The Sapporo Outbreak (15 page)

Santos paused for a second before responding slowly.

"Yes. In fact I know it is. There are cases of this very thing happening, but they are extremely rare and almost entirely from people already predisposed to instability. Why? What are you thinking Ben?

Skinner's eyes lost their focus, as he gazed into the distance.

"I don't know what to think Eva, I really don't. But something feels very wrong."

#

10am Thursday, Tanaka's Quarters, Sapporo (Minus 5 Hours)

Itou scrutinised the scruffy, short, round man as he nervously brushed his right hand over his tangled mop of brown hair and smoothed down his unkempt beard.
 

Itou's thick neck squeezed into his crisp white shirt, his blue blazer and grey slacks struggling to contain the muscular man. He blinked once, and swept a finger twice in the air before refixing his glare on the portly bearded man standing before him. Itou looked offended by the unkempt man's presence.

"Mr Tanaka will see you now Doctor Becker" and with that the frosted glass door slid into a recess in the wall. Becker hustled forward, keen to get some distance from the guards, and walked through a corridor wide enough to drive his new Lexus SUV through.
 

At the end of the polished timber corridor, a cavernous penthouse spread before him. Enormous potted plants, green leaves and bamboo shooting upwards created splashes of green everywhere, while several oversize paintings of Tanaka's wife and daughters were dotted around the area.
 

Tanaka was sitting on a deep red sofa. Facing him on one of four large polished oak and white leather armchairs was an old Japanese man. To Becker, the old man had a distinguished air of authority, although his expensive pin-striped suit seemed to hang on him a little. It accentuated the shrunken form of the old man.
 

As always, Tanaka wore a black Armani single-breasted suit, black shirt with the top button open, and black patent leather shoes. With his dark skin, jet black moustache and goatee, he seemed oddly out of place in the light and augmented colour of the penthouse.

Becker waited patiently as the men shook hands. They then stood, exchanged low bows and with that the old man made his way past Becker, through the corridor and out into the visitors lounge. Becker smiled as the old man walked past, but the old man ignored the doctor - as if he didn't exist.

Bemused, Becker shrugged and turned to see Tanaka gesturing to join him. Becker walked over to Tanaka, now sitting again, and said "Mr Tanaka, I am so honoured that you agreed to meet me at such short notice."

Tanaka gave a tired smile. "Not at all Doctor Becker. The pleasure is all mine. Please - take a seat."

Becker slumped into the still warm leather armchair, and waited for Tanaka to speak.

Tanaka examined the man in front of him. This scruffy, overweight, hairy man was Tanaka's secret weapon. A true genius, the man behind iSight 3's most remarkable achievement.

"What can I do for you Doctor?"

Becker coughed nervously. He had worked for Tanaka for over three years now, and in that time the doctor had received only kind words of support - and enough money that he'd never have to work again. And yet Becker had never felt comfortable around the brilliant Japanese entrepreneur. Becker was a student of people, and something about Tanaka had never quite felt right.
 

"Mr Tanaka, I have come to ask your thoughts about my proposal."

"Proposal?" Tanaka waved his hands above his head questioningly.

"Yes sir, six days ago I sent you the results from our iSight 3 game immersion labs around the world. As you know we have been testing day and night for the last few months, and in the last few weeks we've started to see some ... anomalies."

"Anomalies?" Tanaka raised an eyebrow.
 

Becker sighed internally. Clearly - yet again - Tanaka had not read the report.

"Yes sir. A few of our research centre managers are suggesting that the virtual personalities are simply
too
lifelike. The managers feel that the virtual players are adapting incredibly quickly to the actions of the real game players and the scenarios inside the game. The result is that many of the human players testing the system in the research centre report being unnerved, disorientated and in some cases angry about their inability to separate the real from the virtual players. A few - at this point it's difficult to tell how many - have reported trouble separating the game from real life hours after they have left our research centre."

Tanaka let out an exasperated sigh. "So what exactly are you suggesting Doctor?"

Becker watched as Tanaka shuffled in his seat, clearly unhappy with the conversation.

"Sir, my recommendation is that we delay the release of the game by 8 weeks, so that we can more fully understand these issues and upgrade all iSight 3 virtual players."

"Upgrade? You mean make them
less
realistic don't you Doctor Becker?"

"Yes sir, I do."

Tanaka took a sharp breath in, and leaned forward "Doctor Becker, do you trust me?"

Becker was caught off guard for a moment. Tanaka's elbows were resting on his knees, his head jutted forward, his dark eyes fixed on Becker.
 

"Yes. Yes sir, of course I do trust you."

"Then listen to me Doctor Becker. The reason iSight 3.0 is so compelling, so different - and will become the most successful game in history - is the feeling of complete immersion all players experience. That's all thanks to you and your genius Doctor Becker. You are about to change the world. It's
because
these virtual lives you are creating are so realistic that the game is so unique."

Becker felt a surge of pride at Tanaka's ringing endorsement. Much less sure of the need to delay now, Becker continued.

"Thank you for those kind words sir. Of course, I can't take too much credit. They may seem human, but the generated personalities aren't real and the iSight world they live in isn't real. They are and always will be engineered, reconstructed. A blend of many different personalities."

Tanaka nodded. "Yes, yes Doctor Becker. Your genius has been to make this invisible - to any player these players
are
real. That's all that matters. "

Becker began to respond, but Tanaka beat him to it.

"Anyway Doctor Becker, I really do appreciate your concerns, but as with any leap forward there will be some last minute doubts. I have promised our investors, our loyal game players, my own daughter, that iSight 3 will launch soon. And I do not intend to let any of them down. So please - I ask you to trust me Doctor Becker, and put all your energy into these last few days. In less than a week, we will release iSight 3, and within months one third of the planet will be experiencing and celebrating your genius. "

Becker nodded, enraptured.

"I asked a moment ago if you trusted me Doctor Becker. Now I ask, can I trust you? Can I trust that you will put all your time and energy into one last push? Can I trust that you are ready to join me in changing the world Doctor Becker?"

 
Becker nodded quickly.

"Yes Mr Tanaka, you can trust me to make it happen."

"Excellent," Tanaka smiled broadly. "I'm afraid Doctor that I must attend to other matters, and so we must end our conversation here."

Becker hurriedly stood up.

"Yes, of course Mr Tanaka. Thank you once again for taking the time to meet me."

Becker bowed deeply, Tanaka responded in kind and Becker hurried along the penthouse corridor, out through the frosted glass doors, past the hawkish Itou and into the visitors' lounge.
 

As he made his way toward the elevators at the end of the visitors' lounge on the north side of the building, Becker's thoughts turned to his relationship with Tanaka. Becker loved his work here at WhiteStar, and he'd always considered his more methodical approach an ideal balance to Tanaka's big picture, swing-for-the-fences showmanship. A partnership of opposites. Other than one tragic incident a couple of years earlier, it had been a relationship which had succeeded beyond all measure.
 

As the elevator doors silently glided open, Becker mused that in his time with Tanaka, he had helped redefine entertainment and social media, and in the process he had become unbelievably wealthy. He owed his success to Tanaka, and his single-minded determination, his refusal to ever admit defeat.
 

And yet - despite all this - Becker couldn't escape the feeling that this time was different. As the game had grown, so had the risks. Now they were facing issues with players losing sight of reality - problems unlike almost anything they'd encountered before.
 

Tanaka dismissed them - as deep down Becker knew he would. It was no longer simply Tanaka being determined, driven or stubborn. Although he'd never say this to Tanaka, Becker knew exactly what was driving Tanaka. He'd stumbled upon the answer several months ago during a deep dive into the WhiteStar database.

It wasn't money that drove Tanaka.

It wasn't fame.
 

It was something far more important.

#

10:30am Thursday, Main Lobby, Sapporo (Minus 4:30 Hours)

Yui Sakura could see that Hill and Harper appeared to engage iSight at almost every opportunity. Harper, in particular, seemed enamoured - he had already learned to use his hands in small swiping motions to navigate the system, a much faster method than eye movement alone. Intrigued, Sakura flicked down her iSight menu and with a few quick motions, pulled up Harper's details. His use of the system was extensive, already almost compulsive. It was a pattern Sakura had seen before - roughly one in fifteen of those new to iSight seemed to lose themselves in the experience, sometimes with unexpected results. As a precaution, with a few eye flicks and hand sweeps, Sakura sent an iSight alert to security suggesting they monitor Harper's usage.

Sakura turned to the group - all lost in the iSight experience - and motioned for them to follow as she began reciting numbers and facts about the iSight system.
 

 
Skinner looked around at the others and could see no one was listening - they were all experimenting with the iSight system and ignoring Sakura's self-congratulatory praise of the 'world changing technology'. Skinner thought he heard Sakura compare iSight 3 to the invention of the silicon chip and ... what was that? Something about landing on the moon.

Skinner decided it was probably better that he tuned out. He took his cell phone from his back pocket and waved it at Sakura apologetically. She nodded without missing a beat.

Skinner dialled and put his phone to his ear, absent-mindedly drifting toward the pond of Koi fish - or the polished concrete floor as Skinner reminded himself.

The phone rang three times before a deep, rumbling tired-sounding voice answered.

"Professor. I've been waiting for you to call."

Skinner could tell the Santa Clara Detective had been sleeping. He quickly checked his phone -
damn, almost midnight in California
.

"Hey sorry Steve, I didn't realise I was calling so late. Are you ok to talk?"

Clark sat up and stretched - working the knots out of his neck and shoulders. He'd fallen asleep on the living room couch after another beer and pizza night. This had become his routine ever since Keisha had left him. Again.

"Yeah, yeah man - no problem. Do you have something for me?"

Skinner suddenly felt exposed. He lowered his voice to a whisper.

"Probably not big man. It's a stretch - but worth checking out."

"I'll take anything right now Ben - this one makes absolutely no sense to me, and I've got rich people to the left and right screaming that I'm dropping the ball."

Skinner grimaced. He knew if Clark was complaining, it had to be bad.

"Ok Steve, this might sound crazy, but can you check if anything matching this M.O went down in the last say... six weeks ... in London, Berlin, Sydney or New York. Oh - and focus on anything a commuting distance from the WhiteStar research centres."

Clark paused for a second, shaking the cobwebs from his head.
 

"What the hell Ben? WhiteStar? The game guys?"

"Steve, I know it sounds crazy. I'm almost certainly wasting your time - but humour me and take a quick look. We're looking for bizarre behaviour. Unusually violent attacks. Good people gone bad - that sort of thing."

Clark sounded sceptical. "Ehm. Ok Ben."

Skinner interjected. "Oh - and the eyes Steve. Anything about the eyes. Red raw, damage to the cornea, self inflicted wounds - that sort of thing."

Clark stretched and felt his shoulder click.
Damn - that thing's never going away - another present from my man Skinner
.

Clark replied slowly, cautiously.

"Ok Ben, you're not making any sense but I'm going to run with it. Not because I like you, but because I don't. Not because you're smarter than me, because you're not. I'll run with it because I've got nothing better to do here in my Californian paradise. And I'm looking forward to hearing you apologise for wasting my time. Again."

Skinner smirked at the phone. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Sakura flash him a quizzical look.

"Thanks Steve. I'm guessing Keisha's dumped you again so what else are you going to do with your time?"

Clark couldn't help but laugh, a deep, rumbling sound that felt like it echoed in Skinner's ear. "Man, Keisha is just taking some time to thank her lucky stars. You know she gets overwhelmed at the fact she has a man like me. Anyway, that's none of your business Professor - you still owe me for my damn shoulder, and if this doesn't pan out, you'll owe me again. Hope you're ready to pay up egghead."

"Detective Clark," Skinner smiled as he spoke, "I hope you can find your way past the empty beer bottles and 'Dear John' letters. Let me know if you find anything out. If I've wasted your time,
I'll
call Keisha and beg her to come back. Can't say fairer than that big man."