by Bill Doyle
SUDDENLY ALL THE ADULTS COLLAPSED!
“Mom! Dad!” I shouted and rushed to my parents.
Lysa screamed and ran to her mom. Mrs. Benato had been seated at the table eating something and had fallen headfirst into her plate.
“Dad!” Charlotte yelled as she raced over to Mr. Noonan.
“Nurse!” Crockett shouted above the din. But the holo—nurse had disappeared.
Only Yves looked rooted to the ground. “I didn't say you could do this!” Clearly in shock, he was shouting at the adults. “Get up at once!”
Crockett pushed him aside and walked over to Mr. and Mrs. Jackson. They'd been in the middle of a virtual TV show, but the holo-figures had dematerialized, and Yves's parents were in a heap on the floor.
“Nurse!” Crockett called again, but the hologram of the nurse didn't reappear. “Computer! Emergency!” Again, no response.
“What's happened to them, Crockett?” I asked from across the room. My voice sounded panicked and scared.
Flustered, Crockett shook his head. “I don't know.” He straightened the limbs of Mr. and Mrs. Jackson and made them as comfortable as possible. Then he walked over to me.
“The Jacksons seem to be breathing fine,” he told me. “It's as if they've just gone to sleep.”
I had just placed pillows from the couch under my parents' heads and was crouching by my mom. Crockett knelt next to me.
“Let me examine your mom,” he said. I nodded, and he placed a hand on her wrist and took her pulse. “It's fast but steady and strong. Now for her eyes…” Crockett gently pulled back my mom's eyelids to examine her pupils—
And what I saw made me gasp. My mom's eyes were almost completely black.
“Whoa…,” Crockett breathed.
There was a cry of shock from behind me. It was Yves. He must have been looking over my shoulder. Now, he stumbled backward and hit his head against the wall. He slid to the floor, muttering something that I couldn't understand.
I glanced back down at my poor mom. But this time, I didn't panic.
On second look, I could see it was just my mom's contact lenses that had gone black, not her eyes.
WHEN YVES SAW MY MOM'S EYES, HE STUMBLED BACK IN SHOCK.
Following a hunch, I ran the end of my probe over the back of her neck. There was no interference. I gently lifted my dad's head and ran the probe over the skin of his neck. Once again, the screen showed no interference.
“I'm not picking up any signs of their 'quists,” I told Crockett.
He shook his head. “That's impossible. Even when you turn off a 'quist, it will still register on probes.”
All the adults I knew had a 'quist implanted at the base of their skull so they could connect to the Internet. They wear special contact lenses to see '“screens” and can send e-mail, visit Web sites, write documents—everything they used to do with a keyboard and a mouse—just by moving their hands, lips, and eyes.
That's why the device is called a 'quist—which is short for ventriloquist. People look like bad ventriloquists when they communicate with the computers, because their lips are moving. But you can't hear what they're saying.
And now something had gone wrong with my parents' 'quists. “Help me get their contacts out,” I told Crockett.
After we removed the contacts, I was relieved to see that my parents' eyes looked perfectly normal.
We moved around, checking on the other adults. Lysa was crying silently over her mother, and Charlotte was on a couch, her dad's head cradled in her lap. All the adults had the same symptoms—including blackened contacts. We plucked them all out and tried to make everyone as comfortable as we could.
“What is happening?” Charlotte asked, looking down at her dad's face.
“I think the 'quists have made all the adults sick somehow,” I said from between my parents.
“Why weren't the five of us affected?” Yves asked. He was still sitting against the wall.
“Because you have to be eighteen to get a 'quist implant, genius,” Charlotte shot back. But she seemed to realize she was being too harsh, and her voice softened. “We're okay because we're not old enough to get a 'quist, and the 'quist is what made the adults collapse.”
Lysa looked at me miserably. “What do we do?”
“I think—,” I started to say.
Yves lumbered to his feet. “I'm in charge here!”
Charlotte rolled her eyes and ignored Yves. “Keep talking, Otis. What do you think we should do?”
All eyes were now on me.
“First things first,” I said. “We have to check out the Controller,” I said.
“Who?” Lysa squeaked.
“The Controller is the operator down on Level 1,” I replied. “He's the one in charge of driving the Climber. We have to make sure he's okay.”
I walked to the intercom on the wall. You actually had to press a button and speak into the box. I tried contacting the Controller, but there was no response.
I turned back to the others. “Let's go down to Level 1 and check on him.”
Everyone—even Yves—nodded.
Crockett looked up from putting a cushion under Mr. Bennett's head and said, “You four go ahead. I'll stay here with the adults and try to figure out what's wrong with them. Good luck.”
I hated to leave my mom and dad, but we couldn't sit in the Common Room and do nothing. Once the four of us were on the elevator, I pressed my thumb on the pad next to the button for Level 1.
CROCKETT VOLUNTEERED TO STAY WITH THE ADULTS.
“What are you doing?” Lysa asked.
“Level 1 is a restricted floor. You need security clearance to access it.”
The elevator door opened, and we stepped into a short hallway. This floor was meant for Elevator personnel only, so the designers hadn't bothered with the Old West theme. The walls were a stark white that was almost blinding under the harsh overhead lights. Most of Level 1 was occupied by the computer equipment that kept the Climber moving safely up and down the ribbon.
At one end of the hallway, a sign on a door read: CLIMBER CONTROL.
“The Controller's in there,” I said. We made our way to the door and knocked. There was no answer, so I said, “Door open.” The door didn't move. I tried pressing my thumb on the pad next to it. Once again, no luck. The door wouldn't budge.
“We're going to have to force it open,” I said.
“That's impossible,” Charlotte said. “We're not strong enough.”
“Let me,” Yves said, and stepped in front of us. “I don't go to the gym for nothing.” He put both hands on the door and pulled to the side as hard as he could. As I watched the veins in his neck and arms pop. I thought Charlotte was right. You couldn't open a door just by pulling on it.
YVES USED BRUTE STRENGTH TO OPEN THE CONTROL ROOM DOOR.
And then Yves grunted and pulled even harder. Amazingly, the door started to slide open. He was able to move it just enough for us to squeeze through into the Control Room. Charlotte didn't hesitate. She turned her body sideways and slid into the room.
“Good job, Yves,” I said. But before he could respond, there was a frightened gasp from Charlotte.
I squeezed through into a small room filled with monitors and blinking buttons, and saw what had startled her. The Controller, a bald man who looked to be about thirty, was passed out in his chair. His body had slipped to one side, and if he hadn't been strapped in, he might have fallen completely out of his seat.
THE CONTROLLER WAS CNCONSCIOUS, TOO!
We straightened him out and checked his condition. He was breathing fine, but just like the adults up on Level 3, his contacts had gone black. I removed them and turned to the mammoth control panel that took up the wall in front of the Controller's chair.
My eyes ran over the sleek operating system, taking it all in. I tried pressing a few buttons and touching different screens. Nothing happened.
“Someone has destroyed the communications system and put the Elevator
on autopilot,” I said. “There's no way to stop the Elevator, and there's no way to talk to anyone on the outside.”
“But what about oxygen or heat? Are those systems working?” Lysa asked.
“Yes, thankfully, those are all intact. We have plenty of oxygen for the trip down,” I assured them. “And the artificial gravity is working just fine.”
“Why do I know you're about to say, 'But…,'” Charlotte asked. “Because I haven't told you the worst yet,” I answered. “Whoever destroyed the communications system had to do it in person. That means the bad guy has to be somewhere on board the Climber.”
Lysa gasped and covered her mouth with her hands.
“Let's head back to the Common Room,” I said. The thought that there might be a criminal wandering around the Climber made me even more worried for my parents.
“I think I'll stay here,” Yves announced. He plopped down in the extra seat next to the emergency airlock that led outside.
I shook my head. “No, we all need to stick together. Let's go. You can help me carry the Controller up to Level 3 so Crockett can take a look at him.”
Grudgingly, Yves stood up. I took the Controller's legs and Yves took his Shoulders. In the Common Room, we found Crockett holding a magnifying lens with a mini video screen over a small blood sample.
He looked up as we came in. “Who is he and what's his condition?” he asked.
As we made the Controller comfortable on an extra couch, we told Crockett what we'd found on Level 1.
He gave a grim smile. “My discovery isn't much more hopeful than yours, I'm afraid. I've never seen a bug like this. It's like everyone with a 'quist has been infected with a computer virus.”
“But how can that be?” Charlotte asked. “Computer viruses make machines sick, not people.”
Crockett shrugged. “In this case, it looks like everyone with a 'quist was redirected to a server. That server instructed the brain to release a chemical dihydrocarbon-6.”
Lysa said, “And that's bad because…?”
“The chemical caused a sleeping virus to wake up.”
“What are you talking about?” I asked. “What sleeping virus?”
“It must be something we all breathed in on the Space Station or when we boarded the Climber. I checked while you were on Level 1, and I have it. And I'm sure you all do, too.”
“Then are we going to get sick?” Yves asked.
Crockett shook his head. “Not as long as our brains don't release that exact amount of dihydrocarbon-6. And, don't worry. The odds of that happening naturally are about six billion to one.”
“Can't you just turn the virus back off again?”
“I wish I could, Otis. It's started to multiply.”
Charlotte was looking down at her father, who lay on the couch.
“Why did the contacts turn black?”
CROCKETT FIGURED OUT WHY THE CONTACTS TURNED BLACK.
“A 'quist is programmed to shut off if something is harming the user, but for some reason, these 'quists couldn't shut off. I think the contacts were trying to destroy themselves. That would cut off connection to the 'quists and they wouldn't be able to cause any more harm.”
“Are the adults' brains okay?”
“Yes, Charlotte. It's just like they've got a really bad infection. I can't tell you everything about it. There's some Kind of command attached to the virus's DNA that I can't understand. But I haven't told you the worst part yet …”
“You mean it gets worse?” Lysa asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Crockett said. “Much worse. Right now, the bug is happy to live in their bodies. But in a few days, it will move to their lungs and leave their bodies as they exhale.”
“What art you saying?” Yves asked.
Crockett looked him in the eye. “It's only a matter a time before the virus becomes airborne and kills us all. And when we get to the bottom of the Elevator and they open the doors…”
His voice trailed off, so I finished his sentence for him. “The virus will rush outside, and everyone on Earth will be infected.”
TEDDY KEEPING WATCH OVER MOM AND DAD
JANUARY 3, 2031
Day 3 of 6 7:30 PM
This morning, the five of us sat around the breakfast table in the Common Room. Well, the other four sat. It was hard for me to keep my butt in a chair and not pace when talking about such a huge problem. I think better on my feet.
The Elevator was traveling thousands of miles a day as it continued its journey to Earth. But, on board, we were making zero progress.
The night before, we had carefully moved all twenty-six adults to their beds. Crockett had found IV bags in the medical supplies and attached a bag to an arm of each adult. The intravenous solution would provide nourishment and keep them from getting dehydrated. Crockett had moved constantly from room to room, checking on the adults and making sure that they were comfortable.
The rest of us had tried to catch a few hours of shut-eye. But, with everything going on, that had been almost impossible. I had dragged a chair between my parents' beds, where they lay sleeping. They were breathing like birds, their chests rising and falling a little too quickly, as if their bodies were trying to expel the virus with each breath.
When I had jerked awake this morning, my first thought had been, “Please let Mom and Dad be better.” But I could see there had been no change. They were still unconscious. I put Teddy on the chair where I had slept.
Stay with them, I told him using Teddy-speak, a bunch of hand commands that only Teddy and I recognized. My journal would be safe in my jacket pocket without him guarding it for a while.
Teddy blinked at me twice to signal that he understood. If there were any changes, he would find his way to me in the Common Room.
And that's where we all were now. Lysa's face was puffy as if she'd been crying. Charlotte looked stunned and angry. Yves appeared sullen, like a spoiled child whose birthday party has been ruined by rain. And Crockett had circles under his eyes, already showing the strain of trying to care for all the adults.
It wasn't easy to concentrate. Every time someone opened a package of food, a pop-up ad appeared out of the box. I guess when the bad guy knocked out the communications system on the Climber, he or she had also destroyed the pop-up ad blocker. Now there wasn't anything to keep these annoying advertisements from bursting out of every package and box of soda that was opened.
For the first few minutes, the room had been filled with dancing bears, rockets blasting off, and other holograms that yammered jingles like, “Crispy, crunchy and sweet—a taste even aliens can't beat!” and, “The juice! The juice! The juice is on the loose!” Finally, the ads stopped, and we could yet to work on solving our problems.
THE POP-UP ADS WENT WILD!
Unfortunately, Yves was the first to speak. “What's the point of this meeting?” he demanded as he stretched his bulging muscles. “We'll get help when the Climber reaches Earth. The ground crew will open the hatch—”
“And we'll release the virus on the planet,” Charlotte interrupted him.
“We can warn them not to open the hatch until they get the situation under control.”
“We might not be able to,” I said.
“Why not?” Yves asked.
“We could be …,” Crockett started, but before he could say “dead,” Lysa let out her familiar gasp. He softened his tone and said, “We could be too sick—or worst—to warn them somehow.”
But we don't have 'quists,” Charlotte said.
“It doesn't matter,” Crockett told her. “It's like I said before. This buy is going to go airborne in the next few days. And when it does, we won't be able to escape it. We'll be just as sick as the adults are.”
Lysa slumped in her chair as if all were hopeless. “So what can we do?”
“We can't give up,” I said. “We have to find out where the virus came from and who released it. That person might have the cure. So we have to solve this crime.”
“You
mean act like private detectives?” Yves scoffed, rolling his eyes.
“I mean act like people who want to survive,” I shot back.
“Even if we did want to be detectives,” Charlotte said, “we can't use most of our modern devices to solve the crime with the Climber's communications system down.”
“It's like we've gone back in time,” Lysa said.
“You've got a good point. Maybe it's time for us to start looting to the past,” I said and thought, Where was Judge Pinkerton when we needed her?
“What?” Charlotte said.
I hadn't realized that I'd said the last sentence out loud. “I was just thinking about how a family friend would deal with a situation like this.”
As they all stared at me, I thought about my family's journals, which were safely stored in my hard drive. I scanned through my memory as though I were flipping through the journals' pages. I thought about how different relatives dealt with solving their cases. Fitz had been a fingerprinting expert—but we had no prints here. Zeke could crack codes like nobody's business—but there were no codes to crack. I thought of G. Codd Fitzmorgan—Aha! That's it!
“Dramatic reenactment,” I blurted.
G. CODD FITZMORGAN
“what's dramatic reenactment?” Lysa asked.
“Sounds painful,” Charlotte said, trying to make a joke.
“I have a relative who used it to help find a pilot who disappeared in 1926,” I explained. “In a dramatic reenactment, you act out the events that lead up to the crime.”
“Which crime? The, attack on the adults? The sabotage of the Elevator? The switching of the statues?”
“What statues?” asked Lysa
I filled the others in on what Charlotte and I had discovered on Level 2. “I don't think we should consider the crimes separate events,” I added. “I think they're all connected. Like links on a chain.”
Crockett nodded. “Okay, what do we do?”
