How Spy I Am

by Diane Henders

  I sat, and Kane deployed the bug detector again. This time the green light glowed steadily, and Sam gave me a dubious look before leaning closer. “As near as I can tell, you had some sort of… collision in the network.” He glanced at me, then addressed the table again, frowning. “This is a gross oversimplification, of course, but when your consciousness is in the network, it’s essentially reduced to a stream of data packets. I’m not sure exactly how you do it, but you’re somehow capable of collecting and assembling relevant data packets into a cohesive whole.”

  “So…” I thought about that for a moment. “So when I encountered Betty, it was like a big data transfer.”

  “I think so. You read and internalized all her data in a single gulp. You retained all your own memories and experiences, but you added hers, too, and believed them as if they were your own, at least for a short time until your own reality reasserted itself.”

  “But… what was Betty doing in the external network at all? I thought super-users were just like turbochargers for sims. Can Betty sneak around invisibly and decrypt files, too?”

  Kane shifted suddenly in his chair at my question, and we both stared at Sam.

  “No,” Sam said quickly. He ran his fingers through his beard a couple of times. “I think…” He cast his eyes up to the ceiling as if searching for divine inspiration. “I think probably you accidentally breached this network.”

  “I’m sure I didn’t,” I objected. “I was out in the public data stream.”

  “How do you know?”

  “I, um… I just know. Private firewalls… feel… different… I guess…” I stumbled to a halt. “I’m sure I wasn’t in any secured networks. This network is secured isn’t it?”

  “Yes, of course.” Sam’s eyes focused in the vicinity of my left ear. “I’m quite sure you must have been in this network,” he said firmly.

  “Ooookay… So what makes you think I can help Betty?”

  “She lapsed into a catatonic state immediately after your collision in the network.”

  I recoiled, my stomach squeezing into a tight ball of nausea. “I stole her mind? That’s… that’s…” I swallowed hard, willing my greasy breakfast to stay put.

  “No, no!” Sam made calming gestures. “No, you can’t steal someone’s mind. I think she might just be in shock. Maybe there was something in the way you contacted her that locked down her ability to respond…”

  “So I made her into a vegetable. Oh my God…” I wrapped my arms around my roiling gut. “What about Cassandra? Who’s looking after her? How is Jessie managing when she has to work all day? Her deadbeat ex won’t do anything to help, that slimeball-”

  Kane’s big warm hand closed over mine. “Aydan, calm down. Who are these people you’re talking about?”

  “Jessie is Betty’s daughter. She’s a single mom, and Betty looks after Cassandra in the afternoons while Jessie works. They need Betty, and I just wiped out her mind…” I gulped down another wave of nausea.

  “We’ll find a way to fix it.” Kane held me with his eyes until I swallowed again and sucked in a long breath.

  “I hope so.” I eased back in the chair, letting go of his hand and forcing myself into yoga belly breathing. In. Out. Ocean waves. After a few moments, I straightened. “When can I start?”

  “Right away.” Sam rose. “Follow me. We’ve set up a makeshift hospital room in one of the offices. You can talk to her in person, but we don’t really expect her to respond. Then we’ll hook both of you up to the monitoring system and you can go into the network with a standard Sirius-type fob.”

  At the door to the room I paused, supporting myself against the door frame while I took in the hospital bed and its occupant. I stepped forward to take her cool hand in mine and shuddered when I looked into the brown eyes that stared blankly at the ceiling.

  Her hair was coloured a determined coppery-red that made her plump cheeks look even paler. The smooth hand I held was nicely manicured, but her nail polish was beginning to show a few chips around the edges. Unbidden, my mind dredged up the knowledge that she’d had an appointment for a manicure the day after I met her in the network.

  She’d missed it.

  Another shudder shook me.

  “Hey, Betty.” I leaned close to get into her fixed line of sight. “Betty. Cassandra misses you. She wants her Nana.” I patted the waxen cheek. “Come on, Betty, you need to wake up now.”

  She blinked at the contact with her cheek, but the fixed stare never changed.

  “Don’t bother,” Sam said quietly behind me. “We even brought her granddaughter in to see her, but it didn’t help. You might as well go directly into the network and see what you can do there.”

  I peered into her unresponsive face for another moment before letting go of her hand to take the chair Sam indicated. He wheeled over a cart containing familiar-looking monitors and hooked up the electrodes to Betty’s and my foreheads.

  He handed me a fob that looked very similar to the security fobs at Sirius, and I shot a questioning look at him. “Do you have one for Kane, too?”

  “Uh.” He frowned. “Is that necessary?”

  “Yes.” Kane’s voice was hard, and Sam blanched and stepped back a pace, his fingers combing his beard again.

  “Just a moment,” he said, and hurried from the room.

  Several minutes later, he returned with a fob. Kane accepted it wordlessly, and we exchanged a glance before I took a deep breath. “Okay, let’s do it.”

  I caught the beginning of Kane’s nod as I closed my eyes and stepped nervously into virtual reality. Kane popped into existence, and a moment later Betty’s immobile avatar appeared beside us, too, her empty gaze fixed at infinite distance.

  “Okay…” I approached Betty’s still figure. “Betty. Hey, Betty.” I stood in front of her while her eyes looked through me. “Betty?” I held her face between my palms to look directly into her eyes. “Betty, it’s Aydan. We met in the network, remember?”

  A faint tremor shook her avatar.

  I shot a quick glance at Kane. “She moved.”

  He stepped closer. “Be careful. If she does come out of it, you don’t know how she’ll react.”

  I nodded and returned my attention to Betty. “Hey, Betty, remember me? Aydan Kelly? I-”

  Automatic weapons fire exploded out of the suddenly darkened void and Kane flung us to the virtual floor, his avatar sprawling across us. Hysterical screams ripped my eardrum while Betty thrashed frantically beside me.

  Warm wetness pattered across my arm, and I jerked my head from under Kane’s shoulder to see a half-naked man crumpling under a hail of bullets. Blood and tissue spattered us and pooled in the void. Betty’s screams changed to gagging and animal-like whimpering.

  Kane lunged to his feet, and I was scrambling to my knees when his hard hand landed on my shoulder. “Stay low!” he roared over the deafening fusillade of shots. He was reaching for Betty when the sim vanished.

  Suddenly, I was staring at him as he bolted upright in his real-world chair.

  “Aydan, are you all right?” he snapped.

  “Fine.” My voice didn’t seem to be working right. “You?”

  “Fine.”

  We turned simultaneously to stare at Betty’s white face on the pillow. A tear tracked slowly down one cheek, but her eyes still stared sightlessly at the ceiling.

  “Betty.” I tottered over to the bed and took her icy hand in my shaking one. “Betty, wake up. That’s not real. It’s just a sim. You’re safe in the real world. Come back and wake up.”

  No response.

  I looked up to meet Sam’s worried gaze. “What do you think that was, Sam? Is she hallucinating or something?”

  His shaking fingers combed his beard over and over. “I… don’t know. That was very… disturbing.” He curled the fingers of both hands deeply into his beard and sank slowly into a chair. “I’ve certainly never seen anything like that in any of Betty’s sims before.”

  “I’
ve seen something like it,” Kane said quietly.

  We both turned to him, and he held me with his troubled grey gaze. “So have you,” he added.

  “Oh!” Recognition paralyzed me for an instant. “But I didn’t create that in the sim. I don’t think I did, anyway.”

  Sam frowned at us. “What are you talking about?”

  “I, um…” Suddenly I didn’t really feel like explaining.

  “What you saw was part of Aydan’s experiences,” Kane said diplomatically. “Could Betty have absorbed Aydan’s data the same as Aydan absorbed hers?”

  “You experienced that?” Sam looked horrified.

  “Well, yeah, kind of…” I mumbled. I noticed one of my shoelaces was loose and avoided his gaze by leaning over to retie it.

  After a short silence, Sam spoke again. “Maybe this makes sense, if she’s withdrawing from a shattering emotional experience. I need to consult a psychiatrist. Why don’t you go and get some lunch? We can try again this afternoon.”

  When Sam finished removing the monitoring electrodes from my forehead I rose gratefully and headed for the door, Kane trailing me.

  At the front desk, Candy chirped a cheerful, “Can I help y’all with anything?”

  I leaned tiredly against the desk. “Maybe. Where’s a good place to find lunch?”

  “Oh!” She smiled. “Try the little coffee shop just north of this building. Y’all just have to try their pecan pie, it’s the best in Macon.”

  “Sounds great.” I was straightening when an idea occurred to me. “Hey, I should ask a native. Where’s a good hotel? The one we checked into is so disgusting, we’ve decided not to stay.”

  She gave a little bounce in her chair, her smile brightening to supernova levels. “Oh, y’all just have to stay at my Nana’s bed and breakfast. You’ll just absolutely love it, it’s so charming, it’s right close to here, and Nana is the best cook in the whole wide world. Her breakfasts are just to die for.”

  I shot a cautious glance at Kane, but couldn’t read approval or disapproval in his expression. I turned back to Candy. “Do you think she’d have a couple of rooms available?”

  “I’ll call her right this very minute and find out.”

  I started to demur, but she was already dialling the phone, beaming. All that high-wattage energy was too much for my exhausted state, and I slouched against the desk while she had a short but affectionate conversation with her Nana.

  After she hung up, she wrote out an address on a slip of paper and handed it over. “Y’all just go right on over there, and Nana’ll get you all tucked in,” she advised.

  I summoned up a smile. “Thanks. See you later.”

  When we gained the sidewalk I stretched, letting the warmth of the sun relax some of the tension in my muscles. “I sure hope this B & B is okay,” I muttered to Kane as we strolled toward the coffee shop. “I’d hate to rain on Candy’s parade.”

  He shrugged. “At least it’s close. And it has to be better than where we were.”

  “True.”

  Chapter 31

  The pecan pie was as good as Candy had promised, and my attitude was much improved by the time we pulled up in front of the Queen Anne style house with its modest “Bed & Breakfast” sign. We were just getting out of the car when a large but shapely woman hurried down the steps of the verandah toward us, smiling.

  “Oh, you must be Arlene,” she greeted me in a voice like a gravel crusher. I was struck momentarily speechless by a wave of too-sweet floral perfume, and I nodded and plastered on a smile in response. I accepted her handshake cautiously, avoiding the painted and bejewelled talons that adorned each fingertip.

  “Come right on in,” she invited, her hands fluttering in a pretty welcoming gesture that seemed at odds with her booming voice, brassy bottle-blonde hair and the eye-popping orange spandex wrap dress that hugged her ample curves like a second skin.

  I followed her inside while Kane brought up the rear with our bags. As he stood just inside the doorway, she gave him a frank and appreciative once-over. Her face split into a smile, showing man-eating yellowish teeth.

  “I surely love it when a man fills my doorway,” she growled confidentially, and I couldn’t hide my smirk.

  “May we see the rooms, Ms…?” Kane inquired.

  “Now, sugar, you just call me Lurene, and this is my husband, Winston,” she purred, indicating a small mild-looking bald man who was almost invisible in the forest of porcelain knick-knacks that crowded his desk. He clicked his mouse, pausing the murmur of sound from the computer speakers, and gave us a pleasant nod from behind an oversized computer monitor before returning his attention to the screen.

  I was just turning away when I caught a glimpse of movement, and I glanced back to see Winston staring at me. He quickly looked back at the computer screen, but my heart sank as I watched his gaze ping-pong between me and the screen.

  I turned away when Lurene spoke again, extolling the virtues of their B & B. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe Winston wasn’t watching what I thought he was watching.

  Please let Winston not be watching what I thought he was watching…

  When Lurene guided us down the hallway, I discovered the almost-overpowering scent of potpourri was mercifully confined to the front sitting room, and both rooms had a private bath. Kane gave me an interrogative glance and I returned a nod despite my misgivings about Winston. The rooms were beautiful, and more importantly, spotless.

  Kane settled the transaction while I deposited my suitcase in my room. The soft bedcovers issued an almost-irresistible invitation, but I hurried out before I could succumb.

  When I returned to the sitting room Kane had vanished, and Lurene and Winston exchanged a significant glance. Lurene leaned close to whisper. “Is that gorgeous hunk of man your bodyguard, Miss Cherry?”

  Aw, shit.

  “Uh… I’m not…”

  “Don’t worry, sugar, we won’t tell anyone who you really are. It’ll be our little secret.” Lurene nudged me with a suggestive elbow, grinning. “Maybe you could introduce me to your producer. I used to be a dancer, you know. I’ve still got all the moves. Just ask Winston.”

  I couldn’t help glancing at tiny Winston and back to big Lurene.

  No, no, brain, please don’t go there.

  “I think you’ve got me mixed up with somebody else,” I said.

  They both straightened indignantly. “How stupid do you think we are?” Winston began.

  “It’s okay, honey, if you don’t think I’m right for the part, just say so…” Lurene trailed off, looking hurt.

  I sighed and gave up. “I’m sorry. You’re right, I’m Arlene Cherry. Just don’t tell anybody. Please. And Lurene, I didn’t mean to insult you, you’re a beautiful woman…”

  Lurene beamed at me. “So is he your bodyguard? Two rooms when you’re travelling with a man like that? What are you thinking, honey?”

  “We’re co-workers. Strictly professional.”

  “Sweetie, you’re crazy.”

  I blew out a sigh at the sight of Kane’s shoulders filling the hallway as he emerged from his room. “You’re probably right.”

  Back beside the hospital bed again, I eyed Sam doubtfully while he hooked up the monitors to my forehead.

  “Are you sure this is a good idea?” I asked.

  “Dr. Cartwright and I agree that this is the best course of action,” Sam replied, indicating the well-dressed white-haired man seated at the head of the bed.

  “I need to see what Betty is experiencing,” the doctor added.

  “Um… Does Dr. Cartwright know…” I trailed off, not quite sure how to phrase the question.

  “Dr. Cartwright is my counterpart for this installation,” Sam assured me. “He’s familiar with the operation of the network, and he’s also a medical doctor with training in psychology.”

  I nodded, somewhat reassured. “What do you want me to do this time?”

  “Exactly what you did previously,” Dr. Cartwright repli
ed.

  “Is that a good idea? I don’t want to put her through any more…”

  “It’s necessary,” the doctor assured me. “What you saw in the sim was just a manifestation of what she’s suffering. We need to access those memories before she can make any progress.”

  “I’ll be ready to terminate the sim the same as last time if necessary,” Sam added.

  I sighed acquiescence. “At least it’s painless with this fob.”

  When Kane nodded his readiness, I closed my eyes and stepped into the virtual network again.

  As before, Betty’s avatar stood still and silent while Kane and I approached. She didn’t react when I stepped in front of her blank gaze, and I hesitated. It seemed cruel to make her experience my memories when her own were so pleasant.

  Now that I understood what had happened, the images in my head made more sense. I sighed at the peaceful montage of cool dew-wet grass, a sweet explosion of peach juice from ripe fruit, the laughter of friends and family, rich desserts, and the sound of the church choir on Sundays.

  Kane’s hand on my shoulder jarred me from my reverie. “Are you all right?” he asked.

  “Fine. But I really don’t want to do this to her.”

  “It’s already in her head,” Kane said gently. “You can’t change that. All you can do is help her through it.”

  “Yeah, I guess…” I cupped Betty’s plump cheeks in my hands. “Betty, I know you’ve got some scary stuff in your head right now, but you need to let it out. It’ll be okay, you’ll feel better afterward.”

  Her eyes stared through me.

  “Betty. Come on, Betty.” I patted her cheek, but she didn’t even blink.

  “Sam?” I inquired. “Why isn’t it working this time?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Dr. Cartwright’s voice chimed in. “Try identifying yourself. Say your name the way you did last time.”

  I drew a slow breath and leaned closer. “Betty, remember me from the sim? Aydan Kel-”

  I jerked back as the avatar’s arms flailed wildly, her piercing cries jabbing icy needles of horror into my brain. The hoarse screams underscoring hers made me turn reluctantly to face my familiar nightmare. Kane’s arm closed tightly around my shoulders, and together we regarded the broken leather-clad body impaled on the fencepost.