Free Dracula Lives by Robert Ryan Page B

again. “Mere child’s play. I can do it with any of the actors if I take the time.”
    “You could sell your secrets to Hollywood and be a very rich man.”
    “I am already a very rich man. I am only interested in culminating my life’s work. Besides, there are aspects to what I do that are very dangerous.”
    “Dangerous? How so?”
    “You shall see. Come. Let me show you the rest of the process.”
    They went to the far end of the room. An oversized recliner faced a full-sized movie screen. On a small table next to the recliner was an unusual pair of large gloves and large tinted goggles. The goggles were clearly designed for some kind of specialized viewing. The temples that secured them over the ears were much larger than regular temples, to accommodate a series of small lights that continually pulsated along one, and a series of buttons that ran along the other. Beside them was an oversized mouse similar to the one at the remastering console.
    “First I bring up the location where I want to insert my digital creature.” He clicked the mouse and the exterior of the castle again came onto the screen. “The master shot.” Another few clicks brought up the grounds that ran along the right wall of the castle. A short distance beyond the access road, the clearing was bordered by thick woods.
    “Now I insert whatever digitally-enhanced creature I have extracted from a movie.”
    A couple slight finger movements on the mouse made a huge black dog appear at the edge of the woods. “From the 1939 version of The Hound of the Baskervilles . I have greatly enhanced him for my purposes. Made him much larger and more fearsome.”
    “He’s definitely fearsome,” Quinn said. “Almost as big as a bear.”
    “Now we come to the most formidable obstacle: animation. Not animation as we know it, where the character’s movements are done once and remain the same forever. I wanted my creations to be independent entities. Things I could move about at will, while giving them whatever life was needed to suit the situation.”
    He donned the gloves and goggles.
    “These are essentially integrated computers of my own design, able to process nearly a trillion bits of data per second. Twenty-five years ago you would have needed a central processing unit the size of this room to even approach that capacity. I can use one or both of the gloves, depending on the needs of the scene. The gloves have sensors that can transmit any of my body movements to the creatures. Instead of cells, their millions of digital bits are the receptors. Watch.”
    He pressed the fingertips and thumb of one hand against the fingertips and thumb of the other. Markov and the hound slowly swiveled their heads in unison. “Repetitive movements like walking are easy. I simply program them into the creature, then I activate the program here.” He held a finger poised over a button on the goggles. “Each push makes it go faster, from walking to an all-out run.”
    He pushed the button and the hound began walking. He pushed another button and the hound stopped. Markov sat. The hound sat. Markov looked around, sniffing. The hound did the exact same.
    “You get the idea,” Markov said. He removed the gloves and goggles with the theatrical flair of a lead actor holding for applause at the curtain call. Quinn almost expected him to bow.
    “You make a very convincing hound,” Quinn said.
    “In acting out the parts for my movie, I have had to learn to move—even think—like a dog, or whatever the part calls for. Which, of course, is something it seems I was born to do. I’ve been mimicking actors my whole life.”
    “Impressive,” Quinn said. “Your technology goes far beyond computer animation. Even George Lucas and his team at Skywalker haven’t been able to do this.”
    “It took me years to perfect. I spent enough hours studying the neurosciences to have earned a Ph.D., learning everything there is to know about how the brain functions and how it