“Right,” she said, trying to imitate his actions.
“I think we should activate the EMPs now that we’re out of the NGT”.
“Yeah,” Eve powered on her palm screen and loaded the Masquerade app, it’s ‘Have a blast’, isn’t it?”
“Yeah”.
They both activated the function, and each palm screen read “This party is the bomb”. Nothing else appeared to happen.
“Is it working?” asked Eve.
“I fucking hope so”.
And with that, they continued on foot to their destination, their hearts beating more and more rapidly.
The closer Lon and Eve were to the entrance for which they were headed, the more numerous the masses of people became, nearly everyone wearing a white overcoat the same as them.
“This place is certainly more lively than the Tech Centre,” posited Lon.
“What do you expect? Over half a million people work here”.
“Really?! That many?!” he exclaimed.
“Yes, it’s a very important building for the local economy and job market”.
“I thought you said this place was prestigious; how can it be when so many people work here?”
“Not everyone’s a scientist here; there are security staff, cleaning staff, catering staff… you know, a lot more than just scientists”.
“Still, there must be a lot”.
“It doesn’t matter,” said Eve, “let’s just focus on getting into the place”.
They both ceased speaking as they passed the crowds of moving and stationary people semi-blockading the entrance.
The lobby on this side of the Science Centre was vast and spacious, and had several entrances and exits with numerous security checking systems near each one. The latter would have caused Lon to perspire had it not been for the cold internal climate being forced upon them by the powerful air conditioning system that was ostensibly powered by a jet engine.
“Please take the lead,” Lon requested.
Thusly, Eve walked towards the check-in console.
“Please step towards the retina scanner,” it said.
She did so while holding her breath. If this were to fail, the security personnel beyond the metal detector behind the check-in console would likely become a deadly threat.
From the console appeared a blue beam which quickly passed across her eyes. For a moment afterwards it appeared to do nothing, no doubt it was trying to make sense of the new data the contact lenses had just fed it. After the extended pause the console gave a confirmatory bleep.
She let go of the air she was holding in and walked past the console.
Lon also successfully checked in and followed closely behind Eve as she walked towards the metal detector.
“Please remove any metallic items from your persons,” said the closest security guard.
Lon let Eve maintain the lead so he could imitate the correct procedure.
Eve placed her briefcase on a conveyor belt which took it through an X-ray machine.
Lon did the same with his briefcase and his watch. This was a tense moment, as he had no idea the likelihood of each item being detected as other objects in disguise. He then followed Eve through the metal detector.
“What’s in the briefcases?” asked the security officer stiffly once they had reached the other end of the X-ray machine beyond the metal detector.
They had forgotten to consider this basic scenario. Eve went blank; Lon spoke without thinking.
“Sorry, classified”.
The officer looked annoyed. “Which section are you working for?”
Again, without providing himself with a moment for contemplation he said, “Biotech… military applications”.
“Oh, I see,” the officer’s facial expression loosened. “Uh… move along”.
Quickly they grabbed their belongings from the conveyor belt and briskly walked away.
Once they were out of earshot of security, Lon asked, “Was that the right answer?”
“I don’t know how,” said Eve, “but you managed to name the most classified department in this building”.
“Wow, now there’s a stroke of luck”.
“Yeah. Now, do you think we should contact Strys?”
“I think so,” said Lon, “he said to once we’re inside. Here,” he handed her his briefcase, “hold this a sec while I call him,” and activated the connection to ‘Mammy’ using the Close Friends app.
They kept walking to keep looking natural, yet at a slower pace.
“Strys?” said Lon once connected.
“This is Mammy speaking, remember that,” said Strys.
“Oh, sorry Mammy, we’re in”.
“Thank goodness, man. Tell Eve to connect too”.
“Okay,” said Lon, and he took both briefcases from her so that she could use her palm screen.
“Hello Mammy?”
“Hello dear,” said Strys, “glad to know you’re both okay”.
“Yeah, it’s a bit scary though”.
Lon handed back her briefcase.
“I know it must be, man,” said Strys. “Now listen. You have to find out where all the server rooms are in the building, that’s the first thing”.
“Okay, that’s the easiest part,” said Eve, “there are plenty of signs and interactive maps. We’re actually close to one now”.
“Good, let me know when you’re there. I’ll be on the line all the time”.
“Close?” said Lon.
“Yeah, it’s over there in between the stairs and the lifts,” she pointed ahead of them inconspicuously at a staircase and a series of lifts set in what looked like one of four gigantic support pillars that were arranged inside the lobby in a quadrilateral fashion.
“Close?” he said again, “I can barely see it”.
“Well, it’s the closest one”.
Out of determination to get the job done quickly, he picked up his pace.
“Okay, Mammy” said Eve once they had reached the navigation console, “we’re looking at the map now”.
“Right, tell me which floors the server rooms is on so I can make a note”.
“Dammit! There are loads!” she exclaimed.
“I can imagine that, just tell me where they are”.
“Okay, twentieth… fortieth… sixtieth… eight- every twenty storeys it looks like… until the three-hundred and-fortieth floor”.
“Oh my word,” said Strys in disbelief.
“Fuck!” exclaimed Lon. “That’s like seventeen server rooms!”
“There’s one on the minus-twentieth floor as well,” she despaired.
“Well that makes things difficult,” said Strys, “but we might be lucky; all the government’s data is likely stored on one set of servers kept within one data centre”.
“But we still have to find that one set of servers!” said Lon. “How the hell do we do that?!”
“Calm down man, you’ll just have to do it systematically”.
“Where should we start? The basement?” asked Eve.
“Yes, it would be stupid to miss it”.
“Well,” said Lon, are we taking the escalator,” he pointed to a series of escalators going to the floors above and below in the lobby’s distant centre, “or one of these lifts? The lift would be quicker, right?”
“Of course the lift is quicker,” said Eve, “let’s get in”.
“Before you do,” said Strys, “how tall would you estimate the ceiling to be?”
“About… twenty metres,” said Lon, “why?”
“Okay, just go”.
They took the lift straight to the floor of the building’s lowest server room, where there was much less open expanse and many more corridors than the entrance lobby.
“Somehow this makes me feel claustrophobic,” said Lon.
“Just try to act naturally, and don’t say anything that sounds out of place,” said Eve.
“Yes Lon, calm down,” said Strys, “and tell me the height of the corr
idors”.
“Hmmm… I reckon about three metres”. Why was he asking?
A sign on the wall opposite the lifts next to a three-way intersection listed the names of numerous rooms that were contained on that floor. It was a long list, as there were hundreds of rooms and areas.
“Oh my god,” said Lon, “are there seriously that many rooms down here?”
“Think about it Lon,” Eve responded, “the area of this floor must be at least that of the ground floor, and you saw how huge only the one lobby was”.
Lon stepped closer to the sign for a better look, “But seriously, are there really that many rooms?”
“Of course there are,” she began to feel frustrated at his sudden lack of understanding, “I’m sure I told you several times, this building is massive! What else can you expect?”
“But how the hell are we supposed to find what we’re looking for?”
Eve, too, moved closer to the sign. “It’s in alphabetical order, maybe that will help”.
To confirm this tip, he skimmed down the list looking at the first letter of each item. “Oh, you’re right”.
“Of course I’m right,” she said, “how productive would it be not to organise simple things like that in a building so big?”
“Sorry,” apologised Lon, “my mind isn’t working very well right now, I’m running on adrenaline because I’m certain we’re gonna die soon”.
“Wow, you’re making me feel so confident about the situation,” said Eve.
Strys interrupted, “Come on guys, you must stop this and think quickly! Find where you’re supposed to be going”.
“Okay, sorry about that,” said Eve. “Let’s see…” she quickly scanned the list looking for the ‘S’ section, “‘Server Room Minus One’”.
“You’ve found it?” asked Strys.
“Yeah,” replied Lon, “but it only gives us a room number”.
“What number is it?”
“It says ‘Data Centre Minus One: Room Three’”.
“Okay, so you must find ‘Data Centre Minus One’ on the list,” instructed Strys.
“Okay, found it,” said Eve after a moment of searching, “but we only have a direction this time. It’s pointing to our right”.
“Is there no other forms of navigation there?” asked Strys.
“No, it just seems like a complicated mess,” said Lon, “which is odd, because I thought it wouldn’t be productive not to organise simple things like that in a building of this size,” he gave Eve a critical glance as he spoke.
She ignored his sarcasm. “I don’t get it either; there are usually navigation panels outside each lift on every floor”.
“Perhaps they expect you to already know where you’re going if you work down there,” said Strys.
“What do you mean?” asked Lon.
“I don’t know, but maybe they only expect certain people to go down there; people who are specifically chosen, and those who aren’t supposed to be there will get lost”.
“So you reckon there are secrets down here?” asked Lon.
“Probably,” Strys replied.
“Then that makes it all the more exciting,” he replied in a flat, depressed tone, “if someone sees us down here, then there’s more of a chance they’ll know we’re not supposed to be here”.
“That’s a point,” stated Eve, “this place seems empty, but usually every floor is busy”.
“Then it either means that something’s down there that you’re not supposed to know about, or that there’s actually nothing down there at all,” said Strys.
“But why would there be so many rooms if there was nothing here?” inquired Lon.
“Either way,” Eve sighed, “we’d better get moving”.
They began walking to the right, the direction indicated on the sign.
They traversed the corridor, walking, and walking, and walking, passing many turns and junctions, yet no more signs advised where to go, only small written indications on the doors they went by noted any locations.
“This is actually stupid,” said Lon, “we’ve walked at least a couple of hundred metres, yet we’ve got no clue as to whether we’re closer to the data centre or not”.
“You’re right,” agreed Eve, “it is stupid. What don’t they want people to see?”
“Maybe the government servers we’re looking for are on this floor,” proposed Lon hopefully.
“Based on all that’s happened to us in the last couple of days,” said Eve, “I’m not gonna bet anything on our luck being so good right now”.
Lon sighed.
Eve sighed.
Strys sighed. “I would tell you to be more positive, but I’m at a loss, man! I knew it would be a challenge, but I didn’t imagine that place to be so damn difficult to navigate”.
“Like I said, it usually isn’t,” stated Eve.
“Well… what should we do? This place is obviously a maze, I’m scared to take a turn somewhere in case we get lost”.
“Strys, I thought you were an expert at this kind of thing,” said Eve.
“I’m an expert with computers, not architecture!” he defensively replied, “and call me ‘Mammy’”.
“Just a sec,” interjected Lon.
“What?” said both Eve and Strys.
They came to a stop.
“Is everything in this building wireless?”
“Of course,” said Eve.
“But aren’t the computer systems wired in case wireless goes down?”
“It makes sense to do that, but I’m not sure I’ve seen any wires in this building… why?”
“It’s just that…” he paused for a moment to think through his upcoming suggestion, “if all the data centres in the building are connected with wires - which they probably are - don’t you think the easiest way to align them would be vertically?”
“Vertically? Why?” asked Eve.
“Because it doesn’t really make sense for one data centre to be connected to another one on another side of such a large building, and then that one be connected to one on another side, like, diagonally”.
“Yes, that would be extremely inefficient,” added Strys.
“So basically,” Eve began to clarify, “you think the data centres are pretty much stacked on top of each other?”
“Yeah, that’s what I would’ve done if I’d designed the system, and I’m pretty sure any other computer systems engineer would have done the same,” explained Lon.
“Yes, come to think of it, I’d have done that too,” agreed Eve, “but that only helps us if we can find the first data centre”.
“Well, you said that this floor is probably wider than the ground floor, right?” Said Lon.
“Right”.
“Why?” he asked.
“Well, because the building is so tall it needs to be wider at the bottom than it is at the top”.
“So,” Lon continued, “if the data centres are all aligned vertically, they can’t be near the sides of the building because the building’s walls aren’t vertical”.
“Oh, I see what you mean!” Eve exclaimed.
“Nice observation Lon, I didn’t think of that,” said Strys, “the data centres must be close to the actual centre of the building on each floor”.
“Yeah, exactly, so if we manage to find the centre of this floor, we might be able to find all the data centres in this building”.
“Well, it’s worth a shot,” said Eve.
Lon beamed with pride at his deduction, yet was momentarily cut short.
“So, how do we find the centre of this floor then?” asked Eve.
“Fuck, I was hoping you’d know what to do next”.
“Take the right turn nearest you,” instructed Strys, “let’s start from there”.
“Okay”.
They did as he said.
“But this corridor looks the same, there aren’t any distinguishing features; the doors and walls are uniform. How can we guess where to go?” said Eve
.
“Just keep moving forwards, but pick up the pace,” Strys instructed again, “if the data centre is at the centre of that floor, then you’ve got a long way to go”.
“Oh god, we’re gonna be in here all day, if we don’t get killed,” moaned Lon.
“I’d much rather have the former,” explained Eve.
“And don’t you find these lab coats restrictive?”
“Just leave them as they are, you want to look natural in there,” said Strys.
“I know, I’m just warning you that should we need to run at any point, it might be a little difficult”.
“Lon,” said Eve, “please shut up, I don’t plan on needing to run today”.
“Nor do I, but I’m just making you aware of our weaknesses,” he said.
“Okay guys,” said Strys after another two or three hundred metres of power walking, “you should be coming close to the middle of the building, and data centres are usually big, so it shouldn’t be too difficult to find it”.
“But everything so far has looked the same,” noted Eve, “so what if the data centre looks like everything else?”
“Look for a long corridor on your right without many doors; the data centre will probably have only one or two entrances”.
“Okay, I’m holding thumbs we’ll manage to spot a corridor like that,” said Lon.
Soon enough their luck appeared to turn. They came to a halt at the next junction and peered down the expansive passageway.
“I can only see one door,” stated Eve.
“That must be it,” said Lon.
“Thank goodness,” said Strys, “it seems like we might be getting somewhere now”.
They proceeded towards the door.
“What happens once we get inside?” asked Eve.
“You start to look for the server room, but it should be obvious where it is once you’re inside,” said Strys.
“But what if someone’s in there?” she said.
“Yeah,” said Lon, “even the most advanced, fully automated life support system should have at least one person to oversee its processes, not to mention any security personnel that might be there too”.
“Ah, man, if that’s the case, then you’ll just have to be creative”.
“Be creative?!” Lon shouted.
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