Cyber Rogues (93 page)

“I think we might have cracked it,” he said in reply to her inquiring look. His voice lowered. “Two of the outside crew showed up as observers while you were gone. I’ve told them the game’s up. They’re on the line back to base right now.”

She gaped at him. “Cracked it—already? You mean we’re getting out?”

“Right. There’ll probably be a bit of a wait before anything happens, but they know it’s blown. And thanks to Tom, we know how to wreck everything from the inside now, if they try to be obstinate. They don’t have any choices.”

Lilly was about to reply, but then she looked away toward his office door with a puzzled expression. Corrigan realized that it had suddenly gone curiously quiet inside. He went back, pushed the door open, and looked in. Morgen and Sutton had vanished.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Harry Morgen stood facing Frank Tyron in the Monitor & Control Center on the third floor of the Xylog Building. Sutton was with him. They had just come up from the gallery of interface couplers on the level below after breaking one of the cardinal rules for transient observers visiting the simulation: effecting entry and exit in such a way as to risk confronting the inhabitants with abnormal phenomena. Endelmyer had heard the news about Hatcher and was on his way over from CLC headquarters across the river with John Velucci from Corporate Legal. Rumors were flying around the building that the whole Oz simulation was about to self-destruct.

“It doesn’t matter anymore,” Morgen insisted. “Time is more important now. The longer Corrigan has to wait in there, the more likely it’s going to get that he’ll start doing something to sabotage the whole works. You have to believe me, Frank—he’s mad as hell and he’ll do it.” Morgen pointed to the lanky, yellow-haired figure with a pallid, tired-looking face covered in unshaved growth, who was sitting by one of the consoles along the wall, a blanket drawn around his shoulders and clutching a mug of hot, black coffee. “He showed them how to do it. We overcompensated on the TAPS. Now half the animations are shooting each other and crossing over highways. It’s an asylum in there.”

Hatcher’s chest heaved with laughter that was stifled by the thermometer in his mouth. The medic standing by him took it out and nodded that it was okay for him to drink the coffee now. He had flatly refused to be taken to the medical department for a rest and checkup as stipulated in the exiting procedure, and come straight up to the M & C floor instead. Nothing would make him miss what happened now, and that was final. Jason Pinder was hovering nearby, watching him anxiously, genuinely concerned.

“We’re initializing real-time resynch now,” a supervisor called from where he was standing behind two of the console operators. “T-by-tau is dropping at one per second. Should have reintegration in about three minutes.” It meant that the simulation’s accelerated time was being slowed to bring it back into synchronization with the real world.

Despite all these signs that it was over, Victor Borth was not ready to concede final defeat just yet. He turned from where he had been listening with his back toward Tyron and the others, and spread his hands appealingly. “This is crazy,” he told them. “Somebody tell me I’m not hearing this. Are you people saying that two guys can screw up a whole project of this magnitude? I mean, what does it take to keep two guys sweet? All they’ve got to do is name it.” He turned and walked toward the side of the room where Hatcher was sitting. “Hey, you. Tom, is it? What’s the biggest thing you’ve ever dreamed of getting out of life? Cars? Boats? Broads? You could be a millionaire, know that? Everybody’s got something. You could have some of the most powerful people anywhere on your side for the rest of your life—anything you wanna do. There has to be room for us to talk, right?” Hatcher shook his head, sighed, smiled wearily to himself, and looked away.

Of more concern to Tyron than Hatcher’s future right now was the matter of his own. He was the one who had convinced the consortium of F & F’s client-backers that a functioning pseudoworld was feasible; he had coordinated outside development of the advanced system that went past the original specification drawn up inside CLC; and at his instigation, Borth had organized the flow of funds to support it. If he delivered as promised, the wherewithal to smooth over all these embarrassments would be forthcoming. He’d have the leverage; he’d have the friends. If he failed to . . . No, they were all in it too far. There could be no backing down now.

He had authorized temporary resynchronization to permit direct communication with Corrigan from the outside. Now he decided that a more direct form of intervention was needed. He turned to the operators at the section monitoring operation of the COSMOS neural-coupling interfaces on the floor below. “Initialize another two units.” Then, curtly, to Morgen, Sutton, and Borth, “We’re going back in.”

Borth looked taken aback. “All of us? You mean . . .”

Tyron smiled thinly at him. “Why not? You’ve been saying for a long time that you’ll have to try this thing yourself someday. Well, now’s your chance. Use your arguments on the guy who matters.”

“T-tau one seventy-five and falling,” the supervisor reported.

“Come on,” Tyron said, striding across the floor in the direction of the way out to the main corridor. Borth followed, and after a moment of faltering Morgen and Sutton fell in behind. “And anyhow, we still have the final argument,” Tyron tossed back at them over his shoulder as he reached the doors. “We’ve got the switch out here, and he doesn’t.”

They disappeared, and the doors closed behind them. Some of the operators exchanged curious looks. Others shrugged. Pinder leaned closer to Hatcher with a worried expression. “How do you feel?” he asked.

Hatcher stared dully across the room and considered the question. “I’m not sure,” he said finally, looking up. “How is the victim of a successful suicide supposed to feel? . . . Not bad, considering, I guess.”

CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

For Corrigan this was the most unreal part since the beginning of the entire experience. The full-scale Oz project, culmination of everything he had been working toward for the past several years, was about to go live in the next couple of days. Technicians and managers assailed him constantly for decisions about last-minute details; Endelmyer, the president of the corporation, was demanding that his calls be returned. And none of it mattered. There was going to be some delay no matter how quickly events moved in the world outside. His only choice was to either make a dramatic exit as Hatcher had done, or wait it out.

Judy had been away from her desk seeing Yeen from the building, so Corrigan was spared having to improvise some other pretext for getting her away from her desk to cover for Morgen and Sutton’s abrupt disappearance. One other detail that he did need to justify to keep things from getting difficult, however, was the continuing presence of Lilly. It seemed odd, at a time like this, to have to give consideration to satisfying the pseudocuriosity of a computer animation, but it was the easiest way of keeping things simple in the meantime for himself.

When Judy returned, Corrigan informed her that Lilly wanted to spend the rest of the morning going through her notes and listing any final questions before going back to California, and would be using the small conference room that Yeen had questioned her in. Lilly disappeared accordingly, and the routine calls and queries continued unabated until late morning. Then Judy announced that Mr. Ulsen was on the line from the Advisory Office of Advanced Technology, Washington. Corrigan told her to put the call through.

“Mr. Corrigan?”

“Yes.”

“Ulsen again. How are things in there?” At least there were no attempts at pretense this time.

“Never mind the niceties,” Corrigan growled. “Morgen and Sutton are back out, so you know the score. What’s the situation?”

“Your request is understood and appreciated, Mr. Corrigan. A delegation is on its way back into the simulation to talk to you.”

“That wasn’t a request, dammit. And there isn’t anything to talk about. Do you intend doing as I said, or do we start unhinging the whole works from the inside here?”

“Please understand that I am merely an intermediary. I have no personal authority in this. It’s all gone way over my head.”

“Then just get back out there and tell whoever is in charge to shut down the whole operation—now. That’s all there is to it. End. Period. Do you get the message, Mr. Ulsen?”

“Yes, I understand perfectly. But I have been asked to remind you of the reality of the time-rate differential. Some finite time will be required however urgently matters are expedited out here, and that will translate into a delay that may seem unduly protracted.”

“All you have to do is restore tee-tau to unity. Then we’d be able to talk direct and wouldn’t need an intermediary. It’s perfectly simple.”

“That is already being done. But as I’m sure you appreciate, it will still necessitate a considerable delay at your end. All we’re asking is for you to bear with us.”

Only if the intention was to talk. But Corrigan had already said that there was nothing to talk about. He was just about to launch into another outburst of invective when he saw Pinder hovering in the doorway of the office. Pulled in two directions, he wavered suddenly. “Be quick about it, then,” he muttered to Ulsen.

“Thank you for your understanding.”

Corrigan put the phone down and looked up. Pinder came in, closing the door. His expression was accusatory, yet at the same time questioning—unable to condone but reluctant to prejudge. Corrigan had been expecting it. Pinder had been involved when the police appeared with the news about Hatcher, and gone over the river to convey the tidings to Head Office. The calls from on high had begun soon afterward, and now he was back as an emissary to find out what in hell was going on.

Pinder opened. “I was prepared to overlook your indiscretion of yesterday, Joe, but this is going too far. Don’t you realize,
the president of the company
has been
personally
trying to contact you since first thing this morning. And you don’t seem to give a damn. What on earth’s gotten into you? I told you the last time that you are not the technical director yet. Now I think I’m beginning to realize just how unsuited you’d be to that task. Now, are you going to at least cover while we get the project up and running, or do I put in Frank Tyron as acting coordinator, effective immediately?”

Corrigan stared at him indifferently, feeling like Archimedes having to put up with the babbling soldier from Rome while trying to ponder things that mattered. On the other hand, Archimedes had gotten himself killed. There could be no letup yet; the game had to continue. But he had learned how to deal with animations.

He forced an expression of shocked surprise. “Surely you’re not referring to the project . . . not at a time like this, after the news about Tom?” He shook his head to say he knew that Pinder hadn’t meant it—giving him the opportunity that any decent person would have to put it another way. “We’re not imagining that tomorrow’s schedule still stands?”

Pinder faltered while unseen circuits hastily recomputed weighting evaluation matrixes. His change of stance was as abrupt as yesterday’s, or as Barry Neinst’s a few hours earlier.

“Well, of course, I didn’t exactly mean to imply that. Naturally we must observe a proper sense of priorities. . . . But there are certain interests with a considerable stake in the outcome, who don’t share our dimension of, shall we say, ‘personal involvement’—as I’m sure you appreciate. If the schedule is affected—as it has to be, of course—we still owe it to them to be kept informed.”

“I’m working on it now,” Corrigan lied. “But I don’t have a full picture yet. Yeen should be getting in touch again at any time.”

“Very well. But in that case please call Endelmyer back and inform him of that much.”

Corrigan sighed beneath his breath, nodded, and entered the code into his desk unit. Anyway, it would be as easy to turn Endelmyer’s animation around too, he reasoned. The features of Endelmyer’s secretary appeared on the screen. “Hi, Celia. Joe Corrigan for himself,” he said.

“Oh, at last. I’ll put you straight through.”

Then Judy’s voice came from outside on another line. “Sorry to interrupt, but Harry Morgen and Joan Sutton are back with Frank Tyron, wanting to see you. Victor Borth is with them. They say it’s urgent, and you know what it’s about.”

“All right!” Corrigan exclaimed with relish, and forgetting all else, sprung up from the desk and headed for the door.

“Joe? . . . Joe Corrigan, where are you?” Endelmyer’s puzzled voice said from the screen.

“Hello? No, it’s me,” Corrigan heard Pinder splutter behind him as he went out. “Well, he is, but he’s just gone. I don’t know what’s happened to him. . . .”

Whereas Morgen’s approach had been conciliatory and placating, Tyron immediately launched into the offensive—possibly because Morgen had got nowhere; more likely to maintain a firm image of the heavyweight in front of Borth.

“What do you people think you’re playing at?” he demanded. “Don’t you realize that the information that’s coming out of this is already priceless? You’re sabotaging what could be the biggest breakthrough in the whole field in the last fifty years.”

“Everything’s on this now,” Borth pitched in, pushing his way forward beside Tyron. “If it blows, Xylog folds—the whole works. If it flies, we’ve got the oyster. You have to see this one through now.”

Corrigan, furious, pointed an arm in the general upward direction to indicate “out there.” “That’s all you can think about, even after what you forced Tom Hatcher into?”

“Unavoidable collateral,” Tyron said. “It’s a shame it has to happen, but there’s some in every operation.”

“
Unavoidable collateral!”
Corrigan exploded. “Is that what you call it? It’s still all just—”

Tyron brushed it aside with a tired wave. “Look, he’s okay. I just talked to him. If you want to be part of the Big League, you’ve gotta start thinking in big terms, Joey boy.”

Judy, who had been listening bemusedly from her desk, gasped. “Tom, okay? But how could he be? I don’t understand. . . .”