The Hunt for Pierre Jnr

by David M Henley

  Pete was somewhat comforted by the obvious affection the big man had for the thing. He was the type who had been connected to a symbiot all his life. For him it was as natural as breathing, or growing a beard.

  Pale red numbers were displayed along the skin of the bot, and Pete realised it was giving him the time: 10.13 a.m.

  ‘Right.’ Geof clapped his hands. ‘Have you two eaten already?’

  ~ * ~

  Geof refused the Serviceman’s breakfast and insisted they find a real meal. Now that Pete was locked to a symbiot, there was nowhere in the world he could go without Services knowing about it. After a meander in a squib, they ended up at a franchise Geof was fond of for its paisley decor and generous helpings.

  ‘Pete, when it comes to keeping your energy up for your new beast, think flapjacks and syrup. You can always tell a weaver from what they eat for breakfast.’ The man had a likeable manner, and Pete relaxed. The situation wasn’t as oppressive as it had seemed.

  Geof ordered not only a triple serve of pancakes but also a steady stream of side-orders that soon dammed up on the tabletop. Though Pete’s new colleague was built like a nineteenth-century lumberjack, the amount of food he’d consumed and the amount still on the table before him was intimidating. Pete could only lift one arm, and the constant reminder of the crawling bot took away his appetite. ‘How can you eat that much?’

  ‘I’m eating for two,’ Geof laughed, tapping the crust of the symbiot that reached up from the neck of his shirt. ‘You’ll find you need to eat more as well, though yours is a fair bit smaller than mine.’

  Stuffing one last forkful of pancakes into his mouth, he stood up and lifted his shirt to reveal his back. It was all bot. A two-inch layer of matt black lamella disappeared into his trousers and stretched over his shoulders, triceps and the rear hemisphere of his head.

  Can you hear me? Geof thought to himself.

  Pete nodded.

  But you can’t project?

  If there is need.

  ‘So you’re not just a tapper then. Still ...’ Geof hesitated, thinking in the way that weavers do, their thoughts travelling along the world’s information channels before returning to the brain. ‘I’m not quite sure why you’re considered to be so dangerous.’

  Pete watched Geof finish his second plate of pancakes, folding syrupy loads into his mouth and wiping the dish clean with his finger before leaning back and dabbing at the syrup on his beard with a napkin.

  ‘Well, let’s get this over with then. You dive in while I digest a moment.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Come on. We’re going to work together, aren’t we? You’re going to tap my brain sooner or later, I imagine, so let’s make you sure that I’m not keeping any secrets from you. We need to trust each other.’

  Geof reclined, catching the sunlight across his face and relaxing himself for Pete to explore his mind. Pete had never encountered someone so blasé about having his or her brain tapped. It was unsettling, but he leant forward and concentrated on the buzz of the big man’s mind.

  ‘Where were you born?’ A question that usually took someone back to their childhood. The earliest memory Pete could see was of a simple white building, tucked into a foothill covered in conifer trees; similar housing was scattered nearby.

  ‘I don’t know. I grew up in Yellowstone. I wasn’t born there, but I don’t remember anywhere before then.’ The white building was part of a Services cluster, hothousing weavers in a competitive environment. ‘Science was my mother and the Services my father. That’s what we were taught.’

  ‘But you still had a mother and father?’

  ‘No, not really. The zygote I once was would have been generations beyond the original sperm and egg, and each step would have been resequenced. If you go by genetics alone, I don’t have any relatives.’

  ‘One of a kind then?’

  ‘Probably not that either.’

  Geof Ozenbach had been working in the data for the last thirteen years, seeking and developing ways to interpret the mountains of information that circulated the Weave, especially investigating methods to detect psis and other off-gridders. He was currently the most qualified weaver to work with Pete on finding Earth’s most wanted child.

  ‘How can you detect a psi through the Weave?’ Pete prompted. Even though Geof’s mind was extremely well ordered, it always helped when tapping to usher people to think about what you needed them to. Otherwise you would have to become actively invasive, which was painful for the victim and somewhat risky for the interrogator.

  Terms and concepts floated up that Pete couldn’t understand. Anomalies, breaches, greys, patches, black holes ... direct detection.

  ‘I might have to get you to explain those better for me.’

  ‘Another time. These aren’t exact sciences, mere theory. But the World Union is always pushing for Parity and one of their reasons is to get rid of the places psis can hide.’ Geof smirked. It would do no good. There may be gaps in the Weave for people to hide, but that also means we know where to look. Parity would get rid of the grey areas, maybe scoop up the lesser psis, but the big fish would go into deeper hiding. Real threats always find a way, and the strongest psis could just use surrogates to avoid directly using the Weave. Pushing them to extremes will only make them more powerful.

  ‘You’re an interesting man.’

  ‘I’m glad you think so.’

  In a strange parallel to Pete’s probing, Geof was mining the available data on his new colleague, scanning the official and unofficial records regarding the non-Citizen Peter Lazarus. Pete observed this process with some fascination, not only a little shocked at the speed with which Geof processed the stream, but also at the content. He’d never known how close Services had come to capturing him.

  Geof broke his concentration. ‘I still can’t see why you’re ranked at the threat level you are, Pete. No offence, but you’re just a reader who hasn’t even attempted any manipulation for personal ...’ Geof’s voice trailed off as he figured it out. Pete was tagged as an alpha-type, a born leader.

  ‘I have no intention —’

  ‘Of course not.’

  Pete smiled. ‘Isn’t there a contradiction at work when we don’t wish our enemies to share the very traits we deem valuable?’

  You’re not my enemy. Geof thought these words three times to make sure Pete received the message. Out loud, he covered, ‘Let me show you what I’ve been working on.’

  Geof’s vision went in and out of focus as he concentrated; whenever he was immersed in the Weave, he glazed over as if probing an old memory. When talking to Pete, he flicked between watching what was before him and visualising the data flowing from his symbiot. Of course, he could still see what was before his eyes, but it was peripheral. As his gaze focused and defocused, datastreams bounced to Pete’s symb, crowding into a reading pile.

  ‘You see, in the Weave there are anomalies and then there are abnormalities. Anomalies we get used to, they’re patterns we see again and again. Some we can identify, others not, but we’re used to them. Abnormalities, though, are more kinky. They are sporadic and spiky. You understand me?’

  ‘I’m trying to.’ Pete floated over Geof’s inner eye, but only saw images of digital sunsets and wire-frame landscapes. ‘I don’t understand what I’m seeing.’

  ‘I’m showing you some common visualisations. You can do anything with data. Most of our information is number-based, or we can attribute values along any parameters we like and in this way create an image that we can then adjust with filters and tweaking until patterns emerge. There’s too much data to search the Weave by hand, so we have to use different techniques to get overviews that react usefully to the flow of information. You with me yet?’

  The look on Pete’s face was enough for him to continue.

  ‘Okay, graphs are a simplistic data visualisation, and that’s where it starts — ways to compare data that work with our innate b
ias toward visual stimuli. Like we use the analogy of the Weave for the combined Earth networks because we can only understand it that way. Strands of information that go from one point to another. They overlap. They interact. But it’s not woven — that implies a neatness that doesn’t exist on any level. When we add in all available information, it becomes a visual mess we can’t possibly interpret, but by using abstractions we can turn the data into something we can see. We set conditions to limit the data and calibrate different patterns into focus. That’s only part one. After you’ve found a pattern, then you have to figure out what it is that’s going on, whether it’s spending patterns, weather impacts or an amusing joke that’s being passed around. A lot of the time the patterns are unidentifiable.’

  ‘You’ve lost me.’

  ‘It’s not important. This is what I do. It’d help you to understand, but, then again, I don’t understand what you do.’

  ‘I feel there may be some similarities.’

  ‘Let’s talk about you,’ Geof suggested, while ordering milkshakes for them both. ‘Natural-born psionic, son of a Services Sergeant ... lived without confirmed suspicion until the age of thirteen. When did you start questioning?’

  ‘When I was eight. I kept hearing others’ suspicions about me, in my head. Eventually I had to wonder if they were right.’

  ‘So you were in limbo for over four years?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘That’s what we call the time between when Services suspect a Citizen and when the subjects themselves suspect. You were on your own there for a fair while.’ What changed between you and the world in that time?

  ‘How long do most last?’

  ‘Hours mostly. They start giving themselves away pretty quickly.’

  ‘Are we ...?’ Pete paused, a little reluctant to ask. ‘Are we talking about what I think we’re talking about?’

  ‘You’re the psychic.’

  Pete leafed through the pages of Geof’s mind, watching story after story of boys and girls caught out receiving extra desserts without asking, and beneficial, sometimes harmless, accidents befalling those around them. ‘This is how you catch us? Hunt us down? I don’t know how you live with yourself.’

  You know exactly how I live with myself. ’I’m not the one who brings them in at least. You can look forward to that one.’ She’s a humdinger.

  ‘Great.’

  ‘Who did you think they’d send, Pete? If you thought you’d get the Flies With Honey Brigade, you should have thought harder. Services is amuck, my friend. Normally you’d be botbolted and dropped on the islands. The fact that you’re not says they’re willing to accept help, even from you.’

  Of their third team member, who was finishing up her current assignment in Omskya, STOC, Pete gathered little information. His symb revealed no record of her, Pinter knew her only as the top anti-psi operative and Geof had only ever worked with her by proxy.

  ‘I’ve run for her a few times. She’s the best on the ground I’ve been teamed with.’ What Geof didn’t say aloud was that he found her cold and abrupt. ‘If you need any more reassurance that Services consider Pierre Jnr a threat, putting her on the job carries some weight.’ She’s ruthless, Pete. She hunts you guys down for sport.

  ~ * ~

  A week passed with Geof and Pete working in close consultation for the majority of their waking hours. They discussed at length the problem of finding and tracking their target, and Geof trained Pete to work with his symbiot, beginning with the most basic call and response exercises.

  Geof: Pete. Pete. Pete.

  ‘I think I’m hearing that. It’s not like hearing it though.’

  ‘I know the difference, Pete. Try responding.’

  ‘Did that work?’

  Geof: No.

  ‘No?’

  ‘No,’ Geof confirmed. ‘I wouldn’t lie to you. Any setback would be more annoying for me than for you.’ Pete had already felt the mild frustration Geof felt, but suppressed, with those of lesser tech proficiency. ‘Let’s try a little call and response. I’ll send “tick”, to which you respond “tock”. Okay?’

  ‘I’m ready.’

  Geof: Tick ... Tick.

  ‘I’m trying.’

  Geof: Tick.

  Pete: Tock.

  Geof: Tick.

  Pete: Tock.

  ‘At last! Let’s eat to celebrate.’

  ~ * ~

  Tamsin Grey arrived on a Sunday and the hunt began in earnest.

  There were few other patrons in their usual diner that day. A pair of youths sat at the window, plugged in and blind. They barely moved, aside from lifting squeeze-pack drinks to their lips. Two servitors rolled back and forth from the prep room. There was an older man at the back, and a woman of thirty whose table Pete, Geof and Pinter had sat near. She wore all darks with a strapped-in corset and was quite fetching. Geof had subconsciously chosen to sit where he could idly view her eating. The Colonel and Pete sat opposite and watched the entrance. Pete still found the symb cumbersome and he had to use his other arm to lift it up to the table and rest it there.

  ‘Don’t worry, Pete. It’ll feel just like normal soon. Just give it another week for your body to adjust. You hungry? No? You’ve got to learn to eat. These things take a lot out of you, even when you’re not using them.’

  ‘Order me a caf, Ozenbach.’

  ‘Certainly, Colonel. Pete, you should try and order for yourself. Perhaps some Pavlovian conditioning will help you get the hang of it.’

  ‘Tock.’

  Conversation quickly turned back to Pierre Jnr. It seemed the more they talked about him, the more of a mystery he became.

  ‘We must try to understand him. What is he like? What is he after?’ Pete questioned Geof. Pinter usually nodded off at this point in the discussions.

  ‘For a start, I think we have to stop thinking of him as a child. From a learning standpoint he isn’t like us. Humans learn one piece of data at a time, one thing connected to another. This kid, from what I understand, is an information sponge. He takes on data like the Weave does: linearly, yes, but so quickly it is effectively instantaneous. If he walks past someone, he can know what they know, right?’

  ‘But can he take on skills?’ Pete asked.

  ‘Maybe, but he doesn’t need to. This kid controls. If he needs a squib, he controls the driver.’

  ‘Of course. But he still must have the development level of an eight-year-old boy. The same level of processing.’

  ‘Why? Nothing about Pierre is normal. Not how he was born, not how he was raised, and not how he’s developing.’

  ‘You’re right. You’re right.’ Pete threw up his hands. ‘We should talk to his mother.’

  ‘Colonel, can that be arranged? Colonel?’ Geof raised his voice to rouse the snoring man.

  ‘What? Yes, of course.’ He blew out through his moustache. Colonel Pinter kept a constant link with Services decision-makers and within minutes an answer was always supplied. He didn’t really need to be awake, so he wasn’t. ‘Interviews have been arranged with the surviving facility staff. We are to wait until Tamsin Grey joins us.’

  ‘Where are they now? His parents, I mean.’

  ‘The islands,’ Pinter answered. ‘Where else?’

  A long silence condensed in the paused conversation — a typical reaction to any mention of the facility or the project. Two decades ago it had seemed like the first step to destigmatising psis, or people with psionic tendencies. In the Psionic Development Program, Doctor Yeon Rhee had created a place where psis could gather and be open about their abilities, a place for study or even to investigate ways to enhance their skills, and then for the researchers to see if it was possible to spark the talent in all humans.

  Over time it became something else. The participants were restricted like prisoners ‘for their own protection’. The world turned fearful of the risks psis posed. Tests became experiments, looking for ‘cures�
�� and controls. It was turning ugly long before Pierre was born.

  ‘How do we know he even exists?’ The woman from the nearby table was standing behind him. Pete had forgotten she was there, which was strange for him; he couldn’t feel her mind at all ...

  ‘I’m sorry?’ Pete asked as he turned to face her.

  ‘I mean, you’re going to all this trouble, gathering a little team together, pulling the great Pinter out of retirement. All based on the testimony of a non-Citizen.’