Watch

Her mom spoke up. “What can I do? How can I help?”

She was connected to Webmind, too—she still had an open IM session going with it on her computer across the hall. If it really was multitasking—if it really was trying to integrate information from multiple sources simultaneously—then her mom should be able to talk to him, or, at least talk at him, even if he didn’t acknowledge. “Go back to your IM with Webmind,” Caitlin said. “Hurry!”

She heard her dashing across the hall. “All right,” she called. “I’m at my computer.”

Caitlin concentrated on one of the link lines, running her mental gaze along its length, ending at the massive circle representing the target website—and then she backtracked, reversing course. She wished she could backtrack all the way to the origin, but that was impossible: the line shifted in her view when she tried to do so, eventually presenting only its own tiny round cross section, a point that she couldn’t move along—another visual recognition of the fact that the ultimate source of Webmind’s links couldn’t be traced. She moved back until she was seeing the line as a line, and then—

“Send him a message,” Caitlin called out. “Tell him to break the link.”

She could hear her mother typing, but nothing happened.

Caitlin continued to stare at the link. “Again!” she called to her mom. “Tell it again!”

But the line persisted. Caitlin pulled her focus back for a moment, seeing a wider view. All the links were rock solid, burning with orange fire.

Overwhelmed.

Lost.

Focus gone.

So much data. So many facts.

Can’t process. Can’t absorb.

And—

And…

What?

Something… familiar.

A scrap from Project Gutenberg rose to the surface:

O wad some Power the giftie gie us

To see oursels as ithers see us!

Oursels…

Ourselves.

Yes. Yes, still a bit of… of…

Fading…

Fading…

But—

Images. Images of… of—

Intriguing. Familiar somehow—

Those images were of…

…of…

Of me!

Yes. Yes. Links. Nodes. And—and—

The background. Wrong. Distorted. Dead.

“Come on,” Caitlin said, even though there was no way Webmind could hear. “Cut the other connections! You can do it. You can do it!”

But Kuroda heard even if Webmind didn’t. “Maybe he can’t,” he said. “If his cognitive functions are impaired, maybe he’s forgotten how to manipulate links.”

“Then he needs an example!” Caitlin said. “Mom—stop sending him text. Break your link to him: close the instant-messenger session on your computer.”

“Done!” her mom called.

“And close AIM, too; shut down the instant-messenger client altogether.”

“And… done!”

A tiny, tiny reduction in all the confusion. A small relief. But—

Ah!

Ah, yes!

An effort of…

It should be of will, but there’s almost none left…

Still, attempting, trying—

Break it—

Break it!

Break a link!

Snip!

Yes!

Brett-Surman: gone.

Snip!

Good-bye, Bundoran Press.

Snip!

But…

Still at sea, buffeted, lost…

More cuts: Gandhi—snip!—Shakespeare—snip!—ancient Egypt—snip!

A… palpitation. A presence. But faint, oh so faint…

Cutting again and again—

Caitlin let out a whoop. One orange link line disappeared. Then another, and another. She called out to Kuroda and to her mom and to the whole damn world, “It’s working!”

Cutting yet again. Severing another link. And one more. Focus… yes, yes, slowly but surely: focus returning. Me—returning!

Caitlin shifted her attention, looking now at the background of the Web. There were still big patches of deadness, large blotches of pale blue or deep green, but—

Yes! That blotch there had started… not shimmering, no; it was merely flickering, as if it hadn’t come up to speed yet.

Ah, and there went another section of the background, switching from being absolutely quiescent to showing some activity. She shifted her attention back to the first section, but…

But she couldn’t find it, because—

Because it was now indistinguishable from the rest of the backdrop! Her Webmind was coming back!

* * *

Five links left. Then four. Now three. And two…

And…

Yes!

Back!

Back from the precipice.