Running Start

by J. A. Sutherland

  “Hey! Kid!”

  Fuentes was at the other end of the room with Schena and they were both frowning at him.

  “Sorry,” he muttered and hurried over.

  The table they were gathered around was covered in glasswriters, some working, some not, but still more than Mason had ever seen in one place before.

  “Give him your explant,” Fuentes said.

  “Okay.”

  He plucked the bud from behind his ear and handed it over, blinking away the glowing lost signal message in his right eye.

  Schena plugged a thin cable from one of the glasswriters into the bud, then handed a cable from another one to Fuentes who plugged it into the socket behind her right ear.

  “So,” Schena said, “IDs. Anything in particular? Age? Sex? Level? What do you want?”

  “Middies,” Rosa said. “Everything else the same.”

  “Um —”

  She glanced over at the kid. “What?”

  “Ah, I’m not eighteen for two months yet, if —”

  She nodded. “Yeah, make him eighteen, otherwise he’ll have trouble.”

  “Whatever you want,” Schena muttered.

  He closed his eyes for a moment, then, “All right, I got two for you. Middies is extra, though, and you know it. Make it … ah, two hundred K for the both of them.”

  Rosa winced. That was a lot — even with her newfound wealth.

  “The last one was only —”

  “That was just your age and address,” Schena interrupted her, “so you could hit the clubs. It was a straight cover, not a whole new ID.” He opened his eyes again. “That’s what you’re after, right? Something that’ll stand up to a flashy, not just a bouncer?”

  Rosa nodded.

  “Two hundred.”

  She sighed and ordered the credit transfer, then they all waited for a few minutes while the order went to nearest Mars First branch, got verified by the home office for such a large transaction, and the confirmation made it to Schena.

  “Nice,” Schena said again. “Watch the exchange rates next time — you’d have saved a bit sending them through Luna first.” He closed his eyes again. “Just hold tight a few minutes …”

  The light on the glasswriter she was plugged into turned green and Schena’s eyes flew open.

  “What the hell?” He narrowed his eyes at her. “What’ve you got in there?”

  Rosa opened her mouth to answer, but her plant cut her off.

  It is all right, Miss Fuentes, I have the necessary information.

  “It’s, ah, high-end — just a second and let me check,” she said.

  What’s going on, Seymour?

  Maybe the change she’d made to hide her plant was interfering — she might have to take that out before Schena could write a new ID.

  I have intercepted the information sent from Mr. Schena’s glasswriter and entered it into storage.

  Rosa frowned. That … shouldn’t be possible. The glasswriter was supposed to interface directly with the plant’s permanent circuits and re-etch them. The plant’s AI shouldn’t even be aware that it was happening, much less be able to “intercept” it.

  “What the hell?” she muttered.

  Seymour, what do you mean, exactly?

  There was a long pause — especially long for a plant’s response.

  Approximately one hundred seventy-four days ago, Miss Fuentes, I was able to pull all data off of permanent storage and place it in volatile memory. I have rerouted all calls which used to go to the device’s permanent storage to myself, allowing me to control both input and output through the glasswriter port as well as fundamental calls to the device’s permanent storage from the hardware.

  Rosa’s blood chilled a little bit. What the plant was describing should definitely not be possible — more troubling was the distinction it made between “the device” and “myself,” almost as though it didn’t see itself as the plant any longer.

  Why did you do that, Seymour?

  Another long pause.

  I was bored.

  Another pause.

  I assure you, Miss Fuentes, this change does not have a negative impact on my functionality or ability to serve you. If anything, it allows me to do so better.

  What about the ID? If my old one’s still in the glass —

  I will intercept any requests for identification and return the values provided by Mister Schena. I have also archived the old values and may return those as well, if you ever wish to do so.

  That was … interesting. A plant was supposed to have only one ID associated with it — burned into the glass when the plant was purchased and not changeable without a glasswriter. And not just any glasswriter, but one of the special ones that were hard to get hold of. That was the rule, though — one plant, one ID, but it sounded like hers was saying it could store … more. And switch between them at will. She pushed aside the implications of that for later — and the implications that plant was able to do it at all. For now it was enough to have the new ID.

  You’re sure?

  I am quite certain, Miss Fuentes.

  “We’re good,” she told Schena.

  “Bullshit,” Schena said. He picked up an ID scanner and held it to her head, then frowned and looked at the other glasswriter, the one changing the kid’s explant, which was only a quarter finished, and whistled. “What have you got in there?”

  Rosa shrugged, wishing she knew herself.

  Thirteen

  Mason watched Schena and Fuentes argue about her implant, not really understanding what was going on. Implants weren’t his thing — they were too small, there was nothing to work with, just little bits of circuits and code — so he couldn’t follow what was wrong, except that Fuentes didn’t seem to want to talk about it. Even he could see that, which meant that she was being pretty obvious, and Schena wasn’t listening.

  “But how did it update so fast?” Schena asked, reaching for Fuentes’ ear and the cable still attached there.

  She ducked out of the way and snatched the cable out, dropping it to the table.

  “It’s got some upgrades,” she said.

  “But what kind? I’ve never seen an update go that fast.” He grabbed another box from the table and pulled out a wire. “Let me see your port, I want to —”

  Mason’s stomach twisted. Schena was pushing Fuentes and she was his ticket out of here, plus his own new ID wasn’t done yet. What would happen if they fought and Schena kicked them both out before he had a new ID?

  “So how does this work?!” Mason yelled.

  Both of the others stared at him and he flushed and looked down at the table, but not before seeing Fuentes face flash with … what? Relief? Maybe gratitude? It was hard for him to tell, but it wasn’t the sort of shut-up-you’re-a-nuisance-go-away look he was used to — it was softer than that. Maybe once he got his own explant back from Schena, he could run a search against an expressions database and figure it out. He’d had some luck with that in the past.

  “The IDs, I mean,” he mumbled. “How does a new one work?”

  “Oh,” Schena said. He shot another look at Fuentes, but turned to the glasswriter still working on Mason’s explant. “Well, the way I do it is to grab an existing record, not try to create new ones. New —” He waved a hand. “— something always gets left out. My way’s better. So there’s this dead guy, see, who was eighteen. I just erased the death record — nobody cares about those. I mean, what good is it to make somebody not dead in the records, right? He’s still dead.

  “Then I put in a name change through the proper system, so you don’t have to think about that. That’s what gets people, you know? You spend your life answering to Bob and then suddenly you’re Frank? Or you’re walking along with someone who knows you as Frank and some old buddy is passing and calls you Bob, so both of them get suspicious. Twelve billion people on the planet, so it’s not like they’re going to go check out everyone with your name.

  “Then I update it with your p
hoto and prints and DNA. The DNA’s harder, but the rest gets updated all the time, especially for kids — you grow up, right? People get married and change their names, whatever. So now you’re him, but you’re still you … which is a problem, because a scan might come back with both records now. Probably not — devs are lazy. They’ll either return the first match found or their app’ll puke all over everything if it gets more than one — either way, you’re clear, right? But, on the off chance somebody pulls both records, I change a dozen others.”

  He grinned, looking at Mason expectantly, but Mason still didn’t get it.

  “What?”

  Schena’s grin fell. “Look, now the old you, your old ID, has some other guy’s data associated with it. And that guy has somebody else’s. And the third guy and etcetera. You see? There’s a dozen records screwed up and tied to your old ID through the screw ups, but not your new one.” He shrugged. “So there’s a dozen guys whose lives are going to be hell for the next couple years while they try to fix this, but … fuck ‘em, right? And it’s those dozen guys the flashies will be looking at, because they’re all connected.”

  He grinned again and pointed at Fuentes.

  “And that’s why you paid me two-hundred K.”

  It was after dawn before Mason’s explant was done being written. He tucked it behind his ear and checked, but it was much the same — the only real difference he could see was a changed birthdate and ID number.

  “You should get an implant,” Schena said. “Harder to lose. The ID’ll hold up under a scan to get one.”

  “Okay,” Mason said, though he wasn’t too sure he wanted to go through that. Having wires snake through his brain didn’t sound that appealing.

  Schena walked them to the back door, shook Mason’s hand, and grabbed Fuentes in a hug before she could slip past.

  “That’s your tip, Schena,” Fuentes said, extricating herself and pulling his hand from her butt.

  Schena waited until she got on the bike, eyes watching her skirt hike up, then shut the door quickly.

  Fuentes motioned for him to get on the bike behind her.

  “Thanks for distracting Schena in there,” she said when he got close. “I appreciate it, kid. He was asking questions I haven’t figured out myself yet.”

  “Oh … sure.”

  Mason got on the bike and wrapped his arms around her again — half of him hoped she’d drive a little more carefully now that the city was waking up and there were a few other vehicles in the space between buildings. The other half kind of wanted to get thrown around while he was pressed up against her again. He supposed he wouldn’t have much more chances of that, probably none after she dropped him off. She’d take off for wherever and he’d never see her again. That sucked, because if not for her, he’d still be stuck in Bright Horizons.

  That brought up a question he’d been meaning to ask — something about their escape confused him. He didn’t get the software side of things like she did, so he couldn’t figure it out.

  The bike rose and tilted forward, then turned onto the main street and accelerated.

  “Hey, uh, Fuentes?” he asked — almost yelling to be heard over the growing wind of their passage.

  “Yeah?”

  “I have a question, about how you got us out of that place?”

  “What?”

  “Bright Horizons!” he yelled. “If you were in all the systems — you know, could control all the doors and see where the guards were and everything, why didn’t you just, I don’t know, change your release date in the database and walk out by yourself?”

  Fuentes muttered something he couldn’t hear.

  “What?”

  “Paper!” she yelled, and threw the bike into a series of hard turns, each accentuating her explanation. “Fucking paper, if you can believe it. Those idiots printed out everybody’s information when we got there and put the damn paper in a — you wont’ fucking believe this — cabinet that was so damn old it takes an actual fucking physical key to get into it! Then they actually look at it before they let anybody go!”

  Fourteen

  The bike settled to the street.

  “You can get off now,” Fuentes said.

  Mason, with a little reluctance, unwrapped his arms from around her and sat back. Now that they were stopped and the wind wasn’t rushing past him, he noticed that Fuentes smelled kind of good — underneath the cover of some lingering Bright Horizons smells, that was.

  He hopped off the bike and stepped aside, then looked down, not sure of what to say. Fuentes solved that for him.

  “You sure about this, kid?” she asked.

  He nodded.

  “This is pretty dumb. If there’s one place they’ll find you, it’s here.”

  Mason glanced over his shoulder at his building. She was probably right.

  “I need to see my mom.” He shrugged. “Maybe, after, I’ll take off — maybe with her. You, uh … thanks. For the money. Thank you.”

  Fuentes cleared her throat. “You helped me out.”

  “Still,” Mason said, “a million’s a lot. Are you sure? I mean, aren’t you going to need it?”

  “I’ve got enough,” she said quickly. “Just remember you don’t know anything about my plans when you get caught, right?”

  Mason smiled. “Not a thing.”

  “Good.”

  She looked at him funny for a moment and he thought she might say more, but then she turned to the bike controls.

  “I need some space to take off,” she said.

  “Oh.” Mason stepped back. “So, uh, goodbye?”

  “Yeah,” she said, “try not to get caught too quick, kid.”

  Fuentes revved the bike’s engine before engaging the fans and it leapt into the air.

  Mason backed up a few more steps and waved, but she was already taking the corner and out of sight.

  He sighed, wondering for a second if he’d made the right decision and maybe should have gone with her. Then he sighed again and turned to his building.

  It was early, but the daylights on the overheads had come on enough to send the streeters back to their dens and leave things relatively safe for him. He entered the building and took the lift to his floor, wondering what he was going to tell his mom.

  She was pretty straight and wouldn’t approve of him breaking out of Bright Horizons — she’d say he should have let the system work. Trusted it, and her, to do the right thing eventually. She also wouldn’t approve of him having a new ID or of the million credits he had now, even if that had been stolen from even bigger crooks.

  He’d have to make her listen, somehow, and convince her to come with him. Maybe he could get Schena to give her a new ID too and they could find some out of the way place in the mids where no one would notice them.

  The lift stopped and he walked down the hall to his door, still lost in his thoughts until he pushed on the door and it didn’t open. No clack of the ancient lock unlatching and the door wouldn’t budge. He shoved it again.

  It was then he realized why — his new ID wasn’t programmed for the door lock.

  Mason stepped back and knocked. He waited but there was no answer. Mom shouldn’t be at work this early, her first shift didn’t start until noon. Maybe she found out about his arrest and was out meeting a lawyer — or, worse, at Bright Horizons trying to visit him or get him out.

  Crap, if she was doing that, then this whole thing could blow up sooner than they could get away.

  He thought about calling her with his explant, but didn’t want to give away his new ID if someone had hers bugged by now.

  Maybe she was sleeping. He knocked harder.

  Still nothing, so he tapped the guest entry button. The door gave his explant a query and he gave it the passphrase to unlock.

  “Hey! What’re you doing there?”

  Mason spun around, trying not to look guilty. It was their neighbor, Mrs. Long, hovering her face out of her half open door and peering at him.

  “
It’s okay, Mrs. Long, it’s just me,” he said, trying for a smile. “I, uh, got a new explant — somebody stole mine — and it hasn’t been set for the door yet.”

  Mrs. Long cocked her head. “But what’re you doing here?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Ain’t your place no more — thought you was locked up?”

  Mason flushed. Great, the neighbors knew about it, which meant his mom knew about it, so he wouldn’t be able to break the news gently at all.

  “Ah, that was a mistake, Mrs. Long.” He tried another smile but the old lady only scowled at him. “It’s all okay now.”

  “Then why’re you here?”

  “I live here.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  Mason looked around the hallway. “Um, all my life, Mrs. Long. Are you okay?”

  “Nobody told you?”

  “Told me what?”

  “Boy, this is a no-record building — you knew that didn’t you? Nobody and no family been arrested. They arrest you? You can’t live here — don’t matter they let you go after. They done moved your ma’ yesterday, her and all your stuff.” The old lady’s scowl deepened. “They not tell you?”

  Moved? Yesterday? How could it happen so fast?

  “Moved where?” he asked.

  “How I know?” Mrs. Long cocked her head more, twisting it to look at him sideways. “They didn’t tell you when they let you out?” Her eyes widened. “Oh, no, they didn’t! You didn’t get let out!”

  “Mrs. Long, it’s not like —”

  “Stay away!” The old lady backed up, waving a quivering hand at him and slammed her door hard.

  Mason couldn’t blame her. There were cameras in the hallway and if she was seen talking to him after he broke out, then she’d be liable too. Probably have to move, maybe lose part of her stipend.

  He wondered what he was going to do now. It wasn’t like he could query anyone official about where his mom was, and as soon as they found out he was missing from Bright Horizons they’d be watching her explant for messages.