Smartystan

Sounds emitted from the stereo system. They were like little metallic pings. The way that they combined to make a symphony of technology warmed Belinda Gummer. She had been working on this project for the past two years. Success evaded her. Multiple crashes and malfunctions colored her reality. Belinda wanted to see a learned machine change the structure of DNA to help physicians better understand the nature of diseases. Her eyes darted towards the data. All of it came streaming down the screen like electronic rain.

“That’s what I said,” Garvey Kepp mentioned. He had a thin mustache and a strong jawline. A fifty-six-year-old man with a wife, two kids, and four grands, he let everything go but the work. At a mere five feet six inches, he commanded the team to do more, go further. Belinda watched him work.

“If we’re going to do this thing, people, we’ve gotta do it right,” Kepp said it without rancor or ugliness. He spoke plainly and as precise as an ice pick. Belinda walked around to see the various lines of code that had been put into the computer system.

“Hey, Garv’,” she announced.

“Belinda,” Kepp replied. Again, he wasn’t annoyed or bothered, just focused.

“I’m going to award whatever team ten million dollars if they can come up with the best program for detecting abnormalities in human DNA.”

His eyes narrowed and he folded his arms. “Okay, that should be a bit of motivation.” She smirked. “Just remember that there are people competing against all of us here. I don’t think they’ll be getting as tidy a sum as this, but we’ll see.” Kepp looked at Belinda. It was a strange look fraught with both tension and somehow relief all at once. As the chief technology officer, he knew that he had to deliver for his own satisfaction. The fact that Belinda may confer on his team the eight figures brought him to a stage of understanding.

In all of the competition and sweat and toil, there seemed to be a camaraderie apparent. Joyful at this, Belinda also realized that to spur on the various teams in her own company, she had to keep in touch with the other three founders. The land that was set aside for them to use totaled sixteen trillion dollars. This all amounted to something more than just lines drawn on a digital map. This represented the place where minds could go to become greater, more distinguished. She didn’t want to conduct another conference call, so they all decided that next week, they’d meet up at the Mercier restaurant, hotel, and playhouse.

By continuing on her quest for excellence, she brought a sensibility to the fore. In each of her words and deeds, she made sure her message could edify her audience. In whatever endeavor she chose to pursue, she looked at the intention and the results and counted them as a sense of completion. Her heels clicked against the wood floor leading up to her office. Right after suspending her studies from high school, she came to this place. She had saved up enough money from summer jobs at a burger joint and as a lifeguard. She purchased a small space to be shared with a Pentecostal church, a druggist, and an adult comic bookstore.

It took her enough time to recognize that she would be working on something that would be elevated beyond this specific location. In five years, she had managed to build up UltraMinds in a fashion that had surpassed the church, the pharmacy, and the nudey books. She bought out all of them. As her clientele began to expand, so did her confidence. She knew the check she had to sign but she had self-esteem as money in the bank. Belinda counted in her head the amount of space by square footage would necessitate her growing empire.

As one of Delaware’s finest in those days, she kept going. Everything came second, even a husband and some kids. All of that consumed her and remained her passion for being a better person. Self-teaching made her a candidate for working out problems and becoming far richer in mind than in the physical form. This, by the way, came at a time when she could have boasted her six hundred million dollar fortune. But she didn’t. The money kept her fueled but she had to steer the aircraft if she wanted to become better at her profession.

Kepp could walk with his blue eyes slightly squinted, arms still folded. His boss noticed his steely determination in trying to make machines function better. It became a goal, a destination for them both to be fighting the battle for exploration and knowledge. To keep the idea strong in her head, Belinda would take a yellow legal pad and jot down whatever came to mind and pass it to the CTO.

Kepp looked at the notes and smiled briefly. Then, his hard face once again returned. He had to beat chief operating officer Tulip Horman. Her brown skin seemed to sparkle and she dazzled a room with her bone white teeth and her closely cropped Afro.

“I want you two to battle this out like a war against machines in a glass fighting cage,” Belinda said this in a cold manner, but she grinned the entire time. “Leave no one spared and have a bloody-minded attitude about the whole thing. This is about life.”

Kepp and Tulip looked at each other. They knew their boss. They did an about face, almost saluting Belinda. As they walked away, she pulled out her legal notepad and jotted some sketches of what the learned machine program would look like once it had been tested, re-tested, and put through quality assurance. Belinda saw dollar signs, of course. But she also heard hearts beating, talk over family dinner, and shouts at concerts. This meant that there would be life given to people told that they’d only have months to live. Belinda wrote.