by Brandt Legg
“That’s it?” Runit asked.
“Huh?” Krucks asked. “Unless you’ve got books strapped to the underside of this thing. But then it wouldn’t be able to drive, so I think we’re safe with you. Like I said, you don’t look like the foolish type.”
The team took less than an hour to set up, mostly moving things and checking their gear. They started on the top floor. Runit asked not to watch, but Krucks insisted. “As the head librarian, you’ll have to sign off. It’s a swear-and-attest-under-penalty-of-perjury thing. Pretty official.”
Runit and Krucks donned special Tekfabrik jumpsuits, but they were well away from the flames. Runit stood under the domed skylight at the top of the grand marble staircase, which now seemed somehow cold and haunted.
Krucks called at him, “Come on, Happerman, the view is better from here.”
Runit reluctantly joined him in the doorway that led to the special collections. He looked out at all the thousands of books he had failed to protect. Their death sentence came only because they weren’t deemed controversial enough by Blaise Cortez’s DesTIn program. But they were no less beautiful and fulfilling books, and the AOI could just as easily change their contents on all the digital editions to suit some future policy against interracial or same sex relationships. Perhaps one day somebody wouldn’t like redheads and they would all be banned from books. Maybe anything that mentioned the former country of India would be erased, or the entire history of a specific war or financial crisis would be wiped from the recorded memory of humanity with the touch of a finger.
The flame-suit men sprayed Red-1953, which turned out to be neon-red-colored sticky micro-pellets, across all the books. To Runit, it looked like they were bleeding. As Krucks promised, the men were fast and efficient, and the Red-1953 didn’t even create any dust or haze like Runit had assumed it would.
“I told you that PharmaForce has made a perfect product. It sticks to the target material so we don’t have to breathe it in. The same company makes my heart medication. I’m alive only thanks to their incredible R&D department.”
Runit raised his eyebrows and nodded as if this was indeed something to be impressed by and grateful for, but silently he wished the PharmaForce R&D department would spray themselves with Red-1953 and strike a match.
“Ready to fire, sir,” one of the flame-suits announced.
“Commence at will,” Krucks said loudly, and then lowering his voice and turning to Runit, added, “This is pretty amazing to watch.”
The same man who’d informed Krucks of the burn-ready status pushed a button on a long silver tube, which resembled an old-fashioned vacuum cleaner attachment hose, and an orange laser shot out, immediately igniting the Red-1953. Flames spread down the shelves as if choreographed, clinging nearly perfectly to the bookcases. The fire emitted surprisingly little smoke, which was quickly sucked into a large, portable filter machine about the size of a refrigerator that moved robotically on traction wheels.
“The cleanser actually senses and follows the smoke. Fantastic, huh?” Krucks asked rhetorically. “And the Red-1953 works on almost anything except concrete, stone, and most metals.”
The nasty and powerful PharmaForce agent did its job shockingly well, and Runit watched the beautiful books reduced to fiery ash. Who would do this? he wondered. Corrupt people fear books because they contain something more powerful than themselves: ideas. What were they afraid of? What did they think lay hidden in these volumes that warranted such destruction?
Chapter 48
The missing AOI agents troubled Drast. Something was wrong. He contacted his darkest informants, those that existed between the shadows of the Aylantik regime and the Rejectionists. Some of those slippery dregs of humanity surely had direct links to Rejectionists. Others likely believed PAWN existed, and so followed the noise, knowing a word or a face might prove valuable to the AOI. Drast tried to avoid this lot, as they were unreliable and often created reverse leaks and drama, but he needed this thing contained.
He was sure there were things going on in the Pacyfik that he didn’t know of, but his career had been long enough, and his experience deep, so that he could feel the approach of terrible danger the way a veteran firefighter senses when an explosive flame lurks behind a quiet door. The situation wasn’t unexpected. Drast had been chosen to head the most problematic region because of his ability to manage any situation. But, in some sense, his hands were tied. If it had been entirely up to him, Deuce Lipton and Blaise Cortez would have been arrested and placed in solitary confinement at one of the AOI’s remote prisons, because this crisis was unlike any other.
Miner worried about peace and war because he was a businessman. Drast worried about survival because he was a soldier, and not just his own life, but survival of the human species.
He scanned the daily issue-reports: inoculations in two New Mexico Area communities where Creatives often protested, arrests of seven Rejectionists in Vancouver, hackers changing health records, and others manipulating transactions involving digis – both the work of another rogue and mysterious group known as “Trapciers” – an AOI agent caught selling secrets in Panama, a Rejectionist camp located in Peru, books to be burned at the Portland library, an illegal school of pre-Banoff studies discovered in Belize, the investigation of the AOI headquarters firebombing, missing AOI agents, and, of course, the search for that damned PAWN woman. He took out a health-beam, a tiny sensor pad, and tapped it on his forehead, silently thanking PharmaForce for the handy little invention that made headaches a thing of memory.
Then the AOI Chief zoomed. “Polis, I understand you have people missing?”
“We believe it’s connected to the firebombing.”
“Which is connected to PAWN,” the Chief said as if it couldn’t be more obvious.
“That is the present theory.”
“What about the books?”
Why was she so preoccupied with the damned Portland Library? “Agents have been on-site all morning. The books are being torched as we speak. That matter should be fully closed within hours.”
“Excellent. And I have more good news. We have a name for the woman.”
If she has a name, then either the Chief has her own agents working my region, or the woman’s reach extends outside the Pacyfik, Drast thought. Both prospects terrified him. If and when I am World Premier, I will find a way to oust you, he mused, then he worried she might have neuron-mites on him, an experimental mind-reading, nano-sized INU that once introduced into the body, typically without the target’s knowledge, made reading his thoughts was possible. “What is it?”
“Munna.”
“Is that it? Sounds like a code name?”
“May well be. We picked up a woman on the island of Okinawa, off Japan, who gave us the information.”
“How did she give it?”
“Said-scan. It’s accurate.” The method, postmortem brain scans, had been in use for nearly twenty years, and proved more than ninety-eight percent accurate. The challenge had always been getting a complete piece of data. The method had once been described by a technician as “trying to read words written on grains of sand located across the ocean while looking through a window screen.”
“Any images?”
“No. Apparently she’d never met Munna. But it seems a rebellion is imminent.”
“Why?”
“The woman had recently been in Tokyo and taken an allegiance oath to PAWN . . . with two thousand others.”
Drast shuddered.
After a few more minutes, the Chief ended the zoom with her standard, “Peace prevails, always.”
Drast didn’t tell Miner about the call from the Chief. Instead, he reported that his agents had found nothing upsetting or controversial about the Denver Imp with which he’d chosen to work. He did caution, however, that many Imps had ties to Blaise Cortez, and in addition to the implied potential leak, it also meant parts of any Imps’ past could have been hidden or created. Miner knew all that already, but thos
e were chances he had to take.
He and Sarlo raced back to the outskirts of town to meet the “vampire” before he went to sleep. On the way, they viewed the latest report Drast had flashed on the AOI’s ongoing search for the woman in the Pacyfik.
“They’ve got everything in the mix and they still can’t find her,” Miner said. “Sat-grids, swarm-drones, breeze-blowers‒‒”
“Sat-grids use technology made by StarFly, right?”
“Yeah. One of Deuce’s companies. Do you think he’s interfering?”
“Isn’t it possible?” Sarlo’s father had been a farmer, her mother an attorney, and they had divorced when she was just four. Half of her childhood had been spent in the city, and the other time – on alternating weekends and most of the summers – were spent in the rural countryside. She always believed this gave her a unique perspective, and gave her the valuable traits of patience and balance. She also liked to remind Miner of her zodiac sign, Libra.
“Hell, anything’s possible, but how are they beating swarm-drones and breeze-blowers? Deuce doesn’t own manufacturers.” Miner brought up a projected image of a swarm-drone and double-checked the maker. “You understand how they work‒the bug-sized drones, equipped with cameras? They fly into an area like a swarm of bees, usually unnoticed, and instantly transmit live-stream, ultra-high-definition video. We can get in anywhere a flying insect can go. They’re even as small as gnats now.”
“They’re remotely guided by GPS and enabled through INUs, both of which Deuce manufactures.”
“AOI operations don’t use Eysen INUs, and I’ll have to confirm which AOI division routes the GPS data to the swarm-drones, but I don’t believe it’s his,” Miner said.
“What about breeze-blowers? I don’t even know what they are.”
“Breeze-blowers are dust-sized computers, also equipped with video transmitters, but they act with DesTIn and are much more autonomous. They literally blow in the breeze, and can continue to supply data and images for years.”
“I had no idea such a thing existed. Who makes those?”
“They’ve been around for decades, but have only been used in non-scientific applications for the past twenty-two months. PharmaForce makes them. The original purpose was medical.”
“Wow,” she said, adding, “Scary-wow.”
“Drast will find the woman.”
“And when he does, is she the key to stopping PAWN?”
“That, and killing Deuce Lipton.”
“What about the Council?”
“I’m just going to have to change their mind.”
“And that’s why we’re in Denver? Because of Deuce’s uncle?”
“Exactly. His being alive, the very fact that he was born in secret, is proof of a conspiracy. A conspiracy as old as PAWN. I believe I can tie the uncle to PAWN, and therefore the rebellion to Deuce, and that’s treason of the highest order.” Lance smiled. “The Council will kill Deuce Lipton for me.”
Chapter 49
Somewhere on the outskirts of Denver, a district consisting of small rustic lodges, littered in the dense forest, had become an enclave for some of the most brilliant Imps. Sarlo worried that the long narrow driveway, through thick, snow-laden ponderosa pines, would prove difficult for their LEV to navigate, but just as the ramshackle appearance of the cabin belied the modern high-tech interior, so had the dirt and gravel concealed a LEV-capable private road. Almost thirty centimeters of snow blanketed the surrounding woods, but the structure’s roof remained clear thanks to thermal radiation.
The Imp greeted them as Imps often did; an uncomfortably long eye-to-eye stare and a weak handshake. Sarlo almost laughed, as the man appeared to be a stick figure in clothes. Even his black and gray hair was thin, and his face was long, gaunt, and ashen. He could have been a cast in a vampire movie, if the film depicted the sick and aging variety.
Inside, the main room was awash in color from as many as thirty VMs, floating around as if they were alive. Small pieces of equipment resembling modified INUs, connected together with visible nano-laser-links, filled one wall, and the only furniture consisted of two levitating tables and four air-filled conforms which, at first glance, seemed like giant beanbags, but were in fact high-tech custom sensory chairs.
“I’ve never seen these,” Miner said, pointing to the tables.
“Of course you haven’t. You’ve never been here before,” the Imp said dryly.
“I meant anything like them,” Miner corrected, slightly annoyed.
“Same technology as INUs, I just modified it for my use. Perhaps you’d like to market them.”
“Maybe. They seem very functional.”
The Imp scowled, as if the word “functional” took away from his creative wonder. “You have a problem that I might solve?” he asked, motioning to the chairs. “The digis have been moved?”
“They have,” Sarlo answered. The Imp stared at her as if seeing her for the first time, and then pulled a private VM in front of his eyes.
“Yes, I see that, good. Excellent. Proceed.”
In something of a futuristic fortune-telling session, they sat around the floating table for the next fifteen minutes while Miner tried to get his answer without revealing the actual question.
Finally, frustrated, the Imp stood. “Mr. Miner, you’re wasting my time, which you’re entitled to do since you paid for it, but if you want to know something you must trust me.”
Miner looked at Sarlo. She shook her head.
The Imp caught the exchange and began singing an old song from Miner’s childhood, “Must trust, said the rusty bus, or we’ll get crushed, must trust, said the rusty bus, or we’ll get crushed.” Miner remembered the jingle that, during the 2040s, had been meant to encourage people to modify old vehicles for use on the new roads, but sometime after that it became a playground chant.
“Would you trust an Imp?” Miner asked.
“What is misunderstood about my kind, Mr. Miner, is that we are perceived by the general population as somehow being less human. It is because of that misconception that we have become social outcasts which, by the way, suits us fine because you people bore us.” He smiled momentarily at Sarlo, his stare lingering as if to exclude her from his observation. “But what is missed in that consensus is the fact that our accelerated intelligence has created vast amounts of mental capacity and mind expansion which, in turn, has led to something far deeper than someone without an implant could achieve. Awareness.”
“Awareness?” Miner asked.
“There are so many things that you have no idea about, dreams which remain on your tongue when you speak, unappreciated in crossing the sea of imagination. Places to travel to when there is no one left to blame, hidden realms where invitations were long engraved but now gather dust unopened, power capable of twisting ambition and weapons into cake frosted with stars. ” His eyes darted around, looking animated and alive for the first time since they’d arrived. The movement of his pupils seemingly caused the VMs to shuffle and swirl around their heads as his hands remained still folded in his lap.
Sarlo watched the display like a kid at Disney. The moving VMs caused some kind of static electricity, or at least she thought it was, as colored sparks and pops danced among the giant glowing forms. Later, she remembered hearing music in the background. An ethereal chanting mixed with soft, beautiful cries. But just then, all her senses could process were the colors and lights.
“You want to know about Lipton,” the Imp whispered, but it came out as if it was spoken through a microphone, loud and crisp with the name “Lipton” echoing in reverberation.
“How do you know?” Miner asked, stunned. He’d been so careful.
“Must trust, said the rusty bus, or we’ll get crushed, must trust, said the rusty bus, or we’ll get crushed,” the Imp sang.
The room quickly went still, the VMs all changed, and from a hidden source, an aqua light emanated so that each of them and all the surrounding space was an inspiring hue of blue.
“That greater capacity of mind allows us not just to access all the knowledge of humankind, my dear. It also provides us the ability to find the channel and frequency to touch the source.”
“The source?” she asked.
“The human mind, free of distractions, practiced and open, is capable of reaching the higher plane.” His eyes locked onto hers. “I’m connected to the infinite knowledge of the universe.”
“You’re half-machine,” Miner scoffed.
“The machine simply frees my mind,” the Imp said. “Why do you think we get the implants? To get rich?” He motioned his arm around the modest cabin. “No. It’s to find enlightenment.”
Miner shook his head. He’d never considered Imps as anything other than a tool, marrying the best of human intelligence with that of a computer. He’d also never really thought about “enlightenment,” or much of anything past material gain in this one, and all-too-short, lifetime.
“Tell him,” Sarlo said.
Miner, desperate for the information, and just as desperate to guard his main strategic advantage, the secret of Booker Lipton’s other son, didn’t know what to do.
“I am a better man,” the Imp said. “Accept that.” He held Miner’s eyes in his as if magnetized, hypnotized. “If I can help, then I must already know.”
“Prove it,” Miner said. “Tell me where my question begins.”
The Imp, still keeping his stare, remained silent for almost a minute, then spoke in that broadcast whisper. “Booker Lipton. What happened while he was gone?”
Sarlo gasped.
“Torgon unbelievable,” Miner said. “He had a second son. I need to know everything about him.”
“They call him Cope,” the Imp said, smiling, and proceeded to tell Miner everything he needed to know.