The Way Things Seem

by Mackey Chandler

  “Why are you shy of this? It’s defensive, not a weapon. It’s a good thing.”

  “Good for you,” Johnson said, “It’s obviously linked to you. I’d give anything to control such an artifact of power, but to me it’s just the uncertainty of more raw power sitting there than I want to contemplate. May I ask who made it for you?”

  “He made it sitting at the table a few minutes before you arrived,” Jack sneered at them.

  Johnson looked at David oddly and David didn’t understand right away, he hadn’t got the skill of reading faces very well yet. Then it clicked, Johnson was afraid of him. No, terrified to his core.

  “I do not want you afraid of me,” David said. “That is an undesirable, unstable situation. I have enough enemies and would rather have allies.”

  Hathaway looked a question hard at Johnson.

  “He can’t lie to me, but I can’t lie to him either,” Johnson admitted.

  “Johnson, my part in this interview is done,” Hathaway decided. “It’s yours to conclude.”

  “As far as finding allies, unfortunately I don’t have authority to recruit. That’s rather far above me, or I’d seek that,” Johnson said.

  “I’m still learning the fine nuances of face reading,” David said. “Anyway, I haven’t asked to join whatever your organization is called.”

  “Honestly, I can’t even tell you that,” Johnson said. He at least seemed to regret that.

  “Keep your little secret,” David said, irritated. So far he hadn’t seen anything to convince him there was any benefit to Johnson’s organization. They seemed a little full of themselves to him. How different than the simple friendliness of Mrs. Ayers. He’d rather emulate her helpfulness.

  “If you want a token of my good will I’ll give you this for your personal protection,” David said, tapping the sign sitting on the table.

  “I have nothing to trade for such a treasure,” Johnson said.

  “I am not needy. I can afford such a gift. I can make a dozen more today if I wish.”

  Johnson looked at Hathaway but saw no censure. “In that case I’ll take your gift, if it does not diminish you.”

  Take my hand and grasp the disk,” David said, following the form Mrs. Ayers used.

  He repeated the German phrase, she’d gifted him with memory to retain. When he finished the disk glowed even brighter.

  “Did you record that?” David asked Johnson.

  “No, these interviews have material much too sensitive to risk recording and I don’t speak the language to remember it. It sounded rather like German. Was it?” Johnson asked.

  “It was, a variation of it anyway. If you want, sometime in the future, I could gift you with the ability to remember such things perfectly. I’m not that sure of you yet. Continue to make me think we are on the same side, or at least not enemies, and I’ll do more for you.”

  Johnson examined the disk. It didn’t put him off now.

  “But this is still linked to you,” he objected. “I said I couldn’t recruit.”

  “You haven’t,” David assured him. “You have no hold on me through the object. However, I am not constrained by anyone above me from recruiting you.”

  When Johnson looked at the disk, conflicted, David offered. “I can destroy it if you’d rather.”

  “No I still want it. It’s complex however. What if there arises a judgment call who it must favor to protect?” Johnson asked.

  “I have no idea. I doubt it has that sort of intelligence or volition. Why don’t you simply avoid putting it in conflict to find out?”

  Johnson just nodded, then finally remembered to say thank you.

  Chapter 22

  “Well, that was educational,” Jack said after they left.

  “Yes, the government is aware of the problem, has an agency to try to deal with it, and they aren’t terribly impressive in either their intelligence gathering or power,” David summarized, unhappy.

  “Well, look at the bright side of it,” Jack encouraged him.

  David just lifted an eyebrow to encourage the punch line.

  “They didn’t charge you with practicing magic without a license.”

  David wanted to correct him, because the entire focus of his thought on the matter was that there were no mystical secrets beyond knowing, but just a different set of rules that no one had studied and observed with scientific rigor. Instead he just smiled. To challenge every casual statement made in humor, would kill a friendship as thoroughly as repeatedly correcting someone’s grammar.

  “It’s inevitable they will get around to that, isn’t it? Do you have any more cardboard so I can make more of the disks?”

  “No, but if you can use a graphics tablet I can print out as many as you like,” Jack offered.

  David blinked in surprise. “Yeah, my first one was mass produced. That should work fine.”

  * * *

  “I’m going in to work,” David informed Jack the next morning. “If that goes smoothly I’ll try going to my own apartment tonight. I do appreciate your help and owe you big time. Anything I can do for you don’t hesitate to ask.”

  “Do you do love potions yet? I thought that was a basic skill?”

  “How about, if I just make you filthy rich?” David asked. “You can do seminars at hotels and we’ll make you a web site with you leaning on a Rolls or a Ferrari in front of a mansion. My understanding is that’s an irresistible aphrodisiac.” David stopped joking. His face changed and he stared at Jack hard.

  “Oh dear. You’re thinking again,” Jack worried. “Even I can tell, with no special powers.”

  “Exactly.” David said. “Some things don’t require the power to reside in you.”

  “What the heck does that mean?”

  “I saw that these work just fine on a barn or a fruit stand. I didn’t think that through. May I make a set for your house and one for you to carry?” David asked.

  “It won’t make it a target for the bad guys?” Jack worried.

  No, I’d have worried about that at one time, but now I see it’s fallacious thinking. It’s like saying a firewall attracts hackers,” David said, to draw a comparison.

  “Then you better make them for Joan and for your apartment,” Jack suggested.

  “Yeah, our vehicles too. If I’m going to do that many I really need to see if they can be addressed in a batch, lined up so I can see them all at once.”

  Then David had a thought so strong his eyes dilated.

  “And the hits just keep coming,” Jack, quipped.

  Dave nodded agreement. “A lot of my products are put in very high risk environments. A single cosmic ray can do incredible damage to modern chips. A tiny flake of paint orbiting can damage a satellite or my package in it. I think I need to start using a new company logo,” he said, and smiled.

  “Damn… can you copyright it?” Jack asked.

  “Not if it is common like the traditional signs, but the lady who showed me this said it is based on expectations. If that’s so, I can make my own unique design. If it doesn’t work it should be visible to me right away that it’s dead.”

  “Go for it, Buddy,” Jack encouraged him. “I have another printer cartridge if you run low.”

  * * *

  Johnson checked his gun and made sure his protective disk was facing out in his pocket. He had a reputation for shooting one handed against all training. The only reason it was tolerated was that he also had a reputation for being a freakishly accurate shot. What his local partners couldn’t see was the golden shield in his left hand. He tried to be subtle and sweep a circle close to his chest when it wouldn’t be obvious to the local lawmen. If they saw it they probably thought it a religious gesture.

  The raid was against judge Ramaris’ law clerk. Officially he was suspected of influencing the judge and misusing his position to take advantage of the judge’s undiagnosed dementia. Financial improprieties were expected and he had a warrant to seize the man’s computers. It took a lot of conv
incing to get another judge to sign off on that. A visit to the nursing home cinched it. The judge walked out shaken, assuring Johnson he’d spoken with Ramaris just a week ago and found him lucid and articulate.

  “Even if he was heavily couched, I can’t imagine that shell of a man being used as a mouthpiece,” Judge Cotton said. “He must have failed very fast.” Cotton was old enough that was frightening.

  “Faster than you can imagine,” Johnson agreed.

  “I’m hesitant to kick down the door to a judge’s offices,” the Federal Marshall said. “We have to work with the local authorities. If this goes bad and we can’t make anything stick we’ll be a stink. They already think we’re arrogant and hard to work with. Some drug dealer yeah, but a judge?”

  “Let me hit it first,” Johnson agreed. “Then it’s on me. You come in behind me. I’ll go right just far enough to clear the door and you come in, but not past me, and cover the left.”

  “Do you want my master key?” the cop asked. He had a twenty kilo concrete filled steel pipe with handles welded on in his trunk.

  “I’m pretty good at this,” Johnson assured him. The shield was the key, but of course the mundane cop couldn’t see it. They were parked around the corner from the windows overlooking the small court parking lot. They took the stairs up so somebody didn’t see armored up armed men getting in the elevator and ruin the surprise with a cell phone call.

  “Radios muted!” Johnson called over his shoulder before he opened the stairwell door to the floor. He didn’t feel the need to order silence. That was basic and not as easily forgotten as radios and phones. He stopped across the hall from the door and looked at his partner. The man nodded he was ready. Johnson made a show of lifting his chin and looking over him at the four follow-on officers. He didn’t look away until he had a confirmation from each that they were ready.

  To the local partnering with him it looked like Johnson just smashed the door with his fist and not even by the latch. Since he expected him to hit it with his shoulder or draw back a leg and kick right beside the knob, it seemed a miracle when the door ripped off the hinges and flew inside the room to land flat on the floor.

  The man sitting at a desk looked up, but what Johnson had tunnel vision for was the monster looking over his shoulder from a golden haloed hole in the air. Johnson aimed for the shelled horror and dropped his shield far enough to unmask the disk in his pocket. He was already squeezing the trigger when the opening closed, a fraction of a second before the bullet passed through the air where it had been, knocking a decorative globe off the table and hitting the wall.

  The man had that squinty eyed look of somebody blinded, but he yanked his desk drawer open so hard it banged against the stops. He didn’t have to look over his shoulder to know his handler was gone. He felt it the instant the hole closed and he knew himself abandoned. He’d been deeply conditioned what to do for such an eventuality. He leaned over and reached in his desk drawer.

  “Police! Hands up!” Johnson got out before the man stood straighter, pulling his hand out of the drawer. Johnson wasn’t going to wait until he saw what the man was grabbing. Ignoring his commands it couldn’t be anything good for him. He fired low and on center, saw the man jerk and his hand come up with something shiny. Two more shots were on center, each higher as he didn’t fight the muzzle climb. The gun he’d retrieved flew over the man’s shoulder and bounced off the wall. The weapon and he both fell out of sight behind the desk.

  Johnson went to the right, leading with his gun and the local cop went left doing the same, but walking with a bit more of a waddle because he was holding his pistol properly in both hands. The clerk was sprawled loosely with eyes open, pistol beside him but he wasn’t in any shape to go after it. He had one hand on the hole in his chest, like he might hold it closed. His hand had an M on the back, but as Johnson watch it faded away.

  “Stupid geek, you had him dead to rights and he just wouldn’t give up,” the local cop said. “It makes you wonder what they’re thinking.”

  “Yep,” Johnson agreed and swirled his hand to disperse his shield while the cop was looking at the clerk and flipped the disk over in his pocket. Only then did he safe his pistol and put it in his holster.

  * * *

  Boss Alfred, successor to Vince had his computer crash. Even though it was on a UPS it did that and the lights flickered too, whenever he was wanted in the bug meeting room. The one time they got Vince to ask the bugs to summon them differently they just told him it was not a concern to them.

  The room was weird. The other side of the wall should be outside and ten stories up, but if you looked from a nearby window or from the ground nothing was there. One day a bugged judge came by, waved his hands around over the blank wall and there was an opening where there should be solid wall. They’d installed the frame and door over the passage rather than guard it or explain it. Alfred went in the meeting room pulled the door shut behind him. He flipped the tile on top of the pedestal over. The bug, or one of them, appeared, pretty quickly this time.

  “We have once more come near a great disaster by our association with you. We are withdrawing from any contact with your regional organization,” it said, and the hole and halo disappeared. This time however the tile disappeared too.

  “Well crap,” Alfred said. He turned to leave but there was no longer a door. He didn’t worry about it very long because the room and everything in it ceased to exist.

  * * *

  David stopped by Joan’s house, something he’d never done before.

  Joan was a little flustered and asked if he’d like coffee. He agreed but wouldn’t let her seat him in her living room. It looked like it was never used. He asked to come to the kitchen and watch while she made coffee. By the time it was loaded and started she was relaxed again.

  When Joan was pouring their coffee David heard the garage door open and close. Joan’s husband and daughter came in together through the inside door from the garage.

  David had met her husband Ted before at a company function and remembered briefly talking to him. He liked roses and favored paper books, other than that David was embarrassed that he couldn’t remember what sort of work the man did.

  Joan’s daughter Linda, he’d never met before. He remembered she’d been away at school when her father had attended the company party. She looked him in the eye, offered her hand the same as a man would and embarrassed him because her face betrayed she found him attractive, even though her normal countenance didn’t waver. David wasn’t entirely sure he could say the same. He might not be dark enough to cover his blush he was so flustered.

  “Ah, the entrepreneur, you’ve made life very difficult for me, did you know that?” she said.

  “I can’t imagine how,” Davis said, “are we competitors somewhere?” He asked, mind racing.

  “Only in impressing my father. He wants to know why I’m still slogging along in graduate school at the same age you are a multi-millionaire.”

  He relaxed and smiled. “And yet, if you had a sudden inspiration and wanted to drop out of school and risk everything on it, I bet he’d try to dissuade you. My father certainly did.”

  “He sets the bar so high he’d like me to do both,” Linda said.

  “The first thing you need to do,” David suggested, “is invent a drug to eliminate the need to sleep, then you will have plenty of time to accomplish both tasks.”

  “Beggars in Spain by Kress explored that,” Linda said.

  “Yes, but we might hope for a happier ending,” David said. “Everyone seemed unhappy and in conflict in that story and then it went downhill from there. And the next two books seemed strained to keep it rolling and got darker,” David remembered.

  “Oh my goodness, they’ve dropped into nerd mode and are talking science fiction,” Ted said.

  “Why not? We’re living science fiction,” David said. “We sell to the moon colonies, not just the US one and we have a few devices orbiting Mars.”

  “Are
you going to go out there sometime?” Linda asked.

  “It’s attractive, but I’m having lots of adventures still on Earth. In fact if it gets any more adventuresome I might consider going to Mars for the peace and quiet.”

  She laughed at that and it wasn’t faked, it was heart-felt.

  “So, what brings you to our humble abode?” Ted asked.

  “I’ve recently spoken with some government agents, of the scary sort. One of them even indicated I wasn’t cleared high enough to know the name of his agency. We have identified some hostile actors and he’s trying to rout them out. But they have targeted me and tried to compromise local authorities on several levels and in multiple jurisdictions.

  “We have a device that disrupts their systems and hinders their targeting technologies. I worry they may target those known to associate with me or work for me. The protection is incorporated in this new logo the company will be using. I’m carrying one on my person indefinitely and I’d like to give each of you one as well as four to put in the corners of your home.”

  These were printed on a square, but the card was double sized and the second half was a cover that folded closed over the face. Joan was no fool and immediately saw the resemblance to the original disk she held for David, but said nothing. It too was a round stylized symmetrical design.

  David held a stack of them out and Ted took them.

  “Thank you for your concern,” Joan said. “Was the attack in your office part of this?”

  “You didn’t say anything about an attack,” Ted objected.

  “I don’t bring my work home. Anyway, it was directed at David not me.”

  David silently thanked her for not revealing she’d been shoved to the floor.

  “But how do they work?” Linda asked, taking one from her father and opening it.

  “I’ve spent the last couple months being instructed in the principles. I’m just starting to get the basics. They aren’t something I developed. It doesn’t help that the lady who instructed me did so in German by preference. Past ordering in a restaurant my German gets very thin. When I understand it enough to explain it clearly I’ll get back to you.”