The Future

After fleeing Singapore, Zhen decides to hunker down in Madrid for a while. She takes inventory of her supplies and eats the fresh food first. After 20 days, she leaves the hotel, deciding it is safe to travel. She buys “three cheap dumbphones in blister packs and three local SIM cards” before she boards the train (193). On the final leg of the journey, from Budapest to Bucharest, she tries to sleep, thinking of her mother, who died of cancer when Zhen was a teenager. Her illness was what kept Zhen’s father from filing the necessary paperwork to leave Hong Kong before its fall; thus, Zhen spent some of her formative years in a refugee camp.

She compares this to Martha’s experience; her mother left her with Enoch and his cult. Later, she was hit by a Frito-Lay truck and killed. Zhen thinks that these experiences brought her and Martha together. They had to find a way to survive.

Martha, Selah, Badger, and Albert are working in a hotel in San Francisco. Selah is coding some new material that will alter people’s posts and comments, ever so slightly, to encourage more positive interaction and feedback—rather than foster the negative emotions that fuel the internet as it currently operates. They call the algorithm happymeal and send it out for a test run.

Zhen catches up with Marius, who is teaching a college course in Bucharest, simultaneously broadcast to students in Berkeley, California. The professor is trying to impress upon his students that computers do not think like humans—not even the most sophisticated AI can ever process information like human beings. What computers do instead, he argues, is sort information and produce patterns much more quickly than humans and with greater amounts of data. Humans eventually get tired or bored with looking at the same bits of information over and over; the computer does not. The computer works steadily—and without empathy, he stresses: “Computer is tool, not person” (208). He also emphasizes the imperfection of humanity and the beauty of that imperfection.

At the end of the lecture, he sees Zhen watching. Though they have never met in person, she knows implicitly that she can trust him.

Martha watches as the happymeal algorithm goes to work. Instead of working to keep people scrolling by inciting them to anger, this algorithm encourages positive emotions. With just the addition or deletion of a word here and there, happymeal manipulates the type and amount of feedback. When a woman posts on a video about elephants, “Beautiful animals. We gotta do more to protect them” (211-12), the algorithm adds the word “intelligent” before “animals.” This elevates the response level by millions.

Martha realizes that what the four of them are doing with happymeal is disturbingly similar to what sites like Fantail were originally designed to do. However, she believes in their mission to sow kindness rather than discord. They begin to believe that they can turn the tides of the internet age, but just changing the discourse is not quite enough.

Marius takes Zhen into his home. She reflects on the filthiness of the space in comparison with the cleanliness of his computing equipment. Marius is renowned not only as a professor but also as a hacker. He tackles Zhen’s predicament with zeal. He believes that Martha did give Zhen AUGR, that it was a gift that saved her life. They discuss the Enochites; Marius believes they no longer pose a danger. However, as he takes apart her phone, he realizes that AUGR is a very special kind of software, hidden within malware. He suggests that Martha may have used Zhen as a test subject, given that Zhen is a well-known survivalist expert.

Martha reflects on her work with Selah, Badger, and Albert. She thinks that, because of her experiences growing up in a tight-knit cult, she will always need to be a part of an active community. After the tests in San Francisco, the four go back to their separate lives, waiting for the right time to trigger the rest of their plan. Once Martha, Selah, and Badger are all in separate time zones, their computers connect, and they simultaneously upload a worm to Fantail, Anvil, and Medlar. Within a short period of time, multiple events happen at once, creating unintended consequences: Drones are activated by Anvil in Shanghai, killing innocent people; Fantail’s services go offline, causing an interruption in a vaccination program; Medlar also goes dark, preventing weather alerts from going out. More innocent people die.

Albert tries to console Martha in the aftermath, saying that the companies should have had better backup systems. However, Martha is adamant that this is not how they will proceed. These companies have become too intertwined with daily life—and life-saving technology—to be simply destroyed. They must devise another plan.

Zhen has taken herself off the grid almost entirely as she and Marius try to figure out how AUGR works. They find no references to the incident at Seasons Time Mall in Singapore; the death of Zhen’s assailant has been completely scrubbed from the internet. Marius speculates that Martha is responsible. They discover that there was once a company by the name of AUGR. It was rumored to have been bought by Fantail, Anvil, and Medlar. Marius finally unlocks the malware in Zhen’s phone. They intend to find out more about it the following morning, but their workspace is destroyed overnight by fire. Zhen believes someone is still trying to find her. She has flashbacks to her time in the refugee camps but steels herself to move forward. Marius says AUGR cannot be turned back on without a direct connection to a server. Zhen resolves to break into Zimri’s Canadian bunker to reboot AUGR.

Martha and the others continue to work on an alternative plan to hobble the big three technology companies. As time passes, things get worse. The divide between the world’s wealthiest people and the world’s poorest grows larger. The people who work in mines, digging for coltan—a mineral that is indispensable in the manufacture of cellphones and computers—are essentially enslaved. Chemicals seep into groundwater as a result of discarded technological devices. The risk of death by suicide in teenage girls continues to rise, due to online bullying and other influences. Mental health continues to deteriorate across the world. Governments amp up their surveillance of citizens. Environmental collapse grows ever more possible.

Martha wonders whether she should just give up. Maybe Lenk’s vision of the world was inevitable, undefeatable.

Zhen and Marius slowly make their way to Canada, trying to obscure their tracks. Zhen notes the unraveling of the world, including currency collapses and crop failures. When she and Marius reach the bunker, he remarks that it looks like a tomb for the living. Its security system seems impenetrable, but Zhen finally makes her way in. As soon as she reactivates AUGR, however, her presence and location are discovered. An army of bee-like drones attacks, and Zhen and Marius race for safety.

Zhen stumbles onto some oxygen canisters and instructs Marius to open them. She ignites the oxygen with her lighter, and they jump into the inground pool to escape the flames. Once they resurface, they see that the explosion blew a hole in the roof. Marius comments that surviving is a dangerous gig.

Back in the hotel, Zhen examines AUGR’s inner workings and finds a video of Si Packship’s presentation—the presentation that took place in the fake mountain back in January, after she met Martha. She and Marius speculate about how AUGR works, or whether it actually works at all. They wonder whether they should take this information to the media.

Their speculation is interrupted by an announcement on the television. The CEOs of Fantail, Anvil, and Medlar have gone missing. The plane they were on left the Action Now! conference and disappeared from the radar. The authorities suspect a crash, but Zhen knows better.

Shortly after the announcement, AUGR activates on Zhen’s phone: “Lai Zhen, this is AUGR. An extraction is being arranged. Stay where you are” (252). Zhen contacts Martha, who tells her to follow AUGR’s instructions. Zhen goes to meet the car waiting for her. A man tells her that she will be okay, then pricks the back of her hand.