by Sean Platt
“Too literal. Think figurative.”
“You said it’s not a hiding place. Or you said that I don’t think it’s a hiding place. Jesus Fucking Christ, I don’t know. I’m just an old man with a leaky sieve in my mind.”
“Focus!” Serenity’s voice was more stern than York had heard it before. “Slanted up. Wooden.”
“A piece of wood. A ramp.”
“With a handle.”
“I don’t know.”
“Secret. High.”
“Back to an attic door. A secret attic door. Like a trap door, or a hidden…”
“What does it…” Serenity began. But suddenly, York had something. He stabbed a finger in the air, silencing her. Telling her to wait because the finger and thumb he’d used to tweeze the memory from within himself had momentarily managed a better grip. He almost had it, whatever it was. Now, if only he could just wrap his mind around it and reel it in.
“I almost had it. But not literally. Another concept. I don’t know what it means.”
“What?” Serenity leaned forward. “Spit it out so that you don’t lose it! Don’t worry about it making sense. Say it first, and sense will come later.”
“It’s just another statement of the same metaphor.”
Shit. He was so tired of metaphors. Life had once been concrete, and now everything was doublespeak and symbols.
“What were you thinking?” she said. “About the trap door?”
“The idea of something else hidden rings a bell. The same, but somehow very different.”
“Say it! Before you lose it! About the hidden trap door!”
He shrugged. Around him, white bedsheets rustled.
“It’s not a hidden trap door,” York said. “This time, what I see is a secret panel.”
EPISODE 10
Chapter 1
June 6, 2041 — District Zero
Stephen York stood, crossed the lab, and poured himself another cup of coffee. It was 9 p.m., and York knew full well that coffee this late would keep him awake. But that didn’t matter. He wouldn’t be sleeping anytime soon.
He set the coffee back down beside him on the desk, remembered the numerous times he’d ruined keyboards by spilling liquids on them, then decided that it didn’t matter, either. The computer he was using was only a terminal. The entire project was backed up not just at the other end of the lab, but off-site in three different, meticulously encrypted locations, only one of which York would ever be able to find. Noah knew where all three were, of course, but Noah knew everything. That’s what all of the news media said, anyway. Even with Crossbrace still under wraps for another year or so, people knew that the great Noah West was brewing something amazing. Something to “change the world.” Noah had been on the cover of Time in the past year (on tablet as well as the antiquated collector’s physical edition) and had been featured across every news outlet. Noah didn’t grant interviews because fame lit him like a beacon, and all of humanity followed.
Oh, yes, Noah knew everything. He knew how to revolutionize thought and the network that bound the NAU (or, some quarters naively thought, the whole world); he knew where all of the supersecret backup servers were; he knew where the project was going in full even while he left his partner in the dark; he knew all of the people in his precious panel. Or — because you could hear the capital in Noah’s tone — his Panel.
Not that he ever officially discussed it, of course. Because as they said in that old movie, the first rule of Fight Club was that you didn’t talk about Fight Club. Or Panel.
Expecting Noah not to mention it to York, though, was unlikely. If Noah didn’t mention his secret clubs and accolades, he couldn’t brag like a big shit to the man who did so much of his work and took none of the credit. Noah Fucking West had to look like a big shit. He was a genius. He was — and remained — Steve York’s biggest idol. But (and this was something the gossip train didn’t know about its darling) Noah was also obsessed, twisted, and cruel. York hadn’t asked to work as much as he did. He didn’t want to work as much as he did. And Noah, for his part, hadn’t asked York to move into the lab and live there like a prisoner. It had simply happened. One day, York found himself with a bed in the lab, with his food brought in from outside for him. One day, he’d realized there was no need to leave, and so he didn’t. He couldn’t. When he thought about leaving, Noah looked at him askance, questioning his dedication (to the project York couldn’t disclose his part in) without saying a word.
Noah never left. So why would York? Was he disloyal? Was he a quitter? Was he as big of a screw-up as Noah usually made him feel — chastising him for tangling knots that Noah had made with his overbearing fingers…then explaining that mistakes were gifts and thanking York for his constant generosity?
Noah wasn’t perfect either, despite remaining York’s idol. You could respect someone, be devoted to someone, and even stay in awe of someone while hating them much of the time. York knew; it was his reality. He and Noah had begun as colleagues and friends. They had become like brothers. He supposed they still were brothers and friends in a way, but that affection had been buried beneath a frustrated crust and a thickening layer of hatred. There was jealousy and teasing. There were struggles for power. There was passive aggression. Noah always emerged as the Alpha in their pairing, topping the headlines, grabbing the glory. Already, he was Noah the Icon. No one knew Stephen York, who labored in secret beneath his ironclad nondisclosure agreement.
York never stopped working because Noah never stopped working. Except that he did — on business, with his maddening Panel.
“Fuck it,” said York.
He pushed his keyboard aside then used his finger to drag the shell window off-screen. He pulled up Magellan, pulled at the corners to enlarge the window, and touched an icon to bring up the plug-in window. He enabled the tunnel hack he’d written himself (Noah wasn’t the only one with extracurricular projects) and opened a connection to a node he used whenever he wanted to stay anonymous. He opened an emulator on the remote node, re-anonymized a connection coming out of it with a copy of the tunnel he’d planted on the remote server, and opened a second tunnel onto the Internet.
Protected inside two layers of proprietary protection, York began to browse.
He glanced at the lab door behind him, saw it secured (as if his terminal wouldn’t alert him when it opened), and looked at the keyboard. Feeling tired and sipping his coffee to compensate, he touched the microphone icon and began to navigate by voice.
“Search ‘Noah West Panel.’”
This was a warm-up. The idea that whatever Noah’s “Panel” was would be available for anyone to find on the Internet was absurd, but there was always the possibility that paranoid nerds were talking about it. York, from his insider’s view, had discovered that about half of what paranoids said was true. The trick was deciding which half.
No results. Not from the Narx forum or the few places Anonymous were known to gather. York pinged in deeper, using his fingers to browse. Nothing.
“Search ‘Noah West Clive Spooner.’”
Magellan’s search brought up mainly news articles about West or Spooner, but none with any depth discussing both. A few pages in, York found an ancient, late-teens article in an archive, about Spooner’s crowdsourcing the blueprints for the Mare Frigoris lunar base. With a cynical edge to his thoughts, York wondered if the article would explain the main reason Spooner had wanted to build a lab on the moon — to escape Earth laws, like placing a lab in international waters. But that wasn’t fair. He didn’t really know Spooner, and the man was a national (international?) hero. Or at least he had been, before the Wild East had come to hate him. He, like the rest of the NAU, had really only been loved before the Fall, back when the whole world had held hands to sing Kumbaya.
York raked the results aside and clicked over to the images tab. Many showed the exuberant, much-loved face of Spooner next to a Noah West that York didn’t recognize. The Noah West that York knew had become a brillian
t tyrant with cold eyes. The eyes in these photos were bright and wide. Happy. The public face of Noah West, photographed repeatedly with Clive Spooner — out on the town, in fashionable spots, expensive drinks in hand.
Taking his time, York sifted through photos until one caught his eye. In the background was a red-and-gold dragon he recognized: the Chinese restaurant they went to often, in Chinatown.
“That’s your meeting place, Noah,” York told the screen. “What are you doing there with Spooner?”
The idea that Clive was a member of whatever “Panel” was had seemed obvious from the start. That’s why York had begun with him. When you wanted to peel a layer from the top of anything, you had to find a loose corner. Then you had to pry, dig, and itch at what you’d found, scratching to see what else lay beneath.
York reached to his side, turned on the monitor beside him, clicked around, then opened the Bully program. He clicked a few icons on the original terminal then confirmed on the other screen, linking them directly instead of routing their connection through the server. Only the first terminal was connected to the Internet through the secure double-tunnel, and now the second was hooked to it through the first.
York clicked the microphone icon on the second terminal, with the Bully analysis program open.
“Bully.”
There was a ding.
York liked working with Bully — one of the Crossbrace-native programs they had developed for use on the Crossbrace beta. Unlike Magellan, the Bully web browser utilized AI. It was nice having AI around. Ironically, it was more human than most of his coworkers.
York touched the photo of Spooner and Noah on the first monitor then kept speaking.
“Pull the figures out of this photo, then look for the same background in other images within this search.”
After a moment, the second terminal screen filled with what looked like the same search results, except it was now a subset containing only those set in the Chinese restaurant.
“Make a composite of the background only. Then repeat the search, this time looking only for the background in Internet images, regardless of people in photos.”
Both screens changed. The computer running Bully showed a composite background image of the Chinese restaurant, cobbled from images uncovered by the search. The computer with the Magellan window showed a simple Internet search, but the search field showed an incredibly complex string representing the background image. EverCrunch magic at work. The full image was too complex to search for, but you could fit the EverCrunch-compressed version into a simple query. The result was an image search wherein the background seemed to match York and West’s favorite Chinese restaurant.
York looked from one screen to the other. The Magellan window showed photo after photo of people standing or sitting with the same restaurant in the background. He didn’t know most of the people, and only one on the front page was either Noah or Spooner.
York pulled up the original image, dragged it larger, then spoke to the terminal running Bully.
“Give me a frequency analysis of the people in the search.” York used his finger to trace a square around Noah’s face on the image. “This is Noah West.” He traced a similar square around Spooner’s face. “And this is Clive Spooner.”
Small green geometric shapes crawled across their features, along with complex lines threading a web of green dots. A small shell window showed the Bully algorithm’s progress, turning two human faces into numbers.
“Use Noah West and Clive Spooner as anchors. Give me a fish-tail distribution.”
The Magellan window scrolled through page after page of results as the Bully AI scanned each image of the restaurant. Eventually, the second screen filled with what looked like the rear fin of a large fish, or a dolphin. On closer inspection, the fish fin revealed itself to be built from dozens and dozens of intersecting lines, forming a statistical distribution. A relationship web representing the connections of people in the image search.
York squinted at the screen then looked back toward the lab door. No one would be coming back tonight except for Noah, and he had just left a half hour ago. Based on his previous excursions to meet with his “Panel,” he’d be gone for hours. York would spend those hours alone. Working on the project, unsung, with no credit or respect. Like always.
“Put this on the big screen.”
A small dialogue box followed York’s words, appearing on the second terminal’s screen, asking him to verify that he wanted to mirror onto to the large monitor where everyone in the lab could see it. York touched the screen to confirm. Yes, everyone here could see it. Let all these groups of nobody get an eyeful.
When the fishtail distribution was on the big screen, York approached and stood a few meters away. The large monitor, meant for collaborative work, claimed most of the wall. It was taller than York and wider than his wingspan. The graphic displayed on it, mirrored from the terminals, was massive. For some reason, many people had had their photos taken in that restaurant and posted it online.
“Show me Noah West.”
A dot glowed in the matrix of lines.
“And show me Clive Spooner.”
Nearby, a second dot glowed. York noted the position of both and the small labels beside them.
“Clear everything and redraw, centering on West and Spooner.” He touched his chin. “In fact, give me an animation. Give me West and Spooner. Six degrees, animated, looping, one frame per second.”
The fishtail vanished and was replaced by dots for Spooner and West. A few lines and dots appeared spreading out from each, then more, then more. Each second brought a larger interconnected web, spreading out on the screen like a towel absorbing a spill.
York touched a particularly dense cluster.
“Pause. Give me this section.”
His finger on the screen stopped the animation. He pulled to the right and left, advancing and going back a frame at a time. He found the frame with the best view of the cluster then reached out with his other hand and pulled the cluster section forward. Bully helped him out, isolating the bright, tightly interconnected section.
“Who are these?” York touched nexus points on the web that were especially connected, indicating people who’d been publicly photographed often in the same restaurant with West or Spooner.
Tags appeared beside each of the dots York touched, and Bully read them out loud.
“Marshall Oates. Colin Hawes. Eli Oldman…”
“Eli Oldman? He’s still out in the real world?” Oldman was almost a cautionary tale in Internet and geek lore. He’d pioneered much of the imaging technology that underlay Crossbrace and had created much of the underpinning in early AI training but then had become obsessed and began spending more and more of his time deeply wired into his computers. He hadn’t, York thought, been seen in public for years. And now the search said that he was hanging out with Marshall Oates, the Plasteel baron?
“Give me the Oldman photos,” he said. “Are there any with both West and Spooner?”
Onscreen, exploding out of the Oldman dot on the graphic, came a fan of three image thumbnails. York enlarged each. Two showed the geek icon with not just West and Spooner, but also four other people.
“Who are these people?” York touched each face.
“Colin Hawes. Kendrick Hayes. Audrey Pascoe. Shannon Hooper.”
“Pascoe?” The name was ringing very loud bells. All of them were, in fact, but Audrey Pascoe above the others. York suddenly wished he hadn’t been isolated in the office for so long. He lived in a fucking computer lab 24/7 and had mostly lost track of the outside world.
“P-A-S-C-O-E,” the AI voice answered.
“Give me her Omnipedia.”
A new window came up. York dragged it wider and scanned. That’s why he recognized her name. She was the design leader and architect responsible for much of reconstruction after the Fall. Modern districts outside of DZ owed her their look, primarily because her original district became the model. And according
to Omnipedia, who owned pretty much all of the land within that original district that had been shaped by Audrey Pascoe? The answer was Kendrick Hayes, who’d apparently survived the worst years with a massive fortune kept mostly in precious metals. Metals had been as worthless as anything else for a while, but they were also the first currency to return after the Fall. Kendrick had owned land; he’d bought a massive tract and had Pascoe build him a city. Both of them were front-page material, darlings of the press like West and Spooner.
York closed the Omnipedia window and looked at his small isolated cluster.
“Give me a 3-D representation of this.”
The flat image became 3-D, rendered flat but now revolvable by York’s hand. He turned it, drawing his fingers up and down and side to side to make it tumble, rolling it with twiddling thumbs. The graphic was tight like a ball in its 3-D form, indicating that not only was one frequently photographed with another, but that they were all photographed repeatedly in different permutations. Spooner with Pascoe. West with Kendrick. Kendrick with Pascoe. All in that same Chinese restaurant. This was a public search, of images freely available on the Internet. Some of the age’s most famous, brilliant minds, meeting over and over, playing around and taking commemorative snaps. To York, who’d never been invited and seemed to have been deliberately excluded, it was an insulting taunt. If this was their public record, what were they doing when the cameras were off? Were they meeting more regularly, more consistently, more secretly? If so, what were these titans of the modern age doing?
York turned the image. He put his finger on loose end after loose end — data points that only had a few connections or which only touched one or two central people. He flicked each away, cleaning the web, until he had a tight, clean knot of people who met and were photographed together, over and over again.
“That’s not all of you, though, is it?” York asked the screen.