The screen lit up with an animation highlighting how all of the Arrivals on the road communicated with each other. One shot replicated the car’s point of view, sensing everything in its path, not unlike a scene in a Terminator movie, where you saw everything through Arnie’s cybernetic eyes. Signs, other Arrivals, pedestrians, all being identified, classified, distances and speeds calculated, everything happening instantaneously.

It really was like a scene from a science-fiction movie, Sandra thought. The real world had caught up to what, in the past, could only be imagined.

“The future is here,” Lisa Carver said, echoing Sandra’s thoughts at that very moment. “We are, at the moment, living in a time of transition. A bit like, perhaps, when diesel was replacing steam on our nation’s railway tracks. When downloading a movie replaced going to the video store. When putting a stamp on an envelope and putting it in the corner mailbox was overtaken by email.

“Today, conventional cars share the road with a handful of autonomous vehicles, and this transition has not been without its challenges. In fact, so-called self-driving cars currently on the market really aren’t. They are still designed in such a way that the driver can take over if the car fails to do what it is programmed to do. That’s unthinkable where the Arrival is concerned. The driver does not take over. The driver will never have to take over. The Arrival knows what to do.

“The primary goal of every Arrival is safety. Not just your safety, and the safety of those in the car with you, but the safety of everyone and everything outside the vehicle. Does anyone still know Latin? There’s a phrase primum non nocere. Or, in other words, do no harm. Like the Hippocratic oath doctors abide by. Well, the Arrivals take that oath, too. They are designed to do no harm.

“And when we reach the day when all vehicles are self-driving, when every vehicle can communicate with every other vehicle on the road, that’s when something remarkable will be achieved. All the cars on the road will be thinking as one. Not unlike an ant colony, where all these hundreds of ants are a cohesive unit, or when you see a beautiful swarm of birds in the sky, moving together as one.”

“Or like the Borg,” cracked one of the reporters.

“Resistance is futile,” said another.

Lisa smiled, but Sandra could tell she didn’t appreciate the Star Trek reference.

“In a way,” Lisa conceded. “While the Borg were a tad more sinister, they were pretty good at conquering solar systems. And the Arrivals are going to conquer the roads of America, and beyond.”

Nice recovery, Sandra thought.