Palm Sunday (7 page)

“Before we get started, I want to thank everyone for a job well done. The profile would not have been possible without contributions from all of you. So thank you, one and all.”

He looked around the room, making eye contact with each person. When he got to Norbert he threw in a paternal wink. Norbert, he knew, was like a puppy. He didn’t care whose slippers he was bringing, as long as you scratched him behind the ear and said ‘good boy’. He would need Norbert for what he had in mind later, so stroking the boy wonder now would be a good investment.

“I want to hear first from computer ops, since nothing else matters if we have problems there. Norbert…”

Norbert shuffled some papers and pushed his glasses up on his nose. “The final data stream was initiated at nineteen hundred hours. Database listeners were activated without incident, and the external interfaces were opened on schedule. Buffers attained operational status at nineteen oh three, with repository population commencing shortly thereafter.”

“Norbert, layman’s terms, please.” Mason wanted to leave no room for misunderstanding.

Norbert looked at his audience with disdain. “It started properly.”

“Thank you,” said Mason.

Norbert went on. “But there was a glitch several minutes later. There was a bottleneck at the buffers. Normally I like to maintain a five or six per cent cushion, just in case there’s a surge. You lose the buffers, game’s over.” He noticed the blank stares. “The window is too short, we’d never re-initialize the binary coupler in time.” Still the stares. “I had to do without my cushion in order to let the data pass through the wires.” He looked hopefully around the table. They understood wires. Close enough.

“So anyway, we were approaching critical mass–the repositories were filling, but we were losing the buffers. If that happens it can start a cascade event that might be detectable on the outside. So I initiated shutdown. Fortunately the repository load completed just before I terminated processing.”

Tom Snelling of the SP unit leaned forward. “So the data we got was good?”

Norbert shrugged. “There were no interruptions to the flow, and the repositories were filled. As far as what you do with it…”

“Thank you, Norbert,” said Mason. “Tom, you might as well take it from here.”

Snelling looked around at his colleagues. “As you know, the purpose of a societal profile is to identify social trends, as precursors to social movements.”

Kayoko interrupted him. “I’d like to present an opposing view of that premise.”

He didn’t like being upstaged. “I haven’t stated any premises.” He looked around at the others and smiled, but it was forced.

“Yes you did. You said that social trends are precursors to social movements. I don’t believe we’ve made that connection yet.”

“It’s pretty clear that a link exists between how a group of people feel about something and what they do to express those feelings. Your own statistical modeling provided the basis for a substantial part of the SPQ.”

“Irrelevant,” said Kayoko. “My research was highly compartmentalized.”

“Are you saying that your numbers were wrong?”

“Of course not. What I’m saying is that we don’t have the hard science to support your basic assumption.”

Snelling was silent for several seconds. When he responded it was with a much softer tone. “Kayoko, I’m aware of your misgivings, and I value your opinion. But with all due respect, your specialty is in the statistical area.”

“I’m a psychologist; a behavioral scientist. Don’t treat me like a child.”

“Nevertheless, we have to…”

“All right, you two,” said Mason. “We’ve had this debate before, and it will only be resolved once we’ve put our theories into practice.” He had enjoyed the show, but it was time to move things along.

“Sorry, Mr. Mason,” said Snelling. “Continuing with my report, we identified two trends, one barely discernable, the other in the minimal range of confidence.”

“What was the final quotient, for the higher one?”

“Ninety-three point one, just above the threshold.” Snelling knew what the next question would be.

“What was the trend?” asked Mason.

“Valentine’s Day.” Snelling look triumphantly at Kayoko.

She shook her head. “Doesn’t mean anything,” she said. “What else would they have on their minds? Valentine’s Day is later this week.”

Snelling held his hands out. “That’s the whole point. We expected to get this result. Now we can go on to phase two.”

“Phase two?” Kayoko had obviously not been briefed.

Mason took over. “Phase two is where we get them talking about something else.”

“I don’t understand,” said Kayoko.

Mason leaned forward and clasped his hands together. He enjoyed playing the role of lecturer. “When this agency was formed, we were tasked with the mission of determining dangerous social trends, in recognition of the fact that internal collapse has been the greatest threat to powerful empires throughout history. To maintain U.S. preeminence in the world, any such internal propensities must be dealt with before they become unmanageable. Thus societal profiling was born.”

“Yes, yes, I know,” said Kayoko. “Social trends can lead to social movements, which can be precursors to national decline, or so the theory goes. What does it have to do with phase two?”

“Did we ever actually come close to getting the profile right–before now?”

“No,” said Kayoko. “Not until the Internet started to take off.”

Mason nodded. “And how did that change things?”

“We could capture communications, store them in databases, and analyze them–quickly. It made a huge difference. The more communications moved to cyberspace, the more accurate our profiles became.”

“And now we’ve seen that we can indeed create an accurate societal profile, correct?”

“Perhaps, but I’m still not convinced…”

Mason held up his hand. “I’m convinced that the trend identified by our profile is accurate. Do you know why?” Kayoko shook her head. “Because Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. Of course that’s what people are concerned about. But now, in phase two, we’re going to change that.”

“Change what?” asked Kayoko.

“In a very short period of time, we’re going to alter the societal profile.”

Kayoko sat motionless, her eyes wide. “That was never our mandate! Identify, yes, but alter?”

“It’s the next logical step,” said Mason.

“Why wasn’t I told about this?”

  “If the profile wasn’t successful, it wouldn’t have mattered. Now it does matter, and now you all know the direction we’re headed.”

  Muted conversation broke out around the table. This was new territory, a dramatic shift in direction and policy. Kayoko alone sat silently. At last Mason regained everyone’s attention.

  “We have a lot of work to do. The process of altering a profile won’t be easy, and of course, once the procedures have been run, we’ll have to run another profile for comparison.”

  Kayoko was afraid to ask. “What exactly are these ‘procedures’?”

  Mason nodded towards his boy wonder. “Norbert, the floor is yours.”

After he and Bobby fled their home, Stanley drove to the only place he knew of that offered safety from the bizarre events that seemed to follow the palmtop. The small motel that they checked into was remote, yet not so far away that they could not return home on short notice. The morning after arriving they purchased some fishing gear and headed for the nearby lake.

Stanley watched his bobber dancing on the surface of the water. They had caught nothing after several hours of fishing, but he didn’t care. He wanted some time to think things through, and to plan his next move. The serene backdrop of the sparse foliage reflecting off the water soothed his nerves.

“Dad?”

“Yes, Bobby?”

“What’s going on?”

“I guess the fish aren’t hungry today.”

Bobby shifted his position to get a better look at his father. “No, I mean, why did that man want the palmtop, and why did those others want to hurt him?”

Stanley gazed intently at his son. “That’s a very good question. What do you think?”

Bobby tugged on his pole, taking up the slack as his line drifted closer. “The palmtop must be valuable.” He watched the ripples where his line entered the water. “Maybe it doesn’t belong to the first guy, and those others wanted to get it back from him.”

“Could be.” Stanley absently toyed with his line. “None of them were especially friendly.”

“No. That first guy–I don’t know his name…”

“Slocum. At least that’s what he said on the phone.”

“Yeah.” Bobby nodded. “He was, I don’t know, different. Not as scary as the others.”

“I suppose,” said Stanley. “But he did force his way into our home. With a gun.” Stanley looked over his glasses at his son.

“Yeah. That was scary.”

“You okay now?”

“Uh huh.” The boy leaned back, watching the waves lap against the shore. “Dad?”

“Yes?”

“Why don’t we just give the palm thing to the police and tell them what happened?”

Stanley didn’t answer for a moment. He had his reasons, but was it fair to burden his son with all that? “You know, Bobby, I don’t have a good answer to that one. I guess I just got so caught up in what was happening, it didn’t occur to me.”

“Don’t do it, Dad.”

“Do what?”

“Give it to the police. At least not ‘til you figure out what’s in it.”

Stanley smiled. “I’m not going to. Not yet, anyway.” He looked out over the cold water. It was far too early in the season. “Nothing’s biting today.”

“I’m kind of tired of this, Dad. Let’s go back to the motel.”

“You sure? I don’t mind staying a little longer.”

“You can work on the palmtop.”

Stanley nodded his assent, and reeled in his line. After gathering up their tackle and loading it into the car, they drove back to the motel, only five miles away. It was a small affair in an out of the way place. Stanley and his wife had first come here many years earlier, and he had brought Bobby here on fishing trips several times since. They left the fishing gear in the car and went to their room.

“You can watch television while I shower,” said Stanley. “Then I’ll get to the palmtop.”

“Okay.” Bobby turned on the set while Stanley used the shower. He finished quickly, exiting the bathroom fifteen minutes later.

“Ah, much better. Now it’s your turn. Into the bath with you.”

“I’d rather not.”

“But you will.” Bobby knew that it was pointless to argue, and went to fill the tub.

Meanwhile, Stanley placed his laptop on the single small table that came with the room and plugged it in. Like most motels, this one had a data connection, so he logged on to his private email account and checked for the file he had sent himself just before he and Bobby left their home. It was the one that he had downloaded while Slocum was at his house. He saved it to his laptop’s hard drive and logged off, and considered what he knew so far.

Pascua. It could be a name, as he had originally thought, but he was becoming less convinced of this. That it was important–significant–he felt certain. He was equally certain that the palm unit itself had capabilities that went far beyond the ordinary. Coupled with the actions of Slocum and his associates, this seemed to indicate the involvement of forces that were well beyond his own sphere of activities. While this was intriguing, it also worried him. Not so much for his own sake, but for Bobby. Perhaps it was time to involve the authorities after all.

As these thoughts went through his mind, he attempted to process the latest file. It was large compared to the earlier downloads, and yielded much more information. He was able to recover several nearly complete sentences, as well as a number of words and partial words. Most of it, however, was unintelligible, which Stanley found perplexing. If his software was able to decipher part of the file, it should be able to do the whole thing. It occurred to him that perhaps it wasn’t one file, but a combination of two or more files. Could it be that they were intermingled, perhaps in an effort to thwart any attempt to break the code? If so, it would follow that some other decoding methodology would have to be applied to the more resistant portion of the file. Unfortunately, the only other methodology immediately available to him was his wits; he had used up his electronic bag of tricks.

 The file, or at least part of it, was a communiqué or a bulletin of some kind. The intended audience was fairly generic, based on the use of the passive voice in the few passages he could read. Slocum was mentioned as having been ‘relegated’, but precisely what that meant was unclear. It also referenced the palmtop, indicating that its recovery was paramount. Most unnerving, however, was the fact that his address was listed. The remaining bits and pieces were a puzzle. Torn between curiosity and concern, Stanley pressed on. 

When Slocum left Stanley’s house he went straight to his ‘secure’ apartment–a place he hadn’t even told the agency about–and set up Stanley’s computer. Slocum may not have been Stanley’s equal in matters electronic, most notably computers, but he had enough savvy to get into Stanley’s hard drive. After switching a few cables from his own computer to Stanley’s he was in business.

He wasn’t sure what he was looking for, but he knew who he was looking for–the owner of this PC. He had to find the palm unit, and that meant finding Whipple. The man and his son had disappeared somewhere, and the only clues available might be in this computer.

When someone wanted to hide, Slocum knew, especially if it was on the spur of the moment, they often sought a place that was isolated, but familiar. Whipple had run, out of fear, to a place where he felt safe and untraceable. Where would that place be?

He examined the various folders. The usual ones were here; system folders, documents, music, and several miscellaneous entries. There was a folder with a ton of saved emails. When Slocum opened this he was impressed at how organized it was, calling to mind the neatness of Whipple’s house. Everything was categorized, with out of date and personal entries separated from more important business correspondence. He spent over an hour scouring the possibilities, and made several phone calls that resulted in dead ends. As he scrolled down the list of entries his eyes stopped on a line that read ‘reservation confirmed’. It was from a motel, and the message was over two years old. It included a number, and on a hunch Slocum dialed it.