Soul Identity

by batchelder, dennis

  He nodded. “I thought he was going to shoot me.”

  “Bob, why didn’t you just bring us that photograph?” Ann asked. “We could have read it here.”

  Bob was silent for a minute. “We were taught in class that only living eyes could be read.” He hung his head. “I messed up, didn’t I?”

  “It’s not your fault,” Ann said. “It’s our new approach. We rely too much on these darn computers.”

  “And it seems they’re misbehaving,” added George.

  “That’s not true,” Val said. “Each new program is put through comprehensive testing before I deploy it.”

  “Yes, Val, but only since you got here.” George shook his head. “Ten years ago we were scared to death about Y2K. You all remember the predictions of planes dropping out of the sky, power grids failing, and dams bursting. We rushed to get our new systems in place as quickly as possible.”

  Sue smiled. “We hired contractors for the very first time. You raised quite a stink with that decision, Mr. Morgan.”

  Archie nodded. “I remember that all too well. But we had no choice. We did not have the skills we needed to upgrade. When a member recommended an offshore outsourcing firm, we were able to get the work done in time for the new millennium.”

  “You outsourced your computer work?” I asked. That seemed amazing to me.

  “We did. SchmidtLabs is a reputable company in India.” Archie smiled. “Hans Schmidt and most of his team joined Soul Identity when they started on our work, and they are still active members. We have a thriving office in Hyderabad today, thanks to them.”

  I turned to Val. “We’re both pretty sure that there is some bad code attached to the match program, right?”

  “We are. Let me show you what I found.” She reached into her bag and pulled out two stacks of paper.

  “What’s this?” George asked.

  Val pointed to the first stack. “The source code of the matching program. Scott and I went through it and we didn’t see any problems.” She pointed to the second stack. “But then I disassembled the binaries that were running on the system. And I found some extra code lurking in there.”

  Elizabeth shook her head. “I’m lost.”

  “We checked the source and it looked good. But the program that’s running doesn’t come from that source,” I said.

  Elizabeth still looked confused. “Then where did it come from?”

  Val shrugged. “What’s more important is what it does.”

  “I’ll bite,” I said. “What does it do?”

  “Glad you asked. Take a look at the section I circled.” Val passed the stack of papers to me.

  The decompiled source code wasn’t as easy to read as the original, but I could follow it. I ran my finger down the page. “It seems that if one of the identities in this list comes up, there’s a simple substitution scheme to change it.” I flipped the page. “The list contains thirty-four identities.”

  “Right, Scott,” Val said. “And I checked—Berry’s identity is one of the thirty-four.”

  “You need to bring it up a notch for us non-geeks,” Ann said.

  “Okay,” I said. “Your match program computes the soul identities from the images, but then it changes thirty-four of them to something else. Berry’s identity got changed.”

  Val looked at Ann. “And we only discovered this because you calculated the identity by hand.”

  “What are the odds of that?” I wondered out loud.

  Nobody answered.

  “I’m assuming that the other thirty-three identities belong to the other overseers,” I said.

  Val nodded.

  Archie stood up, excited. “Does that mean we’ve been finding but overlooking more overseers?”

  Val shook her head. “I did a quick database check to see if we had added any members who had the changed identities, but I didn’t find any.” She held up Berry’s photograph. “Except for Scott’s neighbor, of course.”

  “I guess we only find an overseer every ten or fifteen years, so it is not surprising.” Archie sighed and sat back down. “Still, it is disappointing.”

  “There’s something else. Look at this line.” Val showed me the code. “If this specific identity comes up, it gets changed to your neighbor’s identity.”

  “I wonder if that’s Feret’s real identity, from his real eyes,” I said.

  “That would be my guess,” Val said.

  “So our program stops all overseers except Archie from matching, and it appears to make Feret match as an overseer?” Sue asked.

  Val nodded. “You’ve got it.”

  Ann sighed. “I knew that guy was trouble.”

  I remembered the phone call I had recorded before Val came over. Maybe somebody here could identify the voices.

  “Archie, I have something else.” I pulled out my laptop. “I intercepted and recorded a cell call earlier this evening.” I clicked on the recording and turned up the volume.

  When it was done, Archie asked me to play it again. After the second time through, Elizabeth raised her hand. “That’s Mr. Feret. I talk to him almost every week. That’s definitely his voice and his accent.”

  Ann nodded. “Yeah, that was him all right. But who was the other speaker?”

  Nobody recognized it.

  “It sounds like he tried to disguise his voice,” Sue said.

  George asked about the recording, and I explained how I used the gadget room scanner to capture and my laptop to decrypt it.

  “So what’s the big surprise Feret’s arranging for you?” Ann asked.

  I shrugged. “I guess I’ll find out later tonight.”

  “And where was the camera?” Val asked.

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” I said. “It’s in your office, where the fire evacuation sign used to be.”

  She nodded.

  “What was Mr. Feret saying at the end?” Bob asked.

  “Quod sum eris. That means what I am, you will be,” Archie said.

  Bob looked puzzled. “What is Mr. Feret, that others would want to be?”

  “French?” I smiled.

  Archie looked around the table. “It would appear that Mr. Feret is not in fact an overseer. What are we going to do about it?”

  “Can you kick him out of Soul Identity?” I asked.

  “Not without some real proof,” he said.

  “Then you’ve got a lot of work to do quickly,” I said. “You need a real picture of Feret’s eyes, you need to figure out the real story behind the changed computer programs, and you need to get to the bottom of what’s really happening in Venice.” I frowned. “And you’ve got to move quickly to protect my neighbor. Whoever is watching Val’s camera knows what we know.”

  Archie had been taking notes. He looked up and nodded. “I like your thinking.” He pointed at Val. “I want you and Scott to visit Hans Schmidt and figure out what happened to the matching program. Get to Hyderabad as soon as possible.”

  “Scott will need a visa, and I’ll need mine renewed,” Val said. “We can get them from the DC embassy tomorrow.”

  Archie nodded and turned to George and Sue. “I need you two in Venice,” he said. “Take a couple good photographs of Mr. Feret’s eyes. Then see what you can dig up about what is happening there.”

  George and Sue smiled at each other. “Right away, Mr. Morgan,” George said.

  Archie turned to Bob. “After you drive Scott and Val home to Maryland, bring Berry to Sterling. Try to bring Madame Flora, if she will come.”

  “How does everybody know Madame Flora?” I asked.

  “She is an old friend of ours,” Archie said. “I want to hear about her experience with WorldWideSouls.” He looked at Bob. “Please ask her to come.”

  Bob nodded.

  Archie turned to Elizabeth. “You can gather more intelligence on WorldWideSouls. Find out who is behind them and what they are doing. Find out why the churches are leaving us and joining with them.”

  Elizabeth nodded
.

  “Ann,” Archie said, “I need you to find out what kind of people are withdrawing their money in Venice.”

  Ann nodded.

  Archie stood up. “Does anybody have any questions?”

  Nobody said anything.

  Archie nodded. “Mr. Feret will arrive next Thursday afternoon for the century party on Friday. We will reassemble here next Thursday night. We are adjourned.”

  seventeen

  As Bob drove us back to the guesthouse, George and Sue discussed what they’d need for Venice. Bob looked at me in the mirror. “Mr. Scott, we should leave for Maryland tonight.”

  I glanced at Val. “It’s almost midnight—what’s wrong with driving down tomorrow morning?”

  “We need to go tonight,” Val said. “The embassy only does visas on weekday mornings, and tomorrow is Friday.”

  So much for my late night gadget room plans. “How long is the flight to India?” I asked.

  “Almost twenty-four hours. If we leave tomorrow night, we’ll arrive at one o’clock early Sunday morning.”

  “I hope Soul Identity has a business class travel policy.”

  George spoke up. “We don’t fly business class.”

  “Oh. That’s bad,” I said.

  He grinned. “First class all the way, baby!”

  Well, that was good news. But I was concerned about our timing. “Can we make it back to Sterling by Thursday night?”

  Val nodded. “The time zones are on our side coming back. We can leave Hyderabad at two o’clock Thursday morning and arrive in Boston that afternoon. That leaves us with four full days in India.”

  “How do you know this?” I asked.

  “I’ve flown over there three times in the last two years. SchmidtLabs is helping with the Internet-based programs we’re building. This time, though, I’m running the projects. Ten years ago, they designed, built, and delivered the new programs, without any oversight from us.” She looked troubled. “And I just took that old code for granted.”

  I nodded. “Companies taking things for granted is what pays my bills. That’s the root of almost all security holes.”

  Bob drove up the guesthouse driveway. “Let’s be ready to leave in ten minutes,” he said as we got out.

  I pulled George aside. “We need to discuss our communication plan while we’re traveling.” If we agreed on the encryption codes in person, we’d be able to prevent any eavesdropping.

  “I’ll generate a one time pad and bring it out before you leave,” George said.

  We went inside. I grabbed my clothes, toiletries, and the ten leftover roses and headed back to the limo. When I got there I saw Val already loading her bags into the trunk.

  George and Sue came out to see us off. George handed a sheet of paper to me. “There are only three copies of this,” he said. “I’ll give the other one to Mr. Morgan. Each day has its own encryption key.”

  I looked at the paper; there were seven long strings of letters and numbers. “We use the first key tomorrow?” I asked.

  He nodded. “Change keys at midnight Sterling time.”

  I opened the back door of the limo.

  KA-BOOM!

  I turned around; an explosion had shaken the guesthouse. The windows had all shattered, and broken glass was strewn around us.

  I shoved George and Sue into the back, then yelled at Val and Bob to climb in next to them. I dove in the passenger door and slid over to the driver’s seat. “Where’s the keys, Bob?” I shouted.

  He tossed them to me, and I jammed them in the ignition and got the limo started. I backed out of the driveway. There was another explosion, muffled for us by the limo’s windows, and the entire guesthouse blew apart.

  I bumped over the curb and across the opposite lawn. “Scott, the tree!” Val screamed, and I swerved just in time. The limo stopped after a three quarter turn, broadsided to where the guesthouse had been.

  We stared out the windows at the sight. What remained of the house was in flames, and roofing shingles, bits of wood, and bricks littered the surrounding lawns. I saw some ripped clothing and sheets, backlit by the fire, float down from the sky. A bathroom door had landed on top of a fence post, improbably rocking back and forth. Then a red nightgown landed on one side of the door, causing it to tip and slide to the ground.

  In the back of the limo, George had his arm around Sue, her head buried in his chest. Val sat on the front couch and stared at the fire. I reached through the partition, and she grabbed my hand.

  “Were any other guests staying with you?” I asked George.

  “No, just you two,” he said. He reached out and rubbed Sue’s back.

  Sue sat up straight and glared at me. “It was just by chance that we came outside to say goodbye. Those bastards almost killed us all.”

  We sat silently for a moment.

  “So this was the surprise,” I said.

  George grunted. “I certainly was surprised.”

  I looked back at everybody. “Do we show them that they missed? Or should we pretend they got us?”

  “How can we pretend? We drove away in the limo,” George said.

  “They probably didn’t stay too close,” I said. “It was a huge explosion, and they would have had to be way back. Maybe they don’t know who made it out.”

  “They were after you, so it doesn’t help for Sue and me to play dead,” George said. “We can buy you some time.”

  I nodded. “How about if you three go back and start a search for Val and me? We’ll hide out here in the back,” I said. “Then later we’ll have a chance to grab Berry and get him somewhere safe.”

  Everybody agreed. Bob crawled through the partition to the driver’s seat and I crawled to the back. Then Val and I reclined the back couch and climbed behind it.

  George raised the seat to hide us from view. “You’ll just have to sit tight,” he said. “I’ll leave the seat back just a bit so you can breathe and watch what’s going on.”

  “Thanks, George,” I called. “Remember, get Bob sent home to Maryland as soon as you can.”

  “You’ll be on your way in an hour or two at the most.” George flashed us a reassuring smile, and told Bob to drive back.

  “Wait a second!” I hollered.

  Bob hit the brakes.

  “You three need to get your story straight,” I said. “Why did you come back to the car? How long were you out there? Who drove? If you don’t agree on this, you are going to look pretty silly.”

  The three practiced their story for the next two minutes. Val and I crouched down and peered out the small gap as Bob drove up the driveway. He, George, and Sue hopped out and ran back toward the guesthouse foundation.

  Val shifted. “You think they’ll be able to pull it off?”

  Sue seemed to be in shock, and judging from his performance at Ann’s tonight, Bob didn’t do too well under pressure. “It’s all up to George,” I said.

  She wrapped her arms around me. “I’m glad we got out.”

  I hugged her back. “Me too.”

  We sat there with our arms around each other. The rescue workers arrived, and we watched them search in the rubble strewn all over the yard. “They must be hoping to find something really grisly that they can share with their friends,” I said.

  We watched Bob, Sue, and George talk to the police and give their statements. George pointed and gestured; we saw him mime driving backward and swerving. He used his hands to show the explosion. He pointed back to the remains of the house and shrugged his shoulders.

  “Looks like they’re buying it,” I said. “George is pretty good.” Then I thought of something. “Hey, let’s switch off our cell phones. Just in case somebody is monitoring our location.”

  Ten minutes later we saw George call Bob and a policeman over, and after a short discussion, Bob walked over to the limo, got in, and drove away.

  We stayed behind the back seat until we got off Soul Identity grounds. Bob smiled as we climbed out and stretched. “We did it,
sir. The police think you two are toast.”

  “Good. You had a big day today, dude. Let’s split the driving to Maryland,” I said.

  He nodded. “I’ll take the first shift. You and Val can rest.”

  Which was fine with me. Val and I reclined the rear seat and slept.

  I woke at four and switched on the GPS. Bob had driven us halfway down the New Jersey Turnpike already. “Jeez, you’ve made great timing,” I said.

  Bob smiled into the rear view mirror. “Yes, sir. It’s been smooth sailing so far.”

  Val sat up and rubbed her eyes. “Is there a rest area coming up?” she asked.

  “Another mile, ma’am,” Bob said.

  “Thanks.” She turned to me. “I’ve been thinking that we need to get Flora somewhere safe. It seems too coincidental that WorldWideSouls just happened to be targeting her.”

  I nodded. Bob pulled into the rest area, and I called Madame Flora from the pay phone.

  One of the twins answered with a groggy “Hello, you’ve dialed Madame Flora’s. Do you have a psychic emergency?”

  “I’m sorry for waking you up so early,” I said. “But I have a message for you and your grandma.”

  “Who is this?” the voice demanded.

  “I can’t say my name, but think about this—I’m the guy who saw your grandma’s fax machine on Monday morning.”

  Dead silence for a few seconds. Then, “Okay, buster. What kind of cookies did I bake?”

  I thought for a second. “Chocolate chip. But without the chips.” So it was Rose on the phone.

  I heard a giggle. “And no salt, either. What can I do for you, Mr.—”

  “No names,” I interrupted. “Listen, I saw you on television earlier tonight. I think there is about to be a serious problem, and you need to get your grandma out of the house right now.”

  “Now?” She sounded incredulous. “Right this minute?”

  I tried to put some extra urgency into my voice. “Your grandma’s life may be in danger. Yours and your sister’s, too. Please get out immediately. Let me tell you where to go.”

  “Hold on,” Rose said. “I have to get my sister, so she can help remember.” I heard her waking up Marie and giving a quick explanation, and then Marie got on the line. “Go ahead, we’re both listening.”