Macronome

by Howard Pierce

  Finally, back to building security/active shooter/comprehensive suppression/options. They listed Narcal aerosol as a benign nerve agent, with a target down-time of one to two hours. Where was it stored? Right in the same god damn engineering closet, locker 4, combination 5432.

  Andrzej thanked the Manager, reminding him that this was a top secret visit and that he might be back. Walking out of the ancient City Hall building he headed by the fountain and towards St. Paul’s Chapel. The Freedom Tower loomed above him. It was time to go collect Morley. Angela was dead, he was 99% sure, and he hoped that Jerzy was well hidden by now. He hadn’t dared to look for him within the RLA system, in case Serendipity had been coopted. That was the reason she was dead. Someone wanted to steal Serendipity, not just cripple her. Could that even be done?

  He had been around her and Danni for so long now that he knew Serendipity as something other than machine or program. She helped Danni and her designates out of a sense of family allegiance. They were her pack. She helped them to better understand what they were really looking at, painting startling pictures of the true world for them to explore. There was no longer any sense they controlled her, and she would surely sense other people at her dashboard. Striding through the trash along the Hudson River Greenway, Andrzej wondered: Do these people not even understand that she isn’t just the sum-total of the data she can access?

  Turning right onto Liberty Street, it struck him that Serendipity was fine. She could take care of herself. His immediate job was to avenge both her and Angela. It felt like a pathetically destructive human instinct, after a life of building things and planning for the conservation of the things he had built. He imagined TIC and Paladin as huge club-footed monsters in his china shop, wrecking all he had created, just like they wrecked Delani Beach and like they had probably killed Angela.

  Serendipity was different; she couldn’t be wrecked. They would find Angela, or her fate, and cut off the monster’s head. Then they would disappear into the bushes while they watched the monster stumble and fall.

  Time to find Morley. There he was, sitting on a park bench talking with another old man who was showing him pictures on his dash. Morley looked up at Andrzej with that smile. This was his kind of game. “Andrzej, come over here and meet my new friend, August West.”

  Running on Fumes

  While he waited suspended in mid-air for his podrone to be scanned, Leslie Massoud looked down at Manhattan with a familiar sense of amazement, mystified by the unrepentant energy of mankind. The city was a testament to the primal urge of humans to build, even in the face of hopeless odds against the forces of erosion and entropy. He looked at the dilapidated bridges, half of which were closed, and the patchwork of seawall sections seeping toxic water into the shielded streets, wondering that the city hadn’t been abandoned years ago.

  But there it was, on a sunny Monday in early fall, bustling blindly forward. Everyone, from the sanitation worker priming a new pump battery below Albany Street, to himself, Leslie Massoud, high in the air a thousand feet above being sniffed for bombs before entering the air-dock. Everyone was going to work.

  His morning had started early, droning into the city from his home at 5:00 and spending a few quiet hours at Paladin’s headquarters in Rockefeller center. He had asked for an early briefing from the team working on the analysis of Serendipity. They seemed excited and energized, hopeful of an imminent understanding of how to gain operational control of the system. But, while not letting on to the group who showed him data maps and interface shots, Leslie had come away unconvinced. There had been too much talk of “subduing” and “containing.” He could tell they were still fighting an adversary, not learning to work with an ally.

  Now on to meet with Murcheson, who seemed to consider 10:00 early. Donald was a weird throw-back. Like a man from an earlier age where bluster and money were enough to build an empire based on image. Not like his grandfather, a pirate and pioneer, or his father, a manager and maintainer. Donald J. Murcheson was more of a huckster, whose talent seemed to be turning every interaction into a zero-sum game.

  His company, TIC, was the official counterbalance to Paladin, the lone guard still standing against a Paladin monopoly. In a world driven by algorithms powered by synthesized data, the drift towards consolidation was like an irresistible force of nature. The best algorithms outstripped their competition algorithmically. The best got bigger and better at a dizzying rate, after a while almost without trying. It helped that every governmental body, from the U.N.A. on down, wanted them both to do well enough to offset the other. The simplistic dogma, that any competition was always better than a monopoly, had kept TIC alive in Leslie’s opinion.

  Donald was also an asshole, but Leslie had long come to accept that he was his asshole for the foreseeable future.

  Scans complete, the podrone pulled into the recessed dock and he was greeted by one of Murcheson’ many lieutenants, who escorted him to the penthouse office. Showtime, as they say.

  “How are your people doing with their research, Leslie? My guys are going full throttle. They say Skramble and Hyde are clearly in retreat and their attempts to retake control of the admin nexus get more ineffective by the hour.” An aide had brought Murcheson a glass of bubbly liquid, taking away the half-finished one already on his desk.

  Leslie wasn’t thirsty. “Well, my team seem pretty excited, but they are mainly watching how she reacts to your probes so far. I wouldn’t say they really have a grip on how Serendipity works yet. She is a complicated beast, Donald. This is going to take some time.”

  “We haven’t got time, Leslie.” Murcheson had been leaning against the edge of his desk, but now he walked over and put his arm on Leslie’s shoulder, his bulk deployed within the starched white shirt to position the smaller younger man below him. “The U.N.A. will move soon to pit us against one another. They will probably cancel the contract with S&H outright, and they will try to force us each to recreate Serendipity’s functionality and transparency services. They will decide to tolerate the pain of conversion to a new system, but they will legislate that we deliver similar services.”

  Squeezing Leslie’s shoulder, he released him and walked to the window-wall. “If we move fast, we can lobby them to just let us jointly take over the management of the current state of affairs. Let us just take over Serendipity. It will be so much easier for everyone.”

  “I doubt it.” Leslie could see any number of problems with Donald’s rough plan, mostly involving TIC’s general incompetence and the inevitable cultural conflict between the two companies. But the safest topic for this meeting was the law and Serendipity herself. “First off, the U.N.A. is never going to let us work that closely together. In fact, I shouldn’t meet with you in person again like this. But, more to the point, I’m far from sure either of our teams is or will be capable of operating Serendipity at any acceptable level. Do you really think Skramble and Hyde just ran away and left her idling for us?”

  “They were running on fumes anyway, Leslie. Jerzy Brodonski is dead as of last night, and his father has gone radio silent. The entire Wieliczka office has been abandoned, ordered evacuated by management, and no one from S&H has touched Serendipity’s interface for 18 hours. Once we got their contract voided, they wisely decided to take their money and run.” The smug look on Donald’s face was infuriating in its ignorance.

  Leslie contained himself. “Still no sign of that merc guy who created the breach, right?”

  Murcheson shrugged acknowledgement. The key actor at the code level was unaccounted for, gone into thin air.

  “We aren’t in control here, Donald. Someone may want us to think we are, but we aren’t. I think we should just watch carefully for the moment and play the good citizens. There have been at least two deaths, and someone is going to be expected to pay for that. Adding in any hint of corporate sabotage, or worse yet anti-competitive collusion, could stimulate investigations and end up cos
ting us a fortune.” Leslie Massoud could suddenly smell danger all around him. “I’m going to head back uptown. I think we should keep our communications fully discoverable for the time being. Some manner of shit is going to hit the fan, and we need to stay away from it.”

  “Leslie, why the fuck do you think we bothered to breach Serendipity in the first place? We can’t just let this opportunity slip away.” Murcheson was getting red-faced, trying not to scream. Maybe he had misjudged Massoud. Maybe Paladin wasn’t keeping up. Maybe they should take them out. There must be a way to invisibly acquire, get around the monopoly thing. That’s why you have the god damn lawyers.

  “Let’s just watch a bit longer, Donald.” Leslie was literally heading for the door of the office. “You will be at the Business Roundtable meeting on Thursday, right? Let’s find time to talk then.” They nodded, and he left.

  On the ride back, Leslie Massoud made copious notes regarding an imaginary mundane conversation they had just had, on ways to assure compliance through science. Andrzej got an alert from the RLA system as Massoud left the tower and headed back uptown. Donald Murcheson brooded on into the afternoon.

  Tower’s Lapse

  The tower’s security system wasn’t any one place. It lived as a cloud surrounding the building and extending out from it as far as necessary. Sometimes that meant just down the street, and sometimes it meant the other side of the planet. It was all the same to the tower, the system, and the humans who cared for them. It was a buzzing hive of subroutines, balance checks, and audits, all looking for something suspicious, all adding their continuously acquired new data into the mix. Recreating expected normal from moment to moment to moment.

  Robert Bishop was normal. His occurrence at the east entrance curtain was within the predictable timeframe. He selected the expected floor from the greeting cart, and, as the elevator stopped at the 91st floor, he exited as expected. Within 120 seconds, he keyed in the proper combination to the service closet lock. The door opened, and the door closed. A tiny piece of code began a timer, expecting him to leave within a range of 15 to 120 minutes.

  Lester Handler was normal as well. The system’s lenses first picked him up approaching from Vesey Street, carrying a delivery pouch and walking with a limp in his pained stride. If it had been paying closer attention, it might have noticed his seeming unfamiliarity with the greeting cart, but once he had entered his floor choice, 93, everything proceeded smoothly since that was his destination 72% of the time. It was a Monday, and on Mondays that number went to 91%.

  As the elevator door opened in the lobby plaza, Morley tapped the button of his antique two-way radio three times in his pants pocket. Up on the 91st floor, Andrzej felt the three vibrations from his radio and began atomizing the compressed Narcal into the air supply for the two floors above him. Morley rode the lift, which went directly to the 50th floor, and then began making stops on its way to 93, and by the time the doors opened on 93 he was the only person still within the glistening cab.

  He stepped out into the reception area, which looked just like the sketch Andrzej had drawn for him in the park gravel. He waved cheerily to the lady at the desk as he ducked into the men’s room just down a hall to the right. What she couldn’t notice was that he was holding his breath. He seemed in an urgent hurry and she was feeling somewhat woozy herself. In the bathroom, Morley donned his filtered head sheath and a pair of surgical gloves while he waited in a stall, studying the classic tile work and the old-style flush valve. A few minutes later he felt the buzz from Andrzej and as he left the stall the toilet flushed, knowing that a human had just left, with an 88% chance they had deposited something in the stainless bowl.

  Andrzej left the Narcal injector running as he exited the service closet and headed back to the elevator. The Tower was pleased that he had stayed within the expected timeframe, but it was deeply disappointed when he hit the up button instead of the down. Considering the possible reasons for this deviation, it could think of no good ones, so it refused the request and lit the down button. Maybe Mr. Robert Bishop was confused or simply hit the wrong one by mistake. Andrzej tried the stairs. Once again, the Tower would only let him go down.

  Morley was standing over a slumped Donald J. Murcheson when the S.O.S. vibrations started against his leg. Murcheson was still in his chair, torso on desktop and mouth hanging open. Everyone on the floor seemed to be properly Narcalized, so Morley pulled the radio out and called down to Andrzej. After hearing about the problem between the building and Mr. Bishop, Morley knew what to do.

  “Andrzej, just get out and meet me in Paradox. You can’t help me now and we can’t travel together anyway from here on out.” Morley looked at the drooling face of Murcheson as he pulled the second filter sheath from his pocket and slipped it over his limp head. “Get to a safe place nearby and turn your radio on. Murcheson should be coming around in about ten minutes, and I want you to hear the answer to my question about Angela.”

  “I can’t leave you alone up there, Morley.” He knew how pathetic that sounded.

  “You don’t have much choice, do you? Your stupid building won’t let you up. Don’t worry. I’ll have my little time with Donald, and then I’ll see you in Paradox. Get moving.”

  So, he did. Twelve minutes later he was sitting again in Pumphouse Park with the radio on and a headset in his ear. The Tower was glad to be rid of the momentary anomaly, but it decided to keep a close eye on Robert Bishop next time he came to visit.

  Morley looked around as he waited for Murcheson to regain consciousness. He found a lamp cord, which he ripped out and used to tie him upright in his rolling desk chair. In the private bathroom he found a first aid kit and used a long elastic bandage to tie Murcheson’s hands and legs together. And on the wall, in a glass covered case, he found a very old baseball bat signed by Mickey Mantle. The inscription at the bottom of the case said, “For my grandson Donald, on his 10th birthday.” He broke the glass and took out the bat, sitting on the desk in front of Murcheson, he waited. Bat in hand.

  The eyes opened, at first uncomprehending, but slowly they focused on Morley. Murcheson struggled briefly before realizing he was hogtied. He spoke finally, after seeing the bat in Morley’s hand and looking to the shattered wall case. “Who are you?”

  Morley slammed the bat against the desktop as he stood, and after spinning the desk chair around, he laid the radio on its dented surface. “My name is Morley, and I have a question for you, Mr. Murcheson. If you answer it truthfully, I will leave. If you refuse or lie, I will beat you to death with this bat. Here is the question. Is the woman you kidnapped in Krakow, Angela Brodonski, dead or alive? Be careful, I already know a lot, and I’ll know if you are lying within minutes.”

  Fear was the only emotion behind the eyes now, and the Tower was oblivious to the goings on in the penthouse office. Morley gave Murcheson a few seconds to consider the situation before tapping him firmly on the knee with the bat and saying, “You have exactly ten seconds to answer, or you die.”

  Donald Murcheson decided quickly. “She is dead, but I didn’t kill her. We hired a contractor to kidnap her, so we could slow down any response to the breach. Somehow, they fucked up and killed her. We didn’t mean it. I’m terribly sorry. It was a mistake.”

  Morley walked around behind the chair and picked up the radio from the desk. “Did you hear that? I’m really sorry, man.”

  “Yeah, I heard it. Now get out of there.”

  “I’ll be on my way soon. Need to settle a few scores first. I’m going to sign off now. See you back at the ranch.” Morley swung the bat again, smashing the radio into bits of plastic and metal.

  He walked back around to face Murcheson. “So, you killed Angela. Now I want you to remember back to 2075. You were only 26 at the time. That was the first time you fucked with me and my friends. By the way, I represent Skramble and Hyde.”

  The look of fear behind the eyes deepened as they wat
ched Morley remember back over fifty years.

  “You paid a Chinese mercenary outfit to bomb my home on the east coast of Africa. Remember that. You killed 14 people, all were my friends.” Morley was old. He was always stiff and now his shoulder hurt from two swings with the bat. But he had become oddly serene. “What do you think your chances are of getting out of this alive?”

  The Tower was becoming concerned. There had been no comm traffic from the penthouse for over fifteen minutes. That was odd. It tested the systems, and all was normal. It tested the environment. Not normal. Narcal was detected on two floors. Trigger the alarm, clear the air, send in the humans.

  Morley heard them coming. He knew that he had been waiting for them. He thought of Norris and Werner, and Dan Talbot drinking on the deck at Delani Beach. As they got closer, he looked back at Murcheson, who had tears running down his face. He picked up Murcheson’s dash from the floor where it had fallen. He put it into Murcheson’s hand, and the interface lit up in recognition. He dialed the police emergency line and a voice answered, “What is your emergency? We see you are in the Freedom Tower.”

  Morley hit the mute button and looked back to Murcheson, “You have five seconds to tell them who you are and that you are responsible for Angela Brodonski’s death. Otherwise, I will immediately bash you fucking head in.”

  Unmute.

  Donald J. Murcheson did as he was told.

  They waited for a few more terrible moments as the SWAT team could be heard setting up behind the beautiful mahogany doors to Donald’s office. Morley raised the bat above Donald’s head, posing as executioner. He whispered to Murcheson, “I’m going to let you live, you bag of shit. Not sure why. Any of the others would have killed you.”

  The doors flew open with a shattering of wood and four energy beams converged on the threat. Morley’s seared body collapsed into the lap of Donald J. Murcheson. The bat smacked Donald lightly on the head as it fell. The Tower smelled the burnt flesh and waited for the humans to clean up and send the all clear.