Spheria (29 page)

Fa∙ro looked up at the Source. It appeared to be far above them… but not that far. He dropped down, rushed outside between the pillars, and nearly collided with the guarding figure of Ga∙zo.

“Ga∙zo! Go, bring me Sa∙ma. Quickly!”

Chapter 35 - The Shadow Room

“Evil is a source of moral intelligence in the sense that
 
we need to learn from our shadow, from our dark
 
side, in order to be good.” - John Bradshaw

“What the hell,” Min uttered to herself. Yes, it was definitely there. Through the darkness under the floor, toward the back of the room, a faint red glow illuminated that area.
 

She retrieved the flashlight and focused it on the light. It looked like some kind of hatch leading through the cement floor. To make matters even stranger, an assortment of red cables converged in a bundle and descended through the same hole, propping the lid open a crack. This allowed the red light she saw to spill out.

Next to it, a red pipe descended from the base of the Qube incinerator and seemed to continue through the subfloor to somewhere below.

Not what I expected,
she thought.

She crawled under the floor toward the light, in her excitement not realizing that she could’ve removed a panel closer to it, if not right above it. Anyway, she was small and nimble, so it only took a few seconds to reach the porthole. It looked like something from a submarine, like a manhole cover with a locking wheel on it. Actually, that’s what it was. She didn’t know if it was typical or not to have something like that connecting floors. But she did suspect that the cables coming through it were definitely not normal. Her first thought was,
Someone is stealing our data.
Her heart raced, and her face turned red with anger.

She lifted the cover. It squeaked, but moved smoothly. It was heavier than it looked and fell backward with a loud clang that echoed down the open shaft. She listened. No sounds emanated from below, but the red light was definitely coming from down there and was brighter now.
 

She peered down onto the top of the drop ceiling of the floor below. Alternating, like squares on a chess board, were white ceiling panels and black fluorescent light fixtures. Through a cutout in one of the panels descended the bundle of wires. And through this rose the bright red glow. What surprised her more, however, was seeing the red incinerator pipe emerging through the cement floor and continuing down through the ceiling tiles.

“This can’t be good,” she whispered to herself. Then she caught herself, listening to see if anyone below might’ve heard her. Only electronic white noise could be heard.

Min reached down to where the wires passed through a ceiling tile, grabbed it, and flipped it over. Directly below, propped against the wall, stood a folding ladder, as if beckoning her to descend. Curiosity getting the better of her, she rotated her body and slid through the hole feet first. Supporting her weight with her arms, she touched the ceiling tiles with her feet, found the opening, and then made contact with the ladder. Testing it to see if it would support her weight, she ducked down and descended the rungs.

What she saw in the room below astounded her. It was an exact replica of the server room above. It had a secured door, eight panels of Qubes, four server racks, and a table with a monitor in the exact same location. The big difference, however, was that every single Qube was glowing bright red!

“What…. the… hell!”

She hung there, halfway down the ladder, in puzzled shock.
Why? How?
Those were the words running through her head, finishing with
Who?

She stepped off the ladder. Then she noticed one other difference. Instead of having an incinerator, the red pipe descending from the ceiling came to rest on the table top. Spilling from a hole in the side were a handful of inactive Qubes.

“No way!” Min exclaimed, too loudly. She startled herself.

It didn’t take her long to put the pieces together. Only one explanation made sense. The incinerator above was fake, and the Qubes they put in to be destroyed instead fell through the floor emerging here. Since they were all bad Qubes, they got plugged into the panels here, which is why they were all red. She remembered Max saying the Qubes were useless to the Spheria Project. But they could be used for nefarious purposes. So they needed to be destroyed to keep them out of the wrong hands. That apparently wasn't happening.

Min felt anxious like she had to get out of there quickly. She had to tell Max. No, she had to tell Dana. No, her mind was paralyzed.
What if one of them was behind this? What if it relates somehow to Olivia’s death?
She didn’t know who to trust.

Her eyes drifted to the monitor. That was the answer. She needed to break in and find out what was going on.

Chapter 36 - Enslaved

“If you must break the law, do it to seize power:
 
in all other cases observe it.” - Julius Caesar

Ga∙zo and Za∙zo entered Fa∙ro’s chamber, dragging the limp form of Sa∙ma between them. Fa∙ro perched on the empty core crystal, as if he were on a throne, his seven legs dangling over the sides. He casually glanced down upon them. They threw Sa∙ma on the ground before him.

“Rise,” commanded Fa∙ro.

Sa∙ma looked up, got his shaking legs under him, and stood.

“Look at your ruler, the sole leader of this Colony. I command the Soldiers, the Workers, and the Drones.”

“What of the Council?” asked Sa∙ma, looking around.

Fa∙ro laughed. “The Council is no more. Its era has passed. The Leaders’ lethargy won't hold us back any longer.”

“Where are the Leaders?”

“They’ve outlived their time in this Colony. Their complacency and inaction have resulted in their elimination. I am now all that remains at the top.”

“What makes you think any of us will follow you?”

Fa∙ro climbed down and approached Sa∙ma, who expected to be knocked over or struck. But instead, Fa∙ro propped him up with a leg and led him to the edge of the structure. Ga∙zo and Za∙zo followed, taking positions on either side of them. The four stood gazing down upon the expanse of the Colony. The many hives were quiet, occupied by their exhausted inhabitants.

“Fellow Polyans!” Fa∙ro called out, projecting loudly. “Come out and hear me.”

The Soldiers, who weren’t as tired after their bonus meal, were the first to emerge from their dwellings.

Ga∙zo motioned to them to enter the hives and bring the others out. This they did, and soon the ground was packed. Everyone in the Colony – Soldiers, Workers, and Drones – stood looking at the top of the tallest building.

“Everyone. I have sad news,” mocked Fa∙ro. “The Council’s intent to create another god has failed. Tragically, the attempt cost them their lives.” The crowd shot concerned glances at each other. “Shortly after this terrible disaster, I was visited by another of my kind, the god Pi∙ro. He came to lift me up to the Source to join with my brethren. But I declined his offer for the benefit of the Colony. The failure of the Council made it all clear. It is my purpose, my divine destiny, to lead you into a new era of prosperity. Look at the Mountains enclosing us from the edges of the Rift. Now look at the other valleys over and around us. These lands are unconquered and contain resources waiting for us to take. Together, fellow Polyans, we will tame all Spheria! Together we will have everything we ever need in infinite abundance. When this has been completed, I will bring down the blessings of the gods. You will never want for anything again!”

Some cheers erupted from the attentive listeners.

“Bow before me, my subjects.”

Many of the Polyans glanced at each other, unsure. But the Soldiers assisted them all into squatting. The entire community bowed before its new ruler.

Fa∙ro whispered to Sa∙ma, “See, they’re having no problem listening.” Then louder, “Go! Return to your hives and your new family members. Celebrate the giving of life that happened tonight. Tomorrow, we begin the glorious journey to greatness.”

As the Polyans began to stand, Fa∙ro turned and led Sa∙ma back into his chamber.

“Phase two of my plan is a special project for the Workers. You're going to guide them as you used to, and in exchange, I’m sparing your life.”

“What kind of project?” inquired Sa∙ma, not wanting to cooperate.

“Remember your vision in the cave?” Sa∙ma nodded. “You said you saw ‘how to make larger and stronger structures than anything we’ve ever built before.’ It didn’t interest me at the time, but now it’s
exactly
what I need.”

Chapter 37 - Split Decision

“For years I'd thought my color was black: deep, dark,
 
thoughtful, mysterious. Black, you can hide behind.
 
But now I know it is red.” - Jami Attenberg

Min’s eyes had grown accustomed to the red light in the replica of the server room. She sat at the terminal and hit the keyboard. The screen awoke and a login prompt appeared. It had a single field with a blinking cursor: Passcode.

She typed “12345” and hit enter. The computer beeped and a message, “Invalid passcode. You have one more tries before lockout,” flashed in red letters.
Nice grammar
, she thought. Her mind drifted to Olivia, her deleted file, and the conversation with Ashley. Min typed in 6EQUJ5, the values of the Wow! Signal. The words “Login correct” flashed on the screen and a desktop appeared.

“That was too easy,” she muttered. The knowledge that Olivia somehow made this possible gave her chills.
This is wrong, very wrong.

She searched for the Spheria Development Environment, but it wasn't installed. She looked at the running services. The one consuming most of the CPU was called Gridway. She opened a browser, but got an Internet restriction error. She pulled out her phone and searched on there. Wikipedia claimed it was “an open source meta-scheduling technology that enables large-scale, secure, reliable and efficient sharing of computing resources.” In other words, something that spreads calculations across many different processors.
Interesting.

She opened the task manager and flipped to the network traffic tab. A bunch of data was being sent out. This was mysterious, considering there was no open Internet connection. She drilled into the sending application, and it was listed as Tor. This one she had heard of. She’d played with it many times out of curiosity.
 

Tor was developed in the mid-90s by the Navy as a secure and untraceable means to communicate over the Internet. Tor soon fell into the wrong hands. It was adopted by black market weapons and drug dealers to sell illegal goods online. The most famous site was Silk Road, run by someone calling himself “Dread Pirate Roberts,” a reference to the movie The Princess Bride. The FBI arrested the owner in 2013 on charges of hiring a hit man, and the site was shut down. Shortly after that it was reopened by another “Dread Pirate Roberts,” further playing homage to the reference.

Tor... Gridway... no direct Internet. Min began to connect the dots. The Gridway program was using the banks of red Qubes to process some kind of calculation. It was sending the results somewhere over Tor in an untraceable manner, possibly on a dedicated line. Figuring out where it was sending was going to be impossible.