by VK Fourstone
He was delighted that at last his sister had a chance to get well. And not just a chance but a very high probability of returning to a normal life. Of course, he was nervous and agitated, as anyone would be in his place. Besides, he still felt embarrassed that while she was in a coma and that he had almost fallen in love with her. He still wanted to say the same words to her as he did then: that he loved her very much.
They went towards the lift and did not see the receptionist dial the commissioner’s number.
Vicky’s ward was on the third floor. The blinds were up, and through the windows one could see a magnificent view of the sea and the city. It was probably the only hospital in the world with such an insanely beautiful view.
Vicky was lying under a sheet, with various tubes and drips attached to her body. Her chest moved calmly and evenly as she breathed, and the sheet rose only a tiny little bit. Even with those closed eyes and pale skin she looked tremendously attractive. Someone in the future would be very lucky to meet her.
His thoughts were interrupted by the doctor who came to explain the plan of the operation and Vicky’s recovery.
There were still several days before the operation. A brain surgeon would specifically come from America. Right now they were introducing markers through the IV, to color the tumor so that it could be better seen on the monitors. The actual surgery would take no more than three or four hours, then the patient would gradually be brought out of her comatose state followed by another week of rehabilitation. The muscles had atrophied, so massage, physiotherapy and injection of stimulants would be needed to restore body tonus. The recovery process used to take at least a month, but now it was quicker, thanks to the Collective Mind. Then they would allow him to collect Vicky and continue with the physical therapy at home.
“And when will I be able to talk to her?”
“In about ten days. Might be a bit sooner or a bit later. We should not hurry with bringing her out of the coma, but don’t worry, you will have plenty of time to talk,” the doctor reassured Isaac.
After lunch the group split up and Pascal went back to his villa. He needed to review the significant events of the past two days, get a clear idea of what was kept where in his home, check the state of his finances, and practice Veggie behavior just in case. His body, accustomed to daily workouts, was literally itching to get on an exercise machine.
Bikie went back to join Link at the villa and Isaac bought a bouquet of flowers and sent them to Michelle’s home.
Pellegrini sat at the table and looked through his notes, Pascal Din goes along with the others to visit Isaac’s sister in the hospital. That was not typical for a Happy. Well, theoretically possible, just a bit weird. The money Isaac suddenly got to pay for his sister’s medical expenses was Pascal’s money. That was even stranger. Then the administrator had reported an alcoholic episode. Again, more than unusual for a Veggie. Looks like they got him drunk to get the money. Maybe it was not alcohol, but some new chemistry, that suppresses your will? They live with Bikie at Wolanski the Chemist's villa...
Theft from Happies was a new crime for the new age and, strangely, in seven years there were no cases of this sort. Perhaps there have been, but they have not been recorded or solved.
Pellegrini felt prickles of excitement inside, like in the old times. He was looking forward to cracking Isaac and creating a precedent of catching someone who dared to take advantage of a trusting soul, to take candy from a baby, so to say. He must look into everything to see if there had been any similar cases before.
It took Pellegrini twenty-four hours to comb through the archives in search of reports that somewhere, at some time, a Happy had voluntarily transferred money to a third party, but did not find any. Donors had always faithfully kept their money in the bank, hardly spending any of it. Pascal Din appeared to be the only exception. So much the worse for you, Isaac.
When the commissioner checked the whereabouts of Isaac’s mobile phone on the night when Pascal went on a bender, he did not find anything. The phone was switched off. But Pascal’s mobile showed up nine times in the region of Lyon. In Lyon? What was he doing there and how did he get there? It was time to clarify all this. Everything suggested that they had got the poor Happy drunk and forced him to pay for the operation of Isaac’s sister.
7
Michelle still was not answering Isaac’s calls and text messages. He left the flowers with the concierge and asked him to pass on a little note:
“How can one speak of love in words both clear and simple?
Must ample words be borrowed from above?
In the surrounding world I’m seeking an example,
To tell you all. But how, I do not know, my love.
Much easier by far than framing your description
Is finding words to tell about the skies and sea,
So I will take your hand and share my silent vision
I will be numb and let my kisses speak for me.
Please forgive me.”
After a futile attempt to get the concierge talking about mademoiselle Blanche, Isaac was going to return to the Villa. The elderly man asked not to pester him with questions which he cannot answer, as he can be fired for giving such answers.
“Young man,” the wrinkles on the face of the gray-haired Concierge were speaking more of his kindness than of rigor. Taking pity on Isaac, he carefully looked around and added quietly, “I will give the flowers today.”
It was at least something. So Michelle is back and he has a chance to find her.
As always, Bikie was growling over a computer. Pascal couldn’t stay at his home, so he had arrived too. All they had to do was to call the professor.
“What are you looking for?” Isaac enquired listlessly.
“Nothing much, various garbage. Reading about a new motorbike that just came out. Real high-class. What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing much. It’s because of Michelle. She is back. But, she doesn't respond.... Right, let’s talk about something else. Where’s Link?”
“Hey, professor! The pea-brain is here, and Isaac is back! We are waiting for you!” Bikie shouted loudly.
“Dear Students! I was looking into how one can plug into the Collective Mind computers. There’s good news – two pieces – and bad news,” Link said pensively. “I've figured to get close to the servers. We need to discuss.”
“What’s the puzzle?” Bikie barked cheerfully.
“The good news is that the Collective Mind has four servers, containing identical copies... The first is located in New York, the second in Moscow, the third in Hong Kong and the last one, the European server, is where we were, near Paris. I myself once sent Blake my ideas on the location of the servers, when I handed over the technology. Where precisely the central computer and the equipment room are located in the buildings, you and I don’t know. But never mind, we’ll figure that out. The best news is that I have studied the amplifier that Pascal created for Isaac’s anti-rain device. It is small, but very powerful! In theory it is suitable for my hacking-in device. Pascal and I can dig a bit deeper, adapt it a bit and combine the devices together to get a really powerful hacker and transmitter. If everything goes well, all the Happies within several kilometers will get their energy back.”
“That’s heavy!” Isaac and Bikie exclaimed in a single voice. They were inspired by this news, Pascal was smiling too.
Pleased, the professor puffed out a cloud of cigar smoke. This was a familiar, but forgotten situation for him from his past when his student expressed enthusiasm. Sometimes he called his new friends students.
Link smoked a lot, sometimes not taking the cigar out of his mouth for days on end. The house already stank pretty badly. The cigar ash left marks on the floor, the sofas and even the computer keyboard.
“What’s the bad news, professor?”
“The fact that three of the four servers are unsuitable for our purposes, even theoretically. Of course, we could just try our luck the Russian style, witho
ut being sure, but a bunch of Frenchmen in the Moscow institution might look suspicious. Hong Kong is heavily guarded too and the staff there are all Chinese, no Europeans. So Russia and Asia are out. I’ve been in the Paris building from where we retrieved Pascal’s creativity, only once, before they installed the server. I’m sure we could take it over, but there’s no point. The facility is surrounded by forests and fields. The signal won’t reach the city, even with Pascal’s amplifier. There will be no one within reach to return the energy to, so we either have to gather a crowd of Veggies around the Paris storage server, which isn’t practical, or go to New York.”
“So what’s the bad news?”
“That I won’t be able to go through US passport control unnoticed. And it is risky for Pascal to go without a cover story as well.”
“Then let’s split up. Pascal and you deal with the amplifier, and Isaac and I will explore the New York facility. And we’ll think about the border. How’s that?” Bikie suggested.
The professor nodded, agreeing.
“Hang on,” objected Isaac. “I want to tell you about my plan too. My suggestion is to go to the police.”
Bikie and Link gaped at Isaac in amazement.
“We don’t really need any plan,” Isaac went on. “We’ll tell the police everything. I thought about it and realized that we haven’t done anything wrong. On the contrary, everything was right. Let’s stop taking risks and carrying this burden. Of course, we won’t tell them all of the details. There’s no need to say where your house is, Link, so don’t worry about that. We can say that Pascal joined the experiment voluntarily, no one coerced him. He will confirm that. Wolanski’s role doesn’t have to be explained. So we worked for him, who cares about that?”
“Isaac, I don’t trust them,” Link said calmly. “We’ll present our proof, but even with my reputation on our side, there is a risk that the situation won’t develop the way you think it would.”
“And what if some villain has already hijacked the Agency? But no one knows or realizes that?” Bikie said in support of the professor. So his rebellious spirit hadn’t disappeared after all. “Our plan is safer. That way we don’t risk running up against malevolence in the Collective Mind or the police.”
“The Agency could react in a hostile way,” the professor agreed. They could start lying and say that transferring of OE did not take place, that we simply erased Pascal’s memory and that the energy was returned to him incorrectly. Even sue us for theft.”
“But not the police, why would they want to do that? And the police still have enough power to stop anyone at all, whether it’s terrorists or the Agency.”
Pascal supported Isaac, affirming that, to his mind, his testimony and Link’s conclusions would be enough. Professor Link himself! The creator of the invention, whose opinion should be regarded as the most authoritative in the field! And if several more people were brought back from being Happies that would definitely be enough for the police to prohibit doing further downloading.
Bikie retorted with a macabre observation that Pascal would be turned into a “lab rat”.
To enhance the effect, he sang in a morbid voice:
“Happy, happy end,
All the Happies will have their Happy ending!”
Thus, opinions were divided, so Isaac had to make the final decision and accept the responsibility. He thought things through again, weighing up the pros and cons deciding that informing the Agency was definitely not a good idea. He recalled that even though children born to Veggies had zero creativity, they hadn’t stopped, but buried the problem under a mountain of endless tests and analyses.
And now they might not stop, but launch an endless search for errors in the Link’s method of back transfer of OE. Yet if that was true for the Agency, it was not for the police and, thank God, so far the authority rested with the police. On the other hand, there was some logic in what Bikie and Link were saying. The professor declared that he had not agreed to anything like that, that his freedom and even his life would be in danger, and if Isaac went to the police, he would leave immediately. Without the professor, their case would collapse, and keeping him here by force wouldn’t be a smart thing to do.
Big money was at stake, the contributions of the Collective Mind were too innumerable, and the Agency’s influence too immense. Of course the truth was on their side, but it had to be got across. Skillful counter-propaganda could easily distort all the facts.
And really, no one knows how the world actually works. Which people would turn out to be good, and which bad? Who could be trusted and who couldn’t?
Of course, Isaac was tempted to go to the police and tell all: it would all be over, he could calmly take care of Vicky, and find Michelle. If they didn’t say anything now, thousands more people would download and turn into living corpses.
Intellectually Isaac had already accepted his friends’ reasons, but he wanted so badly to shrug this problem off his shoulders. The police were closing in on him, and if he told them everything, he would be a hero instead of a suspect!
“We take the professor’s plan.” Isaac’s voice was decisive again. “And we’ll get this done as quickly as possible.”
“Hoo-ray!” Bikie exclaimed and the professor sighed in relief.
Isaac and Bikie didn’t waste any time, and immediately started analyzing the information on the American facility. And there was a lot to go through. The Collective Mind Branch was in a building beside Central Park that used to be the Guggenheim Museum.
“I have an idea…” Bikie began, but stopped short.
“Then tell me,” Isaac urged. “You know, popcorn’s for chewing on, ideas are for telling.”
“The Americans are smart chaps. They make money on everything! They could have put the storage server in the UN headquarters, but no, they put in a public place and now they make money on guided tours as well. And that gives us a definite chance. A lot of personnel work in the building and some are stationed there permanently, some visit from overseas. They don’t all have access to the underground central storage server, but I think there must be a few dozen: the director and his deputies, lab assistants, security men, technicians, cleaners, etc., etc. If you think about it, the list could be even longer. And what’s more, I think the security is not serious. More to deal with fanatics and vandals, so most of the activities take place at the entrances to the building.”
“Yes, look. The Agency branch used to be located at the intersection of First Avenue and 42nd Street, and they only moved to the former museum last year. And there haven’t been any serious attacks on the Agency for at least four years.”
“There are the photos,” said Bikie, leaning back in his chair, pleased with himself. “It’s all out of the social networks. In some you have a great view of the central hall, the cloakroom and the restrooms. The security at the door is serious, of course, but in the hall, basically there isn’t anyone.”
Bikie was incredibly good at his job. In fifteen minutes he dug up all the statistics for attempted attacks on the storage servers. Official data wasn’t too comprehensive, but he found a mass of information in the press and the social networks. In the past the servers had been attacked regularly, and often by extremely well-prepared groups. But that was before. Now it was loners like Elvis, who were easily neutralized by standard security measures. The “Monaco terrorist attack” had been the most notorious case that year.
“First let’s look at the ones who might need money. There must be a lot of cleaning ladies for a building like that,” Pascal suggested.
“You’re wrong there,” Bikie replied. “While you were a vegetable marrow, cleaning ladies were replaced by automatic robots. A cleaning lady is probably someone who controls the automated vacuum cleaners.”
Pascal could see that Bikie disliked him, even though they were on the same team. Pascal hadn’t actually done anything bad to him. Well, he phoned Eva once when he was drunk, but that was understandable, he’d lost two years of his life
and the girl he loved. Isaac mostly ignored Bikie’s attacks. He knew that calling someone a vegetable, a pumpkin with brains or a sardine out of the tin was part of Bikie’s style, especially if that someone had once downloaded his OE.
“Come to think of it, Pascal’s idea is pretty good. Pascal, you’re rising to the occasion as always.”
“More ideas than seeds in a watermelon,” Bikie droned.
“Bikie, why don’t you just dig up the names?” said Isaac. “I think the chances of finding ourselves an ally out of thirty or forty people, or at least a gullible blockhead, are close to a hundred per cent.”
“One blockhead is already an ally of ours; we can put a whole team together!” Bikie chortled.
“Pascal, please take no notice of him,” Isaac forced out through his laugher. “Bikie got a tattoo on his head, the ink percolated into his brain and darkened his sense of humor.”
“The important thing here is to do the search for the blockhead right,” Bikie persisted. “We should listen to Pascal’s advice and do the opposite.”
“Bikie, before I was a professor, I was a lab assistant, and I earned the money for my experiments at poker. Leave this to me, I won’t get it wrong,” boasted Link, who had just walked up.
“Professor, I’m checking the stakes, show me your bluff,” Pascal joked.
Everyone laughed at last and the tension hovering in the air between Pascal and Bikie evaporated. Whether Bikie liked Pascal or not, he was a high-class technician and recognized Pascal as a talented inventor. He appreciated that the amplifier created by Isaac’s old friend was now the key element of the operation: he had been impressed by the way that Pascal and Link discussed reconfiguring the device to enable OE transfer over long distances. So, now it turned out that the rebirth of the biker movement and the reanimation of the good old, uniquely designed Harley-Davidson were in Pascal’s hands. And nothing infuriated Bikie more than picturing the shops of the future, where they sold almost identical, averaged-out Ducatis and Harleys. Bikie envisaged the difference in the future as existing only in the emblems, and for some reason the Ducati’s was white and the Harley’s was red. Or maybe these companies wouldn’t exist anymore and there’ll be just one, combined. “Collective Bike”. Damn! Things were already heading that way.
