by Adrian Speed
“You can do that?” I leaned in closer, but the computer code looked like gibberish to me.
“Are you familiar with the concept of a software back door?”
“Er, a way for governments and companies to let themselves into data that is supposed to be secure?”
“Precisely so,” Sir Reginald nodded. He tapped in a few more commands, the screen flashed blank, and then returned to the original elevator software. “The paranoid governments of the twenty-first and twenty-second centuries placed back doors into all important software. They see terrorists in every shadow, and revolution in every newspaper. Augs and slates are a boon to them all. But, the important thing, the very important thing, is that data security is all just numbers. If you know the very long number that’s the key, you can open the lock. A supercomputer would take the lifespan of the universe to crack the government’s back door code for an AMS-T system. The Genesis computer in the ninety-ninth century will simply tell me what it is,” Sir Reginald grinned.
“Convenient,” I said, stepping into the elevator to head up to digital compositing. “But its unnerving to think you can crack into any computer you like whenever you like.”
“Not whenever I like,” Sir Reginald raised a finger as the elevator doors closed and we began to climb. “If this hadn’t been an AMS-T system we’d have had to go back to the time machine. Or found another way to contact Miss Soko. I suspect the latter would be faster.”
Studio B was empty when we arrived. With the full lights up the studio seemed smaller somehow. The projection space was about the size of a cinema screen. That made sense, I suppose. The corners of 20-cm squares were marked out by white crosses. Each wall seemed matte black until I got close to it and saw the rough surface was made up of hundreds of microscopic lenses for focussing lasers. Each one was the size of a grain of sand. Sir Reginald did not regard it with much curiosity but sat down in one of the chairs at the editing desk, clasped his hands together and waited for the set designer.
We didn’t have to wait long. The staff must have been waiting on tenterhooks for news of the end of the lockdown. With a creak a head poked around the door. Black hair was woven into a thick weave with LEDs and coloured ribbons so it looked like rain drops of light were streaming down her hair. A thick gold ring looped through her nose and a tattoo of a spider’s web sat next to her right eye, resting just below her aug. She had broad cheeks that hinted at a smile that wasn’t present, but her eyes burned with iron will.
“Excuse me, my calendar says I have a meeting I don’t remember setting up with a... Sir Reginald and Hannah Delaronde?” She looked from him to me. “My aug isn’t recognising either of you.”
“It wouldn’t, we’re not within your network.” Sir Reginald stepped forward, hand outstretched. “Its a pleasure to meet you Miss Soko, I am Sir Reginald and I am a detective. I was hoping to ask you some questions about the set design you did for Fontainebleau.”
“Er... is this to do with Jonathon’s death? Because I really think I should have an attorney–” Her head threatened to disappear behind the door.
“No, no, this is just about the set design–”
“We’re interested in the history of it,” I said. That seemed to stop the retreat. “We just want to ask a few questions and then we can let you get back to work. Please?”
“Oh, alright,” she slid into the room. The LEDs in her hair flowed into her dress, which swirled in rainbows of colour as each droplet of light fell into them. “What do you want to know?”
“Well, Ms Soko–”
“None of that. I’m Minenhle. Friends call me Minny. The only people who call me Ms Soko are people who are asking me for money, or people about to fire me.”
“My deepest apologies, Minenhle,” Sir Reginald said with an incline of his head. “Do have a seat.” He indicated a chair and went to sit down himself. “Could I ask you, how does the set design process begin?”
“Er, well in the case of Fontainebleau we got a high-resolution scan from the palace itself with a fleet of drones,” Minenhle said, sitting opposite from Sir Reginald. “Well I say we, some tech company got the scan about... twenty, thirty years ago? And then we bought a copy as a framework.”
“A framework.”
“Yeah, so a scan isn’t something we can manipulate. It’s just extremely high resolution pictures and dimensions, so we break it down into objects, chairs, tables, bookshelves, etc. We also got a clean sweep of the palace without any furniture in it which was really valuable as it let us populate it as we saw fit.”
“Ah, so the items are not accurate?”
“Well sometimes we have to remove furniture to get the shot we need,” Minenhle shrugged. “Some directors are using the tech to do pretty impossible things like shots from inside furniture or passing through walls. But for 100 Days we also tried to make it look as much like it would have done in Napoleon’s day as possible. Today things get moved around to better display the collection.”
“And how do you know what was period correct?”
“Oh we have historians on staff to work with us, and we have reference drawings and paintings, and, well, plain old guesswork,” Minenhle smiled. So far it hadn’t been much removed from an interview she would have given to a film reporter.
“There’s one specific item from the set I wanted to query with you,” Sir Reginald said. “From the scene when Napoleon has to sign the Treaty of Fontainebleau. There is a book on the bookshelf behind him, the diary of Heinrich Verstekt. I wanted to find out who added that to the scene.”
“Wow, that’s a toughie.” Minenhle chewed the inside of her cheek. “I have no idea. Simon, d’you know?”
“Er...” I looked around to ensure we were alone.
“Simon is a common personality for the aug,” Sir Reginald said, tapping his temple.
“Oh, here we go,” Minenhle said, looking at results only she could see. “That was a file Jonathon made. I don’t remember him talking about it with me... he must have slipped it in as an Easter egg. He always knew his way around an editing desk.” She tapped the machine that controlled the holo-tank.
“The copy that I looked at in holo-projection earlier did not have any interior pages. Does any version you have access to have interior pages?”
“Er, let me look.” Minenhle scooted her seat over to the editing desk and began tapping away at one of the keyboards, browsing through file menus. “Here we go, 1.256H7, let’s see, versions from all scenes... er... no, it looks like it’s just what you saw then.”
“Can you see what it was based on?”
“Ah, yah, it’s a copy of one of the other books that would have normally been on the shelf, but he had a digital grip replace the title.”
“Damn and blast and hell-fire and doom!” Sir Reginald exploded upwards and kicked his chair away. Minenhle and I both flinched at his sudden temper. “Apologies, I... I thought we were on to something. You must excuse me.” With a few ill-tempered steps Sir Reginald was out the door. His cursing was loud as thunder for a moment, then the doors closed with a phut.
“I’m sorry,” I said, sinking into a chair next to Minenhle. “We thought this book might tell us something about the history of the Arnold family.”
“The Arnold family? Jonathon’s family? Why are you looking into that?” Minenhle’s hard eyes made it hard to lie.
“We are investigating an inheritance case. A man called Marlin Arnold thinks there is a forgotten branch of the family and he wants us to find it and deliver his inheritance to them,” I explained. “We think it had something to do with a man called Ebenezer Arnold being–”
“Wait, Ebenezer Arnold’s real?”
“Er... yes? Why?”
“Because there’s an Ebenezer Arnold in the film.” Minenhle ran her hands over the console of the editing desk. The lights of the studio dimmed and the lasers started up with a plink. Light hit light and before I knew it I was looking at a white Palladian palace, zooming in through the wi
ndow and into a mess of gilt and plaster and marble gleaming against the corps of officers standing in the hall of the palace.
“Monsieur Talleyrand,” a tall man with blond curls and sideburns addressed a thin gaunt man encased in velvet. The speaker was in the prime of his life, thirty-five or so years old, in a gloriously black military uniform with glinting buttons, golden epaulettes and dozens of medals.
“Your highness, Alexander,” Talleyrand bowed low to the emperor. “It is my honour to welcome you into my home. It is my hope you will find it comfortable, and with its comfort, you will have all sufficient energy to restore France to rights.”
“There,” Menenhle pointed into the crowd and slapped a button on the editing desk to freeze the image. “Do you see him there?” I followed her finger and stared into Jonathon’s face. It was in the finery of the nineteenth century with a flowing cravat and tight silk stockings, but it was clearly Johnathon. “That’s Ebenezer Arnold. Johnathon always gives himself a little cameo, and that was his for the 100 Days.”
“Is that all?”
“Well, I think there were meant to be a few more scenes with him, but they got cut–”
“Anywhere he talks?”
“I dunno, I only design sets.” Minenhle looked put out. She rubbed the back of her head. “There is a scene... we scrapped it almost immediately but there’s a scene in the Hotel De Ville where the king of Prussia, the emperor of Austria and the Tsar of Russia are discussing what terms to force on Napoleon. I remember having to tweak the rendering algorithm so reflections of Ebenezer’s buttons would stop causing artefacts in the chandeliers.”
“Can we bring that up?”
“It’s not even remotely finished,” Minenhle warned.
“Please?”
“Oh, let me see...”
The image of the Hotel De Talleyrand faded and in its place the Hotel De Ville began to build itself. The floor tiles each had ‘place holder’ written on them with white text. Statues in the corners were untextured. A floating yellow rectangle pointed towards genitalia on one of the gods and just said ‘change for ratings?’. The table that assembled itself was just a wire frame. A map of the world sat on the top, still displaying a watermark. The king of Prussia’s coat stuck through the back of his chair at an odd angle.
“If we execute him we will simply be furthering the cause of the revolution.” Tsar Alexander looked the same as he had in the previous scene, but he wasn’t animated. Instead he was frozen in a flat stock pose with one arm raised. He glided around the floor as he spoke. “We must strip him of all powers and exile him to some distant island. The French people saw the blood of Louis spilled and came for all the kings of Europe. Do you want the same to happen when they see the blood of Napoleon?”
“Then where?” The emperor of Austria didn’t speak with any passion. It sounded like a technician reading the script. His motion was jerky, flipping from one pose to another in the blink of an eye. “Where on earth can Napoleon be put where he will not threaten Europe?”
“The Pacific.” The king of Prussia stood up. His motions were perfectly captured, but his coat writhed against him as the simulation failed. “There are a thousand islands in Indonesia or beyond Australia where he can be put out of mind.”
Alexander shook his head. “No, he must be close enough for us to check on him. From the islands of Indonesia Napoleon could too easily hide aboard a ship or bribe the natives, and before we know it he lands at La Rochelle.”
“That’s true enough I’d grant you,” the king of Prussia said. “But long before that he’d catch a tropical fever and die.”
“The British have islands in the Atlantic, do they not?” The emperor of Austria asked. “Frozen wastes where only whalers go?”
Alexander shook his head. “I don’t trust the British. They are altogether too keen on hangings to be given Napoleon.”
“Send him to your wastelands then, out in the great Sibir where only wolves and Tartars could aid his escape.”
“Saint Helena...” the king of Prussia said slowly. “That has to be the most isolated island in the world.”
“British.”
“But safe.” The king of Prussia put his hands on the table and leant over it. “A thousand sea miles from the nearest land. Let him waste his last years staring at that great ocean and knowing that the only ships that he will ever see will fly the flag of the Royal Navy, his greatest–” the Prussian emperor paused and waved his hand between the three of them, “well ha, second greatest, enemy.”
“I hear it is cold, and wet, and miserable,” the emperor of Austria said. “Full of slaves and Chinamen and not a bit of European character.” His model twitched into a smile. “I can think of no better fate.”
“There is his wife to consider,” Alexander said. “If Napoleon was on Helena Marie Louise would either have to live with him, or never see him again.”
“I can assure you, there will be no love lost in the latter. Although I know she will want her son to succeed the father.”
“A second Napoleon? Out of the question!” The king of Prussia burst out of his seat and slammed the table. The technician reading the lines could not sound more bored.
“Peace, Frederick, peace, none of us are considering that.” Alexander raised his hands. “We’ll give Marie Louise and her son a duchy in Italy, and if he is fool enough when he is grown to think he deserves more he will find it quite impossible.”
“His father managed more with less,” said the king of Prussia as he sank back into his chair.
“Perhaps we should continue this in the morning.” Emperor Alexander slid over to the window. “We shall all have cooler heads.”
“And no doubt that snake Talleyrand can press us with another set of ‘recommendations’ we can struggle to deny yet only seem to strengthen his hand.” The Emperor of Austria put his head in his hands. “I would rather settle this tonight.”
“That snake Talleyrand is the only reason Napoleon does not currently sit as master of Europe,” Alexander snapped. "If he hadn’t convinced me of Napoleon’s treacherous countenance I would have happily watched your precious lands become nothing more than vassals to France.” The model span on its heal. “Forgive me, friends, I spoke in haste. Of course we should remain vigilant of Talleyrand. Every master he has ever served has fallen while he continues to whisper in the ears of each successor. I would be a fool to trust him. But we must recognise our debt to him.”
“I think you are right, Alexander.” The emperor of Austria stood up. “We will have cooler heads in the morning.” Without another word his model slid towards the door. The king of Prussia nodded his head to Alexander and followed the emperor. Alexander’s model turned back to the window.
A featureless model frozen in a jumping jack pose floated over to Alexander.
“Your Imperial Majesty.” The same technician’s voice spoke, but it was clear it wasn’t meant to be the king of Prussia again. “There is an Englishman to see you.”
“Lord Castlereagh?"
“No, Your Imperial Majesty.”
"Thank heaven, I want this peace with Napoleon agreed before that moon-faced simpleton gets his claws into it. Who is it?”
“Ebenezer Arnold, he owns a manufactory of ship mechanisms, and wishes to bring you a gift of Portuguese wine.”
“No doubt wanting us to buy his mechanisms for the new black fleet,” Alexander sighed. “Very well, bring him in.” The featureless manikin floated off. It returned with Ebenezer Arnold. He wore short trousers and hose, in close-cut black, with a sparsely embroidered jacket. He looked like Jonathan Sotherby-Arnold of course; he was a direct digital replica, but at the same time, in the old fashioned clothes, I could almost see John or Jacob Arnold standing there. The same features echoed down through time.
“Presenting Mr Ebenezer Arnold, of England.”
“Your Imperial Highness,” Ebenezer bowed low, until his head almost touched the floor.
“Emperor Alexander is co
rrectly addressed as His Imperial Majesty.” The manikin servant rotated on the spot.
“Calm yourself, Alexei; for an Englishman to even try does me great respect.”
“You are very kind Your Imperial Majesty.” Ebenezer rose. “I wished to express my gratitude to you for bringing Napoleon to bear. My ancestors began as wine merchants and to this day I have excellent relations with the Portuguese wine merchants. Europe has been starved of the fine wines of Oporto for many long years now, so I brought you a crate of their finest.” He patted empty air where the box was waiting to be rendered.
“That is very thoughtful of you.” Alexander inclined his head. “I will not celebrate victory until Napoleon comes to terms, but when he does, I shall enjoy opening a bottle.”
“Planning your next campaign, Your Imperial Majesty?” Ebenezer indicated the map on the table.
“Of a kind.” The Russian emperor slid over to the map. “Humour me, Mr Arnold; if Napoleon was within your grasp and you had the power to punish him, what would you do?”
“If it were up to me?” Ebenezer rubbed his chin. “Well, the snap of a hemp rope works for most criminals. But then he would be another martyr of the revolution, and we can’t have that. Kill a man and all you’re doing is proving you fear him.” Ebenezer looked at the map. “I would banish him to an island in the Mediterranean, like the Romans of old. Britain controls the seas so thoroughly there he might as well be in the Sandwich Islands. Yet he will still be close enough to demonstrate to France and all the Bonapartists that their saviour, their hero, is nothing but a thrall of the powers of Europe.” A cruel smile slid across Ebenezer’s face. “You couldn’t give him mastery of Corsica, that would be far too big a prize. But give him… Elba… and you would prove to the world your utter dominance of ‘the Master of Europe’.”
“You have a devious mind, Mr Arnold.” Alexander's model went back to the window. “Please send a crate of demonstrations of your company’s craft to the Admiralty board in St Petersburg with my compliments."