The LieDeck Revolution: Book 1

by Jim Stark

  As soon as Randall and Helen had departed in the helicopter, St. Aubin called in his chief of staff, Ralph Dellaire. Twenty minutes later, U.S. Ambassador Foley was sitting on a picnic bench in the back yard of 24 Sussex, getting briefed, and recruited, with the assistance of Defence Minister Nick Godfrey. An hour later, they had a plan. Tomorrow was the day. The LieDeck was the way. One American general was going down, along with the latest incarnation of fascism, the loftily named World Democratic Alliance.

  EASTER SUNDAY, APRIL 20, 2014

  Chapter 20

  THE CAT'S IN THE FRIDGE, BEEP BEEP

  Victor awoke in the same waterbed he'd slept in at the manor four days earlier, the day he had first met Randall Whiteside and sworn off taxi driving for this lifetime. His watch read 8:12 a.m. He'd had a bad night, in spite of a strong sleeping pill that Helen Kozinski had given him. It wasn't that he hadn't slept, only that his time away from reality had been as the blink of an eye, and had changed nothing. He had to pick up where he left off yesterday. “Wherever the hell that may be,” he said aloud as he took a brand new pair of socks from the dresser drawer.

  It bothered him that little bits and pieces of his private stream of consciousness still escaped from his lips—not because he was ashamed of his thought processes, but because they might be misunderstood by a species that spent much of its energy making outward appearances conform to the expectations of other folks. That was a game Victor played poorly, and preferred not to play at all. “I suppose I have to live in the real world, even if people throw bombs at me,” he said as he zipped up and tucked in.

  He'd actually awakened half an hour earlier, but he had stayed in bed to listen to the squeals of little Julia discovering Easter eggs hidden all over the mansion at the ends of trails of colored, construction-paper bunny tracks. He had been dragooned into the bunny footprint squad the night before, in order to get his mind off the awful events of yesterday morning. It hadn't worked. He felt the need of a shower.

  * * *

  In the wee hours, in the quiet grandeur of the master bedroom, the Whiteside matriarch had explained to the Whiteside patriarch, pillow to pillow, that he had to talk about the attack on the lodge with the children—all of them, including Julia—in full. “Randy,” she had said firmly—he always knew she was deadly serious when she called him Randy—"the kids are upset. They'll remember this incident all their lives, and they're going to remember how we handled it, so handle it. Handle it like the sensitive man you are. Give them the straight goods, together. I'll be there for back-up."

  She's something else! thought Randall. He had often started his business speeches with a reference to how he couldn't have made it without her, and that was the truth.

  Now it was 8:30 a.m., and the Whiteside clan was assembling for the only meal of the day that the help was not supposed to help with. This was the one time of day when the family was sure to be all together, and Doreen Elizabeth Dawe-Whiteside had long ago established a tradition that breakfast was for the family—only for the family.

  As soon as Randall entered the kitchen, Sarah confronted him. She had eavesdropped on a heated discussion yesterday afternoon between her father and O'Connor, and learned that Cam had temporarily suspended Helen for not sending Annette to the bomb shelter with Victor. “Mr. O'Connor's had it in for her for years,” Sarah whined. “You should fire him, Dad. She's nice and he's a big jerk."

  "We don't call people names in this house,” Randall reminded his elder daughter. “And Mr. O'Connor did what he thought was right. We all have our good points and our bad points,” he added, “even you and me.” That turned Sarah's snit into a mere sulk, but everybody in the family knew that “Daddy” disliked Cam as much as the kids.

  Breakfast presented serious problems for Randall. He could talk to Michael later, alone, but he wasn't sure how to present the story so that it satisfied and helped fourteen-year-old Sarah and sweet little Julia, nine in body, perhaps four in most other ways. It didn't help that Victor was back at the manor, but there was no choice on that score, for the moment. He had been told of the plan to talk to the kids the night before so that he'd be there at the breakfast table, and participate, and not have to cope with the thing second hand. Victor had agreed, and so now he waited, and nibbled, like the others.

  Randall had already made a decision to tell the media about the LieDeck tomorrow morning because of the super-secret information he had received from the prime minister, and that meant that he could reveal all to his children today without putting them in any danger. He took a sip of his coffee and indicated to Victor with his eyes that the time had come.

  "Children,” he began, “we have to stick together as a family right now. Yesterday, something terrible happened at the lodge. A lady was hurt ... badly.” He glanced briefly at Doreen, and was reminded by her eyes to tell the unvarnished and whole truth. “She was shot ... with a gun ... in the head.

  "Three men flew to the lodge in a plane. They were trying to hurt our good friend Mr. Helliwell ... Rip Van Winkle.” Julia put four fingers in her mouth, hunched down, and giggled at the reference to the nickname she had given to the new person only a few days earlier. Victor aimed his eyes at her face and pushed out his lower lip, pretending to pout, which started the giggling all over again ... and told her that he wasn't hurt, that he was okay, that he could still joke around.

  "They blew up the lodge,” Randall continued. “You know, where we keep the boats, Julia?"

  "Like in the cartoons ... they blew it up?” she asked innocently.

  "Yes,” said Randall. “I'm afraid so, honey, but we're going to get a whole bunch of grown-ups together, and they're going to work all day and all night until it's all back just the way it was ... you'll see. We're not going to let some bad people spoil our lives ... no sirree Bob."

  "But who are those bad people, Daddy?” Julia asked.

  "Well,” said Randall, “we don't know who these bad men were. They ran away, but the police are going to find them and make sure they can't do any more bad things like that."

  Doreen glared. He had inadvertently raised the possibility that these men could return. That was sure to frighten Julia. Randall had blown it, to some extent, but he knew it, so he could fix it ... he hoped.

  "These bad men aren't coming back here, that's for sure!" he said in a chest-beating voice. “They'd be too scared, with the police all around the house. So we've got nothing to worry about. But we have to help the police in case these bad men hurt some other nice people that live in some other place.” Whew, that was close, he thought.

  "Why did they want to hurt Mr. Helliwell, Daddy?” asked Sarah.

  "Yeah, why, Daddy?” repeated Julia.

  "Do you remember that cast that Mr. Helliwell had on his arm, like you get when you break your arm? Well, he had a secret. He was just pretending that his arm was broken."

  "You were just pretending?” asked Julia as her head swung around to catch his reaction. “I like to pretend,” she giggled.

  "You see, the cast on his arm was a hiding place, Julia,” explained her father. “And I bet you can't guess what he had inside the cast."

  "What did he have, Daddy? What did he have inside the cast?” asked Sarah with lots of enthusiasm, knowing that Julia would follow her lead.

  "Yeah, what did he have in the cast, Daddy?” asked Julia.

  "Welllll,” said Daddy, “I ... don't know if I can tell you. It's supposed to be a secret. What do you think, Mr. Van Winkle? Do you think we should tell them?"

  "Hmmm,” said Victor, “I don't know ... it's a pretty big secret."

  "Oh please, Daddy,” said Michael, playing the game Sarah had begun, the game that helped his little sister understand. “I can keep a secret."

  "Me too,” said Sarah.

  "Me too,” said Julia.

  "Well, do you promise to keep it a secret and not tell anybody until tomorrow?"

  "Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,” said all three kids—mostly Julia.

&nb
sp; "Well, inside the cast, Mr. Helliwell hid a teeny-weeny machine that Daddy bought, Daddy and some other people, like Senator Cadbury. You remember him, eh Julia?"

  "I like him, Daddy,” Julia grinned as she explored her ear with an unoccupied finger. Then she threw her arms out sideways and teeter-tottered back and forth in her chair, singing, “He's the cho-co-lit man, the cho-co-lit man."

  "Well,” said Randall as he calmed her down, “the men who wanted to hurt Mr. Helliwell at the lodge, they were trying to steal that little machine that he had hidden inside the cast on his arm. The machine is called a LieDeck. They didn't steal it, though. We still have it here, yes sir, because ... we fooled them!” he bragged ebulliently.

  "We fooled them,” exclaimed Julia proudly with her little fists in the air.

  "What kind of machine?” asked Sarah.

  "Well, it's hard to explain,” he said. “It's a new machine. When a person tells the truth, it doesn't do anything, but if you tell a lie, or if a person who's talking to you tells you a lie, there's a little pin and it taps you on the wrist and tells you. It can help the police to tell if a person is bad or good and..."

  This wasn't working for Julia. Randall tried to explain that it was like Pinocchio's nose, except much better, but she was still looking perplexed. He had to do better than words, so he pretended to be the machine, using his finger. He had Sarah say something true, and he did nothing. Then he had her tell an outrageous fib, an obvious lie, and he tapped her wrist, to the great amusement of all. Julia had a turn too, two turns, actually, and the family all encouraged the game until it was clear that she understood what the machine did.

  "You're going to manufacture these things, Daddy?” asked Sarah. “Like ... anybody could have one?"

  "Mr. Helliwell wants us to make these machines and sell them, and I think we should do that,” said Randall. “He wants us to put these machines inside of watches, so when you wear the watch and someone tells you a lie, you'll know right away that it's a lie, and you can ask if maybe the person wants to change their mind and say it right—say what is true instead. And if—"

  "How do you know it's a lie?” asked Julia.

  "Well, the little pin goes like my finger did—you remember when I tapped you on the wrist when you told me that the cat was in the fridge?"

  Julia laughed at the recollection of her clever lie. “I like it when your watch goes beep beep,” she beamed. “It should go beep beep."

  "You mean ... when somebody tells a lie?” asked her father, sounding utterly amazed.

  "Yeah,” squealed Julia as she pulled her golden hair towards the sky with both hands. “The cat's in the fridge, beep beep."

  Chapter 21

  WE HAVE TO MOVE NOW

  Victor Helliwell had spent a quiet morning at the manor, watching cartoons with Julia, vaguely aware that he had about as much control over his life as Bugs Bunny had over his. The police had asked him to stay indoors for a few days, just in case. Mrs. Whiteside had things to do, people to see, places to go, and although Lucinda had put aside some of her maid duties to make him feel at home, they both felt awkward about the situation. At least when I drove cab, I had some sort of semi-real contact with humanity, he said to himself.

  He thought of using that powerful computer in his bedroom suite, of going online and actually conversing with people the world over. He'd tried that for a while once, back around the turn of the century, using a computer in a public library, and he'd found the people he'd met on ICQ to be almost impossibly shallow, or at least universally inclined to behave that way, given the power to dump each other with the click of a mouse. And besides, he thought, what would I tell them about myself now? The truth? I don't think so!

  A few minutes before lunch was to be served, something snapped, and Victor was gone. He felt reborn, in control, behind a steering wheel again. He had “borrowed” the jeep and was cruising down Highway 148 towards Ottawa at an unsizzling 55 miles an hour, silently daring every oncoming car to commit to a header. “Life is all that I have,” he said aloud. “It's all anybody has, but life hiding behind a security outfit is not much better than life behind bars."

  Patriot Security was in hot pursuit ... or warm pursuit. There was no point overtaking or stopping the man, they had concluded. That would only aggravate an already tense situation. The inventor was proving to be as stubborn as Whiteside himself.

  The brutal shooting of Annette Blais had capsized Victor's thinking and stomped all over his heart. It was only three short days since he had shared his incredible secret, and already somebody was tossing bombs in his direction. He'd spent more than a decade in hiding, as an urban hermit and as a rural hermit, wondering all along whether he was being paranoid. Now he had become the object of violent attention, and he didn't know how to deal with it. He was also suffering acute withdrawal from his habit of many years, the custom he had developed of speaking out loud, testing his every thought against the judgments of the LieDeck. In effect, he missed his best and only friend, Victor Helliwell. He lit a smoke, his first of the day—he was trying to cut back—and decided on a course of action.

  "Hiroshima Survivor calling Patriot,” he said into the air. “I know you can hear me, you guys, so listen up. I'm going home. You got that? You tell Mr. Whiteside that I truly appreciated his hospitality, but I don't want it any more.

  "I expect Patriot to follow me everywhere, and try your best to keep the bad guys off my case, okay? I'm disgusted with your performance out at the lodge. If you can't do the job, just tell me, and I'll hire someone who can."

  Victor stopped talking for a moment as he eased across the center line to pass a tractor that was creeping along the shoulder, lumbering its way from one sopping wet field to another. He didn't have a LieDeck on him, but he was sure that if he had, it would have called him a fibber when he blamed the security failure at the lodge on Patriot. It wasn't their fault. Surely only criminals and crazies run for cover when the RCMP shows up at the door, he thought.

  "Now here are the new rules, people,” he continued. “No one, and I mean no one, is to say a single word to the press or to anyone about my connection with the LieDeck for the next few weeks at least, maybe for months. That's my decision, and while I realize that sooner or later my cover will be blown, it had better not be your fault. I intend to lead a normal life for as long as I can, and by normal, I mean private. You put any bugs in my house and I'll sue your nuts off, or your tits, or whatever body parts you've got that you'd rather not lose."

  Helliwell chuckled to himself. Sometimes he just plain enjoyed lying. Of course Patriot staff would be busy taping this soliloquy, and they'd realize he was lying, but what the hell. Rich people were entitled to have fun however they pleased. He also found it amusing to consider that perhaps the jeep wasn't bugged, and that he might be driving down the 148 talking to nobody at all. If they think life is strange when they're carrying a LieDeck, he said to himself, wait until they find out how primitive they were before they got the thing!

  "If I'm needed to sign something or whatever, you can call me,” he directed his pursuers. “I don't want my tranquility disturbed for any reason, unless it's a duty that is urgent or unavoidable. I hope you got that loud and clear."

  He went on to tell the Patriot agents exactly how things were to be, and what he wanted, now and in the future. “Pay my rent at the farm—get my old Cutlass back—stock up my fridge while I'm asleep tonight, and don't wake me—tell Winnie I'll call her as soon as I can—Annette too—tell Julia I'm just taking a little holiday...” When all of the practicalities of his move were covered, he began singing, too loudly: “Paranoia strikes deep..."

  * * *

  There were four Patriot cars behind the jeep. The chopper was a mile north of the convoy, over the escarpment that ran alongside Highway 148, out of sight. Even Grant Eamer had been enlisted in the “chase,” and he was listening to the transmissions, relaying the gist of things to Helen, who was in Kanata, at Whiteside Technologies. Randall
Whiteside had just entered the room.

  "There's basically nothing we can do to stop him,” said Helen. “He's a free man, and he's going to be very wealthy, and he's made up his mind. He says that if it comes down to making a choice between being free or being safe, he chooses freedom."

  "Translation?” demanded Randall.

  "He's going back to his rented farmhouse,” explained Helen, with a disbelieving and resigned shrug. “He wants us to retrieve his 1996 Cutlass. It was impounded when the police found it abandoned up on Parliament Hill, from when he went to see Senator Cadbury. He says he wants Patriot to do what it can to ensure his security twenty-four hours a day without being visible, and he says he'll sue the bejeebers out of us if we eavesdrop on his private life. He says we're to put a lawyer in charge of all his business affairs and an accountant in charge of his money and to basically ... well, leave him alone."

  Randall smiled. This was a man he could respect. “So ... we do it,” he said, “just the way he asked. No screw-ups. I like this guy, Helen. The day will come when he'll have to come in from the cold again, and I want him to be happy that he had this little bit of time to indulge his whims. Keep me apprised of his activities. Where's Cam?"

  * * *

  Cam O'Connor was huddled in his office, still deeply shaken from the assault on the lodge. His conservative temperament winced even at verbal flamboyance. Although he had proven himself in his younger days as a Patriot administrator and occasional field agent, he was known to avoid movies that involved even a modicum of derring-do. His ideal world involved the highest levels of law and order, steady profits, a minimum of politics and no fireworks at all—life in the smooth lane. Helliwell had disrupted all that, and Cam felt like he was trying to land a Boeing 747 during an earthquake.

  "Good riddance, as far as I'm concerned,” he whined as Randall poked his head around the door.

  "Now Cam,” cautioned the boss, “he's entitled. In any event, I can make Helen his main contact and leave you out of the picture, okay?"