Diffusion Box Set

by Stan C. Smith

  “I cannot know what is next, Bobby. What would you like to happen next?”

  Bobby sighed. “It’s not up to me. I’m just a kid.”

  Addison turned back to the window to watch the growing dawn.

  Bobby’s thoughts returned to Peter. All those years ago he had found the hanging village and the Lamotelokhai. And after leaving—or escaping—he had created Kembalimo, one of the biggest networked learning programs ever. He didn’t do it to make money, so why?

  Then Bobby had an idea. “We need to call Peter Wooley,” he said out loud. “Mr. Darnell, can we use the phone?”

  Ashley perked up. “We have a phone?”

  “Quentin, you have a phone?” Mrs. Darnell’s voice was low and cold.

  Mr. Darnell looked in the rearview mirror, right at Bobby. The orange sky ahead lit up his eyes. “Richards gave me the money and his phone. Yes, I have his phone.”

  There was an uncomfortable silence.

  “I could call my parents,” Ashley said. “Why didn’t you say we had a phone?”

  Mr. Darnell let go of the wheel and held both of his hands up, like he was surrendering. “Yes, I have a phone! I didn’t say anything because I wanted to avoid this.”

  “My parents need to know I’m not dead,” Ashley said.

  “They already know you’re not dead!” Mr. Darnell actually yelled, and it shocked everyone.

  Mrs. Darnell kept her voice low. “How do you know that?”

  He shook his head. “I didn’t want to say anything before, because I wasn’t sure. But now I am. They know she’s alive because she isn’t missing.”

  Everyone was quiet now.

  He went on. “It wasn’t a coincidence that the Twin Otter crashed. It was caused by something Samuel did with the Lamotelokhai. A copy of our plane was created. An exact copy, except that ours was damaged in the process. The other Twin Otter was fine. It didn’t crash.”

  Again it was quiet.

  “That’s why there were no search planes looking for us.”

  “We don’t know that,” Ashley said. “I want to call home anyway.”

  Carlos was awake now. “I want to call home too.”

  “Actually, we do know for sure,” Mr. Darnell said. “I called.”

  “You called who, Quentin?” Mrs. Darnell said.

  He stared at the road ahead.

  “Quentin!”

  “I called our house. We were asleep, but I got up to answer the phone.”

  This was followed by stunned silence. Finally, Ashley whispered, “Oh my God.”

  Bobby knew Mr. Darnell’s words were true. He’d seen the other Twin Otter with his own eyes. Days ago, Addison—Addison the monster—had said to him, ‘you can’t go there, they won’t want you.’ Even Addison with his brain damage knew.

  You can’t go there, they won’t want you.

  Seconds passed and only the van’s wheels on the road could be heard. Bobby’s mind was numb. He needed to think about something else. “I still want to call Peter Wooley. Can I use Colonel Richards’s phone?”

  Mr. Darnell sighed and then pulled the smartphone from his pocket and passed it back. “You’re right, maybe he can help us. If you can find a number, you should let one of us talk. I imagine an adult will have a better chance of connecting with him directly.”

  Bobby turned it on and pulled up the web browser. The signal was weak, but before long he was at the home page for Kembalimo. He had been there before, but only to download the app that connected to the servers and allowed him to play. After a few minutes of digging around, he was at the site of Kembalimo’s parent company, SouthPacificNet. There he found some information on Peter Wooley, but no phone number. Finally he found some numbers for customer relations. One of them was in the United States, in Texas. Ignoring Mr. Darnell’s request, he tapped the number to switch to cell phone mode and call it. A computer voice came on, offering him choices. He selected, talk to a customer relations representative.

  “SouthPacificNet International Relations. How may I help you?”

  Bobby sat up straight. “Uh, my name is Bobby Truex. I need to talk to Peter Wooley.”

  “Mr. Wooley resides in Brisbane, Bobby. He does not take unsolicited phone calls. I will be happy to help you if I can, or I could connect you with technical support.”

  “I really need to talk to him. It won’t do any good to talk to someone else.”

  “I would be happy to give you an email address. Mr. Wooley often monitors email, and he’s been known to answer them personally.”

  Mr. Darnell had been right. Bobby should have let an adult call. “No, there’s no time. Is there any way you can tell him what I want to talk about?”

  The woman actually laughed. “Bobby, I have never talked to Mr. Wooley, and I probably never will. But I would be happy to take your message and pass it on.”

  Bobby wasn’t ready to give up. “I have things Mr. Wooley would want to know, I swear. Can you let him know we’ve been to the hanging village in Papua? We met someone he knows named Samuel. And we found the Lamotelokhai. He would want to know that.”

  “Bobby, what did you say? Can you please repeat that?”

  Bobby repeated it.

  There was a pause on the other end, and clacking on a keyboard. “What was it you said you found Bobby? Please speak it clearly.”

  “The Lamotelokhai. We found the Lamotelokhai.”

  “Oh my sweet Lord,” the woman said. “Bobby, please stay on the phone. Do not hang up. In case we get disconnected, can you give me your number?”

  Bobby pulled the phone away and looked at it. He wasn’t familiar with the controls. “It’s not my phone. I don’t know the number.”

  “Okay, if we get disconnected, please call back. My name is Maria Navarro. Ask for me.” She made him repeat her name. “I have to put you on hold for just a moment, okay?”

  “Okay.” Bobby heard a click. He looked up. Mr. Darnell was looking at him in the mirror. The others were staring, too. “I think she’s calling Mr. Wooley for me,” he said. As he waited, Bobby heard several beeps. Someone was trying to call Colonel Richards’s phone.

  At least two minutes passed.

  “Bobby, you still with me? I’m going to connect you now with Mr. Peter Wooley. Is that okay with you?”

  It was a stupid question. “Yes.”

  A click, and then another voice. “Hello, this is Peter Wooley. With whom am I speaking?”

  Bobby swallowed. “I’m Bobby Truex, Mr. Wooley.”

  “How old are you, Bobby?”

  “I’m fourteen. I know Samuel, Mr. Wooley. Do you remember Samuel?”

  Peter was silent for a moment. “I know a few Samuels, son.”

  “This one is different. He’s like a hundred and fifty years old. He said he knows you. He thought you were dead.”

  Another silence. “Well, I’ll be stuffed. Samuel Inwood is alive and well?”

  “He was when we left Jayapura. He was going to come with us, but then we had to leave him there.”

  “Son, where did you meet Samuel?”

  “In the jungle after our plane crashed. We went to his village—the hanging village.”

  “And you got him to leave that village?”

  “It’s kind of a long story. Some bad things happened.”

  “I want to hear it all. But first, something very important: the customer relations folks in my company are required to memorize two words from a confidential policy document. They are instructed to call a dedicated line to me in the event that a caller mentions these words. One of the words is Samuel. Son, what do you reckon the other word to be?”

  Bobby didn’t hesitate. “Lamotelokhai.”

  Peter cleared his throat. “That’s the one. What do you know of the Lamotelokhai?”

  “I know a lot. I know you invented Kembalimo, and that’s how I could talk to it at first. Is that why you made Kembalimo, Mr. Wooley?”

  “Oh, dear God. Yes.” Then there were some shuffling so
unds, like Peter might have pulled the phone away from his face. “Yes, that is precisely why.”

  “Well, it worked.”

  Peter let out a long breath. “I wanted the next person who found it to be ready.”

  “Kembalimo was just the beginning. I asked it to change its shape into a person. Now it looks like Addison, one of my friends. But—” Bobby paused. “Addison’s gone. So now the Lamotelokhai is Addison, and we just talk to it like a normal person.”

  There was another long breath. “I’ll be stuffed,” Peter said again. “Bobby, who else is there with you?”

  “My teachers and two of my friends. We’re trying to get home without getting caught.”

  “What do you mean, ‘getting caught’?”

  “That’s a long story, too. We think some people might use Addison to do bad things.”

  “Bobby, it would seem there is some urgency to your situation. Might I talk to one of your teachers?”

  As he passed the phone forward, Bobby heard the beep of another incoming call.

  Quentin glanced at Lindsey. She took the phone from Bobby, but instead of talking to Wooley she held it out to Quentin with her head cocked to one side. She was angry. He should have told her about the phone—and about everything else.

  He put it to his ear. “This is Quentin Darnell.”

  “Quentin, Peter Wooley. Can you confirm that what Bobby has told me is true?”

  “It’s all true.” Quentin glanced in the mirror. “Bobby isn’t one to lie.”

  “This is astonishing news. Forgive me if I am at a loss for the proper thing to say. May I ask why you called me?”

  “It was Bobby’s idea. We thought you might be able to help us. Peter, what exactly happened at the hanging village?”

  There was a deep sigh. “That was over forty years ago. I am guessing you may know this, but I remember every detail as if I were living it at this moment. I also have not aged a day in the years since. Do you know why, Quentin?”

  “I do. What do your doctors think of that?”

  “I have no need for doctors.”

  Quentin came to a T in the road. Lindsey looked at the map in her lap, and she pointed to the right, so he turned.

  “So what happened in Papua?” Quentin said. “Samuel thought you were dead.”

  “I was a reckless youth then, testing my own blood’s worth with a self-imposed walkabout. When I stumbled upon the village, the natives wanted to kill me when they found I could not speak with the Lamotelokhai. But Samuel convinced them to wait. This allowed me to learn to manipulate the adaptive symbol mapping system used by the Lamotelokhai. I made steady progress, constructing a common language with an intelligence I had nothing in common with. It was enlightening, to say the least. But my progress was not fast enough for the natives. They decided to kill me.

  “But you’re alive,” Quentin said.

  “After they attacked, I woke up a short distance from the hanging village. My body was unharmed. So I made my way back to civilization.”

  Quentin recalled the conversation with Colonel Richards at the airport in Sentani. Samuel had said he had witnessed the Papuans killing Peter. ‘Beaten beyond hope of repair,’ he had said. Quentin knew what this meant. They had pulverized the body. That’s how they made sure people stayed dead.

  “Peter, do you have any idea how you survived?”

  “Knowing that the natives intended to kill me, I attempted to ask the Lamotelokhai’s help. So I assumed it used its curative powers to heal me after they attacked and discarded my body, thinking I was dead.”

  Peter was wrong. The Papuans would have been thorough. And the Lamotelokhai had said it had reconstructed him, as it had done to Ashley after she’d drowned. Peter had been created from scratch, no doubt from elements in the vegetation and the soil. Apparently Peter did not know he was a copy of his original self.

  A beep sounded in Quentin’s ear, an incoming call.

  “Peter, I may have to end our conversation. We’ve got a bit of a situation here.”

  “Bobby mentioned you were avoiding capture. What the hell is going on?”

  “You know how important the Lamotelokhai is,” Quentin said. “Without trying to explain it all, we’re trying to get to our hometown, where we hope to make an announcement to the whole world. This is the only way we can think of to prevent it from being used in secrecy. That’s the only plan we have. We’re kind of winging it.”

  “And where exactly are you at this time?”

  This put Quentin on alert. “We’re some distance from our destination.”

  Peter hesitated. “Quentin, I am convinced your intentions are spot-on. It seems to me you need an ally. I have a bit of influence and some resources that might prove useful. If you would rather not disclose your location, then tell me your destination. You said you wanted to make an announcement to the world. Beauty of an idea. I will help arrange that.”

  “So you’re willing to help us?”

  “I have devoted forty-two years of my life to preparing the world for what I alone knew was coming. Does that answer your question?”

  It did. Quentin told Peter their destination. They agreed that Quentin and Lindsey’s house would be the location for the media event. Peter gave his personal cell phone number, and they ended the call.

  Within seconds the phone chirped. A number with a 213 area code glowed on the screen, but there was no name. Quentin eyed Lindsey but her face was a blank slate. She was either dwelling on his decision to hide the phone from her, or on his unsettling motive for doing so. The phone sounded again, and finally she shrugged. So he answered the call.

  “Darnell? Quentin, is that you?” It was Richards.

  “Good to hear from you, Colonel. What’s happening there?”

  “A great deal of confusion, but the scenario is taking shape. There is a general understanding that we have transported here something extraordinarily important, and that you have sequestered it. I have explained why, but you can bet your life they’re assuming the worst. There’s a shit-storm building here, Darnell. Top-level personnel and resources are coming into play. Where the hell are you?”

  “We have a plan, but it’s going to take some time.”

  “Well, I’m in no position to question your judgment, but you don’t have much time. Listen to me, Darnell. The media blitz we discussed, you’ve got to do it now. And you’d better get rid of my phone. I don’t think they know you have it yet, but—”

  There was a click, followed by silence.

  “Mr. Darnell, please don’t hang up.” It was a different voice.

  “Who is this?”

  “My name is Darron Mesner. I represent the interests and security of the people of the United States. Again, please do not hang up. It is very important that you talk to me.”

  Quentin gripped the steering wheel tight with his free hand and stared at the road ahead.

  “Mr. Darnell—it’s Quentin, right? Please explain your situation and your intentions.”

  “I’m with my wife and our students. We haven’t done anything wrong.”

  “You are not accused of doing anything wrong, Quentin. Therefore we’d like to know why you fled the airport. Is there anything you can explain that would help us to understand?”

  “We have something that is very important. Our only intention is to make everyone aware of it. We believe it’s here for a reason, and that reason does not involve weapons, or one country dominating another.”

  There was a pause. “Perhaps you can tell me what exactly you are referring to.”

  “It’s a gift—for all of us. But we’ve seen that it can be very dangerous. So we want everyone to know what it is, to prevent a few single-minded people from making decisions that could be catastrophic.”

  “Quentin, you have somehow managed to avoid National Security personnel with a device you say is very dangerous. And now you are behaving as fugitives on the run—with a weapon of unknown origin and destructive power. Do you underst
and our concern?”

  Quentin’s stomach sank. “When you put it that way, yes. But that’s a distortion of what’s really happening here. This thing is not a weapon. In fact, the reason we’re running is to prevent it from being used to make weapons.”

  “I understand you brought this thing to the U.S. because you believed our people were best qualified to deal with it. It seems that was a subterfuge.”

  “Or we simply changed our minds. We aren’t terrorists, if that’s what you think. We have no intention of hurting anyone.”

  “I hope to God that’s true, Quentin.” There was a brief silence. “Tell me, what is your destination? What do you hope to accomplish by driving east?”

  Quentin froze. “You know where we are?”

  Mesner’s voice was even, with no hint of condescension. “Of course we do. Quentin, I consider myself to be an honorable man. And I give you my word that this device will not be used in the way that you fear it will. In fact, Quentin, it seems that you are currently the expert on the device. Therefore, if you cooperate from this moment on, you will be included in the investigation of it. Your opinions seem sound and will be considered valuable.”

  Quentin put on the brakes and pulled the van onto the shoulder. “What I need is a promise that the first thing we do is make a live announcement on national television.” He opened his door and stepped onto the road. The sky was orange to the east and deep blue everywhere else. It was actually quite beautiful—and dead silent. No vehicles were visible in either direction, and the sky was clear of helicopters and planes. “I want to make this announcement myself, before the device is examined by any experts.”

  Mesner sighed. “That’s a rather difficult thing to promise, Quentin.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that,” Quentin replied. “But that’s the only way to ensure the safety of all the people of this world. I’m sorry.” Quentin then stepped to the side of the road. He picked up a large rock from the rubble deposited there, dropped the phone on the ground, and smashed it in the desert sand.

  Chapter Ten

  Sleeping was a lost cause for Quentin. He lay awake in bed, listening to the relentless twitter of katydids and crickets through the open window of their bedroom. He had nudged Lindsey awake, and they’d talked about the strange phone call, but her tone was rather dubious. She had no explanation for why the caller sounded so much like Quentin, or how the guy could know the details of their life he had described. She hadn’t heard the phone ring, and so she’d suggested Quentin might have dreamt the conversation. Within minutes she’d fallen asleep again.