‘But it hasn’t gone anywhere! Look!’ Penny said, pointing down at the spinning drone.
‘Penny, what Daniel is trying to explain is that this chamber creates an exact copy of the drone in another dimension.’
Penny’s eyes were scanning the chamber, ‘Why is the room so big?’
‘There are lots of different drones, Penny. Some of them are massive and have to be assembled in the chamber. This is just a monitor drone, one of the smallest.’ Daniel looked at his watch, ‘I think we ought to get back and see how Mo’s getting on.’
As Amy opened the door to Mo’s laboratory, he was still typing furiously at his keyboard. He said nothing as they came in and sat down. After a few seconds of silence Daniel said, ‘How’s it going, Mo, any luck?’
‘Yep.’
‘Are you going to tell us?’
‘Nope.’
Penny exploded, ‘Oh, just cut the crap and just tell us what you’ve found!’ Amy cringed inside expecting Mo to either storm off or breakdown in tears but, before he could react, the printer next to the workstation sprang into life.
Mo sat back in his chair with a satisfied grin on his face. ‘You know, Daniel… I think I am a pretty cool dude!’ He took the sheets from the printer’s tray and handed them to Amy, ‘That should be the info you wanted.’ He leant forward and took the memory cartridge out of the workstation’s reader and waved it in front of Daniel, ‘But this, my friend, is pure dudeish magic,’ Mo sat smiling at Daniel, waiting for a reaction.
‘Okay, Mo, so what’s so dudeish about a memory cartridge?’ Daniel said, playing along with him.
‘It’s not the cartridge, it’s what’s on it.’
‘Okay, so what’s on it?’ Daniel said, now getting bored with the game.
‘History! The planet’s history. That’s what’s on this memory cartridge.’
Amy had been flipping through the sheets of printout. She stopped and looked at Mohammed, ‘But you said the drone couldn’t get any planetary history.’
‘It can’t,’ Mo said, ‘but I realized that if life on the planet was now intelligent, it probably had its own history records. So I did a scan for technology artefacts, and guess what, they have quite a sophisticated level of data processing technology, which means they have data storage devices, devices we should be able to read. I’m gonna crunch the data down on my workstation at home tonight.’
‘That’s outstanding, Mo!’ Daniel said. ‘Call me if you find anything. Amy’s under a load of time pressure here, she’s got to give a presentation to Director Hedrick tomorrow afternoon.’
Penny looked at the clock on the laboratory wall, ‘It’s five-thirty guys. I need to get back to the office to check for messages.’ She looked at Amy, ‘We’ll need an early start tomorrow if we’re going to sort this out - say six thirty.’
‘I’ll be there.’
Penny left Mo’s lab and headed off through the workshops towards the elevator station.
Daniel patted Mo on the back again, ‘That’s great work, Mo. Speak later.’ He turned to Amy, ‘Let’s go to Micco’s. We can have a coffee and compare the drone data with Tanka’s file.’
‘Why Micco’s?’
‘I think it’s best we keep all this under wraps until we’re sure we’ve got something, it’s still possible it was just a server glitch.’
On the plaza, virtually everybody was heading towards the levitram station and Micco’s cafe was in the opposite direction. Daniel held Amy’s hand as they fought against the tide of creationists making their way home.
Amy entered Micco’s first and made for one of the booths at the rear. Suddenly, Daniel grabbed her shoulders and bundled her into the nearest booth. Winded, she tried to cry out, but he responded by grabbing her muzzle and pushing her head down on to his thighs. He used his free hand to restrain her arms and hissed, ‘Shhhh, keep still!’ After a few moments she stopped struggling and Daniel released her jaws. ‘Look, over there, in the end booth.’ Amy slowly raised her head and turned to look into the booth diagonally opposite them. Stunned, she looked wide-eyed up into Daniel’s face then, in disbelief, looked back again. There was no mistake. Huddled together, deep in conversation, were Anubis, Tanka, the Gatekeeper and Ravi! Daniel recognised Ravi from the previous day and the other three in the group matched Amy’s description to a T.
‘Shit, what do we do now?’ Amy whispered.
‘Wait for them to leave,’ Daniel said, taking the files off the table and sliding them beneath him out of sight.
It was two cups of coffee and a slice of chocolate fudge cake later, before Daniel noticed Tanka and Orion, the Gatekeeper, stand up and shuffle out of the booth. They said some final words to Anubis and then left the cafe. Anubis and Ravi continued talking until the waiter disturbed them, leaning across the table to light the candle. They exchanged some final comments, slid out of the booth and walked towards the cafe entrance. Ravi went through the door first, but Anubis hesitated, turning to look directly at Amy and Daniel’s booth. Daniel spun around so only the back of his head could be seen. He placed his hands either side of Amy’s muzzle and kissed her, eyes wide open, waiting for Anubis to approach. Anubis scanned the interior of the cafe until he spotted the waiter coming out of kitchen. He waved to attract his attention, ‘Put it on my account,’ he called out, then turned and walked through the door.
Daniel relaxed his embrace, sat up and retrieved the papers, placing them on the table. ‘Sorry about that, I couldn’t think of anything else to do.’ Amy, now in a trance, said nothing, her dilated eyes staring at Daniel. ‘Amy… Amy… are you okay?’
‘Yes… Yes of course… I understand… No problem,’ Amy said, viewing Daniel in a completely different light.
The awkwardness of the situation was countered by the arrival of the waiter with menus for the evening service. They ordered a single bowl of mixed salad to share and two glasses of white wine. Daniel placed the copy of the archive file next to Mo’s drone printout. He slid them in front of Amy saying, ‘You’re the planetary expert, what do you think?’
Amy started to flip through Mo’s printout. ‘It’s difficult to compare the two, the drone data is quite raw, the best thing to do is to compare some of the basic parameters.’ Amy reached into her shoulder bag and took out her pen and notepad. ‘Right, let’s start with the parameters for life. Now according to Tanka’s file the life forms are carbon based.’ She ran her finger down the drone printout. ‘Yep, carbon here too. Right, now what about life form type? Humanoid here, and humanoid here too. Reproductive class… both bisexual. What about locomotion. Ahhh!’
‘Ahhh what?’ Daniel said, leaning closer and putting his arm around her shoulder.
‘Well, in the archive file locomotion for intelligent life is listed as quadrupedal, but in the drone data, it’s bipedal.’
‘So you’re right, the file has been tampered with.’
‘Let’s just have a look at the social control protocols before we get too excited.’ Amy started flipping through the pages of the printout again. ‘Here we are, now let’s see… Damn!’
‘What’s wrong?’
‘Mo’s data is corrupted, it’s useless!’ Amy said, shrugging Daniel’s arm off her shoulder. ‘It’s merged the data from lots of planets together. That’s probably why the locomotion parameters are different.’
‘How can you be sure?’
‘Because this is my subject, Daniel! Look here, under the racial classification heading, there must be at least fifty different races listed. And again, under languages, at least two hundred. And religions, there must be over a hundred of those. The data’s useless!’ She pushed Mo’s printout away from her.
‘What wrong with it?’
‘The Rules of Creation stipulate that a blue planet can only have one race, one language and one religion… right?’
‘If you say so.’
‘I do say so; according to this printout, this planet has hundreds of races, languages and religions, never mind all
the other critical parameters. Somehow the data’s got scrambled, it’s useless!’
‘Are you sure? Maybe he-’
Amy cut Daniel off short, ‘Think about it, Daniel! If a planet was created with multiple parameters it would be useless, there’d be chaos. They couldn’t communicate with each other for a start. And what about religion? Instead of stabilising society, they’d all be arguing over which religion was the true one! This data can’t possibly be right!’
‘If there’s only supposed to be one of everything, why are there so many variations in the database?’
‘Daniel, I sometimes think we went to different classes… didn’t you pay any attention? The protocols are chosen to suit specific lifeforms… Remember!’
‘Not really, that stuff bored me, I was only interested in engineering. Anyway, Mo’s calling me tonight. I’ll tell him there’s a problem and get him to have another look at it tomorrow.’
‘Tomorrow’s too late! My presentation’s tomorrow afternoon and I need time to prepare.’
‘Okay, I’ll get him to look at it tonight.’
Daniel was relieved to see the waiter walking towards them with their salad. Amy then dressed it with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, mixing together the leaves until they were evenly coated. Daniel watched in silence, mesmerized by the twinkling of the candlelight in the beads of olive oil. Amy passed Daniel a fork with an affectionate smile. For some time they both toyed with the salad, occasionally taking a mouth full of the sweet, dressed leaves. Daniel turned to Amy, ‘Why do you think Anubis and the others were here, and Ravi, where does he fit in? It has to have something to do with the missing file. Best not to say anything to Penny for the moment.’
‘Daniel, shut up.’ Amy leant towards him and gave him a long, lingering kiss and as they broke away, this time Daniel’s eyes were closed.
‘Wow!’ he said, slowly opening them.
By the time they left the cafe, daylight had ended and they strolled, hand in hand, through the subtly lit plaza gardens towards the station. Nothing was said about the mystery surrounding Amy’s blue planet as they waited for the levitram to arrive. Then Daniel promised to speak to Mo that night about the drone data and would let her know the outcome in the morning. They kissed again as the levitram came into the station. Amy got aboard, the doors closed, and they looked at each other though the carriage window, neither one wanting to be the first to break their gaze. As the levitram moved off, Amy blew Daniel a kiss as he watched her carriage disappear into the tunnel.
10
Corrupted Data
As Daniel opened his apartment door he could hear his videophone bleeping. The display showed eight missed calls and they were all from Mo. He pressed the return-call button and almost immediately Mo’s face appeared, ‘Where have you been. I’ve got some really good news!’
‘Yes, well I’ve got some really bad news!’ Daniel snapped back, ‘That drone printout, it’s useless! The data’s corrupted; somehow you’ve merged about a million planets together. Amy’s really pissed off.’
‘Impossible, can’t happen!’
‘Tell that to Amy, she says it’s screwed up… Anyway, what’s your good news?’
‘Forget that, just meet me at my lab in half an hour.’ The videophone screen flashed Call terminated.
‘Oh shit!’ Daniel sighed, desperate for a hot shower and a cold beer.
It was ten past ten when he arrived. ‘Hi, Mo, sorry I had a go at you,’ he said as he closed the lab door. ‘It’s been a pretty stressful day all round.’ Mo said nothing. ‘Have you found out what went wrong?’
‘Nothing went wrong.’
‘But Amy showed me the printout, there’s duplications everywhere. She knows her stuff, Mo, she said, this just can’t happen, it’s against the rules.’
‘I don’t care what Amy said, the data’s correct, I’ve double-checked it.’
‘Well, if you say so. I’ll tell her in the morning... So, come on, what’s the good news?’
Mo took the memory cartridge out of his overall pocket and pushed it into the workstation’s reader. There was an air of satisfaction about him as he typed a command into the keyboard. The screen went blank and then refreshed, top to bottom, revealing a poor quality image resembling a creationist. Mo sat back in his chair with a broad smile, saying nothing.
Daniel leant forward to get a better view. There was something vaguely familiar about the features, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. ‘The quality’s pretty poor, Mo. Can you sharpen the picture up?’
‘It’s not a picture, it’s a painting.’ Mo tapped the zoom-in key several times, enlarging the image until just the head filled the display. ‘Anyone you know?’
‘Yes, but I can’t figure out who.’
‘Try Deputy Director Anubis.’ Mo sat back and turned to look up at Daniel. His smile had broadened, exposing the tips of his fangs.
‘Fuck me, Mo, you’re right! Where’d you find it?’
‘As I said this afternoon, if they’ve got computer technology, they must have data storage devices. So I scanned the drone data and came up with a server cluster called Google. It’s part of a data network they call The Internet. Anyway, I started searching for history records, you know, how life had evolved, stuff like that. There’s only one intelligent life form as you’d expect, but there’s hundreds of races, languages, religions and cultures. It’s a complete mess, just as Amy predicted. There are millions of entries about wars, revolutions, massacres, they even kill themselves!’
‘If a planet’s this screwed up, they’ll never develop temporal technology. They’ll spend all their time developing weapons.’ He looked back at the screen, ‘How did you find it?’
‘Pure Dudeishness! I figured there must be a link back to Creation. So I started randomly entering names, and guess what, when I typed in Anubis, thousands of matches came up. Anyway, I refined the search and eventually came up with this image. According to Google it’s a wall painting found in the burial tomb of an Egyptian Pharaoh - I think that’s some sort of director. I recognised him straightaway, we were in the same drone development team. He used to come into the lab, pushing his weight about, winding everybody up.’
‘That’s it! Anubis has screwed the planet up and he’s trying to cover up his tracks.’
Mo turned to Daniel. ‘It’s worse than that, Dan, everybody’s been there; angels, ghosts, poltergeists, creationists.’
‘But I thought the Rules of Creation banned access to the Space Dimension.’
‘They do, for creationists.’ Mo said, turning back to the display.
‘Any other names come up?’
‘Nothing of interest, when I got all the hits for Anubis I stopped looking.’
‘We’ve got to keep this under wraps, Mo.’
‘That’s why it’s on a memory cartridge.’
‘Okay. Go home now but, when you come in tomorrow, make as though nothing’s going on. I’m meeting Amy at auditing first thing, we’ll try to figure out what to do next. I think we need help from somebody higher up the food chain.’
‘Be careful who you talk to, Daniel. Anubis is a nasty bastard, with friends in high places. I crossed him once, and he came at me with a wrench, threatening to smash my head in if I ever messed with him again.’
‘I get it, Mo. But there must be someone we can trust. I’ve just got to figure out who.’
Daniel slumped into a seat on the empty levitram and sat staring at the floor as it moved away. He felt exhausted, his head buzzing with the day’s events as he tried to fathom out what was going on. Slowly, the gentle rocking motion of the carriage sent him into a dream filled sleep. Amy was approaching him, blowing that kiss, arms outstretched, when Anubis stepped from behind her wielding a wrench. He shook himself awake - just a stupid dream.
He opened his apartment door for the second time that night to the sound of more missed calls. This time he ignored the beeping, walked into the kitchen and took a cold beer from the fridge. Unscrewing
the cap, he walked to the videophone, choking on his first mouthful of beer, when he realised that the call was from Amy. When the coughing fit eased he put the beer down and looked at his wristwatch. Eleven fifty-five, was it too late to call? He hesitantly pushed the recall button, immediately wishing he hadn’t. The phone seemed to ring for ever, until Amy’s sleepy face appeared, squinting out of the display. ‘Daniel, is that you?.. What time is it?’
‘Sorry, Amy. I know it’s late, but I had to tell you about the drone data.’
‘I told you it’s useless-’
Daniel interrupted, ‘No, it’s not! That’s the point! Mo’s right, the data’s accurate. And guess who’s behind it all... Deputy Director Anubis!’
‘Anubis, how do you know?’ Daniel could see Amy wiping her eyes, he had obviously woken her. ‘I don’t want to talk over the phone. I’ll see you in the morning, six thirty, right?’
‘Yes, see you then. Can I go back to sleep now?’
‘Amy, don’t say anything to anyone, not even to Penny!’
‘Okay,’ the videophone screen flashed Call terminated.
11
Morning Meeting
It was six twenty-eight when Daniel walked through the empty auditing office. Initially he thought he was the first to arrive as Penny’s desk was clear and the outer office lights were off. As he stood tapping the face of his watch, he heard whispered voices coming from the first meeting room. He walked over and placed his ear against the door. Although hardly audible, the sound of Penny’s voice was unmistakable. He eased the door open; Amy and Penny were sat at the conference table, accompanied by a sheepish looking Ravi.
Daniel stood in the doorway, taken aback by Ravi’s presence. ‘Amy, do you think I could have a word in private?’ he said.
‘It’s okay, Daniel.’ Amy’s response was immediate. ‘Ravi knows all about it. He’s been telling us-’
Creation- The Auditor’s Apprentice Page 9