‘Blip. Blip. Worble.’” Collins answered. “I know it doesn’t sound like much but it was the way it happened. There was a deliberate rhythm, a cadence to it unlike the other sounds Manitou makes.”

“You’re just thinking too much. What’s the matter? Trying to find an excuse to stay here with us grunts longer?” Schwartz joked.

“Thinking too much is what got Collins out of here. When he gets his PhD he might very well be back here and we might just be working for him!” Teague said slapping his hand on Collins’ back. “What was it you were going to be studying again?”

“Neuroscience: The neurological effects of physical interface between computers and the human brain,” Collins answered.

“Wait a minute. Are you saying the brain can influence computers?” Schwartz asked.

“I think it’s possible. Manitou exists to influence our brains, maybe it’s a two-way street and we haven’t figured out how to do it.” Collins responded.

“That’s why he’s headed back to school, Schwartz, and that’s why you’re stuck here. Ha!”Teague said.

“Give me a desk in an office over a desk in a classroom any day, I say! Now what do we say? Shall we go off to the bar to give Collins his final hurrah?” Schwartz said, already heading out the door.

“Looks like Schwartz is ready for a night of drinking. Let’s go,” Teague said.

“Sure,” Collins said as he typed furiously into his computer. With one final keystroke, he lifted his hands and went to get his coat. “I just had to make a note of that sound pattern.”

“I’ll tell you what,” Teague responded. “Personally I think it wasn’t a significant anomaly but if it means that much to you I’ll keep a record of it. If it turns out to be nothing we can, at the very least, chalk it up to your very last entry with Manitou.”

“Sounds like a fine idea,” Collins said. Teague put his arm on Collins’ shoulder and the two walked to the bar to celebrate his last day at the office.

August 22: Swansea, Wales

Mr. Williams got only a slammed door as a response from his daughter, Mariah.

“The two of you need to cool down a bit,” his wife said.

“The two of us?” he asked. “It’s unnatural and you know it!”

“Be a little sympathetic. They cared for each other.”

“No they didn’t. They didn’t even know about each other until two days ago!”

“They’ve known each other for almost a year through Manitou.”

“That computer was meant to help with her depression. You heard what the scientists said. That computer just rewires the brain. They never made a connection!”

“Then how do you explain their first meeting? You know they made a connection. You saw them yourself! I think they genuinely care for each other!”

“They felt similar things while they were plugged in. Teen hormones accomplished the rest! It’s just like the psychologist said. There was some sort of anomaly that they both happen to have felt at around the same time, and when they met for the first time they—I don’t have to explain my stance. It’s already been said dozens of times by the experts.”

“Don’t you like this Santos boy?”

“It’s not about liking the boy or not! We know nothing, NOTHING, about him!”

“You’re right, honey. We don’t. But we do know that our daughter likes him.”

“She doesn’t know what she likes!”

Mariah’s bedroom door squeaked open. Her footsteps tread lightly on the carpet but not because she wanted to enter the conversation unnoticed.

“I’m glad you trust me enough to let me make my own decisions as to who I can and can’t like,” Mariah said. The sarcasm was dripping with each word.

“Have a seat,” her mom responded, “I think we have to talk about this like grown-ups.”

“Grown-ups?” Mariah’s dad asked. It was apparent where she got her sardonic wit.

“Sweetie,” her mom continued, “Everything that’s happened in the past week has gone by so fast. We’re just trying to make some sense of it all.”

Mariah swiped and tapped her finger on her phone deftly as the silence between all three of them swelled and insulated each of them.

“You don’t actually think you like this boy, do you?” dad asked. “Meeting through Manitou is impossible. Everyone says so.”

“Why can’t I like him?” Mariah asked. “There was a point where you didn’t know mom, right? This is the same but different.”

“We plugged you in to Manitou to help you with your depression, sweetheart,” mom added.

“It’s helped a great deal but I need a real connection with a human being and Josh gave me that!”

“You only met once! Two days ago!” Dad exclaimed. Mom put her hand on his shoulder to calm him down.

“IRL,” Mariah responded.

“IRL?” Dad asked.

“’In Real Life,’” Mariah responded. “We met, I swear, in the network! I swear I could see him, hear him inside Manitou while we were both plugged in.”

“What you can’t get inside your head is that that is impossible! Everyone says it’s impossible!” dad responded.

“And what none of you can understand is that NOBODY but us knows what it feels like to make that connection while plugged in. We just found each other.” Mariah shot back.

“Mariah, all this press coming to visit us, to visit the boy’s family because of this slight anomaly is very overwhelming. Don’t you think it’s possible that you two longed for a connection so badly and coincidentally felt the same thing while plugged in has made you biased towards your feelings towards each other?” Mom wondered.

“And don’t you think,” Mariah answered without looking up from her phone, “that for once you could feel happy that I found someone that I wanted to get to know; that I found someone who makes me happy? Maybe I don’t know him as well as I could but isn’t that the point of dating?”

“He’s from the other side of the planet!” dad started to raise his voice, “How do you date someone that you’re not in constant contact with?! It’s unnatural!”

Mariah just stood up and went to her room. Her phone buzzed in her hand as she shut the door behind her.

“Well,” dad said to mom, “At least she’s talking to me again.”

August 22: Los Angeles, CA

“Josh,” Josh Santos’ mom asked as she gently rapped on his bedroom door, slowly opening it. “Your lola is here. She wants to say hello.”

Josh made eye contact with his mother through the small opening in the door. He looked away before nodding in the affirmative. An elderly woman walked in and set on the bed. She was holding a plastic container as she smiled at her grandson.

“Hello, darling,” she said to him.

“Hi, lola,” he said leaning in to give her a kiss on the cheek. She took his arms and look down on them. She kissed his wrists and he could feel her lips press firmly against it through the gauze.

“How are you feeling?” lola asked.

“I’m tired. I guess I’m doing better.”

“I made you your favorite dessert.”

“Mom doesn’t want me eating too many sweets.”

“Never mind that,” she answered, “Never mind that. Go on. You can tell her I said it’s ok.” She took off the cover of the plastic container and Josh found an assortment of Filipino pastries.

“That’s my favorite desert, lola?” Josh asked. “Everything?”

“You got my sweet tooth!” she said, laughing. Josh began picking at the sweets here and there and his grandmother just looked at him for a bit before finally saying something. “What is all this about, eh?”

“Her name’s Mariah.”

“Do you like this girl?”

“I do.”

“So why are you just sitting here? Get her! You are a handsome boy; she will not say no.”

“Well there are two problems: (1) She lives on the other side of the world and (2) the whole world doesn’t think we’re really in love.”

“No one thought Romeo and Juliet were in love, right?”

“Technically they weren’t but I’ve known Mariah for much longer than those two knew each other. Look, the point is, we met each other through this computer.”

“You met on the internet?”

“Not exactly. Manitou is a special computer that helps the brain with things like depression or developmental problems. The doctor plugs in certain sick people and they get better.”

“And you two met through Manatee?”

“Manitou, lola.”

“Well, what’s wrong with that? You know I met your grandfather when he was on his way to meet his girlfriend. We never know how we meet who we are meant to be with. Your lolo was so handsome too.”

“Okay, lola, ew. No need to go into more detail.”

“It’s natural. How do you think your mother was born?”

“We are REALLY getting off track. The point is I like this girl. I might even love this girl. But the world thinks we’re just two kids. Maybe we are but I think we’ve been through enough to at least deserve some time with each other, right?”

“If it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be.”

Josh stuffed his mouth with the pastries. A cliché isn’t exactly the advice he was looking for but coming from his grandmother he appreciated the sentiment.

“You know,” lola continued, “the Santos’ are known back home from getting back on our feet. Your heart may be broken but you’ll be ok. I love you very much.”

“I love you too, lola,” Josh responded, his mouth full of food. His phone buzzed on his nightstand. He reached over and looked at his messages as his grandmother leaned in to kiss him on the forehead, sniffing his hair as she was doing it. He smiled as he looked at the phone and his grandmother left his room.

One year later: Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, Research Facility

The frenzy that the media had created around Mariah Williams of Wales and Josh Santos of the United States had finally subsided enough to allow Collins to find enough students to help him who weren’t after fifteen minutes of fame. The press hounded the research teams in the neurobiology department for days on end about the validity of the teens’ connection via Manitou. Collins refused to answer as he was uninterested what he felt was a bloated human interest story. Politicians had attempted to use it to question the validity of the science of Manitou but Collins was not about to allow his colleagues to be thrown under the bus by media pundits.

Popularity, as it always does, wanes with the passing of time and a grateful Collins could finally continue his work unhindered. He had missed working in direct contact with the Manitou central processing unit at headquarters to some extent, but he had always been a student of science. The banality of sitting at a desk and listening for anomalies that may never occur had run out of its limited charm for Collins. He admits, however, that the size of the paycheck is a tempting reason to go back.

His research into the human brain, he believes, will further the development of the Manitou project and may possibly mean an upgrade to MANI 3.0. Collins had always been fascinated with the idea the neural networks that the human brain can create are infinite. Not even the most super of supercomputers can compare with the processing power that Mother Nature developed. The story of the two teens that the media dubbed “The Wire-Crossed Lovers” may have turned Collins off to press interviews but he had often wondered if such connections could be made. But it was impossible, Collins said, that such connections could be made via Manitou.

Today, Collins was to research the effect of a connection (physical, spiritual, and emotional) in the human brain. The results were ready and have been interpreted in the same fashion that Manitou reported data a year prior. If all went according to plan, a year’s worth of work will have translated what love (not romantic love but the love between two people who connect and truly care for each other) might sound like when translated through the binary language of supercomputers. There was no denying what Collins had heard for he had heard it before. In a very deliberate rhythm a cadence to it unlike the other sounds Manitou makes: Blip. Blip. Worble.