The Infinity Machine

"Nothing is ever as easy as it seems, is it, John?" Christian sat back as John Tanner stared into the monitor, eyes reflecting an almost bluish light from the monitor in front of him. "John?"

"Yeah… nothing." John was almost catatonic with disbelief. The image on the screen was a scene that ripped through his very psyche. In the image, John’s best friend for over 20 years was holding the knife used to kill his son over his wife’s sleeping body. John was almost in tears, but fought them back. "Why did you freeze it here?"

"Potential, John. You see, you’re not ready for the images this device can produce. Give it to me." Christian knew he had the trump card in his pocket.

"expect it… I had to…" John looked back at Christian with an almost unforgivable fire. "You really are soulless, you know that…"

Christian’s smile turned slyly upward. "What kind of businessman isn’t? Tell you what. Think about it and give me a ring."

A small business card lay face down on the table. On it’s back was a handwritten message: this is just the start. On the front was a spiral graphic with the name "CGI - Christian Garrett International" with a name and phone number. John noticed it only for a second as he dropped the card over a lit candle, almost smothering the flame before the card lit into an amber glow.

"Thought about it." John knew it wasn’t the first time Christian would come up against him… and it probably wouldn’t be the last either.

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"So you see, on a 1024x768 display, there are 786,432 pixels. Over seven hundred eighty six thousand individual dots on a screen, each capable of producing millions of colors each by varying the amount of red, green and blue used in each individual dot. Turn them all the way down and they reflect black. Turn them all the way up, they reflect white. Every conceivable image is located somewhere in between these colors. Just the thought of it is mind boggling." John was like a kid with a new toy. This was it. This was the big pitch. Funding for the project was pivotal and here he had to sell his heart out… if not his soul. "Think about it. Every letter is reflected through dark dots on light dots. This means that if you progress through every combination of light and dark, eventually, every written word ever put on paper would have been displayed in the proper order. Look at a newspaper. Each picture there is made up of dots arranged to reflect a picture. Same concept, except here, we see every picture before it was ever taken. Each word before it was written. If it had existed, or ever will exist, eventually, it will appear on the screen first. We will have witnessed the past, present, and future… all of it."

"I see… and how will we benefit from this?" Sam Warner was a very shrewd investor. Had been for over seventy years, and now wasn’t any different.

"Knowledge… foresight. How would it feel to know everything?" John felt he was starting to lose Sam’s graces.

"What about copyrights? What about trademark infringements? Are you aware of the can of worms you are opening?" Sam held firm.

"What about the trademarks and copyrights you can create from the images you gather here?"

"Just my word that we came across it first. I can’t afford to spend thousands of manhours just filing patents on fictional items. I’m sorry." With that Sam closed his attaché and started for the door.

"Not even going to give me the benefit of a doubt that this might work?" John gave it one last plug.

"No. I’m counting on it… Let me tell you something you might want to keep in the back of that skull of yours. If you do this, you’ll be killing a lot of dreams. My son wanted to be a composer as a teen. Worked at it for over seven years. There was always someone better, and he never made it to the big concert halls. Eventually he became an orchestra leader at a small northeastern college. He never gave up the dream, though. If everything he could ever compose were to come up on that screen of yours, there’d never be a reason to try, because it would have already been done. You do this, and you’ll end a lot of lives. Not physically… emotionally. Takes a cold heart to do that." Sam stared back at John who just stood there, expressionless. "Well, then, take care. God bless. Hopefully I’ve said something you’ll listen to."

"Yeah… take care." Something shattered inside John. Over six months in development and a thousand dollars invested into this project and no one would back it. One investor would say it was due to pornographic or violent content, another would destroy it on it’s improbability… none would back it on it’s artistic merit. That was two years ago.

"You need us, John." Christian couldn’t wait. No more than ten minutes passed before he felt he had to call John back.

"No… It’s mine. I’ve done ALL the work, the research, filed patents… You can’t begin to know how much of my life I’ve lost over this."

"John. You can’t patent an idea… all you have is the patent on the method. Trust me, we will find a way. When we do, we’ll take it from you."

"Yeah. You’ve said it before. Tech Com 97, Net Expo 96, Southern Tele…"

"John… Listen. We have the backing. We have the resources. Just let us but your method. What’s more important, your pride or the dream?"

"Pride? You don’t get it, do you. You told me once you wanted to use the images to find out what triggers the mind. What was that you said? ‘Sanity is a border, we just need a passport’? You don’t care about the project, the dream, anything. You just want to control people’s minds. I’m not here to be your pawn."

"Fine. Are we finished? Just think about this. Your algorithm is based on a 24 bit scheme. Millions of colors. Ours is a 256 color palate. The pattern runs faster. We get our results faster and more efficiently… best of all, it’s our design. We have our answer. We just wanted to let you in on a cut of the action. Face it, Johnny… your dream is dead."

A long pause, then John’s voice, almost beaten came back. "I’ll fight you on this. You know I’m not going to let you get away with this."

"What choice do you have? We’ve won. Besides, what we do with the images is really our business, now, isn’t it?" Christian was finally satisfied.

"Fine. You have now become the harvester of lost dreams… enjoy the title."