Original subtitles

[Jessica] Tonight on Murder, She Wrote.

I feel as if I were inside Hastings Manor.

We don’t call this virtual reality for nothing.

We’re not going for a writing award.

I’m going to do my best to fix your program.

You’re destroying Michael, you know that, don’t you?

I want a signing bonus of 300,000.

Wait a minute. I’m not about to pay you another penny.

I believe what you do is known as extortion.

So you discussed it again, argued, then you killed him.

I think you’re terrified that you’re going to be the next target.

The man was that crazy.

Hack my way inside? Total piece of cake.

Welcome to the mind of the total paranoiac.

[laughing]

[Jessica] Thank goodness it’s nonstop from Boston.

[Doc Hazlitt] To Silicon Valley, huh?

Let me get this straight.

You’ve made up an arcade game, is that it?

What is it, one of those mind-numbing

blast the enemy’s spaceship gizmos?

Or perhaps it’s the one

where one little face goes running around

eating up all the other little faces.

Oh, of course not. Stop it!

This is very fresh. It’s a whole new technology,

and they call it virtual reality.

They? These computer experts,

this Michael what’s-his-name?

Michael Burke, Callie Burke’s boy.

You remember, from Kennebunk. Michael’s her son.

One of the brilliant young men in the field.

Of children’s game. I can’t believe you’re doing this.

Seth, we’re about to enter the 21st century.

I mean, we’ve got to stay with it.

To begin with, this isn’t just for children.

It’s partly a game, partly an environment.

It’s really quite an experience.

Technology, environment, experience.

Oh, Jess, come on!

Listen to me, Seth.

You wear these electronic goggles

that are really rather like little TV screens.

Then you put on this glove,

and suddenly, you’re in a world

that only exists inside of a computer.

How do you expect me--

Except that it feels quite real.

It’s a bit disorienting,

as if you’re visiting this strange, almost alien place.

It’s rather wonderful.

You’re completely surrounded by it, moving through it,

and yet, you’re simply standing there--

And you wrote all this?

Well, just the script.

And then, these young programmers turned it into virtual reality.

The game’s called "A Killing at Hastings' Rock."

[Jessica] Michael, I’m so excited to be

part of this new frontier with you.

[Michael] It’s your words and imagination

that has brought it to life, Jessica.

[Jessica] Well, here we go.

[Jessica] Oh, Michael, it’s breathtaking.

The realism is incredible.

Good evening.

Welcome to Hastings’ Rock.

I trust you will find your stay here... intriguing.

Oh, Jeremy Hastings is perfect.

Exactly as I wrote him.

What about the setting and ambiance?

[Jessica] Just as I imagined.

I feel as if I were inside Hastings Manor.

Well, that’s the idea.

We don’t call this virtual reality for nothing.

[computer beeping]

My compliments, Michael, James, everyone.

It’s amazing.

[Michael] Why, thank you, Jessica.

[Michael] Please, go on.

Excuse me.

Mr. Salisbury is waiting in the...

[gasps]

Have I done something wrong?

No. Alex, are you picking up anything?

Uh, no, Sir. The glitch is in the program.

-I tried to tell you that-- -Hold it, Alex, please.

Jessica, there seems to be a problem in the programming.

Turn away and try again.

Let’s pray it doesn’t cost us any money.

Relax, David. We’re almost there.

Excuse me.

Mr. Salisbury is waiting in the...

We have a major problem. Shut it down.

-You can come out, Mrs. Fletcher. -Oh, God.

[Computerized voice] Alex Porter, please return your mother’s call.

Damn it.

You left your pager again.

That bug never should’ve happened.

In a perfect world, Alex, maybe not.

No, Mrs. Fletcher, that’s a no-brainer. Any high school hacker--

[woman over P.A.] Alex, will you please remember

to keep your beeper with you,

and Alex, return your mother’s call.

She’s been like this ever since I was a kid.

She keeps on calling,

so Lindstrom devised this system

so that everybody’s messages go directly to their pager.

Sounds sensible to me.

Yeah, but I have to remember to take it with me.

I don’t make mistakes like this, James.

The servant girl was your responsibility.

Look, both of you, I don’t give a damn whose fault it was.

-Can we just fix it? -Michael, I want you to understand that--

Sharon, get yourself together.

Go get a cup of coffee or something.

[Alex] It’s not your fault.

I’m afraid we have to reprogram the servant girl.

We still have 24 hours before the introduction.

And if we hit a cascade, we’ll be lucky to solve it

in 24 days. -The risk is that,

sometimes, reprogramming one element creates a kind of snowball effect,

a cascade of glitches that messes up the whole program.

Michael, we can’t spend another dollar on this project.

-We just don’t have it. -I’ve got an idea.

And a buggy product, Mrs. Fletcher, means returns, angry customers and retailers,

and a loss in faith in the publisher and the programmer.

-If you would’ve taken time to beta test-- -Fix it, James.

Not with my reputation on the line.

Cancel the reception.

We can’t. It’s a done deal.

We have media and buyers coming from all over the country.

Why don’t you just change the script?

Why don’t you just be a good little intern

and call your mother? -He may have something.

No time, Michael. No time.

Look, I may be right off-base here,

but would it create the same danger of a cascade

if I were to simply write the servant girl out of the story?

A literary solution to a binary problem.

It might work.

How long will it take?

Well, I’m not sure.

The servant girl runs right through the story,

and provides a lot of the clues.

I’d have to give a lot of her dialogue to the other characters.

Look, I should get back to the hotel if I’m gonna start this.

-Alex, stay with her. -Yeah, sure.

Mrs. Fletcher, keep it simple.

We’re not going for a writing award.

Mr. Lindstrom, I’m gonna do my best

to fix your program.

And don’t worry, David.

It’s on me. Come on, Alex.

There’s not much more we can do until Mrs. Fletcher gets back,

whenever that may be.

Why don’t you finish up and stand by?

I’ll see you later.

I’m not an expert on masochism, but I’m learning more every day.

Oh?

Watching you put up with an S.O.B. like Lindstrom just to be near Michael,

when you don’t stand a chance.

If that were true,

we wouldn’t be discussing it, now would we?

Subject departs Marathon Images by car, 7:17 p.m.

the car is a late-model aqua Corvette convertible.

Oh, Alex, would you please stop pacing?

I’m having enough trouble as it is.

I’m trying to find someone else to give this glove clue to.

Sorry.

Man, I’m really bummed, Mrs. Fletcher.

None of this had to happen.

What do you mean?

Well...

I designed a program to test the game at high speeds,

but Lindstrom, the Prince of Paranoia,

nixed the idea because I would have to have used

his source codes, which he guards like Fort Knox.

When people turn 25,

is there a suspicion gene that suddenly kicks in?

Oh, Alex.

I’m sorry, Mrs. Fletcher.

By the way, have you considered giving that clue to Mr. McCauley?

Mr. McCauley.

Sure. He was down in the wine cellar

just after the servant girl was there... wasn’t he?

Which means that he could’ve seen the Colonel’s glove.

Thank you, Alex.

Where’s Lindstrom?

He took off.

I just tried him. He’s not in his office.

[Computerized voice] Michael Burke, there is a call for you on line eight.

Michael Burke.

Oh, hi, Karl, how are you?

No, we’re excited out of our minds. You’ll love it.

It’ll be worth the trip, I promise.

And don’t forget your checkbook.

Okay. I’ll see ya. Bye.

Not the first time we’ve been here.

Your father’s garage.

At 4:00 in the morning,

a virus gobbling up the program.

We thought our careers were over before they started.

But we got through that,

and then, we went to the beach,

and watched the sunrise.

Seems like a lifetime ago.

Not to me.

Mrs. Fletcher just called. She’s done the rewrite.

That’s great.

Now where the hell’s Lindstrom?

Subject arrives Redwood Concepts,

11:05 p.m.

What do you know?

It seems Mr. David Salt of Rival Marathon Images

has business in the same place.

James, what’s your problem?

Simply that the deal David presented is with John Crowley.

Now I discover it’s really with a certain Charles Kroll.

[laughs]

A legal name change?

Reinventing oneself is about as American

as mom’s apple pie, no?

I took the liberty of hacking into the FBI mainframe.

Three years at marion for extortion and attempted murder.

For the past seven, Chief of Operations

for Leavitt Games International.

It seems that the Justice Department

has a very keen interest in the rather gross methods

you employ to convince casino owners

to use Leavitt slot machines.

James, why are we rehashing the past?

This is a new day.

It’s a new place, it’s a new industry.

Very good. Fair enough.

Your offer is basically acceptable.

But I want a signing bonus of 300,000.

Forget it.

-Ciao. -Come on, James, this is wrong.

Listen to him, Lindstrom.

My people won’t like this.

I know you’re not stupid, so I can only conclude

that you must be very naive.

Remind your people they’re not dealing in one-armed bandits anymore.

And the ones with two arms, they don’t scan in this business.

David, you are in trouble.

You couldn’t come up with some money?

Davey, based on your representations to me,

and his word, which is clearly worth very little,

I have put my tail on the line with some people

who have an even lower threshold of sympathy than I have.

So tomorrow,

if I am unable to announce Lindstrom’s defection

to Redwood Concepts,

you are gonna be in far deeper trouble than I am.

There’s another way.

There always is.

If you had Lindstrom’s source codes,

the ones he wrote for Marathon’s V.R. game,

you wouldn’t need him at all.

Sharon, we’re running out of time. Just set it up.

We’re gonna get started without Lindstrom.

What do you think you’re doing?

Obviously, I’m looking for your codes

so we can get started up there.

The rewrite’s on its way.

My codes are right here where they always are.

I’ll meet you on the bridge.

Now get out.

Okay.

That should do it. Back it up, Alex.

Done and done.

All right. Thanks, everyone.

Let’s go for a final run-through.

Jessica, nobody will fault you if you want to go to your hotel and crash

till the reception.

I’d never be able to sleep a wink.

Michael, is it too late to change one word of Mr. McCauley’s dialogue?

-It’s no problem. -Oh, great.

Your tinkering is becoming tedious, Mrs. Fletcher.

It’s just part of the creative process.

What is it that disturbs you, the disorder?

You could say that, yes.

The beauty of the binary system

is that everything is reducible to zeros or ones.

It either is or it isn’t. Clean, precise, exact.

Words that hardly apply to human behavior, wouldn’t you say?

I mean, gray areas are just feelings,

emotions, irrationality.

Eventually, we’ll codify all of it.

Computers that not only think but feel?

The future.

Tell me the truth.

Won’t that be far more preferable

than the chaos in which we now exist?

I suppose it would...

if control was what I lived for.

In the scene where Mr. McCauley

is talking about Victoria Hastings,

will you please change the word "lust"

to "love"?

[Lindstrom] Another glitch, and we’re dead.

Bite your tongue.

And then pray. Ready, people?

Up and running.

[Michael] Here we go, Jessica.

No matter what happens, thank you for everything.

I have a feeling it’s gonna work fine this time. No glitches,

no crashes.

For luck.

Take it, Jessica.

Fine so far.

Oh. Good evening.

Welcome to Hastings’ Rock.

I trust you will find your stay here...

intriguing.

[Michael] How’s it looking, Jess?

No servant girl, no hors d’oeuvres.

I’ll miss those little hot dogs.

[Michael] Fine so far.

[clearing throat]

I’ll meet you in the drawing room.

If you’re lucky.

[Jessica laughs] And now, all I have to do is find the drawing room.

The Hastings family has a long history

of military service in the cavalry.

Could we change the battle axes to crossed sabers?

Bring up the weapons file.

[Sharon] We’ve got crossed sabers.

[Michael] Keep your eye on the axes.

My compliments.

My lawyer may write me back into the will.

Meet me in the garden at 10:00.

[Jessica] I’ll be there, Carrie, but I happento know you won’t.

[Sharon] Still looking good.

Shut the door.

Exactly in character, Ms. Deavers.

Michael, this door won’t open.

And I don’t recall writing doors on both sides of the hall.

Where did they come from?

Those are static moments,

and they’re an experiment.

-Can we erase them? -No, we cannot.

We changed the axes; why not the doors?

The axes were an appendage.

The doors are an integral part of the structure.

Well, a locked door that cannot be opened

is unfair to the players.

They’ll assume that it holds some significance.

James.

We’re talking major reprogramming.

Jessica, it’s too risky. I promise

we’ll fix it after the press reception.

I understand, Michael.

Attention, please. Attention.

I would like to make a toast.

To Sharon, James,

Kate, Alex, Alex’s mother,

and of course, to Jessica,

without whose intriguing playful mystery

all of this never would’ve come into existence.

[computer beeping]

[Computerized voice] Call, Michael, on four.

Wouldn’t give his name.

Excuse me a moment.

Could be a live one, or a guy with an identity problem.

Michael, I have a lot of work to do. I’ll see you later.

Okay.

Uh, likewise.

Hello.

I figured I better report in.

I spent last evening tailing Lindstrom.

Okay, so where does it stand?

Lindstrom isn’t your only problem.

[Michael] What are you saying?

We’re talking a new case file, Mr. Burke.

A sweeter pot.

Wait a minute, I’m not about to pay you another penny.

You know where to reach me.

Think it over.

Porter!

Uh, I think...

we can all use some rest.

Got a big day ahead.

You would have Marathon’s patented game glasses and gloves,

along with a total audio experience sound system.

It’s a full-service package featuring software and hardware

that we believe will change the face of arcade gaming.

Thank you. I’ll see you later.

Well, yes, in a novel,

the author does get to direct the readers’ attention,

as opposed to this virtual reality game,

in which the player gets to make the choices.

Mrs. Fletcher will be glad to answer all your questions

after you’ve played "Killing at Hastings’ rock."

-We’ll go online shortly. -Thanks, Kate.

I wasn’t quite ready to have a discussion about alternate realities.

You’re doing great.

Don’t blow smoke at me. You were with John Crowley last night.

What I wanna know is why.

Maybe you should find yourself a better private investigator.

James, don’t do this.

Why don’t you find out from the horse’s mouth?

I don’t believe this.

Where the hell did you get that?

Gee, I suddenly can’t remember. I don’t know.

Why, is it a crime to check out the competition?

Get out, before I have security throw you out.

With virtual reality glasses on,

you simply look in any direction you want.

To move through the game, you move your body forward,

backward, to the left, or to the right.

You’ll be in booth number one.

[lock beeping]

You’ll be in booth number two.

Alex, could you check this door, please?

Uh, yeah, sure. Excuse me.

Welcome to the world of fibertech, folks,

where everything works perfectly

until people get involved.

[laughter]

Those source codes,

you’re sure Lindstrom had them on his person?

No, I can’t be sure.

He did have them last night.

But he had to have had them

to boot up the game on the computer.

But he would’ve put them back in his pocket, too.

He was totally ’noid about them.

Paranoid.

Paranoid. That covers a lot of territory.

Well, like you’d have to kill him to get them away from him.

Are they really worth killing a man for?

Sergeant, the codes are the basic operating system.

A good programmer could change the elements,

make it a cruise ship, new characters.

Create a whole new game.

It’d be almost impossible to prove it was stolen,

unless you had the codes.

You boys here in The Valley are pretty competitive.

Any ideas?

John Crowley.

Redwood Concepts.

Sergeant.

Security guard saw Lindstrom enter the virtual reality deck

at 4:30.

No one else was inside at the time.

Did he see anybody else go in after that?

He took a ten-minute coffee break, and returned at 4:50.

We didn’t lock the deck, just the bridge.

I heard Lindstrom being paged at 4:45.

I was coming out of the tape library,

and I checked my watch because I didn’t want to be late for the preview.

Follow it up.

If Lindstrom didn’t respond to this page,

at least we have the shooting narrowed down to a 15-minute window.

-All right? -Gotcha.

Till I give the word, everybody remains available for questioning.

Any problems with that?

Um, I do have some important appointments in Manhattan tomorrow.

Just so I know where to find you.

I was wondering what a celebrity like you was doing here

at The Valley of the Klingons.

But I guess everyone can use a few extra bucks, right?

Well, I do have a business arrangement

with Marathon, if that’s what you’re asking.

Cold-blooded murder. I’m asking everything.

I’ve been working this valley for 17 years.

Every once in a while, one of you guys

will flip out and attack somebody with a spinach salad

or a floppy disk.

But preliminary reports indicate

that Lindstrom was shot with a .22.

That kind of hit you find up on the Embarcadero

in Frisco by the wise guys.

Are you implying that James Lindstrom was murdered

by a professional killer?

It wasn’t a spinach salad, was it?

What time did you leave Marathon?

Right after Michael Burke threw me out.

The reception was still going on,

and believe me, Lindstrom was very much alive.

Burke said you were trying to hire Lindstrom away.

We’d been discussing that, yes.

Coffee?

No, thank you.

So you discussed it again, and argued,

and you killed him.

Yeah. Come on, Sergeant.

You can do better than that.

Where’d you go after you left the reception?

Back to my office. I had some paperwork to do.

Anybody see you?

Not that I know of.

How about your Secretary?

Oh, I’d given her the afternoon off.

-No alibi. -No.

Kind of careless of you, wasn’t it, Mr. Kroll?

[knocking on door]

Excuse me, Sergeant.

Just heard from Brennan.

They found a weapon in the bushes outside Marathon.

A .22 handgun, recently fired.

It was registered to James Lindstrom.

All right.

But even without the codes,

can’t the game still be marketed?

Well, yes, but given its incredible complexity,

bugs can’t be fixed, I won’t be able to update,

and developing the next generation will require

going back to square one

with enormous development costs.

My investors are ready to jump ship already

because of our current cost overrun.

And if we don’t market "A Killing at Hastings’ Rock,"

well, my chance of raising any new investment capital will be nil.

[knock on door]

Sergeant Delcanto.

I was told Michael Burke is here.

Yes, he’s about to drive me to the airport.

I suggest you call a cab.

Mr. Burke, you’re under arrest

for the murder of James Lindstrom.

Sergeant, may I ask--

the victim’s gun was the murder weapon,

but Mr. Burke’s fingerprints were all over it.

This way, Mr. Burke.

Have a safe flight back to New York.

I just can’t believe it, Jessica.

Michael is maybe the world’s gentlest person.

That’s certainly my impression.

On the other hand, James Lindstrom could make almost anyone

want to take a shot at him.

Okay, Michael’s phone list.

Did you say Parker?

I think that’s what I heard.

Parker. Nope. No Parker.

I’m almost certain that it started with a "p."

Um, Porter.

Maybe that was it. Try Porter.

Porter. Porter Electrical.

Porter Investigations.

Investigations. Dan Porter. That’s it.

A private investigator?

What’s that about?

I’m not sure, Kate, but it could be the key

that will prove Michael’s innocence.

Well, you seem to have lucked out, Mrs. Fletcher.

It happens I just finished up an important case

earlier than I expected.

I got this little window before I start my next one.

That’s wonderful, Mr. Porter.

Won’t you have a seat?

Thanks.

Oh, by the way,

how did you happen to, uh, hear about me?

Oh, from Michael Burke, and the police.

Uh... [clears throat]

uh... the police?

They have some rather interesting things to say about you.

Wait a minute.

You said you had someone you want followed.

I don’t, Mr. Porter.

That was a ploy.

Oh, yeah?

Well, I’m not gonna play games with you, lady.

Oh, and you’re gonna get a bill for this, too, ya know?

See you around.

Mr. Porter, I was interested to learn

that the most recent invoice that you submitted to Michael Burke

included a sizable charge under the heading of

"additional expenses."

What are you getting at?

That’s how you collect far more than your legitimate fees, isn’t it,

by withholding information that you’ve been hired to gather,

and offering it to the highest bidder,

whether it be your client or the subject of your investigation?

Hey, I don’t have to listen to this.

I think it would be wise if you did.

I believe what you do is known as extortion, or blackmail,

depending upon who it is you collect from.

Either one is illegal.

Lady, nobody’s ever been able to prove anything.

Till now, but I’m sure the police would like to hear about your part

in this investigation, since it involves a capital crime,

and you are a possible accessory to a murder.

Talk to me.

Tell me what it is you weren’t telling Michael Burke.

I don’t know what you’re talking about.

I think you do, David.

How much did John Crowley pay you to bring him James Lindstrom?

Mrs. Fletcher, I did nothing illegal.

Perhaps not illegal, but certainly not ethical.

Michael trusted you.

Look, if you’ll excuse me.

I think judging from your hasty getaway,

you believe that Lindstrom was murdered by a professional hit man

ordered by John Crowley.

Michael couldn’t kill anybody.

I think you’re terrified that you’re going to be the next target

because you can implicate Crowley.

No.

I don’t know.

I don’t even know that James Lindstrom wasn’t suicidal;

that he didn’t hire his own hit man

just so he could take Michael down with him.

-That is a bizarre notion. -Is it?

The man was that crazy.

Mrs. Fletcher, if anyone ever opened the door

to James Lindstrom’s head,

I’d stake my life they’d have found

that nothing was beyond the realm of possibility.

Open the door.

The door. Of course.

This isn’t fair.

You have no right to fire me.

Wrong. Until Michael returns, I’m running Marathon.

You have until Friday noon to clear out your office.

You’re destroying Michael, you know that, don’t you?

I’m the only one who can clean up the mess James Lindstrom left.

Don’t flatter yourself.

The Valley is full of programmers.

Michael and I will survive very well without you.

Don’t bet on it.

When Lindstrom said we couldn’t 86 that door,

I remember thinking his explanation sounded seriously bogus.

I mean, there’s no way it could be that hard to do.

Can you open it?

Hack my way inside? Total piece of cake, Mrs. Fletcher.

As easy as the New York Stock Exchange?

I happened to see your file in Sergeant Delcanto’s office.

Great. Can you believe, after five years,

I’m still on probation?

You mean, you were only eleven?

Well, I was just trying to see if I could,

you know, crack their password.

It wasn’t like I was gonna steal anything.

[Jessica] Do you know the password?

No, but I will.

Oh, man.

This... it’s unreal.

I’ve run my random character generator, my password algorithm,

I’ve never met a computer I couldn’t crack in less than ten minutes.

Alex, James Lindstrom was a genius, right?

Oh, he told you, too, huh?

Often, what stymies the rest of us about genius

is its ability to reduce the complex to the simple,

to the obvious.

I mean, what about something basic, like...

"open door."

That’s it. We’re in.

All right, Alex, I’m at the door.

Awesome. Let’s go for it.

Keep going. It should just open.

Welcome to the mind of the total paranoiac.

What you are witnessing is not an isolated event,

but one of many similar legacies

I have put into every single program

I have ever created.

-Oh, man. -The truth to my accomplishments

will be discovered by computer hackers

like yourself, for generations to come.

Give me a break.

Ah, but what of the future?

Allow me to foretell it

with a tasty little riddle that goes...

What purpose can be served by the mind of man,

that cannot be better served

by the binary brain?

A lengthy meditation may be appropriate.

Now that is a major nut case.

[sighs]

With an ego the size of a watermelon.

Can you believe that bozo?

At least with a virus, you can get rid of it.

What’s your take on his riddle?

Well, I was hoping that you’d have a thought or two.

The obvious.

Give artificial intelligence a few more years,

and there won’t be anything a computer can’t be programmed

to think out more efficiently than the human mind.

Well, that’s a somewhat disquieting thought.

On the other hand, maybe there is no answer.

Say what?

Well, certain classic mystery stories have been based on

unsolvable riddles, conundrums,

whose only purpose was to lead a reader

into new channels of thought.

Maybe that explains who’s writing

all those undecipherable software manuals.

In any case, I’m afraid we’re back to square one.

I was hoping that James Lindstrom

would have something more specific to tell us.

Mmm. Hey, listen, hacking always makes me hungry.

How about you?

[Woman on P.A.] Alex, your mother wants you home for dinner,

and she doesn’t sound too happy.

Uh-oh.

Oh, I left my pager down by the booth.

I swear it’s subconscious.

Alex, explain the paging system to me once again.

Well, each of the pagers is set up on a different frequency,

and the messages go directly to the personal pagers that we all carry.

Earlier, you mentioned a computer virus.

What if James Lindstrom had planted a virus?

Would there be any way of stopping it?

If he worked them into the source codes,

it’d be almost impossible,

unless, of course, you had the codes.

Which we don’t.

Alex, could you stick around a little longer

without getting into any more trouble with your mother?

-Are you kidding? -Great.

Yeah, mom.

I know, mom.

Yes, I’ll be home.

Yes, it will be some time this century.

She’s really terrific,

except she obsesses about things

like when I eat and sleep and stuff.

It’s not healthy.

Are you certain that this will get the point across?

Oh, positive.

Hello.

Yeah, this is Jessica Fletcher.

I was wondering if you could help me.

Uh, I have discovered a riddle

that was left by James Lindstrom,

and for the life of me, I can’t make head or tail of it.

Well, the riddle goes, "When do 23 and 0014

"combine to penetrate stone,

and nurture a total mutation?"

I see.

Well, I had hoped that it might be a clue of some kind.

Well, possibly it’s just one of those meant to remain unsolved.

Yes, well, thank you very much.

So, what do you think?

Alex, I think we may have started a cascade

that will bring James Lindstrom’s murderer

out into the open.

I’m the only one Michael can trust.

Sharon.

What are you doing here?

I’m saving Michael’s dream.

Mrs. Fletcher called me.

Apparently, James left a riddle.

"When do 23 and 0014 combine

to penetrate stone and nurture a total mutation?"

She didn’t know what it meant.

But I did.

James has planted a fatal virus

in "A Killing at Hastings’ Rock."

A time bomb set to begin destroying his brain child

in exactly four minutes.

My god.

Genius version of "last tag,"

but he didn’t count on me.

The source codes. You killed him.

Put it in.

Zero or one.

I promised myself a long time ago

that I’d never live in that gray world in between.

It’s either everything or nothing for me.

I really had no choice.

James was going to destroy Michael,

and Michael is everything.

So after I save him from James’ virus...

I’m going to save him from you.

Police. Freeze.

The V.R. game.

The virus is programmed to start in--

when 23 and 0014 combine at 14 minutes after midnight

on the 23rd?

No, Sharon. There’s no virus.

But...

Alex composed a riddle we hoped you’d solve.

But it was only designed as a distraction,

like the one you hoped to create by using

Lindstrom’s own gun to kill him.

Your plan backfired,

because you didn’t know Michael’s fingerprints were on it.

The reception provided a perfect opportunity,

and an abundance of suspects.

Lindstrom never saw you coming.

He was defenseless.

Vulnerable deep inside the world he created.

As you approached him in the booth,

you heard him being paged.

[Computerized voice] James Lindstrom, you have a call

holding on line eight.

[Sharon] I threw the gun in the shrubbery,

and went back to the reception.

But in your haste, you forgot about Lindstrom’s

novel paging system.

You see, had you been coming out of the tape library

as you claimed, you could not possibly

have heard Lindstrom being paged.

The only way that you could’ve heard that page

was if you were in or near the V.R. booth

with Lindstrom.

Let’s go.

[Jessica] Consider yourself lucky to be alive, Mr. Salt.

Well, thank you very much for your help, Mrs. Fletcher.

You’re very welcome, Sergeant.

My mother’s really stoked about meeting you, Mrs. Fletcher.

I just hope it gets me off the hook for a while.

Well, so do I.

-Have a great trip, Jessica. -Thank you.

Jessica, thank you again for everything.

-Have a safe flight. -Thank you, Michael.

You know, we may just be looking at the answer

to James Lindstrom’s riddle.

"What purpose can be served by the mind of man

that cannot be better served by the binary mind?"

I wonder if a computer can ever be programmed

to enjoy something as simple

and as beautiful as this.