The Spartacus File

by Carl Parlagreco Lawrence Watt-Evans

  Then she got a look at Casper's face—thin, long-jawed, pale, framed by brown hair in need of trimming, and watching her intently from deep-set brown eyes.

  He didn't look drugged or wired. He looked sincere, attentive, and almost ... almost noble.

  “I think Quinones is on your case,” she said. “He wanted me to tell him the minute you stepped out of the office.”

  Casper blinked once, slowly, coolly. Then he turned and looked over his cubby.

  There was no way of knowing just what Quinones actually wanted. Perhaps he intended to check Casper's files—though he should be able to access those from his own computer. Perhaps he wanted to set up some little surprise.

  Or ... ?

  “I think he's decided you're a vicious drug fiend, and he wants to ferret out your stash before you can pollute the rest of us,” Mirim said, perching herself on the edge of Casper's desk.

  Or that, Casper thought.

  There weren't any drugs to find, of course, nor anything else suspicious; Casper's life was dreary and utterly innocent of any wrongdoing. Even his debts weren't his own, but inherited.

  However, sooner or later, Quinones would discover that Casper wasn't working. Maybe he already had discovered it, and wanted to see if he could discover the reason. Quinones wouldn't believe that the imprinting had screwed up, and that instead of adding to Casper's liability-tracing skills it had apparently wiped them out.

  Even if he did believe, it wouldn't do any good. Casper had signed that stupid waiver at NeuroTalents, and Data Tracers, Inc. wasn't about to waste their time and money fighting NeuroTalents on his behalf. A second imprint might not do any better; Casper's brain might have indetectable quirks. Much easier to just throw him out and find a replacement whose brain was still virgin and imprintable.

  He was going to lose his job.

  Well, screw that. He didn't want the lousy job anyway. He was sick of kowtowing to that fat fool, Quinones. A person had to stand on his own two feet.

  Better to go out now, rather than waiting to be fired.

  And there was no reason to go quietly.

  While he ran through all this he had been gazing mildly up at Mirim. Now he smiled broadly, reached over and took her hand and squeezed it gently. He did this without knowing why; it went against all the habits he had always had, but it felt right. He had never touched Mirim before, and he felt her start slightly at the first contact.

  “Thanks for telling me, Mirim,” he said. Then, to Mirim's utter astonishment, he stood, climbed up onto his desk, and shouted, “Listen, everybody!”

  The normal hum of the office faded slightly as faces turned toward him. Most of the workers couldn't see him, because of the partitions, but they could hear him.

  He looked across the partitions and saw that the door to Quinones’ office was closed. He wouldn't hear anything.

  “Some of you know me, some of you don't,” Casper called out. “I'm Casper Beech; I've worked here for nine years now. Nine lousy, boring, painful years!”

  A few voices tittered nervously.

  “Well, that nine years is ending; I'm about to leave here for good. You know why?” He paused dramatically. No one replied; the decrease in office noise deepened as a genuine hush fell.

  “Because last week they sent me for a neural imprint—they were too cheap to train me properly, or buy software a normal human being can run. They sent me for a neural imprint—they ordered me, a free-born American, to take it. They sent me to have my brain rewired. They sent me to be force-fed skills I'll never be able to use anywhere else. They sent me to be programmed like one of their infernal machines!”

  Casper could feel the people listening. He heard a chair scrape as someone stood up for a better view.

  “Well, I'm not a machine to be programmed. I've been living like one for nine years, but I'm not a machine! I've been taking their orders for nine years, but I'm not a machine! But I didn't rebel—after nine years, I think even I thought I was a machine! I did what they wanted, I took the imprint—but my brain rebelled! The imprint didn't take. I was sick as a dog for a week, my memory's fouled up, I can't work—but I didn't rebel. I came in here and tried to work anyway, like a good little machine...” He paused again, and then bellowed out, “And they fired me! Because their imprint screwed up, they fired me!”

  A murmur of sympathy—probably more feigned than genuine—ran through the room.

  It wasn't sympathy Casper wanted, though. It struck him suddenly that he had no idea what he did want, or why he was doing any of this, but he knew he had to do it, he knew he had to carry on, he knew what to say next.

  “And you know what, folks? I'm glad. Because at least I'm out of here, and the rest of you aren't. But I won't be the last to go—no, I'm just the first! Because do you know what our dear Mr. Quinones told me, when he sent me to have my brain reprogrammed, my mind tampered with? I'll tell you what he told me. It seems software that runs in people is cheaper than software that runs in computers, because we can do our own debugging. It seems that dear old Data Tracers intends to do a lot of imprinting from now on—I was just the first! And do you know what the failure rate for neural imprinting is? Do you?”

  He waited, but nobody replied.

  “Neither do I,” he announced. “Because I'm damn sure it's not what they've published. Most of you work with data all the time, bend it around to suit management, to suit the customers’ whims. You think any of the data we get hasn't been tampered with? Ha!”

  He waved in dismissal, and his tone changed from anger to false joviality.

  “Well, boys and girls, I'm out of here, and glad to be free. I'll leave you all to enjoy your imprints—or if they don't take, I'll see you on the streets, with the other unemployables. Stop by and say hello, and remember—my name's Casper Beech.”

  Then he jumped down, grabbed Mirim by the hand, and said, “Come on.”

  “Come where?” she said, startled.

  He stopped in mid-stride, turned, and smiled at her. “Wherever you like,” he said, “but back to your desk for a start. You don't want anyone to tell Quinones it was you who warned me, do you?”

  The room was buzzing; several people had emerged from their cubbies and were approaching Casper uncertainly.

  Mirim hesitated.

  Casper abruptly leaned forward and kissed her, taking her head between his hands—and as he did, he whispered, “I need to leave now, or it'll ruin my exit.” Then he released her and strode toward the door.

  Mirim blinked, then ran after him. She detoured just far enough to grab her purse.

  Together, they marched out the door. A crowd gathered in the doorway, watching them go.

  When Mirim and Casper had vanished into an elevator, the crowd gradually dispersed. It wasn't until almost five minutes later that somebody thought to tell Quinones that two of his subordinates had just walked off the job.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  * * *

  Chapter Seven

  The man dozing on the rooftop heard the buzz; he rolled over and looked at the read-out on his phone.

  It was Quinones’ number. He didn't know that; he only knew that the number matched the code he had been given. The target was on his way out of the building—or at least, he might be.

  The man really hadn't expected anything for hours yet, but that was fine; he was eager to get it over with. He picked up the Remington 700 in one hand, the binoculars in the other.

  The damn phone kept buzzing. That wasn't in the plan. He was supposed to get the code number on the read-out, the target was supposed to come out the front door, and then the sniper was supposed to put a bullet through the target's head. Then the cops and paramedics would go to work, and make sure the target was securely dead and that everyone was convinced it was the doing of some unknown crazy or terrorist.

  He didn't see the target. He put down the binoculars and took another glance at the holo.

  The phone was still buzzing. Annoyed, he reached o
ver and flicked it open, but didn't say anything.

  After a few seconds of silence, a worried voice said, “Mr. Smith?”

  The sniper grimaced. His name wasn't Smith; nobody involved with the operation was named Smith, so far as he knew, but then, he wasn't supposed to know any names. “What is it?” he whispered. He whispered to keep his voice from being recognized, not because he expected anyone else to hear him.

  “I'm sorry, but Beech left early, and I missed it; he's been gone almost ten minutes.”

  “Damn!” The sniper slammed the phone closed, grabbed the binoculars, and began scanning the neighborhood.

  No one fitting his target's description was anywhere within a hundred meters of the door where he had been told the target would appear. The target was supposed to head for the Race/Vine subway station; the sniper scanned quickly in that direction.

  And there, descending the steps, he spotted a man and a woman, walking together and talking.

  Nobody had mentioned anything about a woman, and it would be a long, difficult shot; he hesitated, and then it was too late.

  “Damn!” he said again, as he reached for the phone.

  The contact man, whom the sniper did not know by the name Smith, took the news calmly.

  “You didn't fire?” he asked, after he'd heard the sniper's report.

  “No.”

  “Good. Then he still doesn't know that anyone's taking an interest in him. Pack it in, cover your tracks, and report in—full pay, and half the usual bonus if your story checks.”

  Smith hung up the phone, thought for a moment, and then called Quinones to ask what had happened, and who the woman with Beech was.

  “Where are we going?” Mirim asked, as they stood on the empty subway platform.

  “Um ... well, I thought I'd go back to my apartment, I guess,” Casper replied uncertainly. He was scanning the station, not looking at her.

  “You guess?”

  “Well, I don't know—is there somewhere you'd rather I went?”

  Mirim stared at him. A few minutes ago Casper had been a commanding, self-confident orator; now he was a wimp who couldn't even look her in the eye. “You don't know?”

  “No. Hey, I just lost my job, I'm a little thrown, you know? Where else should I go?” He shook his head. “And my mind's been playing tricks on me.”

  “What kind of tricks?” Mirim asked, puzzled.

  “Like that speech I gave. I mean, what was I doing standing on my desk? That was crazy!”

  Mirim stared at him.

  “I thought you were great,” she said.

  “But it's crazy,” he said. “It's not me. It cost me my job.”

  “I thought you were going to lose your job anyway,” Mirim said. “You said you were.”

  “Well, yeah, I was,” Casper admitted, a bit puzzled. “Maybe, anyway. No one had actually said I was fired yet, but I wasn't doing my work.”

  “So you were going to be fired.”

  “I think so.”

  “So what harm does it do to tell them what you think?” Mirim challenged him.

  “None, I guess,” Casper admitted. “Unless they blacklist me and keep me from getting another job.”

  “You think you have a chance of ever getting another job in the same field?” Mirim asked.

  Casper thought for a moment, then said, “No. Not really.”

  “So what harm did it do?”

  Casper had no answer for that. He was busy studying the pillars and tracks.

  “What are you looking at?” Mirim asked, puzzled.

  “Oh,” Casper said, “Well, see there, I was checking whether you could set up a crossfire over the end of the tunnel, but I don't think the niche in the far wall is deep enough...”

  “A crossfire?” Mirim stared at him. “Casper, what are you talking about?”

  He turned and stared back at her with a haunted expression. “I don't know, Mirim,” he said. “I don't have any idea, and it scares the heck out of me.”

  Mirim hesitated, about to say something, but just then they heard the screeching of steel wheels as the train neared the station, and she decided it could wait. For awhile there she had thought that Casper was at last coming out of his shell, but now he seemed to be retreating again, and she didn't want to force anything, not yet. Something strange was happening to him, presumably brought on by that stupid imprint.

  She wondered if he would be willing to see a doctor.

  She wondered if he could afford to see a doctor.

  There was no point in berating Quinones; the important part was where Beech was now. Smith didn't need to think very hard about that; the obvious place for Beech to go was home.

  That he had the Anspack woman along didn't change that; he might take her home with him, he might drop her off at her own home first, he might stay at her place awhile, maybe even until morning, but sooner or later, unless he had somehow been alerted, he would go back to his own apartment.

  If he had been alerted ... well, even with the Spartacus File, Beech was a beginner. The file wouldn't be running properly yet. He would make mistakes. Even if he had somehow realized that people were pursuing him, Beech might go home.

  Or he might go to Anspack's place; Smith would want to cover that possibility, too.

  He picked up the phone.

  Ten minutes later he hung up, reasonably satisfied. There wasn't time to set up anything fancy, or even to get to the apartment before Beech did, so it wouldn't be as neat and tidy as he might have liked. Still, the job would get done.

  When they emerged from the subway the sky had clouded over, threatening thunder and rain, and the two of them hurried up the block, against wind that was suddenly cold. Casper almost reached out a sheltering arm for Mirim, then thought better of it.

  “Here we are,” he said a moment later, pointing.

  “You live here?” Mirim asked, looking up at the building's gloomy facade.

  “Sure,” Casper said. He shrugged. “It's not so bad.”

  Mirim shuddered.

  “You didn't have to come,” Casper said. That sounded more hostile than he had meant it to, though; to soften it, he added, “But I'm glad you did. Would you like to come up for a bite to eat?”

  Mirim shrugged. “Sure, why not?” She followed Casper past an overflowing trash dumpster up to the door.

  “Careful on the steps,” Casper said. He unlocked the door and ushered Mirim through ahead of him; when they were both inside the dim hallway, behind thick panes of dirty glass, he flicked the light switch a couple of times, but the only illumination came from outside.

  “Oh, hell,” he said. “The damned lights are out again. You'd better take my hand—the stairs can be tricky.” He offered his hand, and she took it, neither delicately nor grabbing, but just holding. They started up the steps.

  “What do you mean, the lights are out again?” Mirim demanded. “Can't you do anything about it?”

  “Afraid not. Look out, that one's broken. No, I can't do anything about the lights or the stairs, because my lease—everyone's lease who lives here—has a no-liability clause. We can't sue, all we can do is withhold rent, and at what we pay, the owners don't much care.”

  “Hmph. That's a hell of a thing. Have you got a tenant's union?”

  Casper laughed. “Not in this building. The people who live here tend to keep to themselves. There's no clause in our leases to keep us from suing each other, after all. We have to pay for our low rent somehow. Here's my floor.”

  They left the stairway, and Casper unlocked his apartment door while Mirim waited uneasily in the hall.

  Once they were inside he carefully located Mirim next to the door, where she would be safer, before locking it.

  He tried to keep his own windows reasonably clean, so the apartment wasn't as dim as the halls, but since his only view was of the building next door to the north the place had a certain gloom about it. He flicked the light switch, but nothing happened.

  “Power's out for th
e whole building, same as usual,” he said. “Sorry if the place is a little untidy,” he added apologetically.

  “I can't see well enough to notice.”

  Casper smiled. “Wait right there, and I'll get some light.”

  He stumbled into the kitchen, and returned a moment later with a candle in each hand. He set them both on the dinner table, saying over his shoulder, “I've got wine, milk, and diet cola.”

  “Wine would be nice.”

  “It's just cheap California white,” he warned.

  “That's fine.”

  “I'll be right back. The stereo is over there. It's on the UPS, and the backup battery should be good for a couple of hours if we don't use the computer for anything else, so feel free to put on some music. Your choice.”

  When Casper returned with the glasses of wine, he found Mirim sitting on the couch, the stereo playing softly. The music was Beethoven. He handed Mirim her glass and sat down beside her.

  There was an embarrassed silence as they sipped their wine. Casper put his glass on the end table.

  “I'm not entirely sure why you came back here with me,” Casper said at last. “I mean, I'm very glad you did, and it was good of you to warn me about Quinones, but you didn't have to come with me. You've probably just thrown away your job, and it's not like it's easy to find work these days.”

  “Well, you'd thrown away yours,” Mirim pointed out, “and you gave some very convincing reasons why the rest of us should, too.”

  “I did?” Casper asked. Mirim thought she heard a concatenation of unhappiness, confusion, and pride in those two simple words.

  “Yes, you did,” she said. “I was impressed.”

  “But why?”

  Mirim started to speak, and Casper cut her off. “I don't mean why were you impressed, I mean why did I do that? It's ... it's not like me.”

  “Oh, I don't know,” Mirim said. “I always thought you had it in you somewhere.”

  He stared at her, his hand on his wine glass, not moving. “You did?”

  Mirim nodded.

  “But...”

  Casper was interrupted by a knock on the door. Startled, he turned.