The Great Race

by Tom Clancy

  Leif sat on his couch, wincing at the lousy synch-in. A second later, he was sitting at his virtual desk. No messages - what a surprise!

  He reached out and picked up the Constellation icon. A second later, he was aboard the Onrust - on an empty bridge.

  Unless they’d suited up and were patching in virtual hull plates outside, there was no way the guys could be in this simulation.

  Of course, they might have gone to visit someone else’s simulation. Leif tried not to think where that would lead … or what would happen if they were caught.

  Leif pulled the plug on the sim and opened his eyes back out on the computer-link couch. He had the beginning of a headache, but it didn’t come from the maladjusted electronics. This was stress, pure and simple.

  Jumping off the couch, Leif jammed a hand into his back pocket and brought out his wallet. He flipped aside his IDs and credit cards to reach the inset foilpack keypad. Unlike most wallets today, Leif’s was made of real, live (or formerly alive) leather. At least, the outside was. Inside, there was a layer of polymer embedded with micro-circuitry. A stab of his finger switched those circuits to the ‘phone’ option.

  Leif didn’t need to look up David’s phone number - his personal number, for the phone in his wallet. He knew it by heart, didn’t even have to resort to the speed dial. A muted purr sounded in the room - the connection being made with the physical phone in David’s wallet. The question was, would the connection also get through to its virtual counterpart?

  Oh, it was a gamble - or rather, an exercise in applied probabilities. David was very good at programming - even adding oddball quirks to everyday items. If it could be done, he might have done it.

  Leif held his wallet-phone to his ear. The ringing tone suddenly cut off. David’s voice came over the connection. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Where are you?’ Leif asked.

  ‘Huh?’ David’s voice went from bafflement to embarrassment. ‘We’re in my virtual office. Meant to leave a message for you, but we couldn’t remember your new system address.’

  Leif snorted in exasperation. ‘How about just leaving me a note out in the real world?’

  ‘Huh!’ David said. ‘We didn’t think of that.’

  A second later, Andy suddenly stirred on his couch. ‘We’ll go back in together,’ he said. ‘I’ll guide you to David’s workspace.’

  ‘I can hardly wait to see that,’ Leif muttered. He settled into his couch and once again went through the teeth-gritting process of synching in.

  When he opened his eyes, he was in the same old office - except Andy was there with him.

  ‘Why are we in my office?’ Leif asked.

  ‘Actually, it’s my office,’ Andy told him. ‘The minute I came in here, I drew an X on the wall.’ He pointed to a huge scrawled X behind the desk.

  ‘Talk about creepy,’ Leif said. ‘You mean all of Pinnacle’s people get the same cruddy virtual space?’

  ‘Oh, I think folks like Milos Wallenstein probably get something a little nicer,’ Andy replied. ‘And if you have a little programming ability, you can modify the space.’

  He took a program icon out of his pocket. ‘Wait till you see what David did.’

  Grabbing Leif’s hand, Andy activated the program. They went through a moment of darkness like an eye blink. A second later, they stood in what looked like a Hollywood designer’s dream of a South Seas grass shack. Brilliant sunshine filtered through the woven roof and walls. From nearby came the pleasant roar of the surf and the calls of exotic birds.

  ‘I love what you’ve done with the place,’ Leif said with a smile. ‘My father actually took us off for vacation to someplace like this once. The bugs drove us crazy.’

  ‘No bugs here,’ David said. ‘I specifically programmed ‘em out.’ He sat cross-legged at a low table that served as his workspace. Unlike Leif’s desktop, there were icons galore. Some Leif recognized; others made no sense at all to his eyes.

  ‘I can see you’ve been busy,’ he said, looking down at the small collection of items directly in front of David. They were even odder than usual - a small spool of thread, a tiny bottle, and what looked like an old wooden match stick - odds and ends at best, trash at worse. Except that they were on the desktop, and they glowed slightly. They represented programs David and the others had crafted. ‘What do they do?’ Leif asked. ‘Vaporize any intruders?’

  ‘We figure whoever is hacking into the systems is too good to be caught by virtual burglar alarms,’ Matt said.

  ‘They’ve got to be pretty good if they could get in, weaken the structure of the Arcturan ship, and fix it so that the engineering console was hoaxed,’ David said. ‘They could probably outclass any direct, active security measures we might program in to protect the ship -though we tried them anyway.’ He pointed to a group of high-tech-looking doodads off to one side. ‘That’s the best and the brightest in the way of virtual security. Tamper with the Onrust, and they’ll scream bloody murder. So far, at least, they seem to be working. I compared the ship against the original specs we turned over to Pinnacle. The Onrust appears to be untampered with.’

  ‘We figure our friendly neighborhood hackers will expect to see top-flight security systems - and probably know how to beat them all,’ Matt said.

  Andy grinned. ‘So we decided to go for indirect - and passive.’

  ‘Rather than a burglar alarm that would contact us if something was up - and form a connection our techno-burglars could spot - we’re trying simpler tricks.’ David pointed to the spool. ‘This is like a piece of thread stretched across a doorway - an intruder might not even feel it. But we’d know somebody had gone through.’

  ‘The match-program is pretty much the same - like those old flatscreen detective movies. The private eye would tuck a match stick between the door frame and a closed door. If it fell to the floor - or was gone - when he returned, the guy’d know that someone had opened the door since he’d last shut it.’

  ‘It’s basically the same programming trick,’ David said. ‘Just a couple of lines of code that are erased if somebody goes into our programming, and another couple of lines that delete themselves if the ship’s systems code is changed. The changes are small - hardly noticeable.’

  ‘But we’d spot them.’ Leif nodded. ‘Nice.’ He pointed at the bottle. ‘And that?’

  Andy’s grin got wider. ‘It’s based on another poor man’s burglary warning. In real life, you’d pour powder on a rug. If somebody stepped on it, the powder would stick to his shoe, either leaving a dark footprint in the powder, or a powdery footprint somewhere else.’

  ‘I don’t think it will actually do much good,’ David said, with a glance at their irrepressible friend. ‘But if anyone actually appears on board the Onrust, they’ll leave a virtual “footprint.” We’ll pick up a new switch or two on the control panels if somebody breaks in. It won’t be obvious to anybody but us - but we’ll know immediately.’

  ‘So what’s left?’ Leif asked.

  ‘I have to install them,’ David said. ‘Give me a couple of minutes.’ He gathered up the security icons, high-tech and low, in one hand. With the other hand, he went for the crystal Constellation icon. An instant later, he disappeared.

  As he waited, Leif stepped onto the porch of the grass shack, enjoying the virtual sunshine. It was slanting in, indicating late afternoon. Leif was a little surprised. Did David’s sim follow the clock here on the West Coast, or was it always late afternoon?

  He glanced at his watch. It was later than he expected.

  Leif thought for a minute, then looked at the other guys. He said, ‘I’m going to pop out into the real world for a minute and use the phone.’

  ‘Why not use David’s?’ Andy asked.

  ‘Do you really want to leave a traceable link into our new, top-secret Net location? Be right back.’ He blinked and returned to the miserable office in Casa Falldown. Reaching for the phone^, he contacted central reception to find out what, if any, cab services Pinnacle Stud
ios used. Next he called for a cab. Then he popped back into David’s tropical paradise and told his friends what he’d done.

  ‘I don’t know if that bus is still waiting for us, but I’d like to get back to the hotel for a while - and eat something that isn’t commissary food.’ He grinned at the others. ‘Since it’s my problem, it’s my treat.’

  David reappeared, and they all disconnected from the world of veeyar.

  ‘Did they say when that cab was arriving?’ Matt asked as he got off his computer-link couch.

  ‘Couple of minutes.’ Leif was the last one out of the crowded little office space. As he left, he pulled the door as far as it would close against the bundle of cables snaking in to connect the couches. Then he slipped a tiny, intricately folded piece of paper into the crack between the door and the frame.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Andy asked.

  ‘The same as we were doing in veeyar - only out here in the physical world,’ Leif replied. ‘If somebody tries to get in there, we’ll know about it.’

  His teammates were quiet as they filed out of Casa Falldown. There were too many unpleasant things a technically skilled person could do to computer-link equipment.

  I think I made this a heck of a lot more real for them, Leif thought. But we don’t know how hard the other side is willing to play …

  • • • When he arrived back at the hotel, the reception desk had a message for him. The clerk called it up on his display. ‘A Mr Courcy tried to reach you,’ he read.

  Leif grinned. Alexis de Courcy was one of a handful of rich kids who tried to keep the memory of the Jet Set and the Euro-Brats alive in the world today. Leif sometimes played at being a playboy. Alex was one. And surprisingly, he was also a very nice guy. They had gotten together in Washington, Paris, Tokyo, and dozens of other world capitals and fun cities.

  Could Alex be out here} Leif asked if there was a number.

  There was, but the code told Leif that the number was in Washington.

  The boys went upstairs, and Leif headed straight for the suite’s computer-link couch. The equipment in the hotel was much better maintained than the stuff they were using at the studio. He passed smoothly into veeyar - in this case, a duplicate of the suite’s living room - and went to the line of icons on the lamp table. There was a stylized lightning bolt among them. Leif picked it up, recited the number he’d gotten at the front desk, and in a moment was flying through the night sky over an incredible neon cityscape. Because he had the time and enjoyed the sensation, he took the scenic route.

  He had visited Las Vegas in the real world, the home of bright lights and gaudy holo-displays. But the sheer size, scale and gaudiness of the Net made real-life Vegas look as quiet and drab as a funeral parlor. The virtual buildings of the Net were completely constructed of light: brighter, more complicated versions of the glowing force-fields of Ultimate Frontier. Leif flew past great blazing skyscrapers and towering castles that would have immediately crumbled into ruin if they were built of mere stone and mortar. Giant logos of proud corporations seared his eyes. Smaller companies maintained more modest domains here and there, a place to rest one’s eyes. And all through the great black canyons between these towers of light, smaller glows flitted firefly-like on their separate ways. Program orders, packets of data, and fellow veeyar travelers like Leif, they all sought their destinations.

  Leif flew onward across the Net until he too reached his target. It was a virtual replica of a fancy Washington hotel - larger and more dazzling than its real-life coimterpart. Would he be deflected to virtual reception, or would this be a direct call?

  He swooped to one of the windows in an upper floor, and found himself in a hotel suite that was similar to the one he’d just left - only this one was fancier.

  The room was empty, but then he hadn’t expected to be greeted by Alex himself unless his friend was already in veeyar. Enough time passed for a tone to have sounded in the actual room. Then Alex’s voice resonated in the virtual copy. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Alex, it’s Leif Anderson,’ Leif replied, ‘returning your call.’

  A moment later, Alex appeared in the room and came over to shake Leif’s hand.

  ‘Good to see you, mon ami, even if it is your virtual self.’ Alex gave Leif an amused look. ‘I fly in firom the Left Bank to find you’ve gone off to the Left Coast. Your mother told me about this virtual race out in Hollywood. Will you appear in the holo? The things some people will do to win even a small part! I remember Sylvie Lachance—’

  ‘It started off innocently enough, and became a bit more exciting than I’d hoped for,’ Leif said. He’d quickly learned that if you didn’t interrupt Alex, he could talk forever - entertainingly, but it would go on for hours.

  Instead, Leif explained how they had come to participate in the race, and the complications that had followed.

  ‘Amazing,’ Alex said. ‘I don’t know how you get into these situations, my friend. Your fellow racers sound very serious. They need to - what is that charming American phrase? Ah, yes - they need to get a life.’

  ‘Well, everyone can’t be as useless and charming as we are,’ Leif said easily.

  Alex laughed. ‘Some of them seem very industrious. Using an old dish antenna to pick up radiation from a computer - quite clever.’ He gave Leif an interested glance. ‘Does your father’s company still make those things? I bought one when you offered them for sale, and quite liked it, but lost it a couple of months ago. You’ll like this, it’s an amusing story.’

  He listened to my story, Leif thought. Ifs only polite that I listen to his.

  ‘We were flying from Munich to the Greek islands when we got caught in a storm. The weather can be frightful over those mountains. My plane was damaged, and the pilot said we had to land immediately. The nearest airport was in this awful, drab city. “This will be a boring stopover,” I told myself. But I met this lovely girl, blond, dimples when she smiled.’ Alex pointed to two spots on his cheeks.

  ‘Oh, of course.’ Leif rolled his eyes.

  Alex laughed. ‘No, it is not that kind of story. This belle femme showed me what little there was of entertainment in this backwater town - a pleasant enough time. I got on my plane the next morning , flew off - and discovered a brick in the case for the computer. Yes, the fair Ludmila was most certainly an expensive date.’

  Leif s laughter stopped. ‘What was the name of the town where you put down?’

  Alex gave an expressive French shrug. ‘One of those awful Balkan places. Somewhere in the Alliance de les Carpathes’

  That was what the French called the Carpathian Alliance. It has to be a coincidence, Leif told himself. Aloud, he asked, ‘I don’t suppose she posed for a holopic with you?’

  ‘No,’ Alex replied. ‘I have a somewhat more quaint - or rather, old-fashioned - souvenir. A moment, please.’

  He vanished, then reappeared a moment later. ‘I had to scan this in. One of the clubs we visited had un photographe - a photographer - with a camera shooting instant flat-films.’

  Alex handed over a thin sheet of plastic - the picture from the instant camera. It showed the sort of small table that expensive clubs all over the world use to jam more people into their seating areas. Alex sat on the left, one eyebrow raised in a slightly scornful grin at the photographer. On the right was Ludmila, the girl from the C.A. racing team, smiling, dimples and all.

  Chapter Twelve

  ‘What’s the matter?’ Alex asked. ‘You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.’

  ‘No, but you may have gone out with a spy,’ Leif told his friend. ‘This young woman is part of a team competing in the race - from the Carpathian Alliance. If they win, they stand at least to see, and possibly even cart off, some prime examples of new computer technology.’ He looked at Alex. ‘By the way, did you report your unauthorized technology transfer?’

  Alex rolled his eyes. ‘I was just asking if you could help replace the computer I lost!’

  ‘Had stolen,’ Leif corrected. H
e could see he was going to get nowhere with his fun-loving friend. So they talked for a while more, made plans to get together if Leif got free of Hollywood before Alex headed back to Paris, and then cut the connection.

  Leaping from the computer-link couch, Leif went through the suite, rounding up his fellow Net Force Explorers. ‘You’re not going to believe this,’ he told them. ‘The friend who called in made a recent, unscheduled stop in the Carpathian Republic. And while he was there, he had his luggage lightened.’ He went on, repeating Alex’s story - and telling about the girl in the picture.

  ‘You’re sure it’s the same girl?’ Davis asked.

  ‘Unless it’s her twin or a clone,’ Leif replied.

  ‘She is kind of hard to miss,’ Andy admitted. ‘What did you say her name was? Ludmila?’ He grinned and began talking like a holo announcer. ‘Stay tuned! Our next program is Ludmila Popov, Sexy Spy!’

  ‘Knock it off, Andy,’ Leif said, a little annoyed.

  ‘Well, we thought the C.A. team was involved in spying on us right from the get-go,’ Matt declared. ‘Now we know they had reason to be familiar with the kind of computer David was carrying.’

  Leif just shrugged. ‘The proof is a little late in coming. Maybe Wallenstein might have put his foot down in the beginning if we could have pointed to a single team up to no good. After the meeting this morning, everybody will be trying out their full collection of dirty tricks.’

  ‘At least we know who we’d better stay away from,’ Andy said.

  Leif had to agree with that.

  I wonder if I’ll end up feeling sorry for old Hairless Jorge from Corteguay, he thought.

  That evening, after a little rest and a decent meal, Leif and the other Net Force Explorers got in their rental car and drove over to Pinnacle Studios. The visitors’ lot was a bit of a hike from Casa Falldown, but they walked the distance with lots of time to spare. Leif grinned to see the little scrap of paper still stuck in the door to their ofiBce. He and the other boys took their places on the computer-link couches and synched in.