“Yes…” Margo said, growing impatient.
“But in the event of some catastrophic event where the crypto officers can’t get to El Segundo to open the safe and the recovery-key shareholders aren’t available to rebuild the key, do you know what the ICANN protocol is then?”
“What?”
“Drill the safe for the fucking key.”
“You’re shitting me,” Margo said.
“I’m not. At the end of the day, it still comes down to sticking a key in a slot, but yeah, one of the three crypto officers would notice any shenanigans and, of course, once the whole Internet came back online it would become pretty obvious what had been done.”
“How long to shut it down again?” I asked.
“Well, to realize what had happened, regenerate the right card if it’s been destroyed, reboot that, that could buy you some time, but of course the government still controls the hubs, so if they really wanted to shut it down, we’re talking minutes. Ten minutes?”
“What are you figuring out?” Margo asked me.
“Not a lot,” I said. “Just what I can do in ten minutes that will both destroy Burke and keep the government from pulling the plug on a restored Internet.”
“Not following, mate,” Stanton said.
“It’s like Rowsdower said. We have the evidence, but no government we can trust to give it to. So we give it directly to the people. Make it seen by so many eyes that it can’t be unseen. Give the truth to so many people that it can’t be taken away.”
“How?” Margo asked.
“Well, I’m thinking of a place where the greatest number of people can watch one thing, so…”
“Hollywood Bowl?” Margo said.
“Sydney Opera House?” Stanton offered.
“No, I was thinking Times Square. Like with the ball drop on New Year’s Eve?”
“Our places definitely hold more people,” Margo said.
“Yeah, but unlike your suggestions, walking in New York City is free, just like the Internet we want to return. I also want to hit Burke in his hometown. I think Rowsdower would like that.”
“So, what, you want to run some sort of an ad on the Jumbotron screen?” Stanton asked.
“First of all, I want it on all the Times Square screens, and not an ad. I’m going to talk to the people. A broadcast on your PeepHole app. I want everyone on their phones watching me, and I want all the evidence Burke collected on the screens all around me.”
“But if you do a PeepHole broadcast, you’ll reveal your location,” Margo said.
“Right, but it’s hard to find one man in a packed Times Square. Even harder if he’s wearing a hat and holding a phone over his face like everyone else in the crowd.”
Margo wasn’t happy. Months earlier, she’d found me nearly in pieces, and though I wouldn’t say she nursed me, she did watch me. And being watched made it easier to heal and grow, like a plant that’s been moved into the sunlight. As I became more of myself, she did too, and then we watched each other—not out of concern but because we liked seeing us become a couple. But now that I was feeling better and more certain than I had in years, Margo was scared.
“They’ll kill you,” she said.
“Who?” I asked.
“Pick ’em,” she said. “There are so many people we can’t trust, you can’t even take evidence to the government.”
“They’d have to kill everyone in that crowd to get to me. I’ll be faceless.”
“Well, none of this means anything if Crypto Dundee here can’t get the Net rebooted anyway.”
“Crypto Dundee?” Stanton asked.
“Sorry. That was stupid,” Margo said. “I’m upset.”
Stanton’s phone rang, and he was pleased to see it was Leonards returning his call. “Kevin, thanks for … Well, I’m in Vegas, aren’t I?” Stanton switched into listening mode as best he could. “What do you mean confession, this isn’t … Oh … oh, I’m sorry to hear that.… That bad, huh? Rough.… So Friday’s still on then? Tell him to hold on, Kevin. I’m coming to get you. Both of you … yeah, well, you tell him I know a way out of hell.”
Stanton put down the phone and finished the rest of his drink. “Well, I think rebooting the Internet just got a lot easier. Neville confessed to Leonards. Rowsdower and Anonymous were right: Neville was Burke’s mole. Also, he’s dying.”
Stanton went to his hall closet and pulled out a flight jumpsuit. “You guys get some sleep, I’ll be back tomorrow with Leonards and Neville.”
“One second,” Margo said. “You can’t let him know where we are. He might be lying.”
“How the hell do you think I became a multibillionaire?” Stanton asked. “I’m aware of that possibility, and aside from having a fairly good bullshit detector, I’m also gonna run him by Jeeves.”
“Jeeves is still in L.A.?” I asked.
“Yeah, he’s staying in my pool house. One of the perks of being on staff. That guy picks stocks like a motherfucker … well, after meeting the CEOs of certain companies at a little party I threw the other night.”
“Isn’t that insider trading?” Margo asked.
“Sort of?” Stanton replied. “But I’m pretty sure there’s nothing about psychics in SEC regulations. Besides, is that really your biggest problem now? Anyway, if it all checks out, I’ll have Leonards and Neville here tomorrow and we’ll figure it out.”
“You can’t fly yet,” I said. “You’ve been drinking.”
“Why do you think I’m putting on my Airwolf flight suit? If I’m going to wait an hour to sober up, I gotta make some time.”
* * *
I woke at around eight the next morning, but Margo was already working on her Mac at Stanton’s bedroom desk. She was wearing nothing but her underwear and my corduroy sports jacket. One of her long legs disappeared under the desk while the other stretched out to her right.
The master bedroom, where we’d decided to sleep, featured a bed far bigger than “king” and a giant Andy Warhol print of our host over the headboard. There was also a bearskin rug on the floor and a stuffed koala clutching a fake eucalyptus tree in the corner. It seemed extreme wealth was just as damaging to sanity as poverty.
“Whatcha working on?” I asked, but Margo was too studious to be distracted by me. I got out of bed and put my arms around her middle, nuzzling my chin into her neck. I could see she was tweaking the data Anonymous had collected on Burke, turning it into an animated PowerPoint. The images and documents came up in quick succession one after another, tying Burke to hit men and terrorists, and she had the whole thing on a loop.
“I wanted to get it to a repeated five minutes,” she said. “Enough information to make an impact and to be recorded by anyone filming the screen.”
“You’re so talented, baby,” I said.
“Now, let’s work on your speech,” she said.
“Don’t worry,” I said, “I got it.”
“That confident?” she asked.
“Well, the last time I wrote something,” I replied, “this super foxy L.A. chick optioned it for a movie.”
“So I assume you’ll be wearing your grandfather’s fedora?” she asked.
“Yes,” I answered.
“So you don’t mind if I wear the Bowie one?” It was already on the desk and she put it on. It slid down slightly and bent her ears. She looked up at me from under the brim with big doe eyes.
“Not at all,” I said. “Makes sense.”
She frowned and took the hat off, laying it back on the desk.
“What?” I asked.
“You didn’t even say I looked cute,” she said in a deliberately pouty voice.
“Oh, baby, I’m sorry,” I said. “You’re adorable.” I put the hat back on her and gave her a kiss.
“Jerk,” she said, milking the offense in a way she rarely did.
“I’m sorry, Margo,” I said. “You’re my best friend. Sometimes I just forget you’re a girl.”
“It’s OK, Gladstone,”
she said. “Sometimes I forget that about you too.”
* * *
Stanton returned with Leonards and Neville a few hours later. I’d never met Neville, but he looked sicker than Rowsdower had described in his reports. His arm was around Leonards, an older but stronger man, who brought him to the leopard-print couch in the living room—the one behind the leopard-print recliners. And once the professor made sure Neville was planted, he turned to me with real joy.
“Gladdy,” he said. “I’m so happy you’re well.” And even though I’d only met him once, he hugged me like an old friend. I’d read Rowsdower’s report. I knew Leonards was a rebel and that he approved of what I’d started, or what had been started around me, but surely part of what I was feeling was more.
“Rowsdower’s dead,” I said, and his joy turned more serious than sad.
“I know,” he said. “Reggie’s told us everything, but we’re gonna make it right, aren’t we?”
“I hope so.”
“Good news, lads,” Stanton interrupted, brandishing Krazy Straws. “I stopped at Ralphs before we came back. Koala Fuckers all around.”
Stanton went to the bar and Margo and I pulled the recliners around to face Neville and Leonards on the couch.
“I did it,” Neville said to me before breaking into a hacking cough. He pulled a handkerchief from the silk pajamas he was wearing and even though he wiped his face like an elegant English gentleman, I could see there was blood in it. I could also see what was left of his hair shedding. “I know you know, but I wanted to say it to you. I helped Hamilton.”
“For money?” I asked.
“For a lot of money,” he replied. “My business had failed, and I had three children to take care of.”
“Surely they wouldn’t have starved,” I said.
“No, but I can tell you as someone who’s seen both, it’s a lot harder to stop being rich than only to live poor.” He turned to Margo. “Hello, Ms. Zmena. Nice to see you again.”
“Hello, Mr. Bhattacharyya,” she said. “You’ve taken quite the turn.…”
“I’ve started chemo,” he said. “I was gonna just, y’know, die, but I’ve decided to fight it. Yesterday I was recovering from my second round of chemo, and you know what? They called me. They pulled me out of Cedars-Sinai and brought me to El Segundo to reboot their bloody protocols again because of Rowsdower’s PeepHole broadcast, and that’s when I realized I can’t die like this. I want my children to be proud of me.”
“Really?” I said. “I thought you just wanted to make sure they didn’t have to come home from Exeter or summer someplace more pedestrian than San Tropez?”
“Wayne,” Margo said.
“Wayne what? I’m not sure what this guy wants.” I leaned in to Neville. “You want me to bless you? I’m not that kind of messiah. You want me to say it’s all OK? It’s not OK. You’re part of the problem. You’re dying of cancer in silk pajamas because you smoke and because you had the ill-gotten money to buy fucking silk pajamas. I’m sorry. I know you’re not supposed to speak ill of the dead, but this is my first chance as I’ve only just met you. Also, you’re still kicking.”
“OK, Gladstone,” Stanton said from the bar.
“No, it sure as hell is not OK. My friend Rowsdower is dead. He’s dead for doing the right thing. He’s dead because he believed in me and what I’m doing. He was good and he’s dead, and the world is a worse place because he’s gone. You? You’re some rich chain-smoking English prick who wants to die feeling like a good guy after selling out the world to a murderer.”
“I didn’t know there’d be murder,” Neville said. “I just thought he was playing some moneymaking angle. I didn’t know, and I’m sorry Rowsdower is dead, but I need to ask you something. Is your dollar-store story true?”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s true. They were the happiest little girls in the world. For three dollars, their father was a hero. They loved him.”
“Do you think they always did?” Neville asked.
“I don’t know. Those little girls are all adults now, but what does that matter? It’s not about what happened after that; it’s about what can happen. He was a hero, even if just for that day. Even if those kids were taken by the state due to neglect ten years later. Even if they all became crack whores dying of HIV from shared needles. Even then, I’m guessing that before their malnourished, syphilitic bodies fell to dust on a clinic bed someone told them to think back to their happiest memory as the morphine filled their veins. And I truly believe, even under the worst of circumstances, they’d think back to that day. They’d have that day to remember. And that is what I believe in. I believe in that day.”
Stanton coughed again. “I thought you believed in pure things?” he said.
“Sometimes, one day is all the purity we get,” I said. “What are you going to do with your one day, Mr. Bhattacharyya?”
He returned his handkerchief to his pocket and said, “Stanton told me the plan. Professor Leonards and I are perfectly capable of crafting a new DNSSEC protocol to let all the sites back, and I will be the one to insert it. They can deny knowledge. I will take the fall, but you have to tell me your plan will destroy Burke. Because now I know he’s a murderer, and even when I’m gone my children won’t be.”
“I will do everything I can to destroy him. No one, Mr. Bhattacharyya, no one wants him dead more than I.” Neville nodded. “But there’s something I want from you first,” I said.
“What’s that?”
I took out the phone Rowsdower had given me and flipped on the video recorder. “A confession. Documents are one thing, but turning state’s evidence is another.”
He sat up as best he could and ran his hand back through his shedding hair. “OK, Mr. Gladstone,” he said. “I’m ready.”
“Thank you, Neville. Of course, this all means nothing unless I can get in touch with Anonymous and make sure they can hack the Times Square screens.”
“Oh, right, about that,” Stanton said. “I called Jeeves’s place from Neville’s and spoke to Tobey. Anonymous is still holding their meetups with 4chan on Tuesday nights. So once you’re done with your shoot, we better get you to New York.”
Days 437–440
The next morning, Stanton flew Margo and me to New York in his private jet, which he piloted himself. That was good, because the bottle of booze I stole from his bar—his best—didn’t present a security problem on his plane. Margo and I had decided to stay at a centrally located hotel called the Mansfield, which wasn’t too far from Times Square or the New York Public Library.
Over the next few days, we pretended the room was our apartment. It didn’t feel like an apartment, and in truth it wasn’t even the greatest of rooms, but we were days away from finishing what I’d accidentally started, and having a home felt like a necessity. I needed to recharge and prepare for the Internet’s return so I could make my pitch to keep it there. But there was another reason. After Friday, everything could change. It could be worse. It could be over. These few nights could be my last chance to hold Margo all through the night, to look out from a window in the sky and care more about the person beside me than all of New York City.
The meeting with Anonymous on Tuesday night went better than I could have hoped. We sat in the audience and no one noticed us. Why would they? Margo had dressed as Oz, applying some intense winged eye makeup, and wearing a bright blue wig. I wore a Gladstone mask, which turned out to be the most popular costume at the meetup. They were popping up everywhere. Not just bookstores and Starbucks (who also sold their own copy of my book) but even in Times Square tourist shops and from the kind of street vendors who sell Statue of Liberty foam visors. She’d been licensing like a champ.
Margo confirmed for me that the man leading that night’s meeting was the Black Fawkes Down guy Rowsdower trusted, although, not being a moron, she didn’t call him that. Tobey (who was dressed as Tobey with no mask) had reestablished himself at 4chan, so after the show was over he was able to get us ba
ckstage for a private meeting. That was good because I didn’t want to announce my identity to a roomful of strangers.
We didn’t speak at first. Instead, Margo took out her Mac and played the presentation she’d made, showing Rowsdower’s murder followed by a flow of the Hamilton Burke–incriminating evidence Anonymous had gathered while Fawkes sat on the same old ratty green room couch I’d seen before.
“Well done,” Fawkes said.
“Did you know Burke was Quiffmonster?” I asked.
“I’d suspected it for some time. If you notice, he’s not around here anymore. He stopped appearing after he started running for president.”
“Well, y’know the damage is already done,” I said.
“I’m sorry, Gladstone,” he replied, and I took off my Gladstone mask because, really, what was the point?
“Don’t be. It’s not your fault, and thank you for helping us gather this information.…” I paused. “I’m sorry I don’t even know your fake name.”
“Most people here just call me Black Fawkes,” he said.
“Really?” Tobey asked. “I thought that was just me.”
“Well, actually, it is mostly just you, but that’s the closest I have to a pseudonym.”
“How about Black Fawkes Down,” I suggested.
“Pass,” he said.
“Too racist?” I asked.
“Too stupid. Anyway, you’re welcome.”
I explained to Black Fawkes that while I trusted him, I didn’t want anyone else to know I was in town. I also explained everything we wanted to achieve for Friday. A massive Times Square demonstration timed with ICANN’s return of the Internet. We wanted to create an event that could be witnessed, downloaded, and spread around, before the government shut the Net down at the hubs or, better yet, until the government realized that so many people were mobilized that it couldn’t be shut down.
Margo clarified the point from a PR perspective. “So keeping Gladstone’s presence a secret isn’t just for security reasons,” she said. “It’s the whole angle for the presentation. We’re building anticipation for the event: This Friday, the Internet Messiah Comes Home. That’s the word we’re spreading and we want you to spread.”
Reports on the Internet Apocalypse Page 17
