When the River Ran Dry

by Robert Davies

  “These are raw data compilations, but when I ran them through my discrimination software, the architecture and status notes told me what I needed to know.”

  Ricky looked, but nothing made sense.

  “You recognize this stuff?”

  “I haven’t read it all, and it’s been a long time since I’ve seen my father’s notes, but yes, I know what they’re for.”

  “Did you work with your father?”

  “I followed him into the profession, but we took different paths.”

  Maela waited for a moment, but nothing on the screen was recognizable; they would need to hear the story from Valery.

  “This was the baseline code they used to make Starlight?”

  “Some of it, yes, but most of what you’re seeing are architecting blocks he was working on in the last year.”

  Ricky nodded and pointed at the time stamps.

  “This is the information he believed would change everything?”

  “Yes.”

  Maela and Ricky looked at the jumble of numbers and letters, but nothing was recognizable.

  “I don’t understand any of this, Valery; we’re not computer people.”

  “The working file structure is masked by a security feature I can’t break from here; certain algorithms that map to known processes my array at the office will recognize. I don’t have that kind of processing power, so I need to take copies into the lab.”

  “But you know enough from Elden’s notes to recognize the general direction, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where should we start?”

  Valery pulled a chair from an adjacent table and settled next to Ricky.

  “You know how Starlight works, right?”

  “Yeah,” he answered softly, “I know all about Starlight.”

  Maela heard more in his tone than his words could convey as Valery continued.

  “When he developed the initial concept years ago, my father’s goal was establishing a direct pathway between analytic systems and the human brain.”

  Ricky held up a hand and said, “He wanted to let people communicate with a computer system directly?”

  “Yes,” Valery replied, “and by a mere thought. He believed voice or keypad interface methods were needless and cumbersome.”

  “Did he have a reason, or was it just a theory he wanted to test?”

  “My dad wanted to make interactions faster and easier, but also more accurate. He saw a future where medical diagnostic equipment would establish a direct link to a patient’s brain and analyze neural networks, for example.”

  “Go on,” Maela said, suddenly interested as Valery’s words took shape in the images she described.

  “He believed a direct interface could help find hidden clues that might identify a sickness or condition long before it surfaced in the form of outward symptoms, but it went much further as he progressed in his research.”

  “In what way?”

  “Just as the brain might communicate to a machine designed to analyze physiological difficulties, perhaps it could root out emotional problems as well.”

  “Help the doctor see a problem before it became one?”

  “I remember his conversations with colleagues when I was still in school, but the concept became known by his supervisors and they narrowed the scope of research very quickly and not to my father’s liking.”

  “This happened before he went to Novum?”

  “Correct.”

  Ricky sat forward, too. The possibilities had become obvious, even to a hustler from the streets.

  “These things sound very beneficial, Valery; why did Elden’s bosses have a problem?”

  “The corporation he worked for imposed restrictions on my father he wasn’t willing to accept. They wanted specific limits placed on any research where direct interaction with a machine was concerned, but only for risk mitigation; they were afraid of losing a legal battle and the associated cost due to unforeseen injury to a person. He didn’t agree.”

  “Elden wasn’t very adventurous.” Ricky frowned. “Why did he fight them?”

  “My father wanted to accelerate the concept further and reverse the pathway—to make the analytic process reciprocal. In this way, a machine or system would interface with a human, so that faults or anticipated mechanical risks could be identified and repaired before they failed. In my dad’s mind, beneficial systems fault analysis and human medical diagnoses were one and the same.”

  “But his masters didn’t like the idea?”

  “They worried that base-level control between a human and an artificial system would invite trouble, so they prohibited further research on the project.”

  “They shut it down completely?”

  “Yes, and that’s when it started to unravel.”

  “You mean contact from Novum.”

  “It had only been a few years since the cease-fire, but there were people there who knew him and his reputation. When your government fell and the Commission took control, some of the more powerful ones had been told of my dad’s research.”

  “Told by whom?” Maela asked suddenly.

  “I really don’t know, and he never said. They told him there would be no barriers to his work if he went out there, and the idea became more compelling than he could resist, especially after his employers threatened to dismiss him if he didn’t obey them.”

  Maela smiled at the thought, knowing too well the notion of ethics was never a prominent piece in Novum’s authority structure.

  “The Commission promised him a paradise where he could continue his work and not be punished for it.”

  “Yes, that’s it.”

  Ricky knew what came next.

  “So he left you and your mother to follow his dream?”

  “Not at first,” Valery answered. “He tried to convince my mother to move, but she reacted by telling him it would end their marriage if he went away.”

  “But it didn’t matter to him?”

  “I think it mattered to him, but I also believe he felt trapped. The possibilities of unfettered research, and my mother’s refusal to move, simply left him with only one of two available choices and he took the Commission’s deal.”

  “What you describe doesn’t sound at all like the Elden I knew.” Ricky frowned.

  “I can’t help what it sounds like, Mr. Mills; I’m just telling you what happened.”

  “And then he was gone?” Maela asked, although they knew the answer.

  “He said it was temporary, but my mom told him not to come back and that was that. He packed and left the week before I graduated from the University. I’ve only seen him a handful of times since.”

  The silence returned and only the rattle of an antique clock above tick-tocked its note in measured time like a solitary percussion instrument in a vacant concert hall. Valery stood and moved to the sloping wall of glass, looking out at the park beyond and lost in her thoughts. Maela waited a while, but the history lesson only clouded further her search for a killer. She needed answers and it was clear the only path ran through Valery Sharma’s tortured memories.

  “Do you think those hidden files will fill in the blanks?”

  “I’m sure of it.”

  “It’s going to be difficult for us to get out here again,” Ricky said softly. “I don’t mean to hurry you, but…”

  “Don’t worry about that,” she replied, “We’ll go down to the lab right now, but why is it a problem for you to return? Is your transit card good for one trip only?”

  “We didn’t ride out on the trains.”

  “You flew an air car all the way from Novum?”

  “We came across the Broadlands.”

  Valery only stared.

  “We wanted to conduct the investigation without a lot of attention,” Maela continued, “so we came out on the surface.”

  “I wouldn’t make a habit of going across the Broadlands.” Valery frowned.

  “It was important to maintain anonymity
for this trip.”

  “If you say so, but right now, we need to get these files into my work system.”

  They went quickly to Valery’s car and rode in silence as it sped into the heart of the city, finding at last her place inside a cavernous garage mid-way up a triad of identical towers linked by pedestrian bridges not unlike those common in Novum. After a short lift ride down three floors, they followed her through a series of security checkpoints, all of which demanded full retinal scans and voice sample recordings before the gateway portals would grant admittance. Valery waited patiently, but even her authority wasn’t enough to obviate the process.

  At last, they were in. A vacant, mostly open bay configuration revealed test stations and the odd-looking equipment at home only in a laboratory. Maela thought at once of Jonathan, knowing he would surely delight at the chance to work in such a place as Valery settled at one of the coding stations to load the files into a machine, trying her best to describe its function to an obviously bewildered Ricky. In seconds, the search software did its work and the structure was revealed, scrolling data streams at her touch. She pointed for them to sit while she reviewed Elden’s notes on one monitor, looking to a second display where the jumble of numbers and unrecognizable phrase blocks seemed to verify the old man’s intent. When she paused, Valery turned suddenly to Ricky.

  “You have a Starlight account?” she asked.

  “Had; I don’t do that anymore.”

  She looked again at the display.

  “Who is ‘Neferure?’”

  Ricky was sure she could see his face go red. It had been months since he heard the name and it shocked him when Valery asked so casually and without knowledge of all that had been. Immediately, his memory pulled him across time and space to the warm breezes along the Nile and evenings spent with a princess. He could still hear Bartel’s cruel suggestion that Litzi could wash away his debt if only she would agree to Boris Konstantinou’s demands. He remembered the Walk and a night of terror no one could forget, but worse than any of it, the sudden realization Elden knew all along. Had he monitored the sessions, Ricky wondered with horror? Perhaps Ellis Justman described those moments in violation of the rules prohibiting managers from revealing a client’s plot content.

  “She was a character in my simulation.”

  “A very special character, judging by my father’s description,” Valery noted.

  “That was supposed to be private,” Ricky said with a growing tone of irritation Valery (and Maela) heard clearly.

  “I’m sorry if this makes you uncomfortable,” she said softly, “but I’ve heard far worse from Starlight programs than a romantic adventure with an ancient Egyptian theme.”

  Ricky looked at her for a moment and said, “Why did Elden mention it at all? I never told him about my simulation!”

  “Well, somebody did, and judging by the secondary descriptions, in very intimate detail.”

  “But why? What does my Starlight account have to do with any of this?”

  “I’m not sure yet,” she replied, “but it looks like your character figured into my father’s plans at a very high level.”

  “His notes don’t tell you more than that?”

  “Of course they do, but I have to cross-reference most of it with his raw data to fully understand where he was going.”

  Ricky looked away to avoid Maela’s eyes.

  After another moment or two, Valery nodded at the display and said, “This is going to take a while. Through those double doors, there’s a lounge and self-serve café; if you’d like to rest and refresh yourselves, no one else is here this time of day.”

  “I am getting a little hungry,” Maela said. “Let’s leave her alone for a while, Richard.”

  Ricky nodded quietly and followed around a maze of computer stations to the lounge, finding his way to a small couch against the far wall. An open space on the opposite side of the room held food and drink dispensers, inviting visual displays of the café’s offerings and beyond, a hallway leading to restrooms. Maela walked quickly past an empty buffet counter, selecting instead an automated machine’s idea of warm croissants and tea served in a tall, ceramic cup made to resemble bamboo. She looked over her shoulder where Ricky sat alone and said, “You should eat.”

  “I know.”

  She waited for a moment, deciding at last to grab two more pieces of pastry and an additional cup of tea. When she placed them on a low table near the couch, Ricky smiled and thanked her, suddenly returned from a distant place in his mind she knew must’ve been made by Valery’s abrupt questions.

  “It bothered you when Valery asked about your simulation.”

  “She just caught me off-guard,” he replied.

  “It didn’t look that way to me.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “You got pissed-off all of a sudden—embarrassed. Valery saw it, too.”

  “It isn’t something I wanted to discuss in front of strangers. I’d rather forget about that time, not have my nose rubbed in it.”

  “So now I’m a stranger?”

  “You know what I meant.”

  “I don’t think she meant to rub your nose in it, Richard; she found a link to your program in Elden’s notes and wondered about it, that’s all.”

  Ricky looked at Maela with confused sadness.

  “I never told him, don’t you understand? Elden knew I had a simulation, but we never discussed the details. He couldn’t have known about Neferure!”

  “Elden wrote the damn thing; is it so surprising he had a pipeline into particular client simulations?”

  “I guess not, but no one would’ve told him those things unless he asked. Why did he ask?”

  “Maybe Valery will have that answer when she finishes her analysis. In the meantime, tell me about this character of yours; who is Neferure?”

  Ricky closed his eyes and clenched his jaw knowing the arguably sordid details of his relationship with a computer-generated fantasy would be paraded in front of him yet again. Maela knew how to get information and it was only a matter of time, yet Ricky resisted. After a moment or two in silence, she leaned close.

  “Do you really think an innocent jerk-off video could be anything close to the unspeakable shit I’ve seen on the streets of Novum?”

  “That’s not what it was!” he snapped. “I didn’t create the simulation just for sex, all right?”

  Maela held up her hands in a mock surrender.

  “Okay, okay, I’m sorry. It doesn’t matter to me why you took out an account, or how you scripted it—that’s your business. I just wondered because Elden mentioned this character so prominently, and…”

  “She was a princess in ancient Egypt; the daughter of a Pharaoh.”

  “You made your simulation into a period piece? That’s novel.”

  “I liked learning about the Egyptians from history vids when I was a little kid, so I made a second life and used that time and place.”

  “This princess was a real person back then?”

  “Yeah; I used a lot of real people for my characters.”

  “Why did you pick this one in particular—why not Cleopatra?”

  Ricky hesitated, feeling himself slipping as more and more details would surely be revealed. He couldn’t stop it, there was little chance of that, yet he fought against the sensations of dread and embarrassment he would suffer when the full depth of his simulation spilled out for Maela to see.

  “I wanted something different; a time and place no one else knew or cared about. Everyone knows who Cleopatra was, but no one knows about Neferure. Well, no one except people who like Egyptian history, I guess.”

  Maela nodded as he went, watching the faint pictures from his imagination as they became real in her mind.

  “What was your role? I assume you interacted with this princess, right?”

  “Yes. I cast myself as a soldier in her mother’s army.”

  “Lots of exciting battles to fight?”

  “Something
like that.”

  “So you had a relationship with…”

  “Neferure. Yes, I was a suitor.”

  “And her lover?”

  Ricky looked at Maela with a dull expression of resignation.

  “Yeah, there was that, too.”

  “At least you had a story and a reason beyond cheap sex,” Maela said suddenly. “Most of the assholes who get hooked on Starlight use it only as a virtual prostitute. It sounds like you put a lot of time and thought into developing an authentic scenario.”

  “It was a better place than Novum.”

  They sat in silence for a time and Ricky hoped desperately Maela would change the subject, satisfied with what he revealed, but she wanted more.

  “How did you get the images uploaded? I never opened an account myself, so how does that work?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, they didn’t have cameras four thousand years ago, but I know enough about Starlight to know you have to provide images for the software to use as it builds a character. I’m guessing there was an artist’s rendition from a history text?”

  “Not exactly.”

  Maela waited for Ricky to finish his thought, but he stood and turned away, sullen and quiet as he stuffed his hands into his pockets. At last, and pushed reluctantly by what he knew would follow, he returned to the couch.

  “I watched a documentary about the Pharaoh—Neferure’s mother—on the vids a few years ago. Her name was Hatshepsut and she got famous because she was the first female Pharaoh to rule Egypt. The role of Neferure was played by Scylla Anders, so I used video and still images from the ‘nets.”

  Maela smiled a little as the picture, once blurred and fleeting, became clear.

  “Your princess looks like Scylla Anders?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well, you didn’t cheat yourself there, I have to admit. If you’re going to create a fantasy, why not use a big vid star as the template, right?”

  “I guess so.”

  Maela heard the twinge of Ricky’s shame in his words, exposed like the secrets of an adolescent boy in front of grownups.

  “It’s not exactly new, is it? Starlight users steal the images of famous people for their simulations every day.”

  Ricky wanted nothing more than to move away from a conversation stabbing at him with knives of guilt and regret.