Original subtitles

The data stream, now simply known as the stream, was developed 50 years ago so

that the Earth's population could have immediate access to the newly built

Information Network.

Data relays, known as eddies, transmit information directly to an individual's

cranial implant.

However, the success rate achieved in practice was less than 100%. Certain

configurations of the cerebral cortex were found to consistently block data

transfer to and from the brain.

For the few individuals who possess neural defects, access to the stream is

effectively impossible.

Impossible for defects.

Ryan.

Hey, Mark, what's up?

An alarm went off because someone's screwing around with something they

shouldn't be. Yeah, I'm sorry. I just thought that if I took a netty apart, I

might be able to figure out why. This isn't a hardware problem.

It's a wetware problem, Ryan.

It's you that's defective.

I know.

I'll put it back together.

Don't bother.

The stream's already dispatched an authorized technician.

Don't make me have to do this again, Ryan, okay?

Now, come on. You've got some folks to take care of.

The

contents

have all been put on stream.

Okay, I don't care what you do with these books. Just get them out of here.

need the space.

I know.

Hi,

Cheryl.

Hi, Ryan.

Standing in your stream?

Ryan, that's impossible.

This stream is... It's digital, not analog, I know. I was making a little

you know.

What are you doing?

Research for the hospital.

It's kind of complex.

Yeah. Well, that's great. That's great.

Have you... Have you read this?

No.

Give me a second. Okay.

Go on to bed.

Here.

Was there something you didn't understand?

No.

I just thought it was a good story.

Listen, Stanley, I know Ryan is practically like a son to you, but he's

learn to accept his limitations.

He's entitled to pursue his potential.

Potential? Potential for what? Reading books?

I mean, if his aspirations were more realistic, it might be possible to

him. Maybe become a janitor? If that's all you think he's capable of, then

you're the one who needs to be educated.

The stream gives us instantaneous access to virtually every fact and idea, every

recording.

Brian simply wants something we all take for granted.

To know.

He wants to know.

And you could be more considerate.

You know, there was a time when reading was a sign of intelligence.

Oh, yeah?

Yeah.

Thank God those days are gone.

There is nothing wrong with your television. Do not attempt to adjust the

picture. We are now controlling the transmission.

We control the horizontal and the vertical. We can deluge you with a

channels or expand one single image to crystal clarity and beyond.

We can shape your vision to anything our imagination can conceive.

For the next power, we will control all that you see and hear.

You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the deepest

inner mind to the outer limits.

Please stand by.

We quantify our world in order to learn. We break it down into facts,

numbers, information.

But how far dare we go before we destroy its mystery?

Neuroelectrical connections can be established using dendritic transistor

Interesting stuff.

Go on.

Interface directly with the main synaptic pathways provided the charge

incompatibilities are compensated for.

Word for word.

What is that like to read without reading?

I don't know.

It's essentially automatic. Never really gave it much thought.

scan the page.

Letters go upstream for character recognition, come back down translated

data, which can then be stored as memory.

Just like that, huh?

I think it'd be more interesting to hear you describe what it's like to actually

read letters, how you convert them into words and sound, memorize

them one by one.

Stanley says that you can even do arithmetic in your head.

I wouldn't be too impressed.

I don't have a choice.

Well, I wouldn't mind learning myself one day.

That's like telling a cripple you'd like to learn how to use his crutches.

I'm sorry, Ryan. I didn't... Sorry.

Wait.

You have a second.

I'm worried about Stanley. I think he's sick.

Sure. Come on.

I don't know.

Lately, Stanley's been wasting a lot of time worrying about trivial things,

insignificant detail.

The other day, he was over with my books, and he wasn't reading them. He

just looking at them, looking at the colors, feeling the textures.

Well, curiosity is a primal biological drug. It's even built into the stream.

Not indeed.

We only got one order.

Okay. Well, what do you have?

Do you want me to take your order?

I'm sorry, Ryan. I locked my order on the way over here. Just forced a habit.

Oh.

You need to hear the menu, then. Right.

Our appetizers today are clam chowder, chicken soup, Cobb salad.

Uh, Cobb salad.

Please.

You know, Ryan...

We've known each other almost our whole lives, and you've never told me how...

How I became disabled?

Why, it's in the stream.

Well, I'd rather hear it from you.

Is it sort of a professional curiosity?

Well, I am a neuropsychologist.

The truth is, I've never actually seen anybody with your condition before.

Um, I hope you're not offended.

When I was five, I was in a car accident.

I received extensive neurological damage.

The doctors kept me alive, but... Sorry.

Your parents?

They died instantly.

Stanley took me and taught me how to make do.

Stanley isn't sick, Ryan.

He just wants to be involved with your life, your book.

He can't read them, so he does what he can.

I think he just...

wants you to know that he feels what you're doing is important.

Thanks.

Stanley, I'm home.

Hey, Stanley.

I'm working.

Sorry. Did you know there's a predominance of the number seven in

security numbers over the past 61 years?

No, I didn't.

Stanley. Are you ashamed of me?

Brian, how could you ask that?

How old is Mark?

He was 15 years old on May 17th, 9, 12 p .m. local time.

Why? He already knows more than I ever will.

And he's always going to be an idiot.

And I wish you wouldn't listen to him.

I've spent my whole life plotting through page by page, trying to learn,

to shove every bit of information I can in this useless brain of mine.

And it doesn't matter how hard I work.

There's nothing I can know that Marcus, anybody else can just download in a

second. It is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth

learning can be taught.

But I have to read it to know.

No, you're right.

You don't know the things that I know.

But one, you don't know how special you are.

And you don't know how strong your weakness has made you. And mine, you're

when you think I don't understand your frustration.

Have you ever watched someone you love try to do something and you know there's

nothing you can do to help them?

were young, I couldn't help you learn the one thing you needed to know most of

all. I could not help you learn to read.

But you didn't really need me to, now did you?

Nothing worth learning can ever be taught, Oscar Wilde.

Thank you.

It doesn't make sense.

Your social security number should have a random distribution.

You feeling okay, Stanley?

I'm fine.

But it is interesting that the digit seven would be done.

24 ,627.

Daly? What's the matter? Daly?

I have 124 ,627 hairs.

I counted.

I wanted to know, and I needed to know. So I counted. I have 24

,627 hairs.

It's on my arm.

It's on my arm.

How many? I need to know. I need to know. It's okay.

Help!

Help!

What is wrong with him?

Viral.

An infection?

No, it's a computer virus. It infected his neural interface.

It was accessing and downloading information faster than his brain could

process.

He knows there's nothing I can do for him.

That's not true, Ryan.

You cracked the eddy and alerted the stream. You drew help when you needed

It was very clever.

It wasn't clever. I just reacted.

We have some of the best ones in the world on stream and working on the

We'll find a cure.

Promise.

I know.

Have the doctors made any progress?

They're already in level three testing of an antivirus. Is there anything I can

do? Just don't bother Ron, okay? Okay.

Excuse me.

I don't mean to interrupt you, but could you tell me what's happening?

Stanley is my guardian.

I see.

Doctor, I know. Would you give this young man a status update?

Doctor.

I've run 147 cross -checks with the antivirus to confirm human safety.

The safety protocol requires only 100.

Don't you think that's a bit overcautious? No.

Don't think so?

I've streamed with Bonn and Melbourne.

They believe they have an effective antivirus for the strain, but aren't

to commit to a clinical court.

They're 15 ,219 kilometers apart.

I'll have them send us a program now.

We can run a phase four diagnostic with San Francisco and have a definitive

answer within the hour.

Just leave it to us.

Of course. What else can I do?

BP 110 over 60, pulse 72.

I don't have extreme functions and normal.

Particle stabilizer, please.

Yes, Doctor.

AV compilation at 80%. Bring AV downloader online.

Downloader online.

Pressure 100 over 50.

Halt 61 and steady.

He's out, Doctor.

Doctor? Levels are good.

He's stable.

Taking him off screen.

stay, doctor.

Diagnostic?

Cortical functions are nominal.

Send me its factors, please.

Thank you. I'm going in.

Administer antivirus.

Administer antivirus.

Dr. Renaud, are you with us?

Beginning download.

AV download at 10%, 20%, 30%.

They have to manually download the antiviral instructions directly into its

interface.

It'll only take a couple minutes.

Hey, everything's going to be all right. All right.

Download at 75%.

It's impossible.

What's going on?

I don't know.

Decomposition. No,

stop it now.

Turn around now.

No,

stop it now.

Approaching the cuticle to her teeth. Break it.

Brain can't handle the data right now.

I'm here, Stanley.

I'm dying.

I'm sorry. You can't stay.

I'm not moving.

I'm right here, buddy. No, you're not.

There's chaos.

I don't understand you. You're going in and out the shop.

You're different.

I know I am. I'm so sorry, Stanley.

You don't have what we have.

What did you say?

Don't eat me.

Don't eat me.

I'm

sorry.

I'm sorry I couldn't be what you wanted me to be.

I'm sorry for who I am. I'm sorry I couldn't help you.

I'm so sorry.

You shouldn't be.

Everything that we tried to do to stop it was useless.

It's not your fault, Ryan.

You could have gotten the virus a little faster.

Stanley was a good man.

I'm sure his last thoughts were of how I let him down.

No.

His last words were that he loved you.

That transcript of Stanley's last moments was put on stream during the

operation. We were hoping that someone might be able to use it to find a way to

disable the virus.

And? And it could take a while.

For you, using the string? Well, the sheer amount of information that was

through Stanley's mind near the end was astonishing.

The analysis of the data could take weeks, but the strange thing was the

content. Near the end, Stanley had calculated 197 different shades of red

OR.

Why? I always hated red.

Apparently that's what this virus does. It makes you curious, but to an

incredible extreme.

Did you know that Dr. Renaud was infected by it as well?

She bit her fingernails to the quick, trying to test how much pressure was

necessary to break them.

Downloading and uploading millions of bits of useless data.

She reached her limit this morning.

She died.

The virus is spreading, Ryan.

The stream is flooding.

A present?

Come on, come on.

Today, right?

What is it? It's like the stream, but it's all your own.

I don't want my own stream.

I want yours.

You can't get onto the stream, Ryan.

Maybe someday, but... For now, Ryan, you're just gonna have to get used to

outside.

The ER is full.

All new admissions, please report to the maternity wing.

Repeat.

Please,

my child.

I have to get back to the beach.

No, no, no, no. So many grains of sand.

17 .8 million grains of sand per square meter.

We may need the library to handle the overflow.

If we have to, we have to. I can't stop it. The virus keeps mutating.

That's why you have to stop it at the source.

Ryan, that's exactly what we're trying to do.

The virus is not the problem. It's the stream. That's why we have to shut it

down. We have to kill the stream.

That is absurd.

There are thousands of people infected by this virus, and you want us to cut

ourselves off from the one source that can give us the answer? No, the stream

the problem. That's why you can't tackle the virus head on. This is a serious

problem, Ryan, but it's just a virus. It doesn't think. It doesn't have to. It

sees you coming. Would you stop wasting our time? You don't even know what

you're talking about.

I know

how

you must be feeling. You've always been jealous of people who were on stream and

considering what happened to Sam. It's only natural that you would develop a

resentment towards the stream, giving it human qualities. This isn't about me.

Listen to yourself, what you're suggesting.

You're attributing intelligence to a tool.

Look, read it. Look at that. Come on. It's difficult for me to process

handwriting. Every time you thought you stopped it, the virus did something

unexpected, as if it was prepared for your cure, always one step ahead.

What are the odds of that happening?

One in a million, 605 ,000. Okay, okay, impossible.

That's what it is. Don't you understand? The stream created the virus, and it's

become so adaptive that the damn thing has developed a survival instinct.

Ryan, the stream builds self -diagnostic and self -repair functions into all of

its programs, including this virus.

That hardly qualifies as a survival instinct. Do you think that distinction

matters to the stream? You're talking about it as if it were a person. The

stream doesn't think, Ryan, and it doesn't feel. It's not alive.

No, but it does learn.

Because you made it love knowledge.

No, you know, it's not knowledge. It's just information, okay? And it's hungry,

and it's using all of you to feed it as much information as it can. It doesn't

matter how petty or useless or irrelevant the information is. And

not alive, it doesn't care about you.

The stream will never be full until it can quantify everything.

But you can't quantify everything. You can't quantify the world.

You will only die trying.

We can shut it down.

Anytime we want to.

No. No, you can't. Not even if you wanted to.

What are you talking about?

You don't see.

It's out of your control.

Practically every thought you have, every idea, every insight is all

from that thing. It's not going to let you pull the plug on it.

It is not going to let you want to.

How can you know?

How can you be sure?

Because I'm outside.

Emergency shutdown response is built into the stream's base level

One of the first demonstrations of the stream's effectiveness.

After activation, the stream cut off all outside access to the shutdown.

Tell me something I don't know.

Screen design commission ordered the shutdown codes to be printed in over 700

publications, but not this one.

Not in any of them. The answer's gone.

What if... I'm not just overdue.

Your book is overdue, Mr. Call.

I just lost Dr. Kevington.

It's worse than we thought.

We've got to do something.

How are you? Oh, Cheryl.

Glad to save you the trouble of having to come find you.

Let's go.

Where?

West End Financial District.

Why? There's nothing there but some old abandoned buildings and industrial

waste. Any answer?

Ryan, are you familiar with the Express and the Fool's errand?

Because that's exactly what this is.

Stop treating me like one of your patients, Cheryl.

I don't qualify to get the virus, remember?

Listen, Ryan, I just came by to help, okay? Then help me. I want you to come

with me.

May I ask why?

To access the stream.

We can do that anywhere, Ryan.

Not this.

All right?

Okay. Just tell me what you need to know.

I will.

As soon as I figure that out.

Okay. Well, we're here.

We're nowhere.

Okay, let's go.

What exactly are you hoping to find?

Anything blunt and heavy.

I was referring to the larger picture.

Aren't you trying to help me here?

No.

Do you know I had a crush on you?

Uh, yeah.

How come you never said anything?

I don't know.

I guess I never felt worthy of you.

So you're telling me now?

That's because I'm running out of time.

And we all are.

You know, you used the past tense.

What? You said you had a crush on me.

Did I?

Yeah. Huh.

Probably just looks like time, you know.

Occupational hazard of defective humans.

Probably.

I can't get anything past you, can I?

To you.

Lady.

When are we going to get a bank?

I'm crazy.

You know that, don't you?

If you want to leave, now's the time.

You still haven't told me what we're doing here.

Blasphemy. You know,

sometimes I really don't understand you.

I'm here because it's a Jesse Cole's office. You're here because you're

Who's Jesse Cole?

Ranch manager of this obsolete bank and very possibly the smartest man that ever

lived.

Then what's with all the books?

How can you possibly know who he was or how smart he was if he predated the

stream? His library records.

And he didn't predate it. He just liked to read.

Over a period of 30 years, the men checked out virtually every book in the

library.

Welcome to the last rest of your literacy.

At the Chetty Cole's time, all published materials put on stream by law, any

book considered dangerous, was destroyed.

Well, for our own sake.

You know, someone once said the only crime worse than burning books was not

reading them.

Certain kinds of information shouldn't get into the wrong hands, Ron.

not the wrong minds.

And do you know who decided what was to stay and what was destroyed?

Well, the stream. It was given a serial... The stream, exactly.

And it decided that anything that could shut it down was just about as dangerous

as it could get.

Here it is.

Here what is? The procedure guidelines.

Jesse Cole may have been very smart, but he was also irresponsible.

He checked out every book in the library, but he didn't return any of

stream can't destroy something it doesn't have.

And this book is the program.

you were going to use to shut it down.

I doubt that.

Oh, no.

Let's go.

Let's go. The dream knows where you are, Ryan, and it knows what you're trying

to do.

thinking of going in there.

That's the idea. Don't move!

Don't move!

The vault is on a time lock. There's no way to open it. We're going to

suffocate.

Maybe.

Sorry to have to do this to you. There we go.

Ryan,

obviously I can't go anywhere. I really don't think this is necessary. How long

before they find their way in? How should I know?

Because they know.

Stop it, Ryan.

You didn't really think we were alone, did you?

Records indicate three levels of reinforced steel. Two hours, 27 minutes

blowtorch. That's way too long.

Let's go, people!

They're going to find a way in here, you know.

It's a time lock.

There's no way to access the mechanism.

You know, even by your own standards, you're a failure.

Excuse me, I'm trying to read.

You could have gotten rid of me and gotten away, and then said you'd have to

away down a dead end and sit there with a book for two hours. I wasn't running

away.

Good one.

What the hell is he doing in there?

He's reading.

Reading what?

You haven't been able to get a good look.

Well, get a good look!

No,

you can't win.

Nothing is impossible.

Nothing is certain.

Unless it's programmed.

You really don't understand anything, do you?

They're going to kill you, Ryan.

Do you want to kill me?

No. Of course not.

But I want to stop you. I want to stop you from doing something that's going to

hurt all of us.

There's no humanity.

Not in them.

Not in you. Why? Because I think you're wrong?

No, because everybody does.

There's not one dissenting voice. Not one person.

It's human.

To disagree, it's human to make mistakes. We don't make mistakes. We

perfect information.

It's especially human to make mistakes in the face of perfect information.

Like when you want something so much, even though every bit of

information is telling you you can never, ever have it.

It's just a program, Ryan. It's just a tool. It's a tool that makes all of our

lives better. It controls your lives.

If you abdicate your free will to it, you're not alive.

You're just a terminal.

You don't know what it's like.

You can't even dream.

Because you can't have dreams without challenges.

This dream has taken all your dreams and didn't even give you knowledge in

return. Just information.

Information without meaning, understanding, context.

It's useless.

He's tricked her.

She's reading the shutdown command right into the screen.

Cheryl, turn away!

What's the matter?

You don't want to look at my book?

You don't want to, but the stream doesn't want you to.

Read it.

Excuse me.

Read it!

We know, Ryan. We know what you're trying to do.

Do it.

Okay, prove to me that there's some humanity left in there somewhere.

Prove to me you're still alive.

In a few seconds, I'm going to die.

I wanted to do that my whole life.

What's happening?

What happened?

We made a choice.

Oh, my God.

That was stupid.

Don't.

It's just going to take time.

All right, let's start at the beginning of the alphabet.

Sound it out.

A. A.

A for apple. A. B for boy.

B. C for cat.

We make tools to extend our abilities.

to further our reach and fulfill our aspirations.

But we must never let them define us. For if there is no difference between

and maker, then who will be left to build the world?