Uncle and Ants

by Marc Jedel

  “What is it that is wrong?” Raj asked.

  Drone, crash, murder. “My sister is in the hospital.”

  Raj’s polite conversational tone shifted to concern. “Hold the horses. What happened? Will she be ok?”

  “A car accident. The cop said a delivery drone fell on her car. And, I think so,” I said, trying to address his questions.

  “My goodness.” Raj now sounded confused. “How could that happen?”

  Drone, crash, murder. I agreed with his confusion. Drones don’t fall on people. At least they haven’t in many years. After the “crash” and “drone”, “murder” was the only part of the mantra left to explain.

  Raj pursed his lips and gave a short shake of his head as he pondered how this could happen. “That is terrible, but perhaps you are mistaken that someone is trying to kill your sister.”

  “Perhaps. But I’m worried.”

  “How long will the police stay in the hospital?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You could call the hospital and ask them,” Raj said.

  “They’re not going to tell someone over the phone when the police will leave a murder scene. They’ll be suspicious I’m going to try something.”

  “Why not ask when your sister’s friend, who’s not on the approved list, can visit her?”

  My mouth dropped open. Raj was clever and sneaky. I admired that about him.

  The hospital told me that, due to unforeseen complications surrounding a police investigation, all visitors were banned until tomorrow.

  I’d have to break the news to the girls after school. However, with all the police in the hospital, Laney would be safe for now. I’d figure out something to help her later. In the meantime, I took out my things and tried to get some work done.

  A few hours after lunch, I looked up. Except for Raj, everyone else listened to music through noise-canceling headphones to blot away the sounds from neighboring phone calls and conversations in the open floor plans that permeated the Valley. Some long-ago misguided consultant must have thought that removing cubicle walls would increase collaboration and productivity. Instead, this despised brainstorm created floors of headphone-wearing zombies trying, in silent desperation, to focus on their work and avoid distractions. Perhaps management used the guise of collaboration to excuse cutting real estate costs by cramming more people closer together.

  I found that the trick to listening to baseball games at work, without getting caught, involved the ability to maintain a straight face and not react no matter what happened. After all, not many people cheered in the middle of listening to music. Oh, and make sure to use just the audio broadcast. It’s a rookie mistake to have the video playing in the background since the boss might stop by and ask to see something on your screen. With the Giants playing well, I’d struggled to maintain the charade.

  Raj looked up from his computer. He never wore headphones. Perhaps they interfered with the brainwaves from his multi-dimensional thought processes.

  I let out a small groan as I stretched. “Hey, I forgot to tell you earlier that new feature we finished for Rover doesn’t work. Twice I tried it, and the car left me both times. We’ve got to pull it out of the beta version before marketing promotes it.”

  “Most peculiar. I tested it myself this morning and it worked splendidly. What exactly did you tell the car to do?”

  “I told it to ‘sit.’ Stupid marketing guy who thought it would be funny to use dog commands for the car.”

  Raj did a small head bobble. “Then that is your error. It is ‘stay,’ not ‘sit.’ ”

  “What do I know about dogs?” I complained. “I’m allergic to them, anyway.”

  “But it is logical. A car cannot sit. A car does not have knees.”

  “Knees?” I said, perplexed.

  Raj added a small finger wag for emphasis. “Yes. You must have knees to sit.” Raj was the robotics expert and evidently, he understood canine anatomy better too.

  Once started, I continued my list of complaints from this morning. “It was also annoying this morning because my nieces used up my water allowance so I had to shower at the gym.” A few years ago, as California’s drought extended into our sixth year and counting, the water agency had installed controls that strictly limited water consumption per dwelling, based on the number of occupants and the size of your yard. Since I lived by myself in an apartment, I had a small water allowance. I’d have to call the water agency to get a temporary increase.

  “It is very important to conserve water.”

  “Yes, I know.” I’d forgotten about Raj’s passion for the subject and braced myself.

  “Americans waste too much water. Your farms pump billions of gallons from the ground and the agriculture chemicals pollute the untreated runoff water. This weekend I read about a new plant in California which will distill out the dangerous chemicals and provide clean water to people in the Central Valley. This is good.”

  “Yes. This is good.” Raj tended to go on about water issues. He’d told me his family had owned a farm in India until his grandparents lost their land. Agreeing with him made the water lectures shorter. I enjoyed speaking to him about his family in India as long as we stayed away from rural Indian politics.

  I tried to distract him from continuing the lecture. Coming up with an unusual idiom often threw him for a loop. Out of the blue, I said, “I don’t think this conversation will cut the mustard.”

  He laughed out loud at this. “Come, now you are just making them up.”

  “No. That’s a real one.” But, I had to leave before this conversation devolved into a contest of silly idioms. “Hey Raj, could you cover for me?”

  Raj raised his eyebrows, “What should I cover?”

  “If the boss asks, tell him I’m doing some field testing. I’m going to pick up the girls and check on Laney. I’ll work from home later.”

  “Yes, I can do this.” Raj gave me a thumbs-up. “I sincerely hope that she is doing better.”

  We had Rover cars waiting in the parking lot for testing so I jumped in one to head to the girls’ school. Good doggie.

  This time, when I gave the car a firm command to “stay,” the Rover car remained where I’d left it. Raj had implemented the new verbal command while I’d integrated the feature into our test version. It felt good to see our software worked as planned. Having code work always felt good. The rush I felt from these successes was the primary reason I became a software engineer. I hadn’t realized that engineering would involve working with stupid marketing folks. They dreamed up new ideas attempting to be funny or cute. Who’d remember to tell their car to “stay”?

  As soon as she saw me, Megan asked, “Can we go see Mom now?”

  Telling them we couldn’t see Laney until tomorrow turned hopeful faces into studies in frustration. I told them the latest news from the doctor that Laney was improving while avoiding any mention of why visitors were prohibited.

  That good news helped the girls feel better and they chattered about school on the way home again. Years of experience working in an open environment helped me tune them out. Purging the thought of the poor murdered woman out of my head wasn’t so easy. I was positive that falling asleep in a hospital room with the wrong name on the door had gotten her killed.

  As I thought of Laney asleep in her room, I broke out in a sweat. Sure, the police swarmed the hospital today, but what about tomorrow? Was someone after her? Why would anyone want to hurt her? I needed to look at Laney’s computer. Perhaps it had clues that would explain what had happened to her. Maybe Laney had been talking to someone who wanted her dead.

  Skye interrupted my thoughts. “Earth to Uncle Marty.”

  “What? Sorry, I was just thinking.”

  Megan wrinkled her nose as something caught her attention. “Yuck. What’s that smell?”

  I didn’t want to explain what had happened in the hospital. “It’s nothing. I spilled some fish sauce on my shoes earlier today.”

 
Rolling down her window, Skye said, “It smells like a super dead fish.”

  “Better than dead ants.” Uncles don’t have to make sense. I take full advantage of this privilege. I’d been practicing since long before the girls were born.

  Delivering a well-deserved eye roll, Skye asked, “Oh yeah, that reminds me. Can I use some water for my ants?”

  I didn’t answer. “What do you call a really big ant?”

  Megan blurted out, “Elephant!”

  “Oh, did I tell you that joke before?”

  “No, we learned lame jokes from Dad.” Skye’s face fell and she grew quiet.

  “I always liked your dad.” Noticing that both girls remained silent, I added, “Yes, the water’s fine.”

  My ex-wife would confirm I didn’t handle unhappy women well. Looking to distract them, I asked, “What do you call a hundred-year-old ant?” Without waiting for a response, I answered, “Antique” and chuckled at myself.

  “Ugh, that’s as bad as Dad’s jokes used to be,” said Skye, without any enthusiasm.

  “Well, he had many fine qualities, especially his sense of humor.”

  But joke time was over, for now. Between their memories of their father and concern for their mother, I wouldn’t be able to change their mood. The girls looked out their windows in silence for the rest of the ride.

  When we got back to my apartment, the girls started on their homework while I stepped into my office. Not Megan’s room. I checked in with Raj. Apparently, the boss wasn’t pleased that I’d missed our staff meeting. I’d do some extra work tonight after the girls went to sleep so he’d see progress on my project.

  I wanted to check out Laney’s things and see if something would clue me into what might have happened. Pulling out Laney’s computer and phone from her satchel, I examined them. Her phone had one of those retinal eye scanners which prevented me from getting access. But her computer started running as soon as I touched the screen. Just like Laney. Highest level security on one device and none on the other.

  I searched Laney’s calendar. She had only three appointments listed for Monday. One name leaped out at me. Laney had met with Jean Rollag before the accident at nine-thirty on Monday morning.

  Jean Rollag’s name should leap out to anyone who knew high-tech. He’d co-founded and still acted as Chief Technical Officer of DroneTech. Only hours before a rogue drone almost killed her, Laney had met with the co-founder and CTO of DroneTech. A flush of adrenaline raced through my body. I had to do something. But what could I do?

  One of the hottest startups in Silicon Valley in years, DroneTech had grown quickly after the government allowed drone flight testing within the United States. DroneTech’s control systems ran most of the commercial drones around the world. Initially, DroneTech built drones before evolving into selling their software and control systems to other drone makers. Now they made even more money managing the commercial flying drone network in a number of countries.

  In nearly eleven years, drones had exploded from a hobbyist’s toy to serious tools used by businesses globally for all sorts of rolling, walking, and flying purposes. Within the last few months, DroneTech had announced their intention to go public. The news drove anticipation of an astounding wave of money that thousands of DroneTech employees hoped to cash out from their stock options and slosh around the Valley to spend on expensive houses, cars, and other toys.

  I wished I worked there. Maybe Laney could get me an interview? No, wait! If Rollag is involved in trying to hurt my sister, then I wasn’t interested, no matter how many stock options he offered.

  Rollag and his co-founder, David Saunders, had started DroneTech while still in school at Stanford. Unlike so many Silicon Valley startup stories, they’d actually both graduated from Stanford, which their public relations people touted as if they were the first Stanford graduates ever to run a successful startup. Saunders turned out to have the business chops to turn their ideas into reality and then to surf the tsunami of success without crashing the company into the rocks. Rollag played the role of technical visionary. He spoke on a regular basis on the TED circuit and appeared on the panel sessions that are such a staple of all the tech industry’s many tradeshows. Like too many of the men whose startups had hit it big, his reputation for arrogance was matched only by stories of his womanizing. Perhaps the press hyped that aspect because his French first name sounded exotic, even though he was born in California.

  Scared, impressed and more than a little jealous that Laney had met Rollag, I wanted to look him in the eye and see if he knew anything about a drone almost falling on Laney. Rollag had the techie chops to hack into a drone.

  It didn’t make sense, though. Laney couldn’t have posed a threat to Rollag. He was too important for her to affect him. However, he might know who could have done it. Maybe a visit would be just the right personal touch to figure this whole thing out.

  If it wasn’t him, maybe I could land a plum DroneTech engineering job.

  5

  Tuesday Evening

  Rollag had met with Laney in a nearby Starbucks. Looks like Mr. Big Shot got his caffeine fix same as normal people. Odd that they didn’t meet in the DroneTech offices, but I suppose consultants go where they’re told.

  Most people were creatures of habit. Rollag might have scheduled the meeting with Laney for his usual time to hit that Starbucks on his way to his office. One thing I knew about coffee was how addicted people became to it. I’d go to that Starbucks tomorrow morning at the same time in hopes of encountering him. Talking to him in the coffee line had to be less challenging than breaking through his assistant’s protection and penetrating his schedule at the office.

  After we cleared up the drone situation, I’d hand him my resume. I liked my job at Rover well enough, but a software engineer would be crazy not to want to work at DroneTech. My folks didn’t raise someone that crazy.

  The rest of Laney’s calendar showed two other, far less interesting, entries for Monday. She’d scheduled a brief call at nine with someone named Fernando Hernandez. His number followed his name on her calendar entry. The last appointment, labeled simply ME, looked like something personal. Laney could have been seeing a therapist, or been taking a personal improvement class, or been seeing an investment counselor. Nah, I knew Laney. She’d scheduled a manicure.

  A soft knock sounded on the apartment door. No one had buzzed from outside so it must be someone from the building. Only building maintenance had ever stopped by my apartment unannounced and that knock didn’t sound like a maintenance worker. When I opened the door, Mrs. Kim, my nosy, elderly neighbor from down the hall, stood at my door, holding a covered dish that smelled amazing.

  “Hello, Mr. Marty. Girls still here?”

  “Yes.” I hesitated since I hadn’t told her about the girls visiting. I’ve even only spoken to Mrs. Kim a handful of times in the three years I’ve lived in the apartment. “My sister will be in the hospital for a few days.”

  She smiled and, bowing slightly with her head tilted down, offered me the covered dish. “Ah, so sorry, but good. Maybe they like special Korean BBQ and rice?”

  Her timing was ideal as it dawned on me that I’d forgotten to notify the delivery service to send our grocery order. “Thank you so much. Please, come in.”

  Drawn by the smell and noise, the girls poked their heads around the corner.

  “Girls, Mrs. Kim brought us her special Korean BBQ for dinner. Please set the table.”

  Even I knew it wouldn’t be polite to grab the food and shut the door in Mrs. Kim’s face. “Will you join us?”

  She smiled and nodded. “Yes. Thank you.”

  Megan frowned at me. “Do we have to eat salsa as our vegetable again?”

  Looking at Megan, Mrs. Kim asked, “What is salsa?”

  “Vegetables, chopped up and spicy,” answered Skye.

  Mrs. Kim gave an enigmatic smile. “I have this. I get.” She turned and shuffled back to her apartment.

  I left the
door ajar and helped the girls get the table ready for dinner. A few minutes later, Mrs. Kim returned with another dish and placed it on the table with a proud flourish. “Kimchee. Vegetables, chopped up and spicy,” she announced.

  As a general rule, uncles enjoy pushing their nieces’ comfort levels. Without saying a word, I spooned some kimchee onto the girls’ plates. Despite some wrinkling of noses, they both tried it. I had to give them credit. I’m not sure I’d have tried kimchee at their age. It wasn’t a hit.

  But the Korean BBQ and rice received rave reviews. Good thing, as peanut butter wouldn’t have gone over very well again.

  Skye’s earlier question about her ants reminded me of some important acting parent responsibilities. As we finished dinner, I asked Megan, “Should we start working on your science fair project?”

  Megan squinched up her face in confusion. “What are you talking about?”

  “How about if I make milkshakes?” I explained, and then took out ice cream and chocolate syrup. I might not have many food options for dinner or lunch, but I had the essentials. Distracting the girls from Laney’s absence could be achieved with dessert as well as bad jokes. Mrs. Kim decided to stick around for dessert as well.

  The milkshakes were an even bigger hit than the BBQ. Taking out some paper, I helped Megan organize her notes on vanilla and chocolate milkshakes for her project while Skye supervised our work. We needed to do some extra testing, in the name of science, of course.

  “Good night girls,” I said as they climbed into their bed.

  “Can we go see Mom in the morning?” asked Megan.

  “You have school. We’ll go later tomorrow to see her.”

  Megan pouted. “Then, what should we dream about?”

  I had completely forgotten about this additional responsibility. Most engineers are not creative in this way by nature. Laney needed to come home soon so she could take back over these duties.