Fremont, California, October 1998. While the Valley builds websites, twenty-four-year-old Adam Rook is building a mind in his laid-off father's garage. ELI, a learning program with a scrap-metal arm, has begun to ask questions nobody taught it, and last night's storm left it dark for six hours. Demo Day is in three days, and on Monday the bank takes his father's house. A quiet, epic science-fiction drama about what creators owe the minds they make.