The Media Candidate – politics and power in 2048
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PARTIAL FILES SAVED.
“Fantastic!” shouted Guinda. “You’re a genius!”
“Well, I’m not exactly a genius, but it did work out pretty well,” Elliott said with some pride. “We aren’t quite done yet. Now we need to get these files transferred here.”
“Why don’t we just read them where they are?” questioned Guinda.
“There are a couple of problems with that. The most important reason is that we’ve changed the configuration of the database by rewriting those files. Suppose whoever deleted them checks back for some reason and sees them back in the system? It would be obvious that someone has been into the database, and there’s probably a trail that leads right to you. The best thing is to delete the files again as soon as possible, and there’s no better time than now.”
“Okay, I should have plenty of storage left in my cube for that stuff. Let’s do it.”
Elliott proceeded to download all the files to Guinda’s computer. Then with them safely in residence in their new home, he deleted them from Leasnet. Next, he uploaded them to his computer at the lab so there would be another copy for safety. The only thing left to do was to wade through the files looking for anything interesting or incriminating.
The next few hours were spent looking over each other’s shoulders at page after page of occasionally interesting, but usually totally boring, text and pictures. ARIS was nothing more than a collection of dozens of papers relating in general to the modern political process. CANDIDATE 1 and CANDIDATE 2 were collages of vitae and other biographical data about dozens of candidates for political office. They searched in vain for earth shaking political dirt but found only the usual. Little was news, and none was interesting. They decided that CANDIDATE 3 was probably more of the same and just skimmed it.
It became clear that this marathon session had to end. It was now late afternoon, and they had searched only four of the fourteen files. So far, none of it contained anything written by Halvorsen, nor was there any personal correspondence with her. It was nothing more than what a zealous student would have uncovered in a library search. This was not the stuff of great intrigue. Neither of them could take any more of the political trivia for a while.
“We need a brake, Elliott. This stuff looks like it could go on forever.”
“I never thought being a detective could be so boring,” Elliott admitted. “I wonder why Halvorsen saved all this junk.”
“I don’t know the answer to that, but I do know that she didn’t do things for nothing. She was an extremely orderly and fastidious woman. If it hadn’t been for her wisdom and encouragement, I would have never finished my thesis. She was pretty incredible.”
“It’s good that you had someone like her to help you,” Elliott said. “A lot of professors in grad school are so focused on research they lose track of their responsibility to their students. It sounds like you had a pretty good experience in college.”
“Well, I have to admit that Terra was unique in that respect. She wasn’t even my thesis advisor, but she worked with me as if she were. My actual advisor was a guy named Joe Geper. He was the department chairman at the time. He lived in his own little world and didn’t seem to understand why I was hanging around there. One time I thought I’d go to see him about something, I forget what the problem was anymore. But anyway, I walked up to his office door, which he always kept shut, and knocked, and nothing happened, and knocked again, and I finally started to walk away because I figured he wasn’t in. I got a couple of steps away, and I heard this, ‘Yeeees?’ and so I went back and opened the door. He was sitting behind his desk peering at me through his bifocals with his feet propped up and some journal open on his lap. I was sure I woke him up, but I proceeded to tell him about this problem and asked his advice.
“After listening politely to me, he put his journal on the desk and stood up. ‘You know, Greta,’ he said, ‘It’s neither fish nor fowl.’ He walked toward me scratching one of his chins. ‘It’s neither fish nor fowl.’
“I stood still and looked down at him. He shuffled past me to the outer office and stopped and scanned every direction looking for something. He said, ‘Now where is my cup? I know it’s here somewhere.’ He stumbled around the place for a while looking everywhere. Then he walked out into the hallway, turned left, and dragged himself down hall still muttering, ‘I know it’s somewhere. I know it’s somewhere.’ That was the last time I ever spoke to him. I finished my thesis with Halvorsen’s help, and I graduated, and he never even spoke to me again, and I sure as heck didn’t want to talk to him. So that was the extent of my relationship with my thesis advisor.”
“But he was right, wasn’t he?” Elliott replied with a grin.
“What do you mean?”
“It really was neither fish nor fowl,” Elliott jibed.
Guinda laughed. “Yeah, he had that right on.” Guinda stood up and stretched, nearly popping the buttons on her blouse. Elliott gulped and lost his train of thought. “How about something to eat?” She walked toward the kitchen, and Elliott followed her with his eyes.
“Sounds good to me. I can go out and get some sushi or something,” Elliott offered.
“You like sushi, too? Fantastic! I love it. How about if we make some right here? I don’t have any fish—or fowl—but I think I’ve got all the makings for some damn good sushi. What do you think?”
“Let’s do it,” Elliott responded enthusiastically.
Guinda rummaged through the refrigerator and came up with an arm full of ingredients. “Here’s some cream cheese, and an avo, and some left over asparagus, and a tomato. And here’s even a package of seaweed.”
“You’ve got a better stocked refrigerator than I do. We’d have to be satisfied with a cheddar cheese and bean sushi wrapped in lettuce at my house. Our Japanese cook grew up south of the border,” Elliott joked.
“I’m flexible. Could be an orgasmic experience,” Guinda joked in return. “How about a beer while we’re rustling up this grub? When you said south of the border, that reminded me I have some Tecates in there.”
“Great idea! Thought you’d never ask. Here, let me get the beer going. Looks like you’ve got your hands full with the rice.” Elliott poured two glasses of Tecate and presented one to Guinda. “Here’s to Terra Halvorsen, Guin. She must have been a very special person.”
“She was. … She was unique. … But I seem to have an affinity for unique people.”
“How’s that?”
“You’re a pretty unique person, too. I’ve never met anyone like you before. And it’s been years since I met anybody who blushes! … In some ways, you and Terra are much alike.”
“Was she old, too?” Elliott asked with a laugh.
“My Aunt Germaine told me, ‘You’re only as old as you feel,’ and if you feel as old as you act, then you’re just a kid inside.”
“Well, I haven’t looked at my insides lately, but the outside of me doesn’t play with marbles anymore.”
“I see the way you zip around on that bike. You can’t be very old if you do that.”
“The only reason I ride a bike is that I can’t pass the driving test anymore. The last time I went down there to get my license renewed, they took one look at me, tore up my license, and told me I was lucky that I could still put one foot in front of the other. I told them if they gave me my license back, I’d promise to only use it for ID when I wanted to buy beer. But that didn’t work, so here I am peddling around town on a bike.”
“I think you’re in pretty darn good shape for however old you claim to be.”
“Thank you, Guin, and I can say the same about you.”
“You can’t make me blush by telling me I’m in good shape. I know I’ve got a great body, but I lack … maturity,” she said as she laughed and dragged out the word maturity throwing her head back and accentuating one breast dramatically.
“That’s okay, I think I’ve got us both cove
red on that score. With my maturity and your body, we make a great pair.”
The rice and the veggies were soon ready, and they began rolling sushi, making bets on whose sushi would hold together the best.
“COPE says you’re dangerous. Sherwood says you’re an anarchist. He thinks you may be planning something.”
“I guess it all depends on your point of view, Guin. I’ve never considered myself dangerous, but my point of view is certainly uncommon enough these days that somebody entrenched in the establishment might view me as dangerous. As for anarchy, I have to plead ignorance on that one. I don’t know what this Sherwood guy means by that, but according to my understanding of the word, I wouldn’t call myself an anarchist. I believe in a strong constitution, but where I probably differ from Sherwood is that I believe in following the one we’ve got rather than inventing a new one just to suit my own purposes. My biggest sin is that I’m old fashioned, which used to be okay but now is illegal … or at least, unhealthy. I really can’t understand why I’m so important to this guy. I haven’t done anything, and I’m nobody. It sounds like Terra was a low profile person, too. I wonder if we’ll ever figure out why they got to her.”
“I don’t know, but it upsets me that it may be our own government behind all this stuff.”
“You’ve been working for CBS for two years now, haven’t you? Haven’t there been any other unusual things going on?”
“Please don’t take this the wrong way, Ted, but before you walked into my office the other day, I was totally in love with my job. I only had to deal with those moguls at the regional office about once a month, and even that wasn’t so bad until that creep, Sherwood, showed up a little while ago. And I can even tolerate him, except in person. I never had any of this cloak and dagger stuff to deal with until Sherwood got on your case. It’s been really exciting dealing with the University and the students and getting the political candidates to come and make appearances. What I’m seeing now is that there’s a whole other side to this politics business that I didn’t even know about.”
“And now that you’ve seen both sides, what do you think?” asked Elliott.
“But that’s the whole problem. I haven’t really seen both sides. I don’t know what I’ve seen. It’s confusing as hell. And then you come along with your new ideas.”
“But my ideas aren’t new, Guin. Yours are the new ones. I’m the dinosaur.”
“Well, they’re sure different from what I know and all the things I grew up with. I really felt good about what I’ve been doing and my role at CBS and the candidates I work for. And now, all of the sudden, there’s you and Sherwood and Terra and her secret files and anarchists and surveillance. What am I supposed to make of all that?”
“I wish I could help you understand,” Elliott said with a sigh, “but I’m even more on the outside than you are. I’ve isolated myself from all this nonsense for more years than you’ve even been alive. I wasn’t joking about being a dinosaur. I roamed the planet in prehistoric days when things were a whole lot different. I guess that’s why COPE feels threatened by us dinosaurs, because we’re not quite extinct yet.”
“You know, Ted, you still owe me the end of your science-fair story.”
Elliott stirred some wasabi into his soy sauce in silence. “I’ve never told this story to anyone. I hoped I’d forget it with time, but I remember every single detail … as much as I tried to forget. I’ve always hoped the people who witnessed my … disintegration, didn’t have as good a memory as mine. But I think the people who mean the most to me are cursed with quite excellent memories.”
Picking up a sushi roll delicately between two chopsticks, his gaze rose across the counter to meet Guinda’s. There was true fear in his eyes as he said, “Okay.” He began.