Cole Perriman's Terminal Games

by Wim Coleman

  All of the attendees wore business suits, although she couldn’t tell if they were male or female. A strong light fell on briefcases in front of each figure, but their faces were still in darkness. That didn’t matter. The figure at the head of the table was the one she wanted to see. Surely Auggie would be the chairman of any meeting he attended. She strained forward. It was as though she was drifting through space, moving closer and closer to the figure. She became aware of small square dots—pixels hanging in the air, forming the shadows and the images that appeared before her. She was frightened, breathing hard, convinced she was about to see the face of Renee’s murderer.

  Suddenly, right in front of her eyes, the pixels coalesced into an image. But it was the white face with the grinning red mouth, the mask of the clown. His dark eyes stared straight at her. Then Marianne gasped as she realized that she was not here as Elfie. She was Marianne. It was her own undisguised face that she was revealing to the clown.

  Terror overwhelmed her and she whirled around to flee. Now the light fell on the other faces at the table, and they were all the face of the clown. They were all shaking with merriment. The harsh laugh of the clown was coming at her from all directions. Then the scene swept away into a vortex of color, and the sound of laughter faded away into the distance. Marianne lay awake and stared at the ceiling of her room.

  *

  Nolan called again on Saturday. This time, he sounded exasperated.

  “You’re not gonna believe this,” he said. “We got another connection for Auggie last night. The second one was in Detroit.”

  “I don’t understand,” Marianne said. “I thought you said he was calling from an Atlanta number.”

  “He was. At least according to Pritchard and Maisie’s caller ID box. Then, about an hour after I talked to you, they call me back and say he’s logged on from a different location.”

  “So what’s going on?”

  “I don’t know what to make of it. They said Auggie disappeared for a while. They thought he had logged off.”

  “He said he had to go to a meeting. Then he just vanished.”

  “Yeah, they had that. They’re recording everything that happens on the screen when he’s on. But apparently he came back about thirty minutes later. And the caller ID box picked up the second number.”

  “Whose numbers were they?”

  “Well, we’ve got some data on them. The connection in Atlanta belongs to a woman—a lawyer with one of the bigger legal firms down there. The one in Detroit’s a man, head of his own manufacturing company. They’re both Insomnimania members.”

  “Can’t you get the woman to take a DNA test?”

  “Not unless we have some evidence that she was here. We’d have to link her to the crime.”

  Marianne groaned with frustration. “So what do you think it is? Some kind of Auggie club?”

  “We put Clayton on the telephone this morning, gave both of these people a nice polite customer service call, asked how they liked Insomnimania, asked who in their household had logged on as Auggie last night. They both denied ever logging on as Auggie. Said they had different alters. Said if someone was charging calls to their number, they probably wouldn’t notice, they use Insomnimania a lot, also use other networks, and so on.”

  Marianne felt a sudden small shock as she remembered her strange dream of the night before. Was there more than one Auggie? Was the nightmare coming true?

  Nolan was still talking, speaking more softly now.

  “Christ, I’m in over my head,” he said.

  “You’re not in there alone,” Marianne said.

  “Thank God for that.”

  “When can we get together?”

  “I’d sure like to see you this weekend,” Nolan said. “But it looks like I’m gonna be tied up here. I’ve gotta talk with the homicide bureaus in both Atlanta and Detroit, somehow explain this whole thing to them. I want to see if we can get a phone tap or a search warrant. I’ve got to do something to keep tabs on these people.”

  “I miss you,” Marianne said, a bit shakily. She realized that she was terrified, but she tried to keep the fear out of her voice.

  “I miss you, too,” he said. “I’m sorry I can’t come up there.”

  “Don’t he ridiculous,” she said. “One of us has to catch Renee’s killer.”

  But which one of us?

  *

  At 1:18 Sunday morning, one of Insomnimania’s smaller terminals suddenly burst out with a few tinkly bars of music.

  “What the fuck is that?” Pritchard demanded.

  “‘The Daring Young Man on the Flying Trapeze,’” said Maisie, putting down his comic book.

  “You gonna tell me why?”

  “If I recall, it was you who suggested I set up a signal when Auggie comes on.”

  “You mean it’s gonna play that stupid little tune every time the clown shows up?”

  “It got your attention, didn’t it?”

  Pritchard made no audible response, so Maisie turned his attention to his other preparations for tracking Auggie. A number of things had already happened automatically: the signaling computer recorded the time; a number came up on the caller ID box and was also recorded; and in the big VAX, a program went into effect to capture Auggie’s every sound, word, and action.

  “But lookit this here,” Maisie said. “That ain’t the same as either phone number we got last night.”

  Ned Pritchard looked over at the caller ID box. “That’s a New York number. Last night it was Atlanta and Detroit.”

  “Looks like our guy is some kinda wizard, all right. I sure hate to think that. We don’t need to get into any war with any wizard.”

  Maisie then got Insomnimania up on another terminal and started a program that would simply record everything that happened on that screen, including the activities of the other alters in Auggie’s vicinity. Now, they could see that Auggie had just stepped through the swinging doors into Ernie’s Bar, and that Marianne already had Elfie waiting in the bar. Apparently the lady was planning to do some more sleuthing. Both hackers sat hunched forward, watching the barroom action.

  “I got a little theory for you,” said Pritchard, snarfing down a Snickers bar with one hand while dexterously unwrapping a Tootsie Roll with the other.

  “Shoot,” said Baldwin Maisie.

  “We’ve got a virus on our hands.”

  “Auggie? A virus? Nah, Pritch. This is just more of your compulsive optimism. You love viruses. And you want to believe we’re witnessing some sort of quantum breakthrough in both artificial intelligence and artificial life.”

  “Either that or a wizard so good even we can’t even figure out what he’s doing,” said Pritchard. “What else could it be?”

  “So we’re talking about a virus with a funny hat and a big red nose,” snorted Maisie. “We’re talking about a virus who carries on sophisticated conversation and likes martinis. We’re talking about a virus with a better social life than we’ve got.”

  “I’ve got news for you, Mais,” said Pritchard ruefully. “All viruses’ve got better social lives than we’ve got. I can’t think of any earthly organism—virtual or real—which gets laid less often that the both of us put together. Can you?”

  Maisie squinted at the screen, ‘Nawwww,” he said incredulously. “It can’t be. Just can’t be.”

  “Why not?”

  “C’mon, Pritch. You ever carried on a conversation with a virus?”

  “I’ve come close.”

  “Only in your stonedest dreams. If Auggie’s a virus, he could pass the fucking Turing Test. Hell, he’s been passing it for months now.”

  “The Turing Test is no big deal—just fooling somebody into thinking they’re talking by computer to a conscious being. Either of us could pass it.”r />
  “Yeah, but we are human.”

  “A lot of humans would disagree with you. If killer geeks like us can pass the Turing Test, it doesn’t say too fucking much for consciousness does it?”

  Pritchard leaned back in his chair and munched away, unaware as usual that his face was getting outrageously smeared with chocolate.

  Maisie tilted his head bemusedly. “So how do you figure Auggie’s a virus?” he asked.

  “Well, you and me’ve got this big assed network, right? Suppose one day, some enterprising dork comes along and drops this cartoon character named Auggie into our game. Only this Auggie’s not like all the rest of our cartoon alters. His program’s like a windup doll. He doesn’t even require a user to get around and cause all sorts of trouble, which makes him like a virus. But as has been already noted, this particular windup doll knows how to pick up chicks in Ernie’s Bar and fuck them in the Pleasure Dome, making him considerably smarter than we are.”

  Maisie chuckled wholeheartedly. “Pritch, I take my hat off to you,” he said. “That has to be the most preposterous, inane, and weird-assed idea you’ve come up with all day.”

  “Thank you,” replied Pritchard graciously. “I try.”

  Then Pritchard sat silently staring at the waiting little elf in the computer bar. Maisie watched him with interest. The spiel about viruses was the kind of nonsense Pritchard often babbled when he was actually formulating a different theory altogether—something he didn’t yet want to talk about.

  I wonder what he’s really thinking?

  In the meantime, Pritchard just kept staring at the screen. It wasn’t often that Pritchard just sat in front of a computer monitor looking at nothing in particular. He was normally the kind of guy who liked to be doing something.

  Something’s goin’ on in there. And it ain’t no fucking virus.

  *

  As soon as Auggie entered the bar, he was again besieged with admirers. Marianne knew that Elfie had caught the clown’s attention last night and hoped that he would remember her. Tonight, she intended to get to know him, to get him to confide in Elfie as a friend. She would throw herself more wholeheartedly into the cyberworld.

  To Marianne’s surprise and delight, Auggie came directly to the table where Elfie was sitting and greeted her like an old friend. He sat down across from her and ordered a bottle of champagne and two glasses. Marianne felt almost as if she were being courted, although Auggie was carrying on nothing more than the lightest of social conversation.

  What is he waiting for? Perhaps for Elfie to say something interesting. You’re onstage again.

  Elfie sipped from her champagne goblet, smiling at the clown. Auggie traded banter with others in the crowd. All the typed conversations in the bar raced by over their heads, making Marianne somewhat drowsy. She actually thought she could begin to feel the effects of the drinks. The colors in the bar around them seemed muted. She looked at Auggie. The clown seemed rounded, three-dimensional. Sleepily, she typed.

  l-fy>this is a lively place. such a variety of people.

  awgy>most uv them don’t hv much 2 sa. i lik 2 find jst one ntresting person to talk 2.

  l-fy>but lok at al the difrent kinds of beings here. evry shape and color—humns, brds, animls, fsh—kinds of creatures i’ve never seen before.

  Marianne was again reading both sides of the dialogue aloud, and she noticed with satisfaction that tonight the technique was working very well—it quickly became easy to convince herself that she actually heard Auggie’s voice. And now even the chatter at the surrounding tables was quite audible, although subdued. Marianne smiled.

  “Insomnimaniacs are so wonderfully creative, don’t you think?” Elfie said.

  Auggie looked around the bar. “Looks like the same old Saturday night crowd to me. I think you’re still wet behind those big green ears, little elf.”

  “But it’s exciting to realize we’re actually talking to people who are far apart, in many different places,” Elfie persisted. “Where are you really, Auggie?”

  The clown stared at her silently for a moment. Marianne’s heart raced. Had she moved too quickly, making Auggie suspicious? She braced herself for one of the temper tantrums she had seen him throw with Sapphire. But then the clown spoke to Elfie very gently.

  “I’m right here, Elfie. Just like you are. Just like all these others are. Otherwise we couldn’t be carrying on this conversation.”

  Marianne made one more try. “But that’s because of the network,” Elfie said. She leaned forward over the table, speaking confidentially. “I’m in California, Auggie. I’m in California and I’m talking to you, but I don’t know if you’re actually even in the same state with me.”

  “California is merely a superstition,” Auggie said condescendingly. “I thought you were more sophisticated than that.” Then the clown reached out his gloved hand and put it next to hers on the table. “See how close we are? This is actual—the two of us together. Why do you speak of distance between us? You make me sad, Elfie, pretending that you are not right here with me.”

  Marianne didn’t know what to say. Clearly Auggie was going to stay clear of the issue. He was not going to discuss the location of his operator.

  “Maybe it just seems impressive to me because I’m new here,” Elfie said. “I hear that you and my friend Gargantua have both been around a long time.”

  “Oh, I could tell you tales of Ernie’s before there were so many people—and before there were so many rules. Ten years or so ago, this was a very exciting place. Now it’s really getting too tame.”

  “Auggie, stop being silly,” Elfie said. “You can’t possibly remember things that happened here ten years ago. Remember, the network’s only been online six months.”

  “Ah, then you are a creationist,” remarked Auggie with a somewhat patronizing grin.

  “A what?”

  “Oh, come on. Don’t be evasive. You’re one of those superstitious, antiscientific holdouts who still believe in fairy tales. You think our whole world exists in some sort of vast machine controlled by gigantic super-creatures. You believe that matter, energy, space, the vastness of time, and even information itself are all just—how do you say it?—‘virtual.’”

  “I wouldn’t put it quite that way.”

  “How would you put it?”

  She didn’t know what to say. This was obviously some elaborate game that Auggie was playing, but she had no idea how to play along.

  “Come with me,” Auggie said with a jaunty wave.

  “Where?”

  “Just come along.”

  The two of them left Ernie’s Bar and entered the maze. Elfie followed Auggie through corridor after twisting corridor. It seemed to Marianne that they wandered there for a long time. In fact, she thought that she might have even dozed off for a moment of the journey. She shook her head to wake herself up and refocused her attention on the screen.

  Auggie and Elfie had arrived at an icon she had never before investigated, labeled “Planetarium.” Together, they clicked it and found themselves squarely in front of a huge pair of wooden doors bearing a sign: HANS PFAAL MEMORIAL PLANETARIUM. The doors opened with a noisy creak. Auggie and Elfie walked inside, taking seats in the otherwise empty circular auditorium.

  The high-domed screen was blank at first. But soon the lights went down, plunging Auggie and Elfie into blackness. Shimmering music began to play—a tinny, electronic rendition of Debussy or Ravel. The darkened screen was gradually peppered with a wilderness of multicolored stars, planets, and galaxies. The stars glittered and twinkled wildly.

  “There, see that one?” whispered Auggie, pointing to a particularly bright spot on the planetarium ceiling. “That’s Alpha Centauri, the nearest star in the sky. Its light has been on its way here for more than four years. Light from countless other stars ha
s taken untold ages to reach us. Scientists have proven it. And yet you claim that this whole universe has only been in existence for six months!”

  “But this is crazy! These aren’t even real stars! They’re only simulations—in a simulated planetarium!”

  Auggie chuckled resignedly. “Oh, yes,” he murmured. “I’ve heard that before.”

  “I’ve seen real stars,” Elfie cried petulantly. “I’ve seen the night sky.”

  “A sky outside this sky, eh? A sky outside this world of ours?”

  “Of course I have.”

  “You? Little Elfie? You really expect me to believe that you’ve visited a realm beyond this one?”

  This is ridiculous. He’s just having a good laugh at my expense. Why am I letting myself get all carried away?

  Perhaps it was because Auggie seemed so insufferably sincere. Whatever the reason, she found herself unable to control a torrent of inane questions.

  “If there’s no other reality, why are we called ‘alters’? Why did we reach this place through a ‘desktop’? And what about keyboard commands—changing views on the screen, moving this way and that? What does everyone mean by such talk?”

  “Figures of speech,” said Auggie with a shrug. “You’re too literal-minded. It’s time you learned to think metaphorically. Oh, I know it’s comforting to imagine there’s some sort of omnipotent puppeteer out there, granting purpose and direction to our lives. But there’s not. We’re on our own. Any sensible, thinking entity can see that.”

  “Who are you?” Elfie blurted.

  Auggie’s face seemed to take on a more menacing look. Marianne’s hands drew hack from the keyboard.

  “Oh, God.” Marianne whispered. “She’s gone too far. I’ve let her go too far.”

  Then Auggie leaned toward Elfie and spoke.

  “Who am I?” he repeated. “I am what I am. Who do you think I am? You silly elf, why do you make everything so complicated? I’m me. I’m Auggie. Why don’t you just pay attention to your own two eyes?”

  Without waiting for a reply, he vanished into thin air, leaving Elfie alone in the planetarium. Marianne let out a discouraged sigh.