Sirius Academy (Jezebel's Ladder)

by Scott Rhine

  “What are those big reservoirs?” asked Park.

  “Corporate, EU, and UN bank accounts that we have access to,” Daniel explained. “Our brakes.” There were several profane exclamations at the sizes involved. “Those are the major stock and commodity markets.”

  “Is this legal?” asked Auckland.

  “It’s a gray area, but the original charter for our team was never dissolved,” Daniel reasoned. “They’ll forgive us if it works. If it doesn’t, we may well be living off what’s growing on this island.”

  “How can we help?” asked Herk.

  “I need to borrow your brains,” Red announced.

  “Told you she should’ve changed her name to Frankenstein,” Yvette told Toby.

  Trina said, “We’ll work in short shifts. Daniel, Yvette, Auckland, and I will trade off every hour until this crisis is resolved. We’ll bring some experts on financial topics into the next room for a seminar on something. They’ll give us a boost.”

  “All night?” asked Risa.

  “We’ll find another excuse after that,” Trina said.

  “Z would have a plan by now,” Herk muttered. Both Trina and Red glared at him. “Truth hurts. You won’t pull this off without him.”

  Red ignored him and started the first shift. By eleven, she was haggard from several rapid, failed attempts. Her old tricks weren’t slowing the slide to doom effectively enough.

  Fists clenched, she told Herk, “Get Z, damn it.”

  Zeiss arrived in pajama bottoms and a T-shirt that said, ‘Four out of five statisticians are above average.’ To Daniel, he said. “Class is canceled tomorrow. Someone dropped sodium down the toilets and flooded the auditorium. The dojo may need new flooring.”

  “It definitely does,” asserted Trina. “I’ll get Alistair on it right away.”

  To Sojiro, he said, “To celebrate the cancellation of classes, you’re throwing a Death Star party. Every Star Wars game ever made is going to have a tournament right here, all night.”

  “You can’t just come in here and take over,” Red complained.

  “I’ll send out the e-invites,” Risa volunteered.

  “We’ll need a prize,” Sojiro said.

  “A six-pack of Mountain Dew,” Zeiss replied.

  “No,” whimpered Daniel.

  “And a twenty dollar entry fee gets you all the pizza you can eat,” the TA added.

  Herk said, “That’s what I’m talking about.”

  Red whistled. “Everybody out. Ten minutes with just me and the advisors.”

  When the room cleared, with everyone scrambling to implement a last-minute party from which to steal brainpower, Red turned to Zeiss. “I need you to tell me the truth. Did you ever implement your quantum-cryptography scheme?”

  He furrowed his brow. “No, I’m a theorist, not an implementer. A prototype would be grossly expensive—billions. Why?”

  Red sighed. “Someone else built it. Remember the digital photo code you couldn’t crack? I couldn’t crack it either, you twisted bastard. It uses the quantum algorithms from your paper.”

  His face went pale. “That’s why you’ve been following me on the cameras and tracing every online action I made.”

  “You knew?”

  “I’m a professional, Red. With all your high-priced help, you still don’t get that.” Zeiss turned to Daniel. “You investigated me?”

  His boss shook his head. “She’s the one with trust issues. I told her no way. But you do keep running into the black hats,” admitted Daniel. “Trina agreed that sooner or later you’d trip over them, and the team would be ready to swoop in and catch the whole lot of them this time.”

  “How do you like it when people make decisions for you?” sneered Red.

  Looking into her eyes, Zeiss said, “I’m sorry. I couldn’t leave Daniel’s room or Trina would’ve shot me. I was afraid you’d fight me if I asked you to stay safe. I couldn’t risk your life.”

  Trina snickered. “I might have, but she definitely would have.”

  Red clenched her fist. “Rrr. If you weren’t so damn useful . . .”

  “And right,” Daniel added.

  “Not helping,” Trina sang.

  “I’m also sorry about Green,” Zeiss said softly. “I should’ve sent someone with him. I just thought he’d be safe alone and knew you’d want everyone possible in the room to power your experiment.”

  Red reluctantly admitted, “He had it for Mori bad. It would’ve been worse if Green had waited longer. It’s not like you told that skank Kaguya to poach my people.”

  Trina and Zeiss locked eyes while Daniel scoffed, “Of course not. So Conrad is back?”

  “Yeah. I’ll find a suitable punishment later,” Red promised.

  “Why is this so secret?” Zeiss asked.

  “The flow models we developed work, but only if people aren’t aware of them,” Red explained. “When people watch and piggyback to make money, it becomes an ever-widening spiral that’s harder to move—kind of like successful retirement funds.”

  Daniel snorted. “It’s more like we’re trying to fight forest fires by controlling the weather. Too many people pushing the wind button fans the flames, but too much water also destroys the very thing you’re trying to save.”

  Red went on to describe her earlier failures.

  Zeiss nodded. “I think I can help. Your problem is two-fold. First, you’re looking for a silver bullet. We won’t find one of those tonight. We just need drag to slow it down. How did your Parallel Programming instructor describe his class?”

  Red raised an eyebrow as everyone stared at her. “When you can’t find a Tyrannosaurus to plow your field, use a thousand bunny rabbits instead?”

  Daniel smiled. “She does listen.”

  “How does that help? Oh,” Red said, blinking. “We need lots of smaller, quiet engines, just like the island has. Okay. How?”

  Zeiss shrugged. “Not my area. Ask the team in words instead of stealing their horsepower and driving it yourself. All of us are smarter than any one of us.”

  Reluctantly, Red asked the others for advice on how to slow Africa’s economic descent. She got several interesting answers. Trina took notes for the session.

  “Schedule the world football championships there this year. That was a huge boon to South Africa,” said Auckland.

  “Find out what they grow there that the bugs didn’t eat,” suggested Yvette.

  Sojiro read lists off the web: “Pumpkins, sweet potatoes, spices, salt-resistant barley for animal feed, Egyptian cotton . . .”

  Zeiss said, “We find a way to protect the farmers that have edible food. Start a co-op that pre-buys their petrol for harvest. Force the futures prices on the rest to increase.”

  “You want me to corner the market on pumpkins?” Red asked.

  “Maybe vanilla,” Yvette offered. “It would hit those soft drink companies where it hurts.”

  “Tourism,” Park prompted. “Safaris, the Canary Islands, Apes, Oprah’s Village, the Mandela Center, . . .”

  “Good. We need to draw in more people and get positive publicity,” Zeiss encouraged.

  “I have a friend with a movie company,” Daniel said cautiously. “She likes elephants.”

  Trina nodded. “The UN space coalition has a lot of grants available for more foods we can grow in space. The Canary Islands imports most of its food. Maybe we could start some shrimp farms and desert olive plantations on the mainland nearby.”

  Red paced. “And get the architect who designed this island to build a fancy center of some kind. They did the City of the Arts in Spain, right?”

  “That’s big money,” warned Risa. “You’d need a big-name sponsor or park to invest while they get the farms up and running.”

  “That place looks like Tatooine,” Sojiro noted. “Maybe George Lucas would build a Stars Wars park there.”

  Daniel winced. “Far-fetched, but maybe the rumors would be enough. I’ll give Red access to our press outlets.
Someone who can spell will need to write them for her.”

  Trina waved her hand. “I’ll correct if someone else provides the copy.”

  Ideas flew for the next hour.

  “Tanzanite,” shouted Risa as Trina filled the last page on her paper notepad.

  Trina looked down and sighed. “I think we have enough to get started.”

  Red looked at the time. “It has to be.”

  They worked through the night. Zeiss made Red rest more often than she wanted, but every time she slid into quantum mode, it felt better than ever. She had to crack the computer systems of several foreign governments and charities to build the mechanism she envisioned. It took seven dives to construct. The first time she tried to use the new economic-correction interface, the controls slipped and she fell from the podium. Zeiss broke the trance to catch her. “Even if I trip the alarms, let me finish,” she demanded.

  On the final dive, she went so deep she didn’t blink anymore. She put her fingertips on the side of the globe interface like they were the hands of God. At the proper moment, all she had to do was twist, and rain watered the parched financial ground. Then she channeled the runoff back to most of the original containers by different paths. “Money is neither created nor destroyed, but the flow generates power.”

  Markets still dropped an average of 11 percent that week, but the worst-case scenario had been averted.

  As Zeiss and Herk carried her to bed, Red confessed, “Next time, we won’t be able to stop the spiral. We need what’s on the artifact to form a new economy in time.”

  Chapter 28 – The Day of the Bikini

  “Red’s birthday’s in May,” Risa whispered when the girl left the room during their weekly supper. “I wanna surprise her with a party between semesters. She’s been pushing hard all year and needs a break.”

  “What theme?” asked Sojiro.

  “The place she was the happiest, the sky’s the limit,” encouraged Auckland.

  “She said Castaway Cay was the last time she spent with both her mothers,” replied her roommate.

  “I’ll find a suitable spot in this hemisphere,” volunteered Zeiss.

  “Red was raised by lesbians?” Toby burst out. “That is so hot!”

  The child in question returned to the room and complained, “Why does every guy say that?” Suspicious, she asked, “What’s everybody huddled up for?”

  “Party plans,” said Sojiro, brain-farting.

  “For his manga release,” improvised Zeiss.

  “We can all come as our characters!” cooed Red.

  “I’m not wearing that skimpy barbarian getup,” insisted Herk.

  “Yes, you are,” said Risa and Sojiro at the same time.

  “You have to, for the party,” ribbed Toby.

  Herk complained, “You just have to dress like Crocodile Dundee.”

  “G’day,” said Toby.

  “You do not get to do that accent,” insisted Auckland. “What do I wear?”

  “Rugby jersey and a headband,” said Toby. “Don’t you read?”

  “Not for pleasure,” admitted Auckland.

  “What does the mysterious shadow wear?” asked the TA. “He keeps rescuing the main characters but we never get a good look at him.”

  Red mused about this question. “We’ve only seen close-ups of his utility belt and sunglasses.”

  “Plus the fedora,” added Sojiro.

  “What’s the big deal about costumes?” demanded Auckland. Sojiro flipped open to one of Trina’s action pages and the man coughed up his drink. “They let you print this stuff?”

  “They pay him well for that stuff,” Red countered.

  The doctor couldn’t take his eyes off the drawing. “Whoa. For someone who doesn’t play for the het team, you sure know what to draw.”

  “I draw what I see,” said the artist.

  “Her legs and hair are dead-on,” admitted Zeiss. “Almost photographic.”

  “So’s the stance,” admired Red.

  Auckland asked, “Could I take one of these home with me?”

  “Ew . . . she’s old enough to be your mother,” said Risa.

  “The riding crop subtracts ten years,” offered Herk.

  ****

  Zeiss found an underbooked resort on the Tonga archipelago. He made sure it had the same white sand and warm, blue-green water as the Caribbean. To schedule the event, he had to reserve half the pool area. For security, he paid for an entire block of ten rooms.

  He showed Daniel the hotel flier advertising spa facilities and excursions. “I checked the whale watchers’ websites, and there should be pods on each side of the island that weekend.”

  His boss nodded. “If I take some meds and don’t exert myself Out of Body like the last time, I should be able to socialize for six or seven hours. Trina and I could even get a room and enjoy a mini vacation, as long as I’m back to the island by 2200 Hong Kong time.”

  “Do you want two adjoining rooms or one isolated one?”

  “Isolated. But dude, there’s no way, I’m letting you do this on your dime. I’m paying.”

  “I’m the adviser.”

  “That means you advise, not pay. I want you to invite a few more people, friends. These kids need to blow off some steam. Do the food up right, like a pig roast on the beach. I have the phone number of a DJ from a singles resort in the Bahamas that can coordinate the co-ed games.”

  “Um, the boy-girl ratio is a little off in our subculture.”

  “That’s geek-speak for sausage-fest, right? Your sister is a model. Invite some. I’ll let you use the corporate jet.”

  “Wow. You don’t mess around.”

  “We only get to be a family on the semester breaks.”

  ****

  Red invited the pilots, who invited other mils. Each person on the team invited another few guests. There were so many people that Zeiss created a website for signing up. A few folks invited relatives and significant others from off the island, so they had to make the site externally visible. Sojiro did the design for “The Tonga Release Party” and convinced his publisher to pay for the site as advertisement. Zeiss’s sister Claire and friend Vanessa jumped at the chance to visit with rich, hero astronauts. Unfortunately, Claire used her underwear catalog photo as her avatar. The hour after she posted her reply, every single male in the program signed up for the event.

  For the next week, Zeiss was greeted as a hero whenever he walked into a class. The only two exceptions were in his data-security class. A student he was bringing disciplinary action against complained, “Z-man, you nail me for visiting a porn site and you post that hoochie?”

  “Let’s get a few things straight, Mr. Dolan. One: you visited a virus-ridden, X-rated, Asian site on a school computer, exposing us to 137 different incursions that took me hours to clean. Two: the actual ticket was for attempting to download a term paper, for which you will get your day in honor court. Three: that beautiful girl is my sister. If you find the post offensive, you may file a formal complaint and block participation by her and her friends.”

  He was shouted down by overwhelming vote of the class. Several men threatened to beat Dolan senseless if he had the picture removed. If the planeload of models didn’t show, they’d go trolling with him in the shark cage.

  Afterward, Dolan talked with a friend in nanotech class. “I’ll bet he visits every one of those sites from his bedroom computer. That’s why he won’t let anyone in. If only we could get a camera in there before my honor court hearing, I’d have him by the shorthairs.”

  “You have to turn in that term paper still, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We can fit a mini, audio-visual bot into the angle of those big binder clips. He always carries the papers into his room to record the grades. He’s so paranoid he won’t log in to the teachers’ website from his office for fear someone will see the password. I know, I’ve watched.”

  “Do it. The microphone can broadcast to the router when it hears s
omething. How do we focus on his computer screen?”

  “I can put little millipede legs on the camera like we did in nano class or use an extending flexible eyestalk like we did for the pool.”

  “The eyestalk’s easy to control with our videogame gear. The millipede’s too expensive and fragile.”

  ****

  Zeiss had just ordered ice cream cake for 300 when the hotel called back. The sheik who owned the island had canceled his reservation, giving no reason. Panicked, the adviser went to Trina. By dinner, she told him, “It might be pressure from the Saudis. But the sheik’s daughter is head of Kaguya Mori’s fan club. Use that as leverage. Here’s his phone number.”

  He called the sheik and mentioned that Mori might do a set from her last album by the pool. The island’s owner eventually yielded under one condition. “No pork.”

  “Pardon?”

  “You wished to bury a pig in my soil. This is offensive to my religion.”

  “Hamburgers and chicken would be better, now that you mention it.”

  “My daughter will be very excited. Can she bring a few friends?”

  “Sure . . .”

  Then, Zeiss had to ask a big favor of Kaguya. He hated owing students.

  ****

  The day of the party, two of his most responsible helpers, Yvette and Toby, disappeared on a scuba excursion and island bike ride together. Yvette hinted to the girls that they’d have a race near sunset and she might let Toby catch her. The professors delayed their arrival to give Daniel as much time at the actual party as possible.

  By contrast, the pilots arrived early with their own kegs of alcohol, causing Zeiss no end of grief. He told Llewellyn, “The manager says you can do this if you rent a suite for the night and keep the alcohol there.”

  “No sweat, Z. We’ll keep it low-key.” The pilot wore shower togs, tight Speedo briefs, designer sunglasses, and carried a meter-long beer bong. “Bring out the tiki torches so we can party all night! Wooo.”

  “No explosives this time!” the TA shouted. He wore a fedora, loud Hawaiian jams, and a matching shirt. He was fully prepared for the event with a canvas explorer belt full of emergency supplies, and aqua socks that covered the tops of his feet while providing a good grip on the wet cement surfaces.