Revolution World (8 page)

"Watch out for that rock," she replied.

He turned to look and promptly tripped over the rock, anyway. He did a wobbling little dance to keep from falling and then blushed with embarrassment. "The past few weeks have gone much smoother than this," said Seth with a self-conscious laugh, looking down. "I just put this shirt on."

Seth turned to look at the lights strung up just ahead like a mirage in a mud desert. The parking lot was just a field and after hard rains and heavy trucks, the field had gotten fed up and struck back with a resentful tide of sticky muck.

"Whose birthday party is this again?" Seth asked her. "I felt I should bring a gift, but what do you get for someone you've never met?"

"Oh, sugar," laughed Clio. "Nobody here ever met the birthday boy. Bigfoot Wallace has been dead for over two hundred years. He's not even buried here." Seth turned to face her. He could see
by the amused glint in her eye that she was serious. He raised an eyebrow.

Clio answered his unasked question. "He's a local folk hero. He fought in the war against Mexico for Texas independence. He was one of the first Texas Rangers. They say he kept the peace by being the scariest man south of Dallas. We celebrate his birthday because, well, I don't really know why. Mostly I guess we like having a reason to have a big barbeque and a band. We all get together to drink beer, eat ourselves sick and dance until dawn."

"Ah." Seth said. That sounded reasonable to him. "Sure. So, is the rest of your family here?"

"Oh yes, they all took the day off and got here when the party started this afternoon. I had some work to do so I'm late. I always have some work to do so I'm always late," Clio said with a sigh. "What about you? Didn't anyone else from your new office come? I can't imagine your uncle missing a party."

Seth laughed. "No, Max would never miss a party, especially one with food at it. I too was working late so Max came with some of the others around eight. No doubt he is lying in a food coma in some corner of this field now. We've had to install some of those treadmill generators at the new office. We have to walk far enough to generate the electricity if we want to play globenet games. And we all love our games. Otherwise we'd have to build a bigger office because we'd all be enormously fat from eating all the delicious food."

"It's a problem that's hard to complain about, what with so many parts of the world having problems getting enough nutrition. But yeah. Those treadmill generators are very popular around here. I have one at home for gaming too," Clio replied as they walked into the laughing crowd of townspeople.

Clio put a hand on Bob the Money Guy's shiny new convertible to steady herself as she cleared the last mud puddle. Where did he get the money for things like this? She knew Floracopia paid him well, but she thought he'd need a lot more money to support his expensive habits. Maybe he got money out of his many lady friends? She didn't like to think about that. She turned to survey the scene. At one end of the big field a band was playing swinging honky-tonk to an enthusiastic crowd of dancers. A line of large black barbecue pits filled the field with delicious-smelling smoke. An enthusiastic crowd milled around in meaty bliss.

"What games do you play?" asked Seth. His eyes had wandered away from the scene to the blue jeans that hugged Clio's curves. Clio caught his gaze.

She batted her eyelashes at him and struck a sultry pose. "Why, honey. I don't play games, I win them." Then she laughed at his expression. "No, I'm just kidding. It just sounded like a bad pick-up line the way you said it."

"I'll be sure to think of better pick-up lines," he replied awkwardly.

She watched him blush in confusion and hurried to answer, "I spend way too much time playing Revolution World actually. It's the re-enactment of the Texas Revolution, you know? There are other versions for a bunch of other revolutions or rebellions too. I hear the American Revolution and the Taiping Rebellion worlds are very popular. It's kind of dorky, but I'm hooked on it and all my friends here play too."

"Oh yes, I know that one. I actually designed some in-game security elements for the Texas Revolution World," Seth replied, clearly more comfortable with virtual reality games than with flirting.

They spotted Max and a tall, pale woman talking to Kalliope. They were sitting at one of the long picnic tables set up next to large fans to cut the heat. Seth and Clio were both starving so they grabbed plates and hit the food tent.

"You worked on Revolution World? Really? Wow," Clio said as she loaded up on potato salad, coleslaw, smoked chicken and peach cobbler. She set down two large bowls of guacamole and salsa she brought as her offering for the party.

"Yeah, just the security elements. It was an application of our privacy networks. The original programmers wanted a way to have secret meetings that couldn't be infiltrated. Personally, I would think spies and secret agents would be part of that kind of game, but that's what they wanted. It was fun to design," Seth replied. He had piled his plate so high with sausage that there was no room for peach cobbler. He looked at it mournfully until Clio passed him another plate with a wink. They walked to meet the others while dodging a group of kids racing through the crowd.

"I use that security system for my gaming team," said Clio. "So it really keeps people from impersonating someone with access to the secret meetings? I always wondered about that." She spotted Eric and Joanna Guerrero sitting next to Kalliope and gestured that she wanted to join them. The group began rearranging itself to make room for them.

Seth dropped a link of sausage as he sat down. A dog snatched it up almost before it hit the dirt. "With so many people working remotely, there are companies that hire people they've never seen," he answered. "So it's much harder these days to make sure the person logging into the network is who they say they are. That's what Omerta originally designed it for. I just adapted that software to the game. In the case of the game, it makes it impossible for someone to log in and play another person's in-game avatar. I actually used Revolution World to test out a network system that keeps people who are supposed to have access from sharing any of the secure information. So your Revolution doesn't have to worry about turncoats who sell secrets to the other side."

"Really? I'm friends with the designers of Revolution World and that's what they said, but I just don't understand how you could do that." Clio replied.

Seth shrugged. "Actually, that feature is only in the Texas part of Revolution World. I made it a while ago, but it's still in test phase. I used a combination of cloud computing to distribute the information and encryption algorithms to make it secure. Basically, it involves a lot of ring theory and other abstract algebras. But the idea is that the only way to share the information in these encrypted meeting rooms is to be in the room. You can't take it out with you. To get in the room, you have to agree to a downloaded program on your handheld that won't let you even describe what you heard in the room. It wipes any mention to that information out of spoken or written communication. The only way you could do it is face to face or written down on an actual piece of paper."

Kalliope had stopped her conversation with Max and Eric to listen to this last part.

"So it's like you are a witch and you put a spell on the secret. So if anyone tries to tell the secret, they can't speak. I didn't know math could be that groovy, Seth," Kalliope grinned and passed him a beer.

"Something like that," Seth said modestly, but grinned with pleasure. Then he discovered mud in his hair and began trying to pick it out while still eating.

"We are all witches at Omerta," Max said cackling like a crone, "I'll get you my pretty! And your little dog Toto too!" He took an enthusiastic bite out of a turkey leg he'd been waving around for effect. Joanna laughed, but soon turned back to command the legion of little old ladies who kept the festivities running smoothly. Eric looked bored and wandered off towards the dancing.

Kalliope leaned forward and gave her sister a wicked grin. "Revolution World? Did Clio tell you she used to be hot and heavy with the guy that invented it? He still comes around, doesn't he?"

"No, he does not," replied Clio, kicking her sister under the table. "You know perfectly well I've been single for a while. Jason is just a friend."

This last part was more for Seth's benefit and her words did not fall on deaf ears. He grinned and moved closer to her. "Jason Schmidt? I worked with him. He's a good guy," he said.

Clio turned to find the tall, pale young woman sitting with Max giving her the evil eye. She wondered how she had failed to notice her until now. The girl would have fried Clio's head off if she had laser vision. She scowled at Seth, too. Clio smiled. This woman was obviously interested in Seth and just as obviously hating Clio for sitting so close to him. How fascinating. It was rarely apparent to her what was going on socially. She almost wanted to brag to someone for having picked up on body language for once.

Clio stuck out her hand. "I don't believe we've met. My name is Clio," she said cheerfully.

It almost looked as though the woman would refuse to take her hand before Seth jumped in. "Clio, can I introduce my cousin, Gloria? She's in charge of the satellite office here," Seth said as he gestured to the young woman. Gloria shook Clio's hand and inclined her head coldly. Clio gave her a big smile and wave. Kalliope shot Clio a look that plainly said she hadn't been impressed with Gloria so far.

"Another relative?" Clio said as she eyed Gloria. "It sounds like Omerta is just as rife with nepotism as Floracopia is. Can't throw a rock in our labs without hitting a family member."

The woman looked to be in her early twenties. She was strikingly beautiful with long black hair, dark eyes, and a haughty expression on her pale face. Clio couldn't understand how someone so young was put in charge of an office, especially with older and more experienced people like Seth and Max in it.

Gloria leaned forward gracefully as a cold smile curled her lips. "So it is with Omerta. Everyone is very close. Although we are not so closely related, Seth and I." She gave him a smoldering look. "We are what you might call kissing cousins."

Seth gave her an odd look. "I never find jokes about incest very funny. And it's been a long time since I kissed anyone, being single like I am." He looked at Clio significantly. She smiled and took a quick bite of pie. Seth did too. Except he was so busy looking at Clio that he missed his mouth and nearly jabbed himself in the eye with a fork.

"I'm afraid the ladies do not appreciate a man who spends more time with his computer than with them," Max observed, handing Seth a napkin to wipe the pie off his face.

Gloria tossed her curtain of hair in a snit. "Seth here is actually the heir apparent to our little throne, you know. His parents are both on the Board of Directors. He and Max are our lead programmers. The rest of the family cannot understand their sudden insane desire to move out to this... well, this little place. So I was sent to keep an eye on them until they return to their senses and go home."

She turned a disapproving eye on Seth who was now so close to Clio their shoulders were gently touching. Gloria reached over to smooth a flyaway strand of Seth's hair. The contact startled Seth into moving away from Clio.

Clio took an instant dislike to this exotic woman. She reacted like a true Southern girl. Her smile got wider and she became even more charming. "Well I hope our little town will grow on you since you'll be here for quite some time, won't you?" she said sweetly, scooting closer to Seth just to make Gloria angry.

"Come. We must dance," declared Max, spilling beer as he stood up. "I have been watching those young men near the stage twitch about like epileptic zombies and I am convinced I can look more foolish than they do." He grabbed Gloria and dragged her across the field. Kalliope cheerfully joined them. Following in Kalliope's wake was the gaggle of adoring farmers that always seemed to surround her.

*****

Seth and Clio remained seated and continued to eat as they watched the dancing. They talked enthusiastically about nothing much at all.

Some large, beefy men came over to talk to Clio about their next session of Revolution World gaming. It seems she was part of a group that met every Wednesday night. Seth listened and idly wondered if every man in this town was six feet tall and built like a refrigerator.

"You hear that Mr. Dennard was taken?" one of the men said to Clio.

"And his wife is sick," the other man interjected with outrage.

She glanced at Seth, but he couldn't read her face. "Government or terrorists?" she asked in a low voice.

"Government of course," the man replied, his mouth set in a hard line. Clio cursed fluidly and pulled the two away for a quick conversation.

Seth looked around and it was large beefy men as far as the eye could see. He was six feet tall himself. He knew he was skinny, but he'd never felt so scrawny before. He could easily pick out Max's lithe form in the crowd, dancing like a possessed hillbilly with Clio's mother just now. Near him, Gloria looked bored as a large farmer whirled her about in an expert manner. Seth was really impressed by the dancing skills these rough men possessed.

"Hey, I'd like to play Revolution World like the locals. Can I join you on Wednesday night, maybe?" Seth asked after the men had gone and Clio sat back down.

Clio flushed and looked flustered. "Oh no. I mean I'm sure it wouldn't really interest you," she stammered. "The game is really only fun for Texas nuts like us."

Seth was taken aback. He'd really just wanted some way to spend more time with her.

"I'm sorry. That came out rude," she said quickly, putting a hand on his arm. "I just meant that those Wednesday meetings are for a bunch of us who are pretty hardcore into the game. Maybe we could play together on a different night until you decide whether or not you like it enough to keep playing?"

The feeling that she was trying to blow him off evaporated under the heat of her hand. "That would be great," he said quietly. She took her hand back and they finished eating, occasionally looking up to smile at each other.