The Silence of Six

by E. C. Myers

Panjea’s auditorium was a big white room with no seats, and a simple stage and podium on the far end. Grooves along the wall, floor, and ceiling suggested the space could be divided with temporary partitions, and he assumed they brought in seats for press conferences and product announcements. Right now, it was filled with hackers standing around impatiently. The energy in the room reminded Max of the anticipation preceding a concert, and for many of the people here, Victor Ignacio was a rock star.

  Max hovered at the edges of the mass, glancing at the people in front of him and back to the swarming dots on his phone screen. He figured out that the green dots were Panjea employees and the red ones were the hackers they were sponsoring, but everyone was wearing a mask.

  It was a carnival, with masks of all kinds adding much-needed color to the space: grotesque Mardi Gras masks, Halloween masks, an overwhelming number of Guy Fawkes masks—made popular by the hacktivist group Anonymous and the film V for Vendetta.

  There were a lot of people with masks they had made themselves: elaborate Steampunk ironwork and things that flashed and glowed. Someone had made a mask of Rorschach from Watchmen, with Rorschach patterns that actually moved and swirled into new shapes: a butterfly, a crossbow, a valentine. Max marveled at the number of intricate papercraft masks, and felt grossly inadequate with his store-bought plastic one.

  Some had taken it to full-on cosplay. He saw some people dressed as Iron Man, Cybermen, and a lot of Batmen. Some were just wearing face paint, others had covered only their eyes with masks like Green Lantern and Robin and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. He recognized a “No Face” from an anime film, Darth Vaders, and a cadre of Stormtroopers. He was relieved to see many people wearing tragedy and comedy masks like his and Penny’s, which were favored by Dramatis Personai supporters—though it was odd to worry about blending into a group that was simultaneously showing off and hiding.

  It was fun to study the other guests without being self-conscious about it. If he let his eyes linger too long—and he caught himself doing that plenty of times—it didn’t carry the same sort of taboo as it might have if his face were visible. The masks distanced people from each other as much as they freed them to become closer.

  It was a relief to not worry about being recognized for the first time in days. But Max didn’t allow himself to relax. He was still surrounded by danger—literally.

  Men and women dressed in black and wearing shiny metal masks modeled after Battlestar Galactica Cylons—complete with red lights oscillating across their visors—circled the auditorium. As they scanned the crowd they moved like robots, in a calculated, inhuman, predatory, sort of way, with slow turns of their heads. Tasers were holstered on their belts.

  These guards didn’t show up on his HackerAid app.

  “Hey, 503-ERROR!”

  Max jerked his head up. Someone in a gold helmet that seemed to have a boomerang jutting from the top of it was rushing toward him. The person had on a brown leather jacket and was holding a cell phone up to eye level.

  Max took a step back as the person landed in his personal space.

  The figure spoke and Max decided it was a guy. “It’s really you. I didn’t know you were going to be here. It is so cool to meet you in person. How are—”

  “Do I know you?” Max asked. He felt like he had to interrupt just so the speaker could pause to take a breath. Listening to him was exhausting.

  “Oh, sorry. I’m print*is*dead. I mean, that’s my handle, but it’s kind of a mouthful, so you can call me Print if you want for short. Can I call you Five-Oh-Three? That sounds kind of badass, doesn’t it? It’s funny how hard it is to pronounce a lot of our handles. You don’t think about that until you come to an event like this.”

  “This is my first one,” Max said. “I like your helmet. What’s it from?”

  “I’m the Rocketeer!” Print struck a weird pose, one that Max supposed was meant to look like he was flying. “I wish I could say I made this myself, but I bought it. It’s a collectible. So you want a job at Panjea? Everyone here does.”

  “Not really,” Max said. “I hear the workload is killer.”

  The lights dimmed.

  “Oh, it’s finally starting,” Print said.

  A spotlight came up and a bald man walked onto the stage wearing a green T-shirt that said “Tectonics Rock,” beige cargo shorts, and white sneakers with no socks. He was wearing the Phantom of the Opera’s mask from the Broadway musical, but it was transparent so Max could see his face clearly, looking much the same as it had on the cover of Wired magazine. It was Victor Ignacio.

  The crowd erupted into applause.

  Victor spread his arms wide, accepting the praise. Then he brought his hands together in one loud clap that silenced the room. “Thank you. People wondered why I insisted there not be seats in here today. The answer is: I have always liked standing ovations.”

  The audience laughed.

  Ignacio rubbed his hands together. “Welcome to Haxx0rade! Let’s make some cool shit this weekend. Yeah?”

  “Yeah!” the crowd responded.

  Ignacio tapped his mask. “People also wondered why I wanted to make this a masquerade.”

  “Because masks are cool!” someone shouted.

  “Yes! Masks are cool. And I really like yours! Power Rangers fan? Me too. Wanna trade?” Ignacio pulled his mask off and extended it toward the audience member in the red helmet. After a prolonged moment, he withdrew his hand. “No? Interesting. Other than wanting to give everyone a chance to get creative with their masks this weekend, I was also curious how people would take it. I thought it would make it easier for some of you, since I know hackers thrive on anonymity.”

  He whirled his mask around in his hands and started pacing back and forth on the stage. This was starting to take on the atmosphere of a TED Talk. Max knew the event was being broadcast live online, even though he couldn’t see the cameras. In fact, he hadn’t noticed any cameras at all in the building, but he knew they had to be there.

  As he had at the debates, Max scanned the wings of the stage. Kevin Sharpe was standing in almost the same position he’d been in at the Granville High auditorium stage. What was he doing here?

  “I am not a hacker.” Ignacio held the mask out, facing him, and looked at it. “But some of my best friends are.”

  More laughter. Max looked around. Was this auditorium equipped with its own laugh track?

  Max got a text message from Risse: I see you in the app. Shouldn’t you get moving?

  Max looked toward the doors. More guards in Cylon masks were blocking them, the red lights in their visors pulsing ominously in the dark. He wasn’t going anywhere right now.

  Ignacio put his mask back on. “Masks are one way to hide your identities, and privacy is important to hackers. I like hackers, I employ a lot of you, and you might say Panjea was founded on hackers. This company started as a little startup in San Jose called Synthwerks.”

  Scattered applause.

  “Some of you remember it? That’s great to hear, because it was only around for a hot minute.”

  “I miss it!” someone shouted.

  “Miss it?” Ignacio said. “But it’s here. It’s all around us.”

  He spread his arms again and walked backwards across the stage, turning in a slow circle. “Synthwerks was the seed for Panjea. Piles of money helped that seed grow.”

  Laughter.

  But where did that money come from? Max thought.

  “It seemed like a stupid idea to open an internet café. Even a few years ago, every coffee shop was pretty much an internet café. But Synthwerks was different. I thought so, anyway.”

  Applause.

  “Why do people go online?” Ignacio asked.

  “Porn!” someone called.

  Ignacio laughed. “Yes, but it has to be bigger than that.”

  “That’s wha
t she said!” the same voice shouted.

  “I guess I walked into that one,” Ignacio said.

  “That’s what she said!”

  Ignacio smiled.

  “Escape!” Print called next to Max. Ignacio looked straight at them, and even though Max was wearing a mask, he felt like the man could see right through it.

  “Interesting. Porn is a form of escape, isn’t it? That’s a good point.” Ignacio looked at the heckler. “If you say that joke again, you’re out.” His voice had a hard edge to it, and his smile only made it more malicious. Then, his lighter tone was back again. “Well, my theory was that people are seeking other people like them, and it’s easier to find them on the internet.

  “The media often suggests that people who spend too much time online are antisocial, but I don’t think that’s true. We are very social, but our concept of society has to change and expand to include online interactions.

  “So Synthwerks was a place where people could go be online together. Everyone who signed in could message anyone else in the café, converse in a chat group. Over the intranet, you could see what people had on their screens, but monitors had privacy filters and partitions between work stations so your neighbors didn’t know what you, personally, were looking at. Big displays around the room also cycled randomly through everyone’s screens making it easy to find out what others were into.

  “And it worked. We were so popular we were turning people away! It was a bold experiment in anonymous disclosure. Synthwerks was helping to connect people with common interests. If you saw someone watching My Little Pony—” Cheers and whoops drowned him out for a moment. He held up a hand and continued when they quieted down. “If you saw someone watching something you liked, you could contact them through the intranet. You could watch the same episode together. And then, when you were ready, you could meet in person and have a cup of coffee together.

  “Wired called it a ‘bizarre social experiment,’ but they changed their tune last month when Panjea was the topic of their feature story, didn’t they? Is there anyone from Wired here? No, don’t raise your hands. I don’t want to know. Or maybe I already know . . . .”

  Nervous laughter. If only he were kidding.

  “To those critics, I said, life is a bizarre social experiment. I used Synthwerks too, but no one knew I owned the place, that I had dreamed it up. But no one really cared who had created it, because it already belonged to everyone. And hackers might like getting attention, but they like not getting caught even more. Am I right?”

  Enthusiastic clapping.

  “So, working out in the open like that, but behind a kind of blind, allowed hackers like you to brag about your abilities publicly without being too public. And the best thing is, the network was stable and secure, so we were protected from outside hackers. I realized that having hackers around, who were invested in the system they worked with, was like having technical support engineers pay me to keep it running. Now that’s a good business model.

  “Synthwerks became more than I had imagined. It was organic; its own little ecosystem. It evolved into a hackerspace that members used to collaborate on projects in perfect anonymity. I had plans to franchise it, open similar places all over the country, carry on my vision. But then I had a better idea, to expand the Synthwerks philosophy to the internet, where it can reach everyone, everywhere, all at once. I want to unite hackers, and unite the world.”

  Unite it, or conquer it? If the hackers in this room learned that Panjea had been sending information about every user to the government—maybe even their current locations—it would be mutiny. Max was tempted to shout out the truth to everyone there, but he knew that wouldn’t go well for him.

  Ignacio paused expectantly. Print started clapping and others followed suit. Max joined in.

  “That brings me back to the idea of privacy. These days, I know this topic is a big deal. We all want to share everything, yet share nothing. With Panjea, the way I imagine it, everyone can see everything any time.”

  “Especially Big Brother,” Max muttered.

  “The only important thing is information, and everyone should have it. The problem is that when a person is linked to information—the source, the creator, the user—people tend to want to limit it. Privacy is all well and good, but identity is also inextricably linked with ego. I know a lot about ego!”

  He sure did.

  “The masks are a way of stripping away ego. They aren’t about protecting identity, they’re about downplaying it. Who you are doesn’t matter. These masks, they don’t even matter. You think a piece of plastic can protect you if someone wants to know your secrets?” Ignacio’s gaze was sweeping the room, but Max swore it lingered on him. Then Ignacio turned.

  “So this is your chance. I invite anyone out there who is daring enough: Take off your mask!”

  Ignacio took his off and rested it on the podium. He looked around the room.

  The lights came up halfway and everyone looked at one another. As the moment stretched on, Ignacio straightened.

  “No one?” He looked around. “Well, we have an exciting twenty-four hours ahead. I hope you’re well-rested and well-caffeinated. We will be holding a number of workshops, panels, and discussions here in this auditorium, along with other activities in conference rooms and workspaces throughout the other floors. Mi casa es su casa. And at the end of it all, I’m going to ask again for volunteers to remove their masks, and we’ll see if any of you have changed your minds. At the very least, you’ll be sleep deprived and your judgment will be compromised.” He smiled.

  “A little housekeeping: Details about our challenge quests this weekend are all in your packets and in the HackerAid app, but feel free to visit the registration desk or stop me or another Panjea staff member if you have any questions. There are showers in the gym downstairs, next to the cafeteria. Use them. And we have a zero tolerance policy of harassment; if anyone makes you feel uncomfortable, speak to one of the toasters and we will handle it.” He gestured to the Cylon guards by the doors.

  Ignacio clapped his hands again. “Now go make awesome stuff!”

  This started off another flood of applause. Max glanced behind him and saw the Cylons had opened the doors again.

  “That was disturbing,” Max said.

  “You think so?” Print said. “I think it’s all really exciting.”

  “Why didn’t you take off your mask?” Max asked.

  “Because this is the one place where people judge me for what I can do instead of what I look like.”

  From Evan’s file, he knew that print*is*dead’s real name was Timothy Hawson. His picture had shown a doughy face covered in eczema.

  “Can you point me to a workstation?” Max asked.

  “Allow me, Max.” The synthetic voice sent a chill down Max’s spine. Print backed away, waving and muttering an excuse.

  Max turned around.

  “Evan?”

  23

  Max saw a figure in a familiar white mask, with large, evil eyes and a grimacing mouth. A red hoodie was pulled up over his head, with a black T-shirt underneath. Gray cargo pants.

  “Evan?” Max asked again, his voice cracking.

  “You like it? I wanted to pay a tribute to our dear friend STOP.”

  Then Max realized. “That’s in poor taste,” Max said.

  Wearing a mask like Evan’s, with that flat, robotic voice . . . he was straight out of Max’s nightmares. But after the initial shock, Max noticed he was taller and broader-shouldered than Evan. His body language was completely different too. Evan had always been fidgety, constantly in motion when he wasn’t behind a keyboard. But this guy was strangely, eerily still.

  “You know who I am, but who are you?” Max asked.

  “0MN1. Good to finally meet.” He extended a hand to Max. Max hesitated before shaking it.

  “How abo
ut a behind-the-scenes tour?” 0MN1 said. “I want you to meet some more of my friends upstairs.”

  “Great. Thanks for the sponsorship,” Max said. “How did you know I was coming?”

  “I was hoping you would, so we would have a chance to talk.”

  Max nodded. He wondered what 0MN1 wanted with him. If he played along, this could provide the opportunity he’d been hoping for to infiltrate Panjea’s servers.

  0MN1 guided him to an elevator and took him to the third floor. “This is the heart of Panjea. Programmers are up here, doing the real work, and all the business stuff is on the second floor. PR, marketing, graphics.”

  Max’s phone buzzed. He snuck a peek at it. A text from Penny: looking for open conference room with a live jack

  “Are all Panjea programmers hackers like us?” Max asked.

  0MN1 led him past rows of cubicles, five-by-five spaces, each one identical but for a few indications of the personality of the occupant: action figures, comic books, printouts of celebrities. Photos of kids and dogs and spouses. One of them even had a replica of an axe from The Lord of the Rings balanced on a shelf, surrounded by hobbit figurines.

  “Every company has an A-team. Here, those are the hackers. The grunt programmers handle basic maintenance, server expansion, software implementation, that kind of thing.”

  “STOP worked here, right?” Max asked.

  “His station was over there.” 0MN1 pointed to the center of the room. There was a pod with ten workstations facing each other in a circle. Only two of the stations were occupied. 0MN1 waved. “Hey guys! Look, it’s 503-ERROR. I told you he’d show.”

  “What up.” A twenty-year-old guy stood to greet Max. He was thin with a goatee and a too-large flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He looked a lot like Shaggy from the Scooby Doo cartoons. His Panjea badge identified him as Nolan Harrison, but Max recognized him from the photo in PHYREWALL’s file. His real name was Nat Hardy.

  The hackers were using aliases IRL too. It seemed trust only went so far when you were routinely breaking the law and there was always the chance that a supposed friend was reporting back to the FBI.