Flashmob

by Christopher Farnsworth

  Then the first dot-com crash hit, and the tech companies either collapsed or began firing people. Stack, with no degree and no contract, was one of the first people dumped in the layoffs.

  But Stack had already cashed out his options—later, he said he was just lucky, he’d been planning to buy a boat—and suddenly had a lot of free time on his hands. He started to play around with the idea of self-correcting, self-programming software, and began researching artificial intelligence.

  One day he noticed that he spent most of his time every morning clearing spam out of his inbox. There were spam filters out there, but they rarely seemed to work. Stack would get a spam email promising him an erection like an oak tree, and would click a button to add the sender to his spam filter. But the next morning, there would be a dozen more ads for herbal Viagra and horny housewives and six-pack abs. The spambots—automated software that churned out millions of messages per hour—were too prolific. The spam filters were not smart enough to catch every single cheap ad. Too many of them still looked like regular email.

  Stack began to wonder: How could he teach his spam filter to tell the difference between spam and real human communication?

  Six months later, he’d created an AI toolkit that stopped almost all spam from reaching his inbox. His software could distinguish between an email sent by a bot and a real person 99.9 percent of the time—a kind of reverse Turing test. He called it GNIRUT.

  Eighteen months later, Google bought GNIRUT for $500 million in stock and worked it into the next version of Gmail. Stack took half of the payout and invested it in a bunch of start-ups. At the time he said he felt guilty about having so much money and wanted to help other programmers get their ideas off the ground. One of those companies was Facebook.

  Today he’s worth about $5 billion. If he felt guilty about being rich before, I imagine he’s deeply tormented now.

  I had to admit, Vincent was probably right. He looked like a good candidate for the creator of Downvote.

  Aside from the lack of any proof.

  Of course, I could get that proof easily. All I had to do was get into a room with him. That was going to be the tricky part.

  I figured there were two options: a commando-style raid on his yacht, involving some kind of minisubmarine, or the direct approach.

  Even though I look pretty damn good in a wet suit, I figured the direct approach was easier. So I made a phone call first. I left a message with his attorneys in San Francisco, telling them I was looking into something that Mr. Stack might be able to help me with. Very polite and courteous.

  I didn’t expect a return call. I especially did not expect to hear from Stack himself.

  “John Smith?”

  “Speaking.”

  “This is Aaric Stack. I was hoping we could talk.”

  “Go ahead. I’m listening.”

  “I meant in person. I’d like to have a face-to-face meeting with you. In fact, I’ll pay you for your time. I’ll give you a hundred thousand as a retainer, up front, just for the meeting.”

  That, I admit, caught my attention.

  “I’m afraid I am already on a job, Mr. Stack, so I can’t take on any new clients at the moment.”

  “I know,” he said. “You’re working for Armin Sadeghi. You’re trying to find out who shot his daughter. How is she, by the way?”

  “She’s still in a medically induced coma, from what I hear,” I say. “In fact, that was what I wanted to talk to you about.”

  There was a long pause. “I know,” he said. “You want to ask me about Downvote.”

  I hesitated. There are times I really wish my talent worked over the phone. All I could think to ask was “What can you tell me about it?”

  He gave a heavy sigh. “Well,” he said, “I think I might be responsible for it.”

  So I said yes to the meeting. I drove up the Five and met Sara Fitch at a private helipad on the North Shore, where we got into Stack’s helicopter for the run out to the yacht.

  She’s wearing standard business attire, good bag, sensible shoes, minimal makeup. And the guns, of course.

  She’s been perfectly pleasant on the surface, but over and over in her head, she keeps thinking the same thing.

 

  Like I said before, she’s usually a lot sunnier than she feels right now. She’s one of those genuinely resilient, optimistic people who manage to bounce back from whatever hits her. I don’t meet too many of them. It’s an odd sensation for me. It’s like her mind has the faint scent of fresh linens.

  But she doesn’t see any silver lining here today. If it was up to her, we’d be doing this meeting over FaceTime. Or not at all.

  For her, it’s simple. Her job is to keep Stack safe. I am a potential threat to that safety, because I harbor the belief—possibly justified—that Stack helped create a situation that put a friend of mine in the hospital. And killed a half-dozen innocent people, and wounded almost two dozen more.

  I can sense the frustration coming off her like steam. I can’t blame her. If Stack were my client, I wouldn’t let someone like me within a hundred miles of him.

  But Stack insisted. He seems to think he can talk to me. Convince me. Or buy me.

  He’s still her boss. So despite her best instincts, we’re about to land on his yacht.

  I read about it, but even I was unprepared to see it in person—and I’ve spent a lot of time around rich people and their toys.

  For starters, “boat” doesn’t begin to describe it. Even the word “yacht” is too small. It’s more like a cruise ship. An aircraft carrier. Or, more accurately, a hotel put on its side and made to float.

  It’s 460 feet long—or about forty-three stories, which is the same height as Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. There are two helipads on deck, and an Olympic-size swimming pool. And, like a baby nestled in the arms of its mother, there’s a smaller yacht—a mere forty-footer—docked at the back of the Nautilus. I’ve read that the entire thing can be steered from a flat black touchscreen the size of an iPad; the usual captain and crew have been replaced by fully automated systems run by a software engine designed by Stack himself.

  It looks invulnerable. You can see nothing but ocean for miles in any direction. From here, Stack could fire up his engines and head for any number of nonextradition treaty countries. Or he could just stay out here, floating in luxury.

  Still, having been involved in more than a few black-bag renditions, I know there’s nothing that would really stop the government from just grabbing Stack if it wants. The Justice Department can always drop a team of U.S. marshals on his deck, put him in cuffs, and then argue the legal niceties later.

  A guy as smart as Stack has to know this too. He must realize he can’t bob out here in the surf forever.

  Which is probably one big reason I’m here.

  He needs a solution before the sharks come to get him.

  The helicopter lands on the Nautilus’s forward pad like it’s been drawn in on a string. Not an easy trick in the middle of the ocean. Whatever Stack’s paying the pilot, it’s not enough. Sara exits the chopper ahead of me, but waits to escort me down the staircase into the yacht’s lounge.

  That’s when she decides to frisk me. “Raise your arms, please,” she says.

  I try not to take it personally, but I also want to establish some boundaries.

  “You know, you invited me.”

  That stops her in her tracks. “I didn’t,” she says shortly. “Aaric did.”

  “Figure of speech. What I meant was, if you really don’t want me here, I don’t have to be here.”

  She hesitates. Her job is to control the situation, and she’s given up a lot already. She considers saying fuck it and canceling the meeting altogether.

  But this is what Stack wants, and she told him she’d do her best to make it happen. It’s more than an order from a boss. It’s actual trust. She believes he knows what he i
s doing.

  She steps back slightly. Raises her hands in surrender.

  And she gives me a warning.

  “You had better not hurt him,” she says. There is something plaintive and vulnerable in it. I don’t get a single note of sexual attachment or romantic feeling from her—she is not involved with Stack that way—but this is more than professional for her.

  I don’t remember ever having this much affection for any of my clients, and I am actually a little envious. Stack has risen a notch in my estimation if he can inspire this kind of feeling. It’s nice to be reminded that for some people, loyalty is more than a paycheck.

  Not that it will slow me down if he had anything to do with the attack on Kira, of course.

  I give her my best smile and say, “You have nothing to worry about.”

  That does nothing to put her mind at ease. She thinks about her guns again. Then begins leading me toward her boss.

  Despite what I’ve read, the Nautilus isn’t entirely unmanned. There are casually dressed crew members waiting for us. They keep an easy distance. They’ve got smiles on their faces, but I can see that Sara has briefed them to watch out for me. They’re ready to jump at me if she gives the word.

  Sara walks me past them, keeping her hands free, tension ratcheted up inside.

  I get a good look around the Nautilus. It’s massive, and massively impressive. Being inside feels like getting hit with a gilded hammer over and over. Sara walks me past a formal dining room, a small movie theater, a library lined floor to ceiling with books, and a racquetball court. Off to one side is what can only be called a trophy room. I get a glimpse of geek treasures like Captain America’s shield, a portal gun, the Right Hand of Doom, a transporter pod. It’s the only area on the boat that seems to have any personality. Everything else looks like it was ordered straight out of a decorator’s catalog.

  We turn down another corridor, and then Sara comes to a surprisingly small and ordinary-looking door. She presses a button on the wall. There’s a chime, and a voice from the other side says, “Come in.”

  Despite the yacht’s size, Stack’s office is tiny—a little round room crammed to capacity with computers, screens, cables, and, behind a curved table that circles him like a belt, Stack himself.

  I do my best to cover my surprise, but Stack has changed drastically from the pictures I’ve seen. The photos that accompany his Wikipedia page and news articles showed a typical geek: soft in the middle and around the edges, a smiling round face on a doughy body.

  Now he looks like a walking skeleton. He has burned himself down to a wire-frame version of his former self, all sharp angles and hollow cheekbones. His formerly frizzy hair is shaved to stubble on his scalp, and his neck looks like a pipe cleaner supporting his head.

  He is starving. Hunger has become his default state. I feel a void the size of a bowling ball in his stomach. There is half of a single protein bar on the desk next to him. He takes a small nibble and folds it in its wrapper again. He feels a thrill of victory and control as he swallows, even as the void inside him echoes with even greater hunger. He stands and greets us, smiling.

  Sara approaches the desk and leans over to kiss him on the cheek. He smiles even more widely, and I get pure affection for her coming from him. Nothing sexual, which I find odd because, well, I’ve seen her. In most straight men, it’s never far from our thoughts. But that part of him seems to be buried deep.

  She introduces me, and Stack offers his hand. We shake, and it’s like holding a handful of pencils. I scan him, like I do most people when we first meet.

  I get the slightly dizzying impression of a stratosphere-high IQ. He’s not the first genius I’ve met, and I’ve learned the hard way that I might be able to read their minds, but I can’t always understand them. However, their actual memories and feelings are usually much easier. Nobody’s very smart when it comes down to the raw emotions curled up close to the limbic system, where we’re all still reeling between our hurts and wants and needs, some going back to infancy.

  For the most part, Stack is calm. I met a billionaire investor and software designer not too long ago whose mind was like a deep freeze, all cold calculation. Stack is a big stuffed teddy bear compared to him. He uses his considerable intellect to focus on the here and now, to anchor himself in the present moment.

  Still, I can see an old scab, way down deep. I know better than to pick at it, but along with the hunger and the design of the room, his damage is pretty obvious.

  Sara takes a post by the door. She has no intention of leaving. Standard bodyguard protocol: never leave the client unattended.

  Stack smiles at her. “It’s okay,” he says. “You can go.”

  “No,” she says. “I can’t.”

  Stack is flattered. But he’s not worried. He laughs. “I told Sara you probably wouldn’t try to kill me until after you’d heard my offer,” he says. “Otherwise, how would you get paid?” He waves her away. “It’s fine. Really. Give us a minute.”

  Sara bristles at being both dismissed and discussed between the two men as if she wasn’t in the room.

  “It’s a bad idea,” she says to Stack.

  I stay quiet. I could easily say something smartass—and honest—here about how I’m already close enough to do whatever damage I want. But I get no fear from Stack. No trace of a guilty conscience. If anything, he seems to want to be helpful. So I don’t want to antagonize either of them.

  Sara fights with herself for another moment, then gives me a warning look. “Behave,” she says, and points a finger at me. Then she leaves.

  Once the door is closed, Stack shrugs in a sort of apology. “She takes my safety a lot more seriously than I do,” he says.

  “You should be grateful,” I say, meaning it. “That’s going to keep you alive.”

  He smiles again. “Yeah, well, we’ll see,” he says. He’s thinking of federal prison, mainly, but I still don’t get any guilt. Just a kind of resignation.

  Then he waves me to the only other seat, a simple chair that could have been bought in bulk at IKEA. I sit down.

  “Thank you for coming,” he says. He is bright and cheerful, despite the problems mounting for him back onshore.

  “Like you said, you’re paying for it,” I tell him.

  He nods. “I want you to know something right up front,” he says. “I know about you.”

  By which he means he’s heard about me, and my abilities. And my reputation.

  That makes sense. I get most of my work by word of mouth and gossip among people in Stack’s tax bracket. Some of them start out skeptical, but I’ve got a fairly convincing track record.

  “So you know what I can do.”

  “I’ve heard about it,” he says. “I’ve even seen a copy of your CIA file.”

  “You know, the word ‘classified’ just doesn’t mean what it used to.”

  “Come on. You are one of the covert world’s worst-kept secrets. There are guys who pass your file around like it’s a bootleg copy of the next Marvel script. You can’t be surprised.”

  I can’t say I am. The truth about me—and the operatives like me, Cantrell’s other special-ed kids—has been out there for years. There have been books, magazine articles, documentaries, cable TV specials, even congressional hearings: the truth about America’s psychic soldier program, revealed at last. If you look hard enough, you can find the line items on the budgets that funded us.

  But nobody believes it’s true. Serious grown-ups aren’t supposed to believe in ESP, even if they check their horoscopes every day. It’s a kind of built-in cover. And for my clients, it’s a kind of additional layer of exclusivity. They get firsthand knowledge of something that the common herd thinks is nothing more than an urban legend.

  The smile fades. “I hope you don’t mind,” he says, “but I would like to conduct a small—well, I hate to use the word ‘test,’ but—”

  “You want to make sure I really can do what I say I can do.”

  “Ex
actly. I hope you’ll understand it’s not a lack of trust. I am genuinely fascinated as to how someone like you works. So I’ve designed a simple protocol that should establish a baseline by which—”

  I’m sure he has. He loves doing stuff like that. But we’ve both got better things to do. So I skip ahead.

  “I could tell you that you were playing a beta of a new game from a friend of yours at Blizzard before I entered the room. Gaming always relaxes you before a big meeting. Or I could give you the name of the lawyer who called you this morning to discuss the latest developments with the federal case—he was supposed to call at ten, but he was almost twenty minutes late—and I could tell you he said that the judge is leaning toward forcing you to make a personal appearance.”

  Stack looks surprised, but reflexively comes up with alternative explanations. He’s about to mouth those objections out loud. He really wants to use his test protocol.

  “But if that doesn’t convince you, I could always tell you what happened when you were five years old,” I say.

  Stack recoils as much as he is able behind the desk in the small space.

  Tears well up in his eyes, and I get a sharp, painful glimpse of the wound deep in his core. He has done something wrong. He has been banned from the family table again and shut in a dark room. There are footsteps in the hallway, and I can feel his fear and dread as the door opens and his father is silhouetted in the light from the hall—

  And then he slams it shut before any more memories can intrude. He breathes in deeply, practicing techniques he’s learned from a dozen therapists and yoga instructors and gurus.

  “I’d really rather not,” I tell him.