Futura: Parallel Universes. Book 2

by Valerio Malvezzi

  The rhino at the end of the hall will turn, showing a less than noble part of the body.

  The two will be in the cafe across the street, in a sitting room at the end of the hall overlooking the river. The woman, drinking hot chocolate, will gaze at passers-by beyond the window. The blond man in front of her will be sipping a black coffee, leaning against the high back of the sofa.

  “This all seems incredible,” she will comment.

  “It is. I can hardly believe it either.”

  The woman will put the chocolate on the table and open her own display. “I checked what you told me this morning. Proctor, Borman, everyone. Proctor appears to have actually published a couple of articles in the past with his colleague, Dr. Porter, the black man. But there are no articles, publications, or essays by Medoc in any major scientific journal.”

  “I told you. You can’t find them because they’re not there. We don’t publish; we analyze unpublished things.”

  “But none of this makes sense.”

  “Still, someone pays the salaries of a lot of people to do it.”

  “The government? Is it public money?”

  “Of course.”

  “And where does this money come from?”

  “Officially they’re Department funds. If you do a simple search, you’ll easily find out which RFPs the Department always gets public funds on. They’re mostly from the Federal Ministry of Defense, or justice. I mean, government bids.”

  “Are you suggesting to me that these public calls are rigged? That you win them because the government makes you win over other competitors?”

  Santilli will rustle the pockets of his coat, nervously clasping his hands before speaking. “And then the buyer will be free to use the software, or physically deliver it where it’s needed. And we’ll have lost him.”

  The Commissioner will look at the two men, then the team of operatives who will move about on the green, forgotten by the rest of the world.

  “And how is this transaction linked to our goal?” he will suddenly ask.

  In the room, the operatives will be talking in the helmets, their voices screened. The chief analyst will be checking the flow of data, his back to them. The project manager and the team leader will look at each other without answering.

  “You’re not telling me that I have to decide based on a guess, without proof?”

  The bearded man will keep his hands in his pockets, bowing his head.

  Cervetti will look at the time: almost midnight. For a few moments, he will stare at the green walls of the room. Eventually, he will turn and walk up the steps, where the armed agent will open the door for him. In the stairwell, he will open his own communicator and compose the holographic connection number. The recipient will not allow the transmission of images. “Doctor, its Cervetti. I’m sorry to disturb you at this hour...”

  “I’m suggesting exactly that. Every year. Always. However, we don’t participate directly. We don’t meet the requirements. But the Department, which participates in it, yes.”

  “And then these funds are given to Medoc...”

  “For the most part.” He will nod, sipping coffee. “Not all, of course.”

  “And who manages them?”

  “I told you. The Department. The data is public. Apparently everything happens in the sunlight. Under everyone’s nose.”

  “I’m going crazy.”

  “I am convinced that if you search in your own newspaper, you will find some article that informs the public about the fact that this year, the Department is in the top ten places for research activities, for example in the public economy. And most of these activities are commissioned to Medoc.”

  “That it didn’t really do any of this?”

  “That’s right. It serves to justify the salaries of people who do something else. People who don’t publish anything. People who study what others around the world have never published.”

  “What others?”

  “Authors, writers. Opinion-makers. Politicians, sometimes. Often scientists.”

  “In short, you analyze the censorship of other countries.”

  “More or less. We study what’s not published.”

  The woman will shake her head, blowing on the hot drink. “It seems like a paradox. Studying what’s not there.”

  “It’s not entirely accurate. We study what we don’t want to find somewhere in the world. But that some people speculate or think.”

  The woman will look at him in silence for a few seconds. “And why couldn’t the government do it officially?”

  “So the others won’t know that we’re watching them.”

  The woman will remain thoughtful, looking at the bar counter where a couple of people are ordering drinks. “Let me understand. Why are you telling me all this?”

  194 days earlier

  The fish shop in downtown Onna Son, Okinawa Island will be crowded with raucous, yelling people that spring morning. The stylish Japanese woman in high-heeled sandals will walk uneasily among the booths, trying to avoid the crowds. The tall girl behind her, in sportswear and flat white shoes, will look down at the women with shopping bags, staring at all those present, including the shouting sellers. One of them, seeing the Japanese woman, will get off the bench to meet her.

  “Where is he?” she will simply ask.

  “Please, Mrs. Nishizawa,” the clerk will answer with a deep bow. “This way.”

  The man will accompany the two women to the back of the room, open a sliding door, and enter a courtyard.

  The elegant woman will look with disgust at the mounds of dirt and garbage, picking her way in her expensive Italian shoes. The salesman will open the garage door and, with another deep bow, will beckon the two women to enter, pointing to a large room with a ceramic floor. At the end of the garage, behind a counter, between pallets of pieces of electronics, glass, optics, and different types of utensils, the lean Japanese with oiled hair will spread his arms. “My dear Saki,” he will exclaim, showing the usual row of teeth yellowed by smoke. “What an honor! Thank you for coming. Let me find you a chair.”

  The woman will look around the garage disgustedly. “No thanks, I prefer to stand,” she will answer, looking at the counter. “Must we talk to each other in this rat hole?”

  The man will move ceremoniously, giving a nod to the girl with short hair, who will remain on the sidelines, giving no response.

  “My dear, this is my kingdom. My business doesn’t need advertising, as it were. It doesn’t look like much...”

  “No, indeed,” the woman will confirm, looking around.

  “... But it is functional,” the man will conclude.

  The man will look through the window at the riverbank and passers-by walking on the sidewalk.

  “Because yesterday the world collapsed on me. My colleagues were all killed. My best friend was killed after talking to me. And I could be next on someone’s list.”

  “And do you think I can protect you somehow?”

  The man will sip coffee, observing the sun slowly descending behind the tallest skyscrapers on the horizon.

  “No. But I think someone has an interest in this whole thing not being known,” he will answer, setting the cup on the table. “And, at this point, their interest no longer coincides with mine.”

  The woman will say nothing, looking at the river, on the surface of which the last rays of the sun are extinguished.

  The woman will look curiously at the disassembled pieces on the work bench. “So, did you invite me here to let me know about your questionable taste in furniture or to talk about work?”

  The thin man will move to the counter with a bow. “Yes, of course. You’re right,” he will say, taking a piece of glass in his hand. “You know the optics problems we talked about? Well, I’ve been working on them. All the finished pieces on that shelf are examples of optics applicable to your rifle.”

  The woman will look at the boxes on the shelves, displaying tags that show two numbers separate
d by a multiplier.

  “The first number corresponds to the magnifications, how many times the image we see will be enlarged; the second is the diameter of the lens, expressed in millimeters. The bigger the lens, the more light can get in, and potentially the better the image resolution will be.”

  “I know that.”

  “Yes, but the shot your client has in mind poses particular problems. You told me you’re going to have to be as effective as possible in any light condition, right? Now, the performance that provides optics in low visibility conditions depends a lot on the pupillary output, which you can consider equal to the smallest visible circle of light in a lens when you move your eyes away to the light source.”

  The thin man will pour whiskey into a not-too-clean glass, taking a bottle from a shelf behind his back.

  Ten o’clock in the morning. The elegant woman will look at him with evident disgust swallowing a sip of the alcoholic beverage. What do you drink at midnight, oil?

  “I prepared some optics and did the tests over very long distances. Now look on that shelf to your left. Do you see those numbers?” the thin man will ask, wiping his lips with the back of his hand. “The diameter of the pupillary output is calculated by dividing the lens diameter by the magnification value.”

  Thursday, 3:26 p.m.

  The riverside bar will begin to receive the first reflections of sunshine on the window, while the orange ball will slowly descend past the tall skyscrapers on the horizon, amid the clear clouds moved by the wind. The man sitting at the table will observe the few people present in the room, among the melodic music of the past.

  “Should we go?” he will ask the woman sitting in front of him. “We’ve already been talking in here a while. Better move.”

  “All right. Where are we going?”

  “Let’s take a walk along the river.”

  The woman will follow the man, pay the bill, and leave the premises, crossing the road and reaching the walkways along the shore. Some people will be stopped, looking at the bridges in the distance opening for a boat to pass. The incredible thing will be how, many years after their construction, those bridges, in such an ancient style, will integrate perfectly into the context of a modern city full of skyscrapers, above which, almost at the edge of the clouds, the flying cars will flow in the colored lanes, and the way this mixture of ancient and modern will be harmoniously reflected, once again, in the river.

  “I mean, do you think yesterday’s murders have anything to do with the government?” the blonde woman will ask.

  “I don’t know that. But I know what aired on holographic space is rubbish. And I know our work wasn’t what it officially turns out to be. Then I put two and two together, and I wonder why anyone wants to arrest me as a suspect.”

  “Perhaps because you stole that gun?”

  “Well, yes, I probably shouldn’t have done it. But you have to be in certain situations to be able to judge them.” The man in the leather cap and brown jacket will walk alongside the blonde dressed in the elegant green coat along the shore.

  “But did you get an idea of the reason? Did you have enemies?”

  “Enemies?” The man will put his hands in his pocket, beginning to feel the cold wind. “No, but who? I told you, we spent our time reading, writing, and studying unpublished writing.”

  The woman will look at him without comment.

  “The square of the value in millimeters of a lens tells us how much light will come to our eye,” he will add, pedantically.

  The tall girl, looking particularly bored, will put a stick of chewing gum in her mouth, chewing without closing her lips.

  “And here I found the first technical solution, you know?” the thin man will continue, chortling. “At that distance, you need optics not at fixed magnifications, but at variable magnifications. This naturally leads to a further restriction, which helps maintain control over image resolution degradation in the event of reduced magnification. As long as your rifle has a computer operated by software that can handle this parameter as well. Will you have it?” The thin man will end the question with a fake smile.

  “Don’t worry. I will.” She will smile in turn.

  The thin man will take a small black tube and insert it into an electronic device, watching the numbers appearing on a small display.

  “Let’s get to the important thing, the light,” the thin man will continue. “In the period of maximum day light, at about noon, the human pupil contracts until it reaches its minimum value, statistically between two and four millimeters. But if your man were to shoot at night, his pupil would open up to seven millimeters wide.”

  “And what should we deduce from that on long-range shooting?”

  The man will take another sip of whiskey before answering. “If the beam of light coming out of the eyepiece is wider than the measurement of the shooter’s pupil diameter, the excess light doesn’t enter. So, if your man shoots during daylight hours, optics with four-millimeter pupillary outputs will transmit the same amount of light as those with seven millimeter outputs. Unless...,” the thin man will conclude, in a honeyed voice.

  “Unless…,” the woman will repeat, striving not to show her irritation.

  “Yes, but you wrote these unpublished things to someone, didn’t you?” the woman will insist. “Outside of that building, someone paid for your services, of course.”

  “Well, yes. They went to the Department formally. In practice, it passed the information on to the government.”

  “And to whom did you write?”

  “I only know that all the papers passed through Borman. So, he was the one who evaluated them and turned them directly over to Hatlock. Not that Borman made an assessment, it was more of a formal action than anything else. However, he wanted to see them. He took me back more than once for that reason.”

  “And who would this Hatlock be?”

  Whiley will stop to look at the river, leaning against the wooden railing. “Professor Norman Hatlock, the Department Director. Strangely, he’s already been reelected for two terms. Each lasts three years, and it’s said that he would also be renewed for the third, the last allowed by regulation.”

  “And then what did this Hatlock do?”

  “In fact, he was our point of reference. Actually, on the operational aspects, there was Professor Turos. He dealt with all the accounting, the payments, expenses, the balance of our invoices, things like that. In short, he actually directed the commercial relations, but Hatlock was the real point of connection with the Agency, as far as I know.”

  “But haven’t you ever participated in physical meetings in the Agency? Haven’t you met other people?”

  The man will notice a nuance of suspicion in the woman’s voice, and turn to look at her. “Whether you believe it or not, it is the truth. I’ve met a couple of times with government agents, but more for inspections or coordination meetings, presentations of RFPs to respond to, things like that. I don’t even remember their names. Our direct references were Hatlock and Turos. If we had any requests to make, we would turn to them. But mostly they were the ones who contacted us. And that’s it.”

  The man will start again along the walkway on the riverbank, walking thoughtfully.

  “Unless you use higher quality optics, much higher performance than these. I tried these other lenses, see? These are extraordinary. They’re brighter, with the same pupillary output diameter,” the man will say, lifting the glass. “Unfortunately, they’re a little more expensive.”

  “How much more expensive?” the woman will ask neutrally.

  The man will put down the glass, spreading his arms. “Well, well, quite a bit more. Let’s say that the entire supply will cost you fifty percent more than the initial budget,” the little man will say persuasively. “Oh, but I guarantee you an extraordinary result. Your client will be thrilled.”

  “That’s fine,” the woman will say. “Do you have anything else to tell me?”

  The Japanese woman will watch
the man jump behind the counter and turn the bottle of an unknown brand of American whiskey.

  The pig drinks that crap.

  “Oh, yes. This has allowed me to solve the second of the problems, namely the hypothesis of shooting with a lack of light,” the thin man will say, pouring another bit of whisky. “If your man has to shoot at night or in conditions of poor visibility, such as at sunset, at dawn, at dusk, if it rains, or there is fog, the music changes. If we use shit optics, we don’t notice a big difference. But if we use these, we see it! And I won’t sell you shit optics, my dear.”

  You just have to try.

  “These optics, you see, that I’ve prepared, allow for higher pupil outputs and therefore higher performance. Not only that, but their high quality allows for proper focal length, and this is a nice plus for your blond shooter. In my opinion...”

  “How do you know it’s the blond guy?” she will interrupt him.

  “Oh, you know, people talk.”

  “See that you don’t talk,” the woman will say with a frosty smile. “And take care only of the work I asked of you. What are the advantages?”

  The man will raise the glass, pointing at the woman with his index finger. “Greater comfort in the use of optics, which means less eye fatigue, better and faster ability to acquire the target,” the thin man will answer. “At that distance, indispensable.”

  “I mean, you think someone killed people for something they knew. But what?”

  “I didn’t say we knew it. I said maybe we could have known. I’m afraid we didn’t know we knew.”

  Two women in jogging outfits will rush along the embankment, their breath forming condensation.

  “But none of this makes sense. Would that be some kind of pre-emptive multiple homicide?”