Original subtitles

(MEN SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY)

STOTTLEMEYER:

Take the 23rd,

MAN: Yes, Sir,

I want you to take

this personal info manager,

uplink all the data on it

to Washington, and then

bring the pin back to me,

Go!

How the hell

did this building's security

allow a guy like Zig Fowler

through its front doors,

let alone its

holy of holies?

I told you,

he isn't Zig Fowler,

Zig Fowler is dead,

I ran that bastard

to the ground

four years ago,

Then why does my pin say

this is Fowler?

Purge it, okay?

The guy in the server room

is named Unger, Cliff Unger,

And don't ask me how the hell

he got in here,

I'm still trying

to figure it out myself,

So, if this guy's not Fowler,

what's he doing here?

I don't know,

This guy should have

folded his cards already,

He's a glorified typist,

for crying out loud,

not a terrorist,

So, like you say,

if we move in on him,

he should lie down,

Get him on the horn,

keep him talking

for five to seven minutes,

Can you do it?

(BEEPING)

Unger,

(CELL PHONE RINGING)

What?

PETER YASTRZEMSKI:

You thought about my offer?

I told you what you can do

with your offer, didn't I?

Yeah,

But now that I've removed

it from that particular place

and wiped it off,

I'm putting it right back

on the table,

Understand something,

There's no wriggle room here,

These FBI guys, ,,

Oh! I've seen

their handiwork,

Oh, you think that was bad?

Wait till you see

what they're gonna do to you,

If I let them,

Let's be real, Cliff,

My name is Zig Fowler,

Your name is Cliff Unger,

That's not what

my chip says,

I don't care

what your chip says,

Look, your only way

out of here is through me,

And you're definitely

gonna want a way out,

You're not gonna blow up

this building,

Oh, no?

I'm holding a detonator

in my hand,

Wanna see me push it?

YAS:

I'm willing to admit,

I might have pushed you

a little too hard,

I, ,, I'll make it up to you,

I'll get that chip of yours

fixed today,

I can make it happen, Right now,

Nah, it's a little late

for that now,

don't you think?

CLIFF: I'm on one path,

and it's heading

in one direction

and one direction only,

Look, you said before

you wanted to talk to me,

face to face,

What if I were willing

to agree to that? Huh?

What do you say, Cliff?

You and me,

Mano-a-mano,

Did you hear what I said?

Yeah, I hear you,

Okay,

CLIFF:

Come on in,

We'll be in position

in three minutes,

CLIFF:

Talk to me,

I am waiting,

YAS:

All right Cliff

I'm coming in,

But, first I've gotta run this

by Agent Stottlemeyer,

No, You come in, now,

Cliff, it's not gonna

take long, I promise you,

You come in right now,

or the deal's off,

You're not Zig Fowler,

Why are you acting like him?

Maybe because Zig Fowler

was right to try

to destroy you

and the unimpeded,

wholly democratic

free flow of information,

That flow of information

you're talking about

is what the Cliff Unger

I know believes in

with his heart and soul,

and that Cliff Unger, ,,

Knows that if he blows up

that information server,

he'll be inconveniencing

an awful lot of people,

Oh! Is that all I'm doing?

You know? Maybe that's

the problem right there,

I think Zig Fowler just won,

Fowler's dead, man,

He was a loser and so are you,

Have a nice day,

(CELL PHONE BEEPING)

Execute Zig Zag end game,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Zig Zag end game initiated,

Sixty seconds to detonation,

What the hell is that?

That is the sound

of the meter running,

You can stop it,

But only if you come in

here right now,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Fifty seconds to detonation,

Cliff,

Cliff!

Stottlemeyer,

I need another minute,

we're not ready yet,

We're not ready!

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Forty seconds to detonation,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Thirty seconds to detonation,

CLIFF: Hey, Weatherman,

You ready to blow this place up?

Yeah, sure, Why not?

What have we got to lose?

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Twenty seconds to detonation,

Absolutely nothing,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Ten, nine, ,,

CONTROL VOICE:

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 thousand 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 hour,

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,

CONTROL VOICE:

As we surrender

more authority to our

evermore capable technology,

what will happen

when that technology

goes awry?

RADIO ANNOUNCER:

Now,

what's going on, Alan?

ALAN:

All we know for sure

is that the building

was taken over

by a refusenik group

calling itself The Syndrome,

and that cybercolumnist

Cliff Unger is among

the group's members,

The Syndrome, have tried

to make a name for themselves

and their anti-technology

campaign by hacking, ,,

They make us sound

like a bunch of lunatics,

Yeah,

YAS:

Can I get you

anything, Cliff?

Food, drink?

Well, ,,

You could tell the media

the truth,

They're gonna find out anyway,

I don't know what truth

it is you're referring to,

That Zig Fowler is holding

this building and the servers

inside it hostage,

Because you're not him,

There's a flaw in your chip,

You're pissed off about it,

That's the truth,

Yes, that is the truth,

But you can't tell them that,

because the technology

is not supposed

to make mistakes, right?

The chip is biocoded to my DNA,

Therefore, I am

who it says that I am,

And it says

that I am Zig Fowler,

Come on, you can

figure it out,

It doesn't take a genius,

YAS: Come on now, Cliff,

We're friends, or at least

we used to be,

Tell me, how do we

get out of this?

Well, for starters,

we can put down the phones

to start communicating

together like human beings,

Yas, ,,

Uh, let me think about it

for a minute,

I want that bastard's head

on a stick,

Three of my men are dead,

What's the body count

on their side?

Two dead, one critical,

I just spoke to the meat wagon

and all I got out

of the critical's

is what a son of a bitch

your boy, Cliff, is,

Like he has his own agenda,

What's going on, Yas?

I don't know,

CLIFF:

Hello, hello,

You've gone quiet on me,

That makes me nervous,

Uh, sorry about that Cliff,

I'm just trying to check

on something here,

Look, Cliff,

I'm trying to save

a few lives here,

Can we make that happen?

"Save a few lives,"

Well, now that sounds

awfully funny coming from you

considering what you did

to my comrades,

The feds made a mistake,

I didn't know they were

gonna do that,

Now, I know it's asking

a lot, but I don't

want it to preclude

you and me coming

to some type of

an agreement here,

Yeah, okay,

We'll just chalk it up

to another valuable lesson

courtesy of Pete Yastrzemski,

(CELL PHONE BEEPING)

Can you hold on

just a little longer?

I can try,

Try hard,

This is our destiny

we're talking about,

No tricks,

or I'll decorate

the wall with you,

Isn't that something?

I was just gonna say

the same thing

to Cliffy here,

You wanna settle the score

when the job's done,

be my guest,

But if we kill him now,

we can't finish the job,

See, here's why

I'm getting confused,

We're wired,

we're ready to rock

and now all of a sudden,

Cliffy wants to

lock eyeballs with

his buddy Yastrzemski,

Why?

I have my reasons, Accept it,

Translation,

The man has got

his own agenda,

Geez, I wonder what it is,

Weatherman,

he's working for them,

And every second we wait,

we're one second closer

to them coming in here

and stopping us,

Maybe, Maybe we should,

you know,

Set the timers,

head for the basement,

WEATHERMAN:

This is not just about

blowing up the servers,

It's about doing it

the way Zig intended,

For God's sake, Weatherman,

open your damn eyes,

What I'm talking about,

that's what Zig intended,

Wait a minute,

Cavalry's on its way,

One of the elevators,

It's not moving yet,

but it will be,

Would Yastrzemski do that to us?

Is he that stupid?

You're asking him?

Yeah, he would,

If they're coming up,

we better hit them

before they hit us,

Come on, Weatherman,

let me drop a load

down the elevator shaft,

Man, this is gonna be cool,

Ten ounces of C4

in an elevator shaft,

Kaboom, boom, boom,

Hurry it up, Roy,

come on!

Don't rush me,

The elevator is coming up,

We're going down,

Everybody stand back,

When this baby goes,

it's gonna kick

all kinds of ass,

Three, two, one, ,,

Boom!

Where's the God damn boom?

What the hell

are you looking at?

This isn't my fault,

That detonator was

state of the art,

C4, Son of a, ,,

Hey!

We got to blow

the computers now,

What have you done to us?

Haven't done anything,

Weatherman,

DELL: Weatherman,

push the button,

If you don't finish the job,

then I will,

(ELEVATOR BELL DINGING)

Elevator,

It's empty,

(SCREAMING)

(GRUNTING)

Cover me,

(GRUNTING)

MAN: Move back, move back,

Shut the door,

We're secure at that end,

How did you get up

the exit stairs?

I punched in

the lockout codes

that Cliff gave us,

Does that mean

we're secure?

You got me,

What the hell's

that supposed to mean?

Hey, if it was Zig Fowler

telling us what to do,

it'd be one thing, but it's not,

What is all this, anyway?

This is all the information

flowing into and out

of the servers,

Hundreds and millions

of terabytes a second,

This, is why we're here,

How are you

making out with

the charges?

CLIFF: Charges are set,

Good, Have you

done everything?

I think so,

Oh! Who asked you?

Where did you get

the idea that you were

in charge, anyway? Huh?

What? Did you and Weatherman

switch pants when you

woke up this morning?

Oh! You son of a bitch!

Listen,

let's not fall apart now,

We've come too far,

Oh, shut up! Just because

you got Zig somewhere

in that pin of yours,

does not make you him,

Hey, I got us

into the building, didn't I?

Zig got us into it,

You came along

for the ride,

Please don't tell me

you still think

I'm up to something,

When you think about it,

it's been pretty easy,

Yeah, a little too easy,

Like it's all

some kind of a setup, hey?

My ass is

on the line here,

same as yours,

What's waiting for us,

Cliffy, huh?

You can tell us now,

You're not Zig, Are you, Cliff?

Tell you what,

You still don't trust me

after all this, ,,

Go ahead, shoot me,

Anything you say,

WOMAN: (ON COMPUTER)

Miss Chalmers,

how nice to see you,

Mr, Ripken is waiting for you,

Just step into the elevator

and I'll send you right up,

Now, remember,

when you grab

the security drop, ,,

I know what to do,

Just reminding you,

we got to move fast,

If that backup drone

gets here before we

reprogram the first one, ,,

I'll try to make sure

it zaps you first,

I'm sorry, Would you please

swipe your hand again?

Just step into the elevator,

and the security drone

will see you,

CLIFF: Okay,

Here it comes,

Please stand where you are,

Get ready,

Go!

(ALARM RINGING)

Hold it still,

Everybody out of here, Now!

(GUNSHOT)

(WOMAN SCREAMING)

DELL: Let's go, move it!

Move it! Move it!

Execute Zig Zag drone sequence,

Move it,

Out! Out! Out! Out!

Let's go, let's go, ,, Move it!

Let go,

WOMAN: (ON COMPUTER)

How nice, ,, How nice, ,,

How nice to see you, ,,

CLIFF: Dell

secures an elevator,

After Weatherman and Roy

clear the lobby,

Yeah, yeah,

yeah, yeah, yeah,

we know it already,

Quit treating us like morons,

I just wanna make sure

everybody knows the plan,

If we do this right,

the whole security system

will come to a halt,

And what if the plan

doesn't work?

Seems to me, like Zig

thought of everything,

One bot takes out the rest,

and while the system deals

with what's happening,

we slip through the crack,

Except it cannot possibly

be that easy,

Why are you doing this,

Dell? Why now?

'Cause I feel like we're

all being sucked into

this by him,

And I'm not afraid

if that's what

you're thinking

and screw you

if you are thinking it,

You know what?

I am willing

to die for this,

But something is not right here,

You want me to

prove myself some more,

is that it?

Hey! If we're gonna do this,

you got to take

a leap of faith,

Listen to me,

When I first met Zig,

I thought the world

was an awful place,

Totally irredeemable,

But Zig showed me

how to have faith,

The first step towards

finding your own humanity,

is finding it in others,

I trust Cliff,

I trust him implicitly,

But if you're not gonna make

that leap with me,

then we stop this right now,

Either we all

go forward together,

or we don't go at all,

She's beautiful, huh?

Your mom?

She was a great lady,

Smartest person I've ever known,

She died of a

genetic heart condition,

Chip didn't pick it up,

You know, ,,

I'm still trying to

figure out what exactly

is happening here,

I mean, two days ago,

I would have walked

through fire

to kill you, and now, ,,

Well, ,,

You know what they say

about opposites attracting,

Come here,

Kiss me,

Don't think about it,

just do it,

You don't believe

half that crap you put

your name on, do you?

I might have said

a few things to get

a rise out of people,

It definitely got

a rise out of me,

There's more Zig Fowler

in you than you know,

Getting our hands

on a bunch of explosives

is one thing,

Getting them on DIR's

main servers

is something else,

I'm with Weatherman,

And if we're smart,

we'll quit while we're ahead,

I don't understand you people,

You have this amazing plan here,

Zig Fowler must have spent

years working out

all the details,

Hell, if I was some

kind of cyberterrorist,

I'd be wetting my pants

trying to get at

a target like this,

Yeah, well, you're not,

So, why don't you

clean yourself up

and get out of here,

Well, I guess I was right,

The only real threat

this group poses

is that they might talk

their enemies to death,

Hey, I'm perfectly willing

to walk into that building

and blow up those servers,

I don't know

about wetting myself, though,

I'd do it, Beats sitting around,

WEATHERMAN: Why are you

so determined to do this?

This isn't some game, you know?

I mean, even if Zig's plan

went perfectly

in all likelihood,

we're gonna end up killed,

You just want

your old life back, right?

Thought I did,

I have a confession to make,

When I was going through

Zig's files, ,,

I came across

your correspondence with him,

That was private,

you son of a bitch!

(STUTTERING)

I know, I didn't mean

to read it, except, ,,

Once I started,

I began to understand

why you're doing all this

and what it means to you,

That's why I came back here,

I always used to

think of you

as this lost soul,

But when I read your words,

I realized I'm the one

who's lost,

Really?

You know, I spend

a lot of time preaching

to the converted,

I don't think I've ever

actually ever converted

someone myself,

(SIGHING)

Zig once told me,

"Have faith in people,"

"They are the disease,

"But they're also the cure,"

Funny thing is, ,,

,, ,now that I'm here,

doing this,

I feel like it's my destiny,

Your destiny?

That's an intriguing word,

(SIGHING)

Okay,

Now it's my turn

to tell some

dirty secrets,

From the first time

I read your column,

even though

I hated everything

you had to say,

there was something

about how you said it, ,,

I don't know how

to explain this,

but I had the bizarre feeling

that you,

of all people,

were my destiny,

Twenty pounds of C4,

There's more of it,

if we want,

I guess you guys

just walked into

the warehouse and took it?

Well, it wasn't

quite that simple but, ,,

More or less,

that's what we did,

Fed a few instructions into

the security system,

the whole thing froze up,

We dropped down from

the ceiling, Cliff here swiped

his way into the storage room,

we filled up the bags

and off we went,

Right out the front door,

Cliffy did okay, for a newbie,

What do you think, Dell?

Is he for real?

I don't trust him,

What have I got to do?

Kill someone?

I'm a changed man,

Why is it so hard

for you to accept that?

Maybe because the man

you changed from

was a scum sucking,

low life, rat bastard

who fattened himself

with everything

the system had to offer,

Aside from that,

What about Roy?

He used to be a scum sucking,

rat bastard,

Touch me again, asshole,

and I swear, ,,

I'm making a point,

I used to be a mouthpiece

for the system,

but I never picked up a gun

on its behalf,

Oh! So I'm worse than you?

I don't think so,

I got out of the army,

and I got the army

out of me

with a grapefruit spoon,

They treated me

like dirt,

Same way they treated me,

I'm no different than you,

What about Walt?

He's still got his chip,

you let him join the club,

I came with certain expertise,

Without my chip,

we would've been

locked out of the system,

WEATHERMAN: Both these guys

came to us with a purpose,

They've dedicated themselves

to the cause,

CLIFF: So have I,

Now,

And I brought you

something very valuable,

Zig Fowler is this chip,

Don't flatter yourself,

You're just the ugly box

the Christmas present came in,

The only difference is, ,,

This particular present,

only works when the box

comes along,

So, ,,

If you wanna play with Zig Zag,

you're just gonna

have to invite me

to the party,

You want me to kill him,

Weatherman?

What do you mean you

wanna join us?

I wanna join you,

I wanna do what this thing

says I'm supposed to do,

You must think we're

really stupid?

Just say the word,

Please say the word

and I'll kill the little SOB,

I told you to back off, Chance,

I don't wanna think

about what will happen

if the whole flow

of information

comes to a grinding halt,

but I do think

that something has to happen,

What exactly brought about

this little conversion?

Zig Fowler,

I never understood him

before but now I do,

You wanna prove yourself?

You break into the warehouse,

You get us the explosives,

And Zig Zag?

CLIFF: Listen to me,

These people, ,,

They're, ,, They're dreamers,

See, they've, ,,

They've all been hurt,

One way or another,

they've all been hurt

by the system,

And they just want

a little justice,

That's all,

Just a little, ,,

Just a little recognition

that for all the good

that technology does,

it also does a lot of bad,

Look at me,

My chip suddenly stops

working, My whole life gets

turned upside down,

Maybe there's something

to what these people

are saying,

Answer my question,

Why are you still

so obsessed

with Zig Fowler?

Because if he's come back

from the dead,

I need to know about it,

See, that's not possible

because he's dead,

He died in a fire,

You found his chip,

Look, Zig Zag,

It's just this pipe dream

that these people have

that they're gonna see

the system in ruins,

"What if we did this?

What if we did that?"

They're waiting for this

messiah to return,

But he's not going to return

because he's dead,

You killed him, right?

Maybe I did, and maybe I didn't,

What does that mean?

What that means, Cliff,

is that until I'm

150% satisfied

that I know everything,

you can't have your life back,

Now, you go back

to those Syndrome people

and you stay with them,

I can't, I can't,

First of all,

they're never gonna trust me,

Then you've got a problem,

Cliff,

A big problem,

If you think

your life is bad now

because you can't find work

and you've got no money

and no place to live?

How would you like it

if every time you swiped

your hand across a reader,

it told everyone in the system

that you were a pedophile, ,,

Or a murderer, hmm?

I can do that, you know,

Just like that,

You, ,, You can't,

You go back

to those Syndrome people

and you stay with them

and you find out everything

you can

about this Zig Zag scenario,

And you report back to me

and then, maybe,

just maybe, Cliff,

I'll give you your life back,

Now, don't take this personally,

but get the hell out,

Answer the question, asshole!

How did you find us?

What did you do to my chip?

Why does it think

I'm Zig Fowler?

Does anybody know

what he's talking about?

I can't get into my apartment

or my bank account

or my computer,

I'm locked out of everything,

It's because of you,

Is that possible? I mean,

we didn't do this, did we?

I wish, It's a cool idea,

We should have thought of it,

Are you telling me

it wasn't you?

He still hasn't answered

how he found us,

I found a reference

on one of his files

to a package

he sent about four years ago

to a woman

named Diane Konzelman,

Is that you?

Is that you?

Is that your real name?

Zig sent me a disk

before he died,

That brought you here?

Bullshit,

I'm not making it up,

Why would I make it up?

Maybe to suck us in so

you can do another one

of your idiotic cyber columns,

"They're out there

and they're dumb as shit,

It's The Syndrome,"

Is that it, Cliffy?

You making fun of us?

Can you access Zig's files?

Yes, That's all I can access,

Good, Move your ass,

Make yourself useful

for the first time

in your life,

I'm totally screwed,

Not little screwed,

not medium screwed,

totally screwed,

You're upset, Who wouldn't be?

I held my chip to the reader

and all of a sudden,

security bots are flying at me

from every which way,

This whole thing

is a total nightmare,

Look, we'll run some diagnostics

and we'll get to the bottom

of it, okay?

(DOOR OPENING)

Morning, Mr, Yastrzemski,

Morning, Ben,

This is my friend, Cliff Unger,

The Cliff Unger,

who writes that great

cyber column?

Yeah, are you a fan?

(SCOFFS)

I read

Strictly From Unger

every day before

I crank her up,

Where's your column been

the last few days?

Well, you know, ,,

Don't get him

started, Ben, please,

Can I get you to scan

your chip for me, Mr, Unger?

Boy, wait till my wife

hears that I met you!

Is she a fan too?

(CHUCKLING) Oh no!

She hates your guts,

Well, all the circuits

check out,

Let's see if any of

your base files got corrupted,

Pretty ironic don't you think,

that a big IT supporter

like you

gets hoisted

on his own petard?

(CHUCKLING)

Hysterical!

(MACHINE BEEPING)

Huh, ,,

Problem?

BEN: Um, ,,

I'm getting a stage four

security alert here,

Mr, Yastrzemski,

A what?

According to this,

your chip's IDing you

as, um, Zig Fowler,

The cyber terrorist guy?

No, that's impossible, Ben,

Run it again please,

Did, Got the exact same result,

What's happening?

What's happening?

YAS: This had better not be

some type of an elaborate hoax

you and your editors

have cooked up,

CLIFF: Mr, Yastrzemski,

we've been working together

a long time,

We have an understanding,

Now I came to you as a friend

because I need help,

So, please, just help me,

I am, we're going

to the main server room,

YAS: I'd like you to download

everything off his chip

and give me a full analysis,

So, after you do this,

after you analyze

everything that's on my chip,

I get a new one, right?

Cliff, there's a reason

this is happening,

Zig Fowler never did anything

just for the hell of it,

See, when you say

things like that,

you scare me,

Listen to me,

Someone is trying

to resurrect this bastard,

I'm gonna help you,

but you are gonna

have to help me,

You pissed off

an awful lot of people,

lot of dangerous people,

So you think one

of these people is

doing this to me?

No, What do you think?

Mr, Yastrzemski,

something strange just

came up with this chip,

The coding almost

looks like a key file,

It's the sort of thing

a hacker uses to access

someone else's files,

The coding indicates, ,,

I think it's aimed at

the security system,

Is it dangerous?

No, it's dormant,

like it came with

its own firewalls,

We should be able

to neutralize it,

I was right,

Someone is using you,

WOMAN: And a strange sequencer

file that keeps looping

around the whole thing,

YAS: I don't like

where this is going,

I don't like this at all,

Johnny, don't do this to me,

I'm having a horrible day,

Now, open this door,

Look, I'd love to let you in,

But if I did that

and Mr, Unger came home, ,,

What are you talking about?

I'm Mr, Unger,

You know who I am,

Yeah, sure I do,

But don't you understand?

Doesn't matter

if I think you're the guy,

If the building doesn't think

you're the guy,

you ain't the guy,

I am the guy,

Look, open this door

or I'm gonna have you fired,

(CHUCKLING)

Now that's a laugh,

You can't get me fired

'cause you ain't the guy,

Mickey, ,,

Mickey,

Give me IS,

My computer won't talk to me,

And that's a surprise to you?

The way you talk to it,

Just do it, I'm not in the mood,

Hello, info services

can only be accessed online,

Hello, I know that,

I can't get online,

That's why I need your help,

Good thing I got no work to do,

There's a problem here,

It ain't your computer,

Oh, look, It's working,

Maybe it's your chip,

have you thought of that?

Don't say that,

Jesus, with a thing like that,

I could be in hell,

And I can't think of

anyone more deserving,

CLIFF:

Unfortunately,

the truth is we're not

nearly as intelligent

as the computers we've built,

There are roughly

12,000 people joining us in

this cyber conference today,

Put all our brains

into one box,

not a pleasant thought,

and our collective

computing power

is less than

half of the

computing power

of one server

in the building that I'm

standing in right now,

Does that answer your question?

Mmm, kind of,

I mean, I'm not

disagreeing with you,

There's no doubt

that the proliferation

of biometrics

has improved our lives,

It's improved my life,

Life is better for everyone,

Example,

A cashless society

is a safer society,

Why?

Because we've removed

human beings

and their weaknesses

from the equation,

You can't steal

what doesn't exist,

CLIFF: Just like the Internet

revolutionized computing,

personal information

technology has revolutionized

what it is to be human,

That's why we built the system,

That's why we have the system,

And that's why the good people

here at DIR are helping us

to spread the word,

YAS: We've got time

for one more question,

Luciana from Sao Paulo, Brazil

I would say that we had

a connection problem, but, ,,

But that would be admitting

that your faith in technology

is based on a lie,

Hackers, ,,

Uh, to whom

do I owe the pleasure?

Weatherman, ,, Just Weatherman,

Weatherman, really?

The Weatherman, hmm,

Don't take this personally,

but you're a lot better

looking than I had imagined,

Fuck you,

Just for everybody out there,

Weatherman is a frequent

e-mailer to my cybercolumn,

She and her group, the, um, ,,

(STUTTERING)

The, ,, Was it the sandunes?

The Syndrome,

Right, right, right,

The Syndromes are under

the ridiculous notion

that all of the wonderful

technological advances

that we've made

in the past few years

are somehow

eroding our humanity,

isn't that right?

As always, you've

oversimplified a complex

and significant problem,

CLIFF: Hmm,

Significant to whom, sweetie?

The few Luddites

and know-nothings

that would rather live

in divine ignorance

outside the boundaries

of big, bad, technology?

WEATHERMAN:

I don't need

a chip in my body

to feel like I belong,

People like you

and your audience

have become so reliant

on technology,

that they let

their humanity wither,

You don't have

conversations anymore,

You have conjoined data flow,

You don't have relationships,

you have cybercommunion,

Doesn't that tell you something?

Don't just stand there,

Get her off, Get her off,

(STUTTERING) It's okay,

It's these postcards

from the lunatic fringe

that remind us

of how good we have it,

Now, I think

this is a good thing,

It's good that you

feel that way, Cliff,

Because time is on our side,

not yours,

And the day will come

when the unimpeded flow

of information will stop,

and people will have

to deal with each other

like humans again,

Thank you, Next time,

don't call us, we'll call you,

God, am I glad this is over,

I hate these cyberconferences,

ZIG:

Weatherman,

how's the weather?

WEATHERMAN: You just love

that joke, don't you?

Never seems to get old,

Trust me Zig, it does,

So, what's up?

Oh, I just called to chat,

No, you never just call

to chat, What's wrong?

You know me too well,

Yeah, except, ,,

I don't know

what you look like,

I don't know what kind

of food you eat,

I don't know

whether you're a boxers

or briefs man,

Other than that,

yeah, I guess

I know you pretty well,

Boxers, Predictable,

So, what's wrong?

I'm gonna have to

go away for a while,

How long is awhile?

Till they forget about me,

Doubt that'll be anytime soon,

You're wrong,

That's the problem,

They will,

So, why don't you come

work with us?

We have the same goals,

You'll just have to

learn to do it

without that chip inside you,

This chip is what's

gonna bring them down,

Who are you kidding?

You're just trying

to embarrass Yastrzemski

at his own game,

He's benefitted at

my expense long enough,

I think it's time

I returned the favor,

What, so this is

all about making

a name for yourself?

You know me better than that,

don't you?

Yeah, I do,

I'm gonna miss your words,

(CELL PHONE RINGING)

Yastrzemski,

Were you planning to call

before you stopped by?

Oh, no, Zig,

What would be

the fun of that?

We've got you this time,

Oh! Well now,

how do you figure that?

I'm a mile away

and I've got three dozen men

riding shotgun,

All this attention, I'm touched,

Okay, so it was a bad joke,

So, we're even,

Are you there?

Zig?

WEATHERMAN:

Zig,

it was a joke,

How are you gonna know it's me?

YAS:

Oh, your chip

will tell me, of course,

Yes, you're right,

You got me this time,

You're right, you know,

(WEATHERMAN SIGHING)

You're gonna have

to be more specific,

I'm right on so many occasions,

Computers aren't the problem,

They have failsafes

built right in,

Thousands of ways

to correct themselves,

Hell, I see that every time

I try to hack in,

It's when the

Yastrzemskis of the world

enter the picture,

When humans get involved,

see, that's when

things get scary,

So, what? You gonna concoct

some elaborate scenario

where the computers

are always right and the

humans screw it up?

WEATHERMAN:

Sounds complicated,

It is,

But it'll be worth it,

Wish I could be there to see it,

I gotta go,

You will be there,

Promise,

See you soon,

What's that?

Another bad joke?

We'll see each other,

It's our destiny,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Six, five, four,

three, two, one,

Zig Zag detonation module

is now activated,

You know,

you could have saved us

a lot of trouble

if you'd just told me

who you were,

I didn't have to,

You knew,

Ah! I knew you'd come,

I knew you didn't

have the guts to do it,

Well, had to get you

in the room somehow,

And here you are,

Back away from the server, ,,

It's all right,

it's all right,

(GUNS COCKING)

Hold your weapons,

Relax, we got 'em,

How do we know

there's not some other

detonation device in here?

ZIG: Oh! There is,

There most certainly is,

But you won't find it

in that modeling clay

we strapped to the servers,

What the hell

are you talking about?

Zig Zag, ,,

It's alive,

It's growing,

Just waiting to be set free

into the information grid,

Oh! By the way,

thanks for letting me in,

You let me into this room,

remember?

The key that you allowed me

to leave on the server,

came real handy,

This is bullshit,

Is it?

It doesn't look

like bullshit,

Zig's chip didn't fail,

Yastrzemski,

You did,

Oh, he's playing a head game,

Yeah, he wants the world

to know how smart he is,

Well, I caught you once

and I caught you

a second time,

End of story, Zig,

No, See, when the execute

command is given,

these servers will begin

hoarding electricity

interconnecting with

all the power that

they can tap into,

This is gonna happen

so quickly, they won't

be able to handle it,

There's going to be

a massive explosion,

It's not gonna be pretty,

They're gonna go, boom,

Then the building,

Then the block,

Then the city,

(MIMICS EXPLOSION)

Mass destruction,

Oh, it's gonna get ugly,

The funniest part is,

the on and off switch

is right there in your hand,

You crazy son of a bitch!

ZIG: And now,

the real countdown begins,

All you had to do

is keep your hand

away from that reader,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Sixty seconds to detonation,

Your chip is the

execute command,

YAS: No, ,,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Fifty seconds to detonation,

That's the end of the story,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Forty seconds to detonation,

Thirty seconds to detonation,

So, this is our destiny?

Enjoy the ride,

ELECTRONIC VOICE:

Twenty seconds to detonation,

Ten, nine, eight, seven,

six, five, four,

three, two, one,

CONTROL VOICE:

In the end,

it may be our certainty

that we are infallible

which will prove