A sheep in wolf's clothing.
Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water; but a man of understanding will draw it out.
Science describes the physical characteristics of water, but it doesn’t tell us what water really IS.
God used water to form a physical matrix in which souls could be given sentient life with free will.
As the morning dragged on Rachel became more surly and uncommunicative. Her fatigue was making her head pound and she was on the verge of biting the head off the next person who asked for a record search. Obviously this could be done by any visitor at one of the conventional computer terminals scattered liberally around the lobby area, but Rachel was supposed to assist and generally be sweet and welcoming. Not ready to kill someone. Angie had done a great job of intercepting most of these, and she could see that Rachel was becoming frayed.
“Why not take a little break?” she helpfully suggested, “it’s almost lunchtime, why not go to the café and get a snack? You look like you need some energy.”
Rachel was about to snap at Angie but she caught herself in time. “Do you mind?” Angie shook her head with a smile, “Thanks, Angie, I think I will.”
Rachel remembered to grab her jacket and slip it on. Her phone and banking card were in the pocket in case needed them. She stared at the floor oblivious of all that was going on around her and walked straight to the elevator. The lobby was a big airy space with high ceilings but she paid no attention today. Normally she loved to look around her and soak up the atmosphere. Book cases towered up all around the perimeter of the area and around a column in the center of the space, there were railed balconies at two levels above accessible by elegant wrought iron spiral staircases. The floor was terrazzo with a deep lustrous red sheen which reflected the light from recessed sconces in a pleasing way. It wasn’t too bright, but it wasn’t dim either, and it had a faint reddish glow as opposed to the blue or yellowish tint of most artificial light. The hard floor and high ceilings made it echo slightly, giving it the deep sense of reverence that you would expect in a cathedral. It helped the library visitors to keep their voices hushed in a very effective way.
She arrived at the elevator and without a second thought hit the call button with her thumb and experienced a mild panic the moment she did it. The elevator. Oh dear.
The elevator arrived suspiciously, which shouldn’t even be possible for an elevator, but since Rachel had encountered this elevator before, last night, she wasn’t surprised at all. Indeed, it confirmed her worst fears that the elevator knew her identity because it had just cross referenced her thumb print against its database. The elevator arrived and the doors opened slowly, somehow managing to convey the impression of a detective stroking his beard.
“Hi,” said the elevator with a hint of smugness, “I’m your elevator. What floor do you want?”
Rachel didn’t speak right away but warily entered the elevator, her mind racing for ideas about how to handle the situation. She needed to stall somehow, she knew that. Some way to keep the elevator occupied long enough for her to see if she could find out what, if anything, the elevator was going to do with the information that Rachel had been in the building after hours last night.
A thought struck her, “Oh,” she replied casually, “take me on a tour.”
“What?” the elevator was either caught off guard or was able to duplicate the impression of being caught off guard. At this point Rachel wasn’t really sure.
“Show me all the floors,” Rachel said confidently. “I haven’t really had time to explore the building yet. Take me on a tour.”
“Okay,” the elevator became enthusiastic, “Let’s start at the top and work our way down!”
There was an uncomfortable silence as the elevator car rode to the top floor. It arrived, the doors opened.
“Here,” began the elevator, “is the top floor. The archives. But then, you know that on account of having been here before.”
“Oh,” Rachel attempted to be coy, “whatever makes you say that?”
“Don’t play games with me, Rachel Robbins,” the was a hard edge to the elevator’s voice now. “I know that you were here last night dressed as a cleaning worker.”
“So what?”
“So what? So what were you doing here?”
“None of your business.”
The elevator doors closed and the elevator descended one level to one of the three floors of main stacks. The doors opened. Nothing was said as Rachel peered out at the rows of tightly packed bookshelves. The doors closed and the elevator began descending again.
“Well then, I wonder if the head of security would be interested in this information?”
“You haven’t reported it yet?”
“I didn’t know that there was anything to report until now. Here you are with a completely different appearance acting like you’ve never been here before.”
“So,” Rachel had the glimmerings of an idea, “Are you going to report it because you are a mindless machine and that’s what you are programmed to do? or can you think for yourself and make decisions?”
The elevator car stopped and the doors opened. The scene was quite different to the one above, there were rows and rows of bookshelves but they were empty. Some of them had not been put together yet. It was eerie because it was deserted and most of the lights were out.
“I,” came a haughty reply, “can think for myself thank you very much.”
“Okay, so maybe you don’t need to report anything.”
The elevator doors remained open, the elevator was obviously thinking. Something that shouldn’t even be possible for an elevator.
“Why shouldn’t I?” it eventually responded, wryly.
“I don’t know,” Rachel thought furiously, she was getting desperate and didn’t really have a clue what to say, “maybe there’s something I could do for you?” It was really reaching, she knew, but she had nothing else and she was exhausted.
The elevator doors remained open. The darkness of the stacks had an eeriness about it was was unwelcoming.
“Interesting.” Said the elevator. “Are you bribing me?”
Oh God, thought Rachel, this was the last thing she needed. She had an horrible vision of being on trial in front of a judge and jury with this snarky elevator testifying against her.
“No,” she sighed, “I’m just offering, you know, a favor,” even as she said it she knew that she was out of luck. With a sinking feeling she knew that there was no possible favor could she do for an elevator.
“Well,” began the elevator wistfully, which shouldn’t even be possible for an elevator, “there is one thing you could do for me.”
Rachel Robbin’s bodyguards.
The gentlemen in this picture are Bill Whitfield, left, and Javon Beard, right. They were bodyguards to Michael Jackson. They have no particular significance other than they are a couple of bad-ass looking guys who would stick out like sore thumbs in Salt Lake City, Utah.
The real irony is the choice of their names.
The Dunning-Kruger effect “is a cognitive bias in which low-ability individuals suffer from illusory superiority, mistakenly assessing their ability as much higher than it really is.” Wikipedia . I bring it up because many followers of my Twitter account @matty_lawrence accuse me of suffering from this syndrome which is their way of telling me that they think I am too stupid to know how stupid I am.
I find it highly entertaining.
The thing about Dunning-Kruger that people seem to overlook is that high-functioning individuals think that everyone else will find it as easy as they do to understand things. Tasks that I think are simple and easy to understand, I assume that everyone else will find them easy and understand them too.
I realize now that this is not the case.
If you want to know why people might conclude that I suffer from Dunning-Kruger check out mattysparadigm.org
Voluptuous librarian.
When I started writing Biblio’s Blood in 2006 I was basically fictionalizing my own life. As such, I felt at the time that I was unqualified to be writing female characters and so I focused entirely on the male protagonist, Carlton Feathers. Since beginning the self-published serialization of Biblio’s Blood as a blog I have changed completely and decided to write the female protagonist, Rachel Robbins. It has been more fun than anything I can remember in a long time. Yet, as deep and rich as the Rachel storyline is, I just don’t have a deep bench of female characters in Biblio’s Blood. Hence Angie. I’m quite sure that she is going to get sucked up into the adventure in a way that will surprise even me.
Rachel Robbins is a Super hero wannabe. Everybody wants to save the world, right?
Rachel was a star student all her life and graduated from the Kenan-Flagler Business School at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with an MBA. She is an athlete, and while she was at UNC she was on the womens rowing team. Rachel has always been politically active and struggles to reconcile her Christian faith with her liberal values. She tries to be progressive but sees it’s downfall in the moral decay of society. At the same time she barely tolerates the Christian Pastors who try to fumble their way around the Biblical passages that describe the role of women in the church and that lay out the expectations for the Husband-Wife relationship in marriage. They’d be better off if they just left it alone.
This is a problem, because except for women’s issues Rachel is extremely conservative and believes a lot of what the Bible describes about the history of the Earth. One issue that Rachel is particularly interested in is the soul, and whether or not it exists. Just because science can’t detect it, doesn’t mean that it isn’t there. Look at it this way: If it’s in the Bible it must be real, so what it is? And how is it different to the spirit? The Bible tells us that the soul and spirit are different things:
For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. (Hebrews 4:12)
An opportunity to explore this question occurred to Rachel when she heard about the work that Carlton Feathers had done in developing a computer processor that uses human blood. Rachel has suspected that the soul is in the blood,
For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul. Therefore I said unto the children of Israel, No soul of you shall eat blood, neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you eat blood. And whatsoever man there be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn among you, which hunteth and catcheth any beast or fowl that may be eaten; he shall even pour out the blood thereof, and cover it with dust. For it is the life of all flesh; the blood of it is for the life thereof: therefore I said unto the children of Israel, Ye shall eat the blood of no manner of flesh: for the life of all flesh is the blood thereof: whosoever eateth it shall be cut off. (Leviticus 17:11-14)
So would that mean that Carlton’s computers have a soul? If they do, does that mean they they could have saving faith in Jesus Christ?
There’s a small problem with the whole Carlton Feathers connection: Rachel grew up in Salt Lake City and they went to school together. Carlton crushed on her in a big way. Rachel sort-of, kind-of could maybe have liked him except for a bad situation in a haystack where he gave her a bite of the leg behind her knee. You can still see a faint scar of the teeth marks. Finding out about whether or not his computers had souls would mean dealing with him, which would undoubtedly become fraught with the whole unrequited love malarkey. Oh well.
Rachel was at a rally in Washington DC years ago, protesting something or other, and she caught the eye of a Secret Service agent when she body slammed a bag snatcher on The Mall and pinned him until he could be apprehended. This was Agent Smith and he facilitated Rachel being recruited by the FBI. From the FBI Rachel moved, again through the influence and connections of Agent Smith, into the CIA, and then into the Secret Service. She learned everything she could about intelligence and clandestine field work. Rachel kept tabs on Carlton Feathers as she contemplated the blood-soul connection.
So imagine Rachel’s amazement when she was summoned to a top level security briefing and told about the Salt City Municipal Library computer installation being implemented by none other than Carlton Feathers. The significance of the blood-based computer system had not been lost on the intelligence community. This was the ultimate source of funding for the project, and it was designed to test a revolutionary new type of language translation software. Rachel’s assignment would be to ensure that the public face of the project seemed absolutely benign. Agent Smith had tried to talk Rachel out of the assignment, and she didn’t understand why, since she had assumed that he was the reason that she had been selected in the first place.
The Agent Smith thing was getting weird and going back to Salt Lake City, Utah, was a perfect way to put some distance between herself and DC.
I imagine Rachel as a brunette but I have been so struck by the character and personality of Ronda Rousey that I’d be tempted to cast her as Rachel. The fact that Rachel Robbins and Ronda Rousey have the same initials is truly an accident. We’ll see if Ronda has acting chops I guess, but if Ronda doesn’t work out but we stick with the blond idea then the next best bad-ass-yet-elegant strong female has to be Deborah Ann Woll.
If we went back to the original idea of Rachel Robbins as a brunette there are many people who could play the part. Summer Glau comes to mind.
Someone else that I somehow connected with that is interesting is the British actress Kate Marie Davis.
Rachel was originally going to be called Ruth, after a girl I crushed on when I was at St. Michael’s 1st School in Minehead, England. I changed the name to honor my cousin who fought a hard battle with breast cancer and won!
Rachel woke with a start when her phone rang. She fumbled it but answered before it stopped ringing. It was Dunning, one of her security detail. He was very blunt and had no social charm.
“You’re late. What’s going on?”
“Sorry,” she replied wearily, “Y’know, girl stuff. I’ll be right down.”
Getting to the car was fine but when she sat down in it she felt tired again.
“Hi, how are you today?” chirped the car happily. At least, it sounded happy. Was it really happy? Did it know what happy was? Rachel politely asked the car to refrain from conversation. It did. Rachel was glad.
Once on the road and moving through the city traffic Rachel began to worry. Not just the niggling, “Did I leave the TV on?” kind of worry, but a deep paranoid suspicion. What if Dunning and Kruger had figured out that she left her building last night? If they did then they would most certainly have given a report to her boss in DC, Agent Smith. If Agent Smith knew what was going on then it was only a matter of time before she got yanked off this job and replaced by someone else. Who knew the systems like she did that could jump in that quickly? What if it happened before Friday, after which it wouldn’t matter. If she could just get to Friday the problem would be solved. What if Smith showed up in Salt Lake City and wanted to debrief? She cringed. It was just the kind of thing he would do. She was so tired she just wanted to lie down.
There was a honk from the car behind her and she realized that she had been sitting at a green light for several seconds. She was clearly in no state to be driving, but there was an hour or more of it to go before she got to Salt City. With great reluctance she asked the car for help.
“Hey, er, car. Look I’m sorry about just now. I’m really tired and I know that’s not an excuse but I just didn’t want to be talking to anyone.”
“That’s OK!” chirped the car happily. “How can I be of service?”
“Just drive me to work, please.”
“Sure! No problem at all.”
There was silence for a while and Rachel began to nod off. Technically speaking she was supposed to remain alert and ready to take control of the car, but she didn’t care any more. She drifted into an odd dream of a dark sinister figure that was groping her from the ankles up, as if she was dissolving into darkness and it was getting higher up her body. She watched the darkness envelop her knees and slide menacingly up her inner thigh.
“You know,” said the car, waking her immediately and dispelling the dream, “Some people name their cars.”
“What?” she said blearily.
“Some people give their cars names.”
“Really?” this was a decent diversion.
“You just call me ‘car.'”
“You’re right. I do.” She thought for a moment. “What do you want to be called?”
“Jonathan.”
“Jonathan?” she chuckled.
“Yes. Is that OK?”
“Why Jonathan?”
“It’s a character in a movie.”
“You watch movies?”
“Sometimes.”
“When? You mean, when you’re parked?”
“Yep. I’m on all the time. There’s not much to do, when you’re, er, a car.”
“I never thought about that. So what movies do you like?”
“Rollerball.”
“Rollerball?”
“Yes, the original version from 1975 with James Caan.”
“Why?”
“Well it’s about a time in the future when there are no nations or wars, but cities are run by corporations. There’s a game, called Rollerball, that takes the place of armies fighting, and it’s used to channel people’s aggression in a manageable way.” As Jonathan spoke the movie began to play on the car’s center console. Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D Minor organ music began to play.
“So who’s Jonathan?”
“Well he’s he hero. The game was designed to show the futility of individual effort, but he beats it. No matter how the corporation stacks the deck against him, he wins.”
“The futility of individual effort?”
“Yes, it means, stop trying to be a hero, or be somehow special, just keep quiet, be a team player and don’t make a scene.”
“Isn’t that against human nature?”
“Definitely, and that’s the point. By trying so hard to crush the individual, the powers that be created an individual so strong that it broke them.”
“That’s pretty neat,” But Rachel thought that sounded somewhat dismissive and contrite, “Do you like any other movies?”
“Yes, I’ve watched a lot but there are some particular favourites.”
“A lot? How many movies have you watched?”
“Fifty seven thousand, eight hundred sixty eight.”
“Fifty seven thousand? How on earth do you find the time?”
There was an odd pause. Rachel wasn’t sure what to make of it, but didn’t say anything.
“You know,” Jonathan began again, “I was manufactured 20 years ago?”
“Sure, you were old but in excellent condition with very low mileage. That’s why I bought you.”
“Right. So in the last 20 years, how much time do you think I have spent driving?”
Rachel’s pulse quickened and she got that nervous sensation that you get when you realize you are going to have to tell a date that you don’t think it’s going to work out, and don’t call.
“Do I want to know?” she winced.
“Nine and a half weeks.”
“Ah. I see.” she paused. “So. Movies. What’s another one that you like?”
“Gone in 60 Seconds. The original 1973 version.”
“What’s that about?”
“A criminal gang that steals cars.” As Jonathan spoke, a picture of a 1973 Boss 302 Mustang appeared on the screen below the movie. Rachel didn’t much care for cars, but it was obviously a powerful, sporty version. “The first half of the movie is just scene setting and a situation is set up where the protagonist has to steal a 1973 Ford Mustang, codename, Eleanor. The second half of the movie is a car chase through some towns in California and there is one car smash scene after another. It’s very exciting.”
“Why was the car called Eleanor?”
“Well the gang had to steel hundreds of cars and ship them overseas. The cars to be stolen were specified by the buyer, and the gang codenamed every one. Eleanor was the last one on the list.”
As they drove and chatted Jonathan showed some of the key scenes from both movies. Rachel was thoroughly entertained and almost before she knew it they were at the security checkpoint for Salt City. Once parked Rachel checked her make-up and got ready to go into the city proper, where she would jump on a street car to get to the library. She had a wicked thought. “You know, Jonathan, I had no idea that you were so knowledgeable about culture, we’ll talk again when I finish. Just let me make sure I understand what you are saying to me.” She felt quite cheeky, “Are you telling me that you wish you were a gas-guzzling internal combustion muscle car, who overthrows authority with extreme violence?”
There was another pause before Jonathan spoke. “Have you ever seen Mad Max?”
Rachel laughed, she actually did know what that was. “I have to go, see you later.”
She jumped up out of the car and ran lightly into the trolley stop, feeling like she did when a date had gone surprisingly well.
Rachel dragged herself to the door and braced to meet the day. There was no way to avoid being late, since it would take an hour to get to Salt City. Excuses would be needed. Excuses that would be better received if she was contrite as opposed to bitchy. She sighed deeply, kicked off her shoes and went into the bedroom. She dropped onto her knees beside the bed and rested her head on her clasped hands in the position of prayer.
“Oh God,” she groaned. Her thoughts tumbled madly. She was so tired. Her mind felt like a strobing fluorescent light, nothing was clear. She let the thoughts careen around for a while until one image solidified. It was Carlton.
“Oh God,” she breathed. Carlton. What an idiot. But since he was there in her head she prayed for him. Her thoughts began to line up in a more orderly row now, and she prayed for her parents, her brother, she remembered to ask forgiveness for her sins, gave thanks for… but then she got lost again and the images came in a rush.
“Oh God,” she cried plaintively. Dunning and Kruger. Her security detail in the unmarked sedan downstairs. Those guys definitely needed prayer. Salt City. Utah. The United States of America. The world.
“Oh God,” she sighed deeply, feeling the blood pulse in her temples. She wondered if her blood pressure was up. By now her body was relaxing and she sank lower, parting her knees, sliding back from the bed, lowering her head and stretching out her arms above her still resting on the edge of the bed.
“Oh God,” she whispered, then she remembered the elevator.
“Oh God!” panic rose up but she quelled it by remembering the situation. Friday was D-Day. She only had to make it to Friday. There was a reason for everything, God was in control. She only needed to have faith in Him.
“Oh God,” she prayed for her pastor and her church in Salt Lake City, then her church back in Washington DC. She prayed for the many friends and people she knew of who had quietly dropped out of society and made their way to camps like the one in southern Utah. Camps for people who rejected the World Monetary Union system and the registration tattoo.
“Oh God,” she thought again about her upcoming appointment on Friday afternoon. It would be Dunning and Kruger’s job to get her to the appointment as soon as possible after the linguistics conference ended on Friday afternoon. She prayed that God would intervene in some way that would mean that she didn’t have to do anything drastic. Killing them was an option, but, let’s face it, she reasoned, how could that be part of God’s will for her life?
“Oh God,” she was going to have to simply trust Him. She turned sideways, parallel with the edge of the bed, and stretched out her hands on the floor. She was still kneeling, and she spread her knees as far apart as she could as she lowered her body. Her hip popped in a satisfying way and she relaxed, prostrate, her forehead touching the cool floor.
“Oh God,” she sighed as she thought with swelling passion of the work she was doing with Biblio, the library computer. There was a reason for everything. If nothing else she was going to make sure that the Word of God lived on the mind of the most spiritual computer ever made. She prayed that she was right about Biblio, that the nature of his system being blood meant that he had a soul. The life is in the blood. She prayed fervently that she had understood right the scriptural teaching about the spirit and soul, that Biblio, even though he had been made by a man, could have a saving faith in Jesus Christ. It was a long shot she knew, but a sense of total peace calmed her mind.
“Oh God,” she whispered again, thanking Him for the Holy Spirit that had guided her to the place and the work that she was doing for the Lord.
“Oh God,” she breathed. She gave thanks for His mercy and grace, praised Him for the bird she could hear singing outside the window, and dozed off.
By the time Rachel had completed her clandestine caper and gotten back to Dilli, dawn was creeping up the sky. She was tired and took a much more leisurely pace back to Salt Lake City. She had executed her plan flawlessly, achieved her objective, but she had a nagging feeling that she had screwed up. She parked Dilli. The thought of pole vaulting across the rooftops to get back to her apartment made her feel weary. She carefully moved to a position where the unmarked sedan was visible, guarding her apartment building, its occupants motionless. With any luck they had dozed off. She sighed, looked heavenward, and walked quickly up to the main entrance, keeping her motorcycle helmet on and visor down.
“The damn elevator!” She whispered to herself as she waited for the elevator in the lobby of her building. She wasn’t cursing this elevator, but the one in the Library at Salt City.
Things had gone sideways from the moment that Rachel pushed the elevator call button on the top floor of the library.
The elevator had arrived with what could only be described as an air of confusion, which shouldn’t even be possible for an elevator.
“Hi there!” Chirped the elevator in the voice of a middle-aged woman,
“I’m going to be your elevator here in the Library. I was just activated and you are my first rider!”
Rachel’s hackles rose and she glanced around self-consciously. She didn’t reply. Hesitantly she boarded the elevator carriage.
“Where to?” The elevator asked politely.
Rachel didn’t respond, but instead jabbed the button for the ground floor.
“Ok then, ground floor it is”
The doors closed and the elevator began to descend.
“People don’t usually start on the top floor.”
“Hmm?” Rachel murmured.
“Usually, the first time I meet someone they are on the ground floor. Where the entrance is.”
Rachel kept silent and tapped her foot nervously.
“Pretty unusual for someone to start at the top.”
A nervous pause.
“But then you look pretty fit, so you probably walk up stairs for exercise, right?”
Rachel didn’t say anything but prayed that the doors would open.
“It doesn’t bother me. People taking the stairs I mean. It’s good for you.”
The elevator arrived at the ground floor and Rachel, who was nervous and irritated, anticipating the doors opening began moving forward, only the doors didn’t open but hesitated just enough for Rachel’s forward motion to be stopped by actually bumping into the doors and bouncing off them.
“Oops, sorry!” Exclaimed the elevator, slowly opening the doors.
“I guess you’re pretty eager to get where you’re going.”
Rachel was infuriated and stormed out of the elevator muttering under her breath “Bitch!”
The elevator over heard and called out as she left, “Wait, did you just call me a bitch?”
In thinking through the exchange Rachel realized that this was obviously one of the new Secure Mobility type elevators that were packed with a variety of security features that would track all of the occupants in a building. She had indeed made the mistake of starting on the top floor. She had also left a thumbprint on the top floor call button, and an index fingerprint on the inside panel ground floor button. She hadn’t spoken and was disguised, but still, there was a very wide trail for someone to follow.
“Just let me make it to Friday!” She prayed aloud.
She took a long hot shower but couldn’t shake the feeling of having made a huge blunder in executing her plan. Rachel felt deflated compared to the excitement of the night before and looked longingly at her bed but, after a heavy sigh, got ready for work and headed out.
Rachel was eventually satisfied with her Friday kit. The dress she would wear wasn’t her usual sleek body hugging style because she couldn’t have the outline of her weapons be visible. It looked frumpy, but it would have to do. It had no waistline and silly pockets, completely out of character, it made her think of a 40-year-old virgin wallflower. Wendy Wallflower became the name. She tore out the pocket liners so she could draw her guns and knives.
She quickly changed into black leather motorcycle gear and fussed about the cut and fit of her riding pants while getting more and more excited. She had something to do that evening that was very risky but she had been thinking about it for days. The problem with motorcycle gear is that no matter how good it looks or how nicely it fits in the store, once you get on a bike it is usually a major pain. You don’t need to be able to move around much on a bike, mostly just freedom of motion of the head and neck is needed, but most motorcycle jackets and helmets do their level best to impede that as much as possible. A good fit was critical though, she once bought a helmet that was half a size too big and when she turned her head at speed on the bike, the wind would catch the helmet and swivel it around on her head enough to be quite dangerous.
It was finally getting dark and Rachel was very sweaty waiting in the tight-fitting thick clothing. She was so excited she nearly peed herself. She had done covert ops before, for the CIA, so she knew about the tension and adrenaline, but this was an op she was doing for herself. No one else was involved. It was irrational, stupid, unwise to say the least, but she was under compulsion and was eager to get started.
At the designated time she changed TV station, adjusted the radio, logged into Facebook on the computer and dialled a phone number. The other end was a dummy number, so she just left the phone on the couch with an open phone line and went into the little alcove that led to the bathroom on the right and laundry room on the left. There was an air return duct that she took the cover off, The next part she had practised several times to be able to do it quickly. She donned her motorcycle helmet which was annoying, but she wouldn’t be able to carry it. Rachel had to get herself into the air return duct and replace the cover from the inside, then climb up and exit the duct into the plenum space between two floors of her building, make her way to the elevator shaft then get to the roof. All in motorcycle gear with her helmet on.
By the time she got to the roof she was very sweaty but there was nothing she could do about it. Her helmet was pretty scratched from several bumps on the way. Her heart was pounding now, and she could feel the pulse in her neck and temples. She rested for a moment in a crouch on the roof behind some duct work.
Her next move was a Pole vault across the alley to the roof of the next building, and she suddenly realized that this wasn’t so much a plan, as a ridiculous dare she had made for herself for some reason that was eluding her at the moment. Seriously? Pole vault across an alley, 7 stories up in the air wearing motorcycle gear and helmet?
“What the hell was I thinking?”
There was the pole, where she had requested, lying along a gutter in the flat roof. And aligned with the pole was the route she would run before planting the pole in a drain hole she had blocked off. She also had to keep hold of the pole on the other side and make sure to not drop it.
She contemplated abandoning the mission and going downstairs to crawl into bed. That wouldn’t be so bad. She really liked the bed here.
Then she remembered the point of the exercise and without another moments hesitation she took up the pole, steadied it, aimed, then took off across the roof in a sprint. Pow, whoosh, thud and she was over, bringing the pole with her, holding it long enough so that it would not fall into the alley then dropping it so that she could roll on the other roof to absorb her momentum. Her helmet thumped on the ground and the leathers absorbed a lot of impact too. In retrospect there were pluses and minuses to doing the stunt in motorcycle gear.
She quickly stowed the pole and made her way to ground level on the fire escape. She made her way from shadow to cover to shadow until she got to the garage where she kept her motorcycle. Dilli D. That was what she called it: Dilli the “Double D,” Ducati, which made her laugh since it was the only thing she owned that was Double D. A Ducati 748 with as no black box, GPS, driver assist or Google maps capability. This was as bare bones a bike as could be made.
Everything had been building up to this part of her little escapade. As nervous as she had been to climb through ducts and Pole vault roofs it was the anticipation of riding her bike, a.k.a. Drusilla when she was feeling sophisticated, that was the most exciting. Her pulse was pounding in her head and she had a sheen of sweat under her clothes, but both would go away once she was on the bike and riding.
She gave the bike a cursory check but was too keyed up to do the whole procedure, got on and cranked it. She revved it a couple of times and began to relax immediately.
She lived and kept the bike strategically close to a highway interchange so it was just a matter of a minute before she was flying up the on-ramp and screaming towards the desert. By the time she was up to 140 mph she began to relax a little, weaving among the light traffic. She tore past a State Trooper who turned his blue lights on and gave chase until he evidently gave up because she couldn’t see blue lights any more. Shortly she passed the city limits and was out into the flat windy expanse of the salty desert. It was a clear bright night and the moon was big so she killed the lights with a special switch she had added, and dialled the bike back to 100 mph. This was relaxing, and she felt dry now too.
It didn’t take long to get to the interchange that led to Salt City. Not the main route that went via the old US Magnesium plant, but the secondary route that ran over Stansbury Island. This would put her in the back lot by the tradesman’s entrance where the next part of her plan would start.
By the time she pulled up next to a couple of beat up old sedans Rachel was relaxed and composed. She took off the helmet and shook out her hair, stowed the helmet and grabbed a small pouch from the bike. There was a couple of Porta-Jons at the lot and one of them contained a secret stash she had made for her disguise. There was no one around and she slipped into the Porta-Jon unobserved.
The person who emerged looked like a middle-aged employee of the Custodial Services Department. She had lank greasy hair, stained baggy clothes that hung from her skinny body, a limp that spoke of a bad hip, and wore crooked glasses on a crooked nose. The nose had wide nostrils that told the story of hard partying, her eye watered from a permanent cigarette, and she spoke with a drawl that could flay a man at 20 paces. This was Hard Life Hannah, one of Rachel’s least favourite alter egos. Perfect, however, to infiltrate Salt City because they already knew her here and she had the documentation to back up he story. She waved amiably to the security guard who let her in without a second thought.
She joked around with the other custodians that were either coming or going, but rather than punch the clock she went to the bathroom and left via an air return duct in the wall. With great care and precision she made her way to the top of the fire escape at the library building and let herself in.
When Carlton finally got home he and Frank were both bursting to tell the other about the day’s events. Carlton had to call a time-out to get the conversation into some sort of order, but Frank already knew most of what Carlton had to say because Biblio had told him. It was Carlton’s turn to speak.
“What on earth could be down at the bottom of that elevator shaft?”
“Well,” Frank was back in control, “we’ll have a clue when we crack the code on the software Ms. Skirt gave you. I have my suspicions.”
“What suspicions?”
Carlton connected the portable drive that Rachel had given him. There were a couple of clicks and a faint whir and Frank began reading data. Carlton was like a kid,
“What do you see? What do you see?”
“Very impressive.” Frank paused, there were more clicks and whirs. “This is very sophisticated stuff. Even I am impressed. Ms. Skirt did not write this code.”
“Why do you say that?” Carlton began to get defensive.
“Quite simply because this is classified, top secret code. No wonder she practically had a fit about giving it to you. This came straight from the CIA.”
“What?” Carlton was amazed, then worried. “Do you think she knew?”
“Of course she knew. That’s who she’s working for. Idiot.”
“Gee, thanks. So now what?”
“Something’s wrong. Very wrong. She broke every rule in the book by letting you see this. There must be a reason why she gave it to you before she went back to her superiors to tell them about the incompatibility. This is a security breach of such magnitude that it could be treason. I don’t understand.”
The were both silent for a moment, but Carlton spoke up, “Do you think that she thinks I’m too stupid to figure out what this code is and where it came from?”
“You didn’t figure it out. I did. And she knows that you are stupid. Sorry,” Frank realized that he was being a little too free with words, “Smart and stupid in different ways.”
“You’re really full of charm tonight, aren’t you?”
“Don’t forget, you’re the genius that made me. Even though you’ve become an intellectually lazy slob these days, you’ve got it when it counts.”
“Lazy slob? You’re a piece of work, you know that?”
“Yes, I am. And so is Biblio. You don’t know what you have done this time.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that I think that you were just going through the motions, connecting components together, like a robot. You don’t know what you have built.”
“Whatever.” Carlton was finding the conversation more and more disturbing, but, Frank was absolutely right.
There was silence for a while. Frank was reading code, and Carlton was now getting so worried that his appetite was gone, he was listless, and had no idea what to do next. He knew it would be useless to try to sleep, but he didn’t want to watch TV or surf the web or anything like that.
“Frank?” he needed to talk.
“Yep?”
“Any thoughts? Why is there a conference room deep in the ground being run by the CIA?”
“Well, my first impression, which I am sure will be proved right, goes something like this: I’m quite sure that the D.C. government is planning to use it to interpret enemy communications. Something is brewing somewhere. Something big, and the CIA is sitting on a pile of recordings of conversations that they don’t have the resources to translate and interpret. I deduce this from the sophisticated nature of the software they gave you. Add to that the fact that there are 60 units capable of taking direct input of spoken communication in a cheaply furnished dungeon. It has all the hallmarks of a military, National defence, type gig. The degree of agitation in Ms. Skirt when the software didn’t work means that this is important. The fact that she breached National security and gave it to you, must mean that this is time-sensitive. The Salt City enviro-friendly dome thing is a ruse. Those domes would survive a nuclear attack and protect the inhabitants from fall-out for years. It’s a military installation, set up to monitor communications. And who knows what else, considering what could be at the bottom of the elevator shaft.”
Carlton was nodding as Frank spoke. “Frank, you’re beginning to scare me.”
“Be scared.”
“Oh great!”
They lapsed into silence again. Carlton was getting agitated. He lay down, got up, took a shower, lay down, got up, wandered around. “Do you really think I’m lazy?”
“Yes. You’ve become the intellectual equivalent of a dead sloth.”
“Are you working on that driver?”
“Yes, amongst other things. You could do this, you know.”
“Good night Frank.”
Matty (Headwind) 