This Is Not a Game

by Walter Jon Williams

  “No. The players will have to dig around in reality.”

  “You mean,” said Jack, “that we’re going to send millions of people Dumpster-diving in every major brokerage in the world? And following that, we’re going to organize the largest coordinated hacking attempt in the history of the Internet?”

  Tension stiffened Dagmar’s spine.

  “Yes,” she said.

  Helmuth absorbed this, looked at Jack, and nodded.

  “Cool,” he said.

  Jack nodded back.

  “Wicked cool,” he confirmed, and took a spoonful of Frito pie.

  Dagmar felt her tension ebb.

  “It is pretty cool,” she said. “Isn’t it?”

  “I have another whole idea, a better one,” Charlie said. “I’m working on Patch 2.0.”

  It was Tuesday morning, and Dagmar was talking to Charlie on the phone. He was in his Moorish extravaganza of a hotel room, and she was in the break room at Great Big Idea, watching her plastic cup of beef barley soup rotating in the microwave.

  “Tell me,” Dagmar said.

  The cup of soup rotated. The microwave hummed. The odor of beef stock crept into the room.

  “The agents are linked in a peer-to-peer network, right?” Charlie said. “So Patch 2.0 rewrites the program to spread the patch itself along the network. It’ll be like a killer virus aimed right at the whole population of agents.”

  Dagmar considered this.

  “You mean,” she said, “we only have to succeed once? And then the whole network gets infected and goes down?”

  “No,” Charlie said. “The peer-to-peer network is organized into smaller groups, and there are bound to be gaps even in those. Gaps where the program’s been wiped by an alert systems administrator, or where a disk drive blew up, or where the computer was shut down and stuck in a closet somewhere, or where the machine was just tossed away.

  “Redundancy,” he said, “is still our friend.”

  “But it’ll make the job easier.”

  “A lot easier.”

  World saved, Dagmar thought. Charlie still rich, game still cool.

  What could possibly go wrong?

  The microwave gave a chime. Dagmar opened the door, gingerly took out her cup of soup by the handle, and put it on the counter.

  “Okay,” she said. “When can you have the new patch ready?”

  “Tomorrow,” he said, “I hope.”

  After the call ended, Dagmar stirred her soup with the plastic spoon, then returned to her office. She found BJ there, peering at her computer screen, his fingers poised over her keyboard.

  “What do you need?” she asked.

  “I’m looking for the script for Week Six, Part One,” BJ said. “I wanted to make sure I included the bit about Carlo leaving the matchbook behind in the Russian restaurant for David to find.”

  “I think you did,” she said, stirring.

  BJ was still staring at the screen, his hand busy on her trackball.

  “Can we make sure? Because I don’t want to leave that detail out.”

  “Let me,” said Dagmar. She put down her lunch, and BJ rolled her office chair out of the way. Dagmar bent over the computer and said, “Open file Briana Assets 6.1.” When the file popped open, she instituted a search for matchbook.

  “Yeah,” she said. “There it is.”

  She pointed. BJ followed her finger, then nodded.

  “Okay. Good.”

  She picked up her soup and tasted it.

  “What are you doing here, anyway?” she asked.

  “I just got back from a lunch with Helmuth,” BJ said. His blue eyes glittered mischievously from behind his spectacles. “I’m thinking of stealing him to work for me at Katanyan Associates.”

  She looked at him.

  “Not funny, Boris,” she said.

  “I was kidding,” he said.

  “Uh-huh.”

  He smiled up at her. “I just got interested in how he does what he does. Making Web sites disappear, hiding stuff in the code.”

  “Be careful around Helmuth,” Dagmar said. “Especially if you’re planning on collecting a big salary from this new job of yours. Helmuth will corrupt you faster than hanging with any twenty rock stars.”

  BJ was impressed.

  “I had no idea,” he said.

  “He’ll tell you so himself,” Dagmar said.

  There was another update later in the afternoon. It was intended that after the last puzzle was solved, there was going to be a clue hunt in Planet Nine, with the players’ avatars zooming around the rust-colored surface of Titan on flying scooters.

  Except that the clue hunt didn’t happen. The players got hung up on one of the online puzzles and never progressed to Titan.

  At the end of the day, there was a meeting concerning how to nudge the players loose.

  “Okay,” Dagmar said. “The misunderstanding is all to do with the recording of Omar in the safe house. He’s saying, ‘I need what’s on the banana split.’ And so the players are trying to figure out what’s on a banana split, and how to get it to Omar, instead of noticing that ‘Banana Split’ is a feature on Titan in Planet Nine.”

  “They’ve all got the Titan map,” Jack said.

  “The problem,” said BJ, “is that they haven’t memorized it.”

  “And so they’re trying to get Omar a maraschino cherry,” said Dagmar.

  “Or whipped cream,” Jack said.

  “Or jimmies,” Helmuth said. “They mentioned jimmies.” He looked at Dagmar. “What are jimmies?”

  “Little bits of candy,” Dagmar said, “in the shape of mouse turds.”

  Lines formed between Helmuth’s brows.

  “If I go into an ice cream store and ask for a banana split with jimmies,” he said, “they’ll give to me these candy mouse turds?”

  “Yes,” said Dagmar.

  Helmuth gave a slow nod. “Interesting,” he said.

  He had learned something new about America. Dagmar concealed a smile.

  “What about Banana Split in the game?” BJ asked.

  Dagmar decided she was too tired to make any major decisions right now.

  “Next update’s on Saturday,” she said. “And that’s a big one, because we’ve got players with Tapping the Source machines sampling every water puddle in the world. So we’ve got to get the Titan adventure over before then-let’s say by Thursday night.”

  “Okay,” said Jack. “Good.”

  “The players could crack the Banana Split thing anytime between now and then. So let’s give them the chance, and if they don’t, we’ll think of a clever way to tell them-or failing that, we’ll just go into one of the forums under a pseudonym and give them the answer.”

  The others were happy to put off the decision, and Dagmar called an end to the mission. BJ rose and looked at the others.

  “Anyone interested in dinner?” he asked.

  Dagmar pushed her chair back from the long table. “Not me,” she said. “I’m for a long night’s sleep.”

  She said her good-byes and left as BJ and Helmuth and some others planned a trip to a restaurant.

  The reek of the ginkgo trees filled the parking lot. Dagmar looked carefully behind bushes and trees for Siyed or any other lurker, then went through the gate unmolested and went to her apartment. She warmed a frozen meal of chicken and pasta in alfredo sauce-despite the appetizing name, it was alleged to be low in calories-and idly wondered when she had last actually cooked something on the stove.

  Weeks ago, at least.

  She turned on CNN and ate in front of the television. Charlie’s bots had been busy wrecking South American currencies-Bolivia and Chile had just been a warm-up. Brazil and Argentina were taking a hammering.

  The IMF and the World Bank weren’t offering any help. They’d already lost billions trying to prop up other currencies, and now they had removed themselves from the bot wars altogether.

  The talking heads speculated that they were keeping
what remained of their reserves to prop up the U.S. dollar if it came under attack.

  If the dollar fell, it was bad news even for people who weren’t U.S. citizens. The dollar was the world’s reserve currency-it was the currency that foreign governments used when trading with one another, or when buying commodities like gold and oil. Other currencies were coupled to the dollar and would collapse when the dollar fell. And Bolivia and Chile had saved a little of their citizens’ savings by coupling their own money to the dollar. If the dollar fell, they’d be ruined twice over.

  It was all too depressing. Dagmar switched the channel and watched a program about a gallant teenager who fought crime with her extrasensory powers. The program’s lack of any connection to reality was a comfort.

  She went to bed early and slept late. When she rose, she started the coffee machine and cooked some oatmeal in the microwave, then took a shower. She ate breakfast while CNN reported that South American currencies were still under attack. Dagmar muted the volume on the television while she booted her laptop and checked her email.

  FROM: BJSKI

  SUBJECT: Corrupiton

  Oh hai!

  U waz rite about Hellmouth. We haz been out all nite and I iz now

  throughly corrupited.

  Ai think her nbame was Beverly. She and Hellmouth goze way back.

  She drinkz mojitos.

  Have you ever haz mojitos? 3 and you can not walk rite. Ai do not

  know how Ai gotz home.

  Ai just write to let you knowz that I iz going to be lait with the

  deliverabblies.

  Bj

  PS Ai haz spent all mai dollarz. Kin I haz a raze?

  Dagmar laughed, saw that the email had been sent at 4:42 A.M., and figured she wouldn’t be hearing from BJ till midafternoon at the earliest.

  At least some people in Great Big Idea were having fun.

  FROM: Charlie

  SUBJECT: Patch 2.0

  Hi. I’m attaching the second version of the patch. I’ve tested it on

  my own machines and it works.

  I’m also attaching files from an assortment of online

  brokers giving the IP addresses of computers making suspicious

  trades.

  Talk to ya soon!

  Charlie

  That email had been sent at 5:08, so BJ wasn’t the only person having an all-nighter.

  It’s like they’re undergraduates again, Dagmar thought.

  She shifted in her seat, and out of the corner of her eye she saw a familiar piece of downtown Los Angeles on the television screen.

  The brick facade of the Figueroa Hotel.

  Her mouth went dry. She lunged for the television remote to bring up the sound.

  “-believed to be one fatality in the early morning blast,” said the reporter. “It has not been officially stated whether the explosion was an accident or the result of a bomb, but sources report that Homeland Security has been called in.”

  Dagmar’s heart sank. The reporter hadn’t said where in the hotel the explosion had been, or given the name of the casualty, but Dagmar already knew.

  She knew.

  The Russians had found Charlie.

  She looked at the screen of her laptop and saw Charlie’s emails, with the attachments listed.

  This might be the only copy left of Patch 2.0.

  She turned back to the television and listened. The explosion had occurred just before six o’clock, a short time after Charlie had sent her the email. The hotel had been evacuated and the fire department called, but the fire had been minor and easily put out. One body had been found, and there were believed to be no further casualties.

  She should find out, Dagmar thought. She should try to confirm what she felt she already knew.

  Dagmar turned to the laptop, took it from the kitchen table, and connected it to the cable modem on her desk. She found the Figueroa’s home page, got the number for the front desk, and called it.

  “Figueroa Hotel.” The desk clerk’s voice was hoarse. He’d probably been answering a lot of phone calls in the past few hours.

  “Can you connect me to the Medina Suite, please?”

  There was a moment’s hesitation.

  “I’m afraid there’s been an accident,” the clerk said.

  “The accident was in the Medina Suite?” Dagmar asked.

  “Yes.” Another hesitation. “May I know the name of the person you wished to contact?”

  “By ‘accident,’ ” Dagmar said, relentless, “you mean the bomb, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Thank you.” Dagmar pressed End.

  She stared at the phone for a long moment while CNN ran a commercial for Viagra.

  Her mind seemed to have nothing in it. Just a big empty warehouse space, with fading footsteps echoing.

  Both her fingertips and her mind seemed to be numb as she downloaded Patch 2.0 to her computer, then copied both it and the broker files to a memory stick.

  Now there were three copies. She put the memory stick in the pocket of her jeans.

  She gave a galvanic leap as the phone began to ring in her hand. The number on the display was area code 818, but she didn’t recognize it.

  She muted the sound on the television, then pressed Send and put the handheld to her ear.

  “Yes?”

  “Dagmar.” Joe Clever’s voice was breathless. “I’ve found the Russian!”

  Dagmar let breath whisper from her lips in a sigh. If only Clever had found Litvinov twenty-four hours ago.

  “He’s in the pool, swimming laps!” Joe Clever said. “I’m watching him now!”

  “Where are you?” Dagmar asked.

  “Oceanside Motel, in Santa Monica. Near Pacific Palisades.”

  That wasn’t anywhere near downtown Los Angeles, but then of course the bomb could have been carried to the Figueroa from wherever Litvinov had assembled it.

  “Charlie Ruff lives in Santa Monica, right?” Joe Clever said. “I think the Russian was probably still trying to stake out Charlie’s house.”

  “Yes,” Dagmar said. Her mind turned in sluggish circles. She didn’t seem to be processing this at all.

  “Man!” Joe Clever said. “I thought I’d never be able to get back to my cell phone! I’ve been watching his door since six thirty last night, and I had no way of contacting you!”

  Dagmar suddenly found herself in a timeless space, the long, soft period between two of her heartbeats extending to infinity in all directions while Joe Clever’s words echoed in her brain.

  “You’d better tell me,” Dagmar said.

  “I’ve been going to every hotel and motel in Greater Los Angeles,” said Joe Clever. “I’ve got pictures I made of Litvinov, and I show them to the desk clerks. I photoshop beards and so on in case he’s trying to disguise himself.” He laughed. “It’s old-fashioned detective work! I tried emailing the pictures, you know, but the hotels don’t always respond, so I have to go in person. And the desk clerks work in shifts, you know, so I don’t always get them all, and I have to come back.”

  Dagmar tried to picture Joe Clever driving his old van from one motel to the next, talking to one bemused desk clerk after another. How many thousands of hours would it take to hit every motel in the Los Angeles area? Even LAPD didn’t have that much manpower, that many hours.

  “Good work,” Dagmar said. It seemed inadequate praise.

  “I keep coming back to the motels around Santa Monica,” Joe Clever said. “I checked the hotels in the Valley, too, but I figured Litvinov wouldn’t go back to AvN Soft, not after you increased security the way you did. Anyway, I got lucky… Yesterday around dinnertime I got to the Oceanside just an hour after Litvinov checked in.”

  “You’re sure it’s him?”

  “Oh yes, once I got a look at him! When the clerk told me he’d checked in, I got a room across the motel court from his. Then I ran to the van and got my Big Ears and video camera and went to my room to set up.

  “I
was going to call you, but I realized I’d left my cell phone in the van, and I didn’t dare leave until I was sure that it really was Litvinov. I didn’t want him to disappear the way he did last time.

  “I didn’t have your number with me, so I couldn’t use the phone in the room. So I employed the Big Ears and I got some conversations of Litvinov talking on the phone.”

  “When did you confirm it was really him?”

  Joe Clever was so excited that his words began to stumble over one another. “Just this morning! S-someone came to the door to give him a package, and I got a good look!”

  “Who was the messenger?”

  “Just some guy. They talked in Russian! I got some good pictures of him.”

  “And you’re sure that Litvinov didn’t go out all night?”

  “That’s right! I was awake the whole time! And even if I fell asl-if I drowsed off, I was wearing my Big Ear headphones and I had my camera running, so if his door had opened, I would have known it. He stayed in all night and watched the CSI marathon on the Crime Channel.”

  Doing his homework, no doubt, learning about all the forensic science that might trip him up when he committed his next murder.

  “Anyway,” Joe Clever said, “I didn’t want to lose him, so I stayed in the room until he came out and started doing laps. I figured he wasn’t going to run off wearing just a pair of swim trunks, so I snuck out to the van and got the cell phone and came back to the room and called you. And the Russian’s still doing laps.”

  “Oceanside Motel,” Dagmar said. “Which room?”

  “One one four. Or do you mean Litvinov’s?”

  “His.”

  “One one seven. Are you coming over?”

  “I’m going to call the police.”

  “Well,” Joe Clever said, “tell them to hurry and not screw up like last time. Litvinov isn’t going to stay in the damn pool forever.”

  He sounded disappointed that Dagmar wasn’t driving to Santa Monica to take down the Russian herself, with his help.

  “I’ll call you right back,” Dagmar said.

  Dagmar called the North Hollywood Station and asked for Lieutenant Murdoch. The receptionist said that he was away from the station, and asked if she wanted his voice mail.