by Alec Taylor
“Well,” he said, “maybe there was some kind of connection there…that was blown to bits by lightning.”
I looked at Pete, perplexed. I showed Glen earlier video footage of the site of the explosion and he eventually accepted that the damage must have been caused by explosive devices, which were placed there purely to take out the power.
“I don’t see the problem now, though,” said Glen, surprising me again. “The attempt failed. Surely there’s no other way of hurting the colony like that now.”
“Actually,” I said, “there are probably a lot of ways. Poison in the water. Tampering with the medicine. Airborne toxins…”
“No, you’re being stupid!” Glen yelled, suddenly angry. “It’s over. You’re doing it again, just like with Imani—obsessing over something when everyone already knows the answer.”
“Okay, Glen, I’m sorry,” I said, trying to calm him down.
Later in the day, I privately asked Pete if he thought we needed to do something about Glen.
“Yeah, the whole thing has definitely messed him around,” said Pete. “But, you know, he’s a square peg in a round hole when these kinds of things happen. He’s a company guy—he’s good at the admin, but not so good when the shit hits the fan. We need to cut him some slack, go easy on him for a while.”
Unfortunately, I was nearing a dead end in the investigation. Many people had access to Imani’s login. Any of her co-workers, any of her lovers, anyone who had decided to pick up her cup in the dining room once she had finished with it—they could all have captured her fingerprints. A dead woman was a brilliant disguise.
None of the wreckage from the explosions was helpful. They were crude but effective bombs that mixed fertiliser with refined plant oil—anyone who had studied chemistry in high school could have designed them, and the parts were readily available around the colony.
We decided to check the entire colony for any other devices. All of the public spaces, all of the greenhouses, and all of the power, air, and water systems were given the all clear. I combed through all the information we had on the people with missing transmitters, but I couldn’t find any coincidences or unusual patterns linking them to the explosions. In the end, it was Liu who made the breakthrough. He called me one afternoon and said, “Mike, can you come down to Systems? I want to show you something.”
I rushed down there.
“Have a look at this,” he said as I sat down next to him. “I’ve been looking at the code in that program, the one that turned off the cameras. Code is like, I don’t know, a story. And if you get five people—or, say, fifty people—to all write the same story, they’ll all be different.”
“You’re being a little abstract, Liu,” I said with a smile. He was uncharacteristically animated—he was usually very direct, and often impatient and cynical.
“A computer program can be like a fingerprint,” he continued. “If it’s complex enough, you can find markers, markers that are unique to the programmer.”
“And you found markers in this program?”
“In a way. You know we all complete a huge number of training modules before we get here. We all have to be able to understand and perform all of the activities in the colony—we’re a redundancy policy for everybody else, right?”
“Uh huh.”
“Well, do you remember the programming module?”
“Sure,” I replied. “It was strangely satisfying, like solving a puzzle.”
“Exactly. Well, everyone has completed that module. Everyone, including everyone on that list of fifty missing transmitters.”
“I think I see where you’re going. But Liu, how did you access everyone’s training results?”
“It’s all stored here, in Systems. Hell, we’ve uploaded piles of JOSEV content and large chunks of Earth’s internet onto our servers. I have access to everything that isn’t high-priority encrypted content, and I could probably crack that, too, with enough time.”
“Hmm.”
“Don’t worry, man, I’m not reading your love letters.”
“…So?”
“So I ran an algorithm to search for unique identifiers in the code. Little unusual habits, like the way you write your reference notes, or indent commands, or whatever. In fact, I didn’t define them; I let the system look for them intelligently, and some of them are the strangest things. But they’re there—weird little idiosyncrasies that can be used to identify someone by their code.”
“Can you tell me who wrote that code?” I asked, getting a little impatient.
“Almost,” he replied. “At least, the system is confident that it was one of four colonists who had the most matching identifiers in their code.”
He shared the list of four names with me and I shivered. Glen was on it.
17. PRESSURE
I wasn’t sure what to do next. We now had a very small number of people to investigate. I could get them in separate rooms, question them, and with the right push I thought we might make the saboteur confess. But one of the four was Glen. His behaviour had become unpredictable, even unstable. I needed to update Pete, but I didn’t want to arouse suspicion in Glen.
“Hold on,” I said. “I’d better have another look at the underlying analysis.”
He showed it to me and he was right that some of the markers were very strange. They included grammatical similarities in completely different sentences and strings of letters. Each marker had a ‘strength level’, an assessment of its usefulness as a marker. The markers added up to a total matching score and there was a distinct gap between the scores of the top four and the rest of the people with missing transmitters. I didn’t need to be an expert to believe it was a reliable analysis.
“What the hell should I do about Glen?” I said, thinking out loud.
“I don’t know, man,” said Liu.
“I wonder if these four studied together?” I mused.
“I don’t know; I haven’t looked that up yet. Want me to see if can?”
I didn’t reply as I thought about the situation. Eventually I came to a decision.
“I need to update Pete,” I said, “and figure out how to handle Glen now that he’s a suspect. He might not take it well; he’s been very anxious since the storm. Can I get Pete down here now?”
“Uh, okay.”
I called Pete and asked him to come down to Systems. When he arrived, Liu rolled through the analysis and its conclusions, and then Pete asked him to do it again. Each time, I had a better understanding and was more convinced that it was sound. Pete was more sceptical but finally decided that it could be helpful. He didn’t say it, but he seemed to have inner conflict between his suspicion of Glen’s strange behaviour and wanting to be loyal to his team member.
I also wasn’t completely convinced that Glen was involved, despite his strange behaviour during and after the storm, and despite Liu’s analysis. The truth was I didn’t want Glen to be the saboteur—he was still my teammate.
“Liu,” said Pete. “Can you please come back to Security with me and Mike, to tell Glen?”
Liu winced, leaned back, and said, “Uh…”
“You think we should confront him?” I asked, not sure that was a good idea.
“He’s on the team and it’s the fair thing to do. He deserves a chance to defend himself.”
“Well, okay,” I said. “I’m not sure how he’ll take it, but if he is the bomber we might be able to make him confess.”
“Can you come down?” Pete asked Liu again.
“I guess so,” said Liu, wincing again. He wasn’t keen and I didn’t blame him.
We walked back to the office and found Glen sitting at his screen. The familiar blue-and-green image of Earth was in the background.
“Glen,” said Pete. “Liu has some analysis that we need to show you.”
Liu explained the analysis and showed Glen the list of four names. Glen’s face flushed and his jaw dropped when he saw his own name.
“Well, this is obviou
sly bullshit,” he said, voice breaking. “It’s a bunch of bullshit numbers dreamed up by a computer. I had nothing to do with the power outage. It’s bullshit.”
There was obvious pity on Pete’s face as he stared at Glen.
“Don’t fucking look at me like that!” shouted Glen.
“Glen,” said Pete. “It’s all right. Don’t worry. I don’t think you had anything to do with this.”
“Pete?” I said quietly.
Pete looked at me and his face fell.
“Pete…” I said again, not wanting to tell him what he needed to do.
“What!” yelled Glen at me. “Fucking what, you fucking asshole?”
We were all standing. Glen slowly backed away and the three of us watched him carefully. I had seen people melt down before, at the police station back on Earth, and knew it was a tricky time. It was also an opportunity to try to flush him out.
“Glen,” I said quietly. “Nobody was hurt and everything turned out okay. I’m sure that whoever put the devices out there had some good reason and didn’t actually want to hurt anyone. Right?”
Glen swallowed and didn’t reply. He was breathing hard. His eyes darted around.
“I’m not even sure that any laws were broken,” I continued, “not out here in the colony. So there might not be any consequences for the person who did it. And if they came clean now, we might be able to cut some kind of deal.”
“Fuck off,” spat Glen. “I don’t want a fucking deal. You can go to hell. It’s just some fucking numbers dreamed up by a computer.”
“Glen,” said Pete. “Just settle down, okay? Nobody’s accusing you of anything, but your name is on the list and until we can strike it off…well…we’re gonna have to stand you down.”
“You…you…you…” stammered Glen, his face bright red. He looked ready to pop.
I realised he wasn’t going to confess.
“Glen, stop it,” I said firmly. “We’re not accusing you of anything.”
That seemed to calm him down a little.
“The computer spat out your name,” I continued, “so you just need to take a break, that’s all. It’s just standard procedure. It’s been a stressful time anyway. Just chill out for a while, while we sort it out, all right?”
“It’s just random,” said Glen with more control, but still breathing hard. “Loo’s computer could have found anyone’s name. It’s dumb—it doesn’t think like a human. Those markers are total bullshit.”
“Well—” started Liu.
“No, he’s right, Liu,” I interrupted, catching his eye. “It’s just the result of a computer program and we need to treat it like that.”
“Just go back to your room and chill out,” said Pete to Glen. “I’ll talk to you in the morning. Who’s your roommate?”
“I don’t have one,” said Glen. “I haven’t for years.”
Liu and I made eye contact for a split second. We both knew that was not good news.
“Okay, well, that’s convenient,” said Pete. “So nobody even needs to know. Go on, head out.”
Glen looked from face to face, searching. After a moment, he made a strange laughing-coughing sound and quickly walked out, bumping shoulders with Liu as he went past. We stood there for a second and then Pete went to the door and discretely watched Glen walk up the passageway.
He looked back at us and said, “Liu, this conversation goes nowhere, understand?”
“Yu-uh, that’s cool.”
“Nowhere, I mean it. If I find out that anyone has heard about your analysis or this conversation...Mike, I need you to keep an eye on Glen. And investigate him first—I want him arrested or cleared by, you know, yesterday.”
Liu went back to Systems and I sat at my screen. As I reflected on the events of the previous few days, I found that there were too many coincidences. Pete’s hope that we could clear Glen quickly looked increasingly unlikely.
But then I stopped myself. Was bias creeping into my investigation? Glen and I did not get along. Was my personal opinion affecting my perspective, my interpretation of his behaviour and actions? How could I objectively prove that Glen was innocent?
Pete had asked me to watch Glen and, in the absence of any kind of legal framework, I took that as a warrant giving me permission to monitor his movements electronically. I checked the location of his transmitter. It was working; he was awake in his room.
Strange that I had never known that he lived alone. I supposed it had never come up in conversation, yet it wasn’t common in the colony. Glen would have been allocated new recruits in every arrival and they must have all eventually requested transfers to other colonists’ rooms. Or he had an agreement with Jan, who was responsible for rooming allocations, to leave him on his own. I wondered what was in his room and realised that, without a roommate, he would have been able to collect and store explosives and other parts required for the bombs. No, I thought, surely that was bias again.
The bombs, I thought. How did someone place them above the cables? I imagined someone going out there…we knew when—during the camera outage that the bomber had so carefully created with Imani’s login, during the final two days before the storm had struck the colony. Everyone was back and inside the colony by then. Who was outside? Nobody. No—not nobody. Our team, Security, was out checking the integrity of all the structures. I stopped myself again—of course somebody other than Security could have left the underground colony and planted the bombs. They just would have needed to go out at a time that we weren’t around…while we were sleeping. Perhaps in the middle of the night, the bomber had carried three bombs out to the power plants and set them.
Hold on, I thought. How on earth could they have carried them out there? Walking three bombs hundreds of metres in the middle of the night seemed unlikely. No, they would have needed a vehicle. I checked the transmitter logs of all the buggies and hovees during the two days before the storm. The only vehicles that had gone out at all were the buggies that Security had taken out to check the colony. Several of them had passed and stopped at the power plants. I vaguely remembered checking them myself, on the day of the trial lockdown. I looked at the buggy logs for the last few hours of the second day, and I found that in the last couple of hours before the storm, during the erased video window, a buggy had stopped in front of the power plants for several minutes. Was that a routine check, or was Glen planting three bombs that almost ended the colony?
What about the cameras? I thought. Who has the skill to write the program that turned them off and on? Everyone in the colony, of course; we had all been trained to be able to write that program. Unfortunately, it appeared that Glen’s programming style closely resembled the bomber’s style, but then how did he get access to Imani’s login? I supposed he could have somehow picked it up from the lab, although Vivian and her team had worked through the storm, so it would have been hard to get access. And then it hit me: Glen had taken Imani’s body to the infirmary!
I smacked my forehead with that realisation and my suspicion went into overdrive. What if Glen was actually Imani’s killer, I thought? If he was capable of sabotaging the colony, he might have been capable of killing Imani…although I wasn’t sure he had the strength. Her death still played on my mind from time to time; the details of the case were still fresh, so I tried to connect Glen to her in some way…but I couldn’t come up with anything. I was sure that he had not been in a relationship with her, that he was not the father of her unborn baby. June had not mentioned Glen, and no calls or messages were recorded between him and Imani—none at all. He had had no way of knowing she was pregnant, anyway, and I was sure he also didn’t know about Imani’s letter—that was a well-kept secret. No, I thought, that’s just my overactive imagination. Glen had had nothing to do with Imani’s death, but he could have captured her prints.
I looked at Glen’s location. It was getting late, but he was still awake in his room. In fact, his biometric sensors were showing that his heart rate was elevated; he seemed mild
ly distressed. That’s not surprising, I told myself. He’s in a sticky situation and stressed about being stood down from Security. He should talk to someone—perhaps he’s already called a friend.
His phone log was a complete blank. He hadn’t called anyone and nobody had called him for many weeks. A terrible chill came over me. He was isolated and alone in the most hostile environment in the solar system. He was my teammate and he had nobody to talk to. He was missing home. He was working in a highly stressful job, investigating murders, suicides, and handling a bigger storm than anything ever seen on Earth. And was anyone thinking about him, helping him? Thankfully, Pete had been calm, and fair, and supportive.
It was late and Pete had gone to bed long ago. It seemed that Glen was finally settling, although he still didn’t appear to be asleep. Better get to bed, I thought, and be ready for anything in the morning.
My sleep was disturbed by flashes of light in dark swirls of dust, and a dark figure standing silently. I dozed lightly all night, occasionally waking and hearing Tony sleeping loudly on the other side of the room.
“Tony, you’re snoring,” I yelled at him. He grunted, rolled over, and stopped snoring.
I rose before my alarm at five in the morning, did a short and intensive workout, and had a shower. Then I went to the Security Office and checked on Glen’s biometrics. He was awake.
Could he have been awake all night? Should I call Pete and just bring Glen in for further questioning? I decided that I had no hard evidence and would continue to monitor Glen until Pete came in—we could discuss it calmly and decide what to do. I went to the dining room for breakfast.
The dining room was the largest room in the inner colony. It could hold several hundred people and was filled with long tables and benches. There were columns of rock scattered throughout the room, holding up the low ceiling. News feeds from Earth were projected onto the walls. Like all the rooms in the colony, it had rounded corners to prevent pinching of the airtight plastic lining the walls. The most open space in the room was near the doorway. On the right of the entrance, there was a long low table used to serve the food for every meal. There was an open space in the middle, just in front of the door, and a single table and chairs on the left side.