“A computer? One who thinks?”
For the thousandth time in his life, Wiz wished he were better at making explanations. “Well, kind of. But it is a machine, not alive.”
“A machine is some kind of non-living thing then. But this machine thinks?”
“Well, it doesn’t really think. It follows preprogrammed instructions. The programmer can make it act like it is thinking.”
“Is it a demon of some kind?”
“Uh, no. A demon’s something else. It’s a program that does something automatically when called. Unless of course it’s a daemon, then it’s active all the time.”
Moira wrinkled her brow. “Let us go back a bit. What do you have to do with these creatures?”
“They’re not creatures, really.”
“These demons, then.”
“I told you, they’re not demons. A demon is something else.”
“Never mind all that,” Moira said impatiently. “Just tell me what you do.”
“Well, I do a lot of things, but basically I’m a systems-level programmer. That means I write programs that help applications programs—those are the things people want done—to run. ‘‘
“What is a program?”
Wiz sighed. “A program is a set of instructions that tells the computer what to do.”
“You command these beings then?”
“I told you, they’re not . . .”
“All right. These creatures, or not-demons or whatever they are. You command them?”
“Well, kind of.”
“But you have no magic!”
Wiz grinned. “You don’t need magic. Just training, skill, discipline and a mind that works in the right way.”
“The qualities of a magician,” Moira said firmly. “And with these qualities you master these—things.”
“Well, you try to. Some days you get the bear and some days the bear gets you.”
“There are bears involved too?”
“No, look, that’s just an expression. What I mean is that sometimes it’s easy to get the computer to do what you want and sometimes it isn’t.”
“Powerful entities are often hard to control,” Moira nodded. “So you are the master of these—whatever they are.”
“Well, not exactly the master. I work under a section chief, of course, and over him there’s a department head. Then there’s the DP Administrator . . .”
“These entities tell you what to do?”
“They aren’t entities, they’re people.”
“But you do not master these, what did you call them?”
“The section chief, the department head . . .”
“No, I mean the other things, the non-living ones.”
“Oh, the computers.”
“You master the computers.”
“Well, no. But I program them according to the tasks assigned me.”
“So you are only a low-level servant,” Moira concluded firmly.
“No, I’m not! It’s an important job,” Wiz said desperately.
“I’m sure it is,” Moira said. “Even temple sweepers perform an important job.”
“No, it’s not like that at all! It’s . . .” He realized it was hopeless. “Just forget it, okay? It was an important job and I was damn good at it.”
“Do not curse, Sparrow,” Moira snapped. “We are in enough danger as it is.” With that she rolled over and settled down to sleep.
Wiz didn’t follow suit. He sat there listening to the wind in the trees and the occasional cry of a night animal. Once he heard a wolf howl far off.
Damn!, he thought. Here I am in the middle of a forest with a beautiful girl asleep at my side and I can’t do anything about it. I didn’t think it was supposed to work this way.
Wiz had never read much fantasy, but he knew that the hero was supposed to get the girl. But then he didn’t feel very heroic. He was cold, uncomfortable and most of all, he just felt ineffectual. The same old klutzy Wiz.
And lonesome. Oh my God, was he lonesome! He missed his apartment, the traffic-clogged streets, the movies, the all-night pizza joint on the corner. With a great inrushing pang, he felt utterly lost.
He even missed the goddamn buggy text editor at work. Do you realize there probably isn’t a computer anywhere on this world? He thought. I have probably written my last program.
That hurt worse than anything. All his life Wiz had only been good at one thing. When he discovered computers in high school, he found he was as good with them as he was bad with people. He had put his life into being the best ever with computers and if he hadn’t been the best ever, he had certainly been damn good. Only a lack of money and fascination with immediate problems had kept him from going to grad school and getting the Ph.D. that would have led him to the top rank of computer scientists.