Null Set

by S. L. Huang

  “You need Checker for this,” she’d protested when I called and commandeered her help. “I can’t cut feeds and sensors for you. I mean, he’s been teaching me some things, but this is way, way, way, way beyond me.”

  “I’ve been breaking into places long before I knew Checker,” I said.

  How long? whispered a voice in my head.

  “I don’t need anyone else,” I insisted over it. “Besides, this is a defunct storage space getting passed around between people who don’t want it in their budget. The security isn’t exactly going to be airtight. I just need some information—floor plans, specifics, how things get tripped. You can get me that much, right?”

  “Um,” she said. “I guess I’ll try.”

  Checker himself had sent me a long, long email that went into digressions about the Holocaust, the Nanjing Massacre, the Khmer Rouge, and the Congo Wars, among other atrocities of the twentieth century. For serious, I’ve never been able to wrap my head around stuff like this, he wrote. I’ve seen violence up close in my life, but brutality on such a wide scale … how the fuck does that happen? How do they get people to go along with rounding up anyone who freakin’ wears glasses and literally hacking them to death with pickaxes? How do doctors go along with injecting syphilis into people or raping countless women to experiment on their fetuses and then say they were “just following orders”? I don’t get it, Cas. And I look around today and see these hosts on cable news willing to shit on other people HARD and even worse, they have an audience … but I’m also stubborn enough to keep believing that most people are fundamentally good. So I don’t fucking know. Don’t get me wrong, I still think your idea is a shittastically bad one, but I keep coming back to what you said about evil in the world being what’s messing with people, and wondering what kind of person I’D be if things went really bad, and if I got scared or managed to rationalize something to myself or … I don’t know, maybe THIS is me rationalizing. But then I think about looking at today’s or tomorrow’s horrors and knowing I might have helped you prevent them, and whether it’s only intellectual arrogance that’s stopping me … Point is, I might change my mind, but I’m willing to help. FOR NOW.

  By the end, I’d started skimming—I was torn between mocking him for sending a doctoral thesis and feeling self-conscious I hadn’t dug as deeply into the possible effects of my tech as he had. I’d been considering violence as an abstraction, with maybe a helping of guilt for what I saw here in my own city, but I hadn’t connected to thinking about specific historical barbarism.

  Not that Checker’s examples were all that historical. He was right—we weren’t exactly evolved past such things. Maybe … maybe this could make a real difference.

  And at least I’d be able to count on having Checker’s computing skills, once he’d dug up all he could on Pourdry.

  Meanwhile, after all her protestations about not knowing whether what I’d asked of her was even in her wheelhouse, Pilar texted me the next day to come meet her where she’d been staying at Checker’s house. She opened the front door and immediately thunked a three-inch binder into my hands, complete with a full table of contents and neatly organized colored tabs.

  “Holy shit,” I said. “What the hell is this?”

  “I’m an admin! It’s what I do,” she said. “Besides, I wasn’t sure what all you’d need.”

  “So what, you branched out into tax law?”

  She wrinkled her nose. “Well, I haven’t had much to do, what with the office closed and all.”

  I pushed in past her to come drop onto the living room couch. “Speaking of, I take it everything’s been quiet on this front.”

  “All quiet,” Pilar confirmed.

  “I brought you a shotgun. It’s in the car.”

  “I almost, um. I almost brought Arthur’s from the office,” she confessed, “but you know Checker. He wouldn’t like having that in the house.”

  “He can deal,” I said. “You’ll need more than a handgun if Pourdry’s goons come around. You’ve got your CZ?”

  I’d bought her the pistol. Pilar’s color heightened and she patted her sweater behind her hip self-consciously. “Yes.”

  “Good.” I hefted the binder. “Now give me the short version of this monstrosity.”

  Pilar sat down next to me and proceeded to talk me through two hours of details I didn’t really need. Checker came in from the Hole right after the eleventh time I told her to move on.

  “Hey,” he said. “How’s it going?”

  “Great!” Pilar chirped, at the same time I said, “Kill me now.”

  Checker snorted a laugh. “Cas, you could do with not flying by the seat of your pants for once.”

  I ignored the jibe. “What have you found on Pourdry?”

  “He’s got a hell of an enterprise. I’m unearthing it, slowly. Following the money and all that.”

  “And what about the cops? What’ve they got on the shootout?”

  “Arthur’s down as a witness, and they’re after you as one, too, but nobody has a good description of you or any good forensics—you’re welcome, by the way; you left your fingerprints on some of the shell casings.”

  “That’s what I’ve got you for.”

  “I’ll add it to your tab. You could stand to be a little more careful, you know. I’m not a magician.”

  “You’re admitting electronic fallibility? You?”

  “Excuse me while I go find something to throw at you.” He headed off into the kitchen. “You guys want some food?”

  “No,” I said, at the same time Pilar called, “Yes, please!”

  I imagined slowly banging my head against the multi-tabbed binder. “Most of this is an easy job. There’s no infrared and they don’t keep the lights on inside, so the only place I can’t avoid the security cameras is going over the fence. It’s too bad they log that, or it would just be a matter of knocking out the guard watching the monitors.”

  Checker poked his head out of the kitchen. “I said I’d help, you know. You need something looped?”

  “It’s a Rachnid system,” Pilar said. “It’s wireless, but an intranet.”

  “Oh, that’s easy. You carry a dongle close enough, I can piggyback onto the signal and edit whatever we want.”

  “Can you also get her the keypad codes?” Pilar asked. “That’s the only piece I couldn’t—”

  “I can just bust it open,” I said. “Unless there’s something we haven’t gotten to yet in your magnum opus here, their security isn’t good enough to sense the damage.”

  “Isn’t it better if they don’t know you’ve broken in, though?” Pilar asked. “I mean, that’s why I looked up all their inventory procedures and whatnot. Don’t you want to hide what you’re taking? ’Cause then nobody will be looking for it, or looking for the effects.”

  Checker had ducked back into the kitchen, but he hollered out, “Cas Russell, put the explosives away. Keypad codes are not a problem.”

  I thought for a minute. “What’s the range of your dongle?”

  “Fifteen feet, give or take a few,” he called back.

  I flipped to the blue tab marked “floor plans” and mentally drew out the radius intersecting the security grid. “No, total stealth is a no-go anyway. I have to take care of the security guard or I’ll cross multiple cameras before Checker’s signal is in range to knock them out.” Checker could edit the footage after the fact, but not a person’s memory.

  Human memory is infinitely malleable, someone sang. Like painting over a canvas …

  “Why not just distract the guard?” Pilar asked, hauling me back to the present. “Then your heist goes undetected and nobody has to suffer a head injury. Win-win!”

  “I liked you better when you were afraid to talk back to me,” I grumped, shaking off the cobwebs and trying to sound normal. I pushed away creeping doubts that I’d be able to do this job at all. I should be able to control my own brain; I just had to focus. “That wouldn’t work anyway,” I said too loudly.
“Mathematically, I can’t be in two places at once. I can’t reliably draw the guard’s attention somewhere else at the same time I’m going over the fence. Unless I use an explosive or something to do it, and then we’re still talking about leaving behind evidence, so there’s no advantage.”

  “What about asking Arthur to do it?”

  I considered. He had offered to help. And though force might be easier, more efficient, and my overall preferred way of doing things, Pilar had a point about stealth helping the cause.

  Checker came back out to the living room, balancing a tray of sandwiches. “Don’t you dare ask Arthur to do field work injured, Cas Russell. Don’t you dare.”

  “It’s not like his condition would impede him on this,” I said. “He can limp in and out just fine.”

  “And if something goes wrong? Wait till he heals. I’m putting my foot down.”

  “If Arthur’s safety is your worry, getting our hands on this technology might help a ton against Pourdry and anyone else we’ve pissed off,” I said. “We need to get the brain entrainment going as soon as possible. Does one of you two feel like going in? I didn’t think so. If you don’t want me to ask Arthur, then we’re back to the quick-and-dirty route inside. You can tell me something else to steal so they won’t notice the Signet Device stuff missing.”

  “They’ll still notice,” Pilar said. “If you look in the green section on inventory—” She cut herself off at the glower on my face. “Never mind. But anyway. Could I help? What would you need me to do?”

  “What?” Checker said. “No!”

  Pilar’s eyebrows drew together so fiercely Checker rocked back in his chair.

  “I just mean, you don’t have the experience!” he squawked. “You’re talking about stealing a highly secretive piece of technology—if Cas gets caught, you get arrested. This isn’t a game!”

  “Thanks,” said Pilar. “I know that.”

  I leaned back on the couch, putting my feet up on Checker’s coffee table and suddenly enjoying the spectacle.

  “Unlike the rest of us, you have a clean record, and Arthur and I would both like you to keep it,” Checker said. “We’re not asking you to do this.”

  “You’re right,” Pilar said. “You’re not asking; I’m volunteering.”

  “Wait,” I cut in. “Checker, you and Arthur have criminal records? Since when?”

  “Since none of your business, that’s when,” Checker shot back. He turned back to Pilar. “I don’t want to have to play the boss card, but when Arthur and I hired you, it was not to get you in trouble as an accessory to burglary! You’re not getting involved.”

  “This isn’t part of my job,” Pilar said. “It’s for Cas, not for you. So you can’t pull rank.”

  “Do you want to do it instead?” I asked Checker.

  “I can’t if you want me editing and looping the security footage in real time! And besides, I’m not good enough at that sort of thing anyway, and I’m smart enough to know it. Wait for Arthur!”

  “I’m a girl,” Pilar said. “The guard won’t see me as a threat. I’ll say I had car trouble or something and just chat with him. Or her.”

  “Hey, she can carry the dongle,” I said. “That way I won’t ever appear on the monitors at all. Totally safe. No chance of anyone catching on.”

  “There’s always a chance! Newton save me—Pilar, why on earth are you humoring Cas on this? Arthur will be better in a few weeks; there’s no need!”

  Pilar hunched her shoulders. “A lot can happen in a few weeks. People can get hurt in a few weeks. If this is going to work the way Cas thinks it will…”

  One of my cousins joined a gang a couple months ago, Pilar had said. Arthur wasn’t the only one with kids he cared about.

  “This won’t be a panacea,” I suddenly felt the need to warn her. “It’ll help. It won’t wipe out every problem.”

  “So maybe it’ll help enough for a good family to balance things out,” Pilar said, not looking at either of us. She stood up. “I’m going to make some tea. Cas, I’m in if you want me.”

  “I want you.”

  She nodded and went into the kitchen.

  “Don’t do this,” Checker pleaded in a low murmur once Pilar was out of the room. “Don’t. She doesn’t know what she’s getting into.”

  “Yes, she does,” I said. “She’s worked for you guys for a while now. She knows. Stop patronizing her.”

  He flushed. “I’m not. It’s an issue of experience—”

  I scooped up half a deli-meat sandwich and took a bite. “Yeah, about that,” I said with my mouth full. “What illegal activities did you and Arthur ensnarl yourselves in? Other than with me.”

  “I did some dumb shit as a teenager, that’s all. As for Arthur, it’s seriously not your business. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “Oh, and my past is your business?”

  “I am dead begging you here—don’t bring this up to him,” Checker said, staring at his hands. “It’s done, it was years ago, and you’ll only hurt him. Just don’t.”

  “Fine. But I get Pilar tonight.”

  “Tonight?”

  “Why wait? What, do you have a hot date or something? Or were you just hoping to talk her out of it?”

  He covered his eyes with one hand, not answering for a moment. “I’m not trying to patronize her.”

  “You’re not trying to.”

  “I still say it’s a stupid risk. She’s never done anything like this before.”

  “Only one way to learn,” I said. “This is an easy job. Good thing to start with.”

  “I don’t like it.”

  “You don’t have to.”

  We sat in tense silence for a moment. I finished my sandwich and brushed the crumbs off onto Checker’s couch. He winced. “Can you at least spare my coffee table?”

  I let my boots thunk back down to the floor. “If you’re thinking about backing out of your part of the gig tonight, we’ll still find a way in without you. Only it won’t be as clean.”

  “God, Cas! I said I was in, as shitty as I feel about all this. I don’t like what you’re doing and I don’t like you involving Pilar, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to go off and sulk and let you get yourselves caught.”

  “We still wouldn’t get caught.”

  “Sure.” He groped at an end table behind him and came up with a tablet. “Speaking of people’s pasts, let’s hop back on yours. Arthur’s digging into this Simon fellow; he needs intel.”

  “Oh, look at the time.” I got up. “I’d better prepare for the heist.”

  “Prepare what? You’re just walking in and walking out. Pilar and I are the ones doing all the work. Sit yourself down.”

  I tried to rustle up a comeback to that and failed. I sat down.

  “Right,” Checker said. “So. We were talking about … um.” He cleared his throat. “How you met Rio.”

  My irritation slammed up against a massive wall of weighted memory, a black tar seeping up over the present.

  The Lord guides my hand—

  Cassandra. We picked the name Cassandra. Remind her.

  I flinched.

  “Cas? Cas, are you all right?”

  “No.”

  “Do you … are you remembering something?”

  Cas. Do you recall who I am?

  One of the people who killed me—

  My mind cringed away, the stabs of image and sound leaving my thoughts speckled red.

  “I can’t do this right now.” The words came out steadier than they had any right to, as if it were another person talking.

  “I’ve been thinking,” Checker said. “I’ve been thinking, um … maybe I should talk to Rio.”

  The sentence whiplashed me back to the moment like I was a drunk who’d been dropped into a freezing lake. My eyes snapped into focus and I stared at Checker for a full four seconds, my jaw working. “What?”

  He fiddled with his tablet and didn’t drop eye contact with me. “Well, I’v
e been putting this together since the last time we talked. It seems like you’ve known him a long time, longer than anyone else you remember, and you keep dodging my questions about it.”

  “Because I don’t want to answer them,” I said. “It doesn’t mean anything.”

  “I think it might.” Checker’s expression softened. “Cas, I’m not sure you even know you’re doing it, but it’s like a … a reflex with you. Every time I ask you something that might get close to what you did before this, you deflect.”

  “No, I don’t.”

  His mouth twitched. “Then tell me how you met Rio. Or give me a phone number or email address so I can ask him.”

  That concept was still derailing my brain. “You. Want to talk. To Rio.”

  “Want? No, no, no. ‘Want’ is far too strong a word.” He flailed his hands and swallowed visibly. “What I want is to help you, and in order to help you, I am willing to attempt some extremely delicate inquiries of your friend who also happens to be the pure embodiment of blood-curdling evil. That’s just how good of a person I am.”

  “Or you have an obscene level of curiosity and are like a pit bull when you want the answer to something. I can’t believe you want to talk to Rio.”

  I expected Checker to snark back at me, maybe something about how obscene curiosity was the best kind, but instead he winced away and turned the tablet over in his hands. “Cas,” he said, without looking at me, “if you don’t mind, this is really rather a terrifying thing for me, and I wouldn’t do it if I weren’t trying like hell to help you, so please give me the damn contact information before I lose my courage entirely.”

  There wasn’t much I could say to that. I wrote down Rio’s phone number for him.

  nine

  I HALF EXPECTED Checker to call Arthur and try to get him to thwart my plan for the night, but he didn’t. Maybe he was worried enough about Arthur’s injury that he didn’t want to be responsible for him volunteering to take Pilar’s place.

  I didn’t care which of them served as my diversion. It was an easy part to play, and even if things went wrong, I didn’t anticipate any danger.