Author Part 5
(Chapter 58 of "Senses")
SPACE
The final frontier...sorry. Always wanted to do that.
Back in space for the second time in as many days. There are shuttle pilots creaming their shorts right about now.
I spent most of the trip up sightseeing and talking with Scott, who told me the basic outline of the story called Hack. Now I understand his fascination with earthquakes, and I was making notes in my head on how to flesh out the story.
"Question," I said once he had finished his narrative.
"Answer," he responded.
"Smartass. How far out do you have quakes predicted?"
"Only about ten days. Once I'm satisfied with all of the testing then we'll try long term testing, which we should be able to start upon our return to solid ground. I'll keep you posted."
"Fair enough," I replied. "Next question. How do you take into account things like the pull of planets and all the rest of the extraterrestrial crap?"
"Janis helps," he told me. "Her stores contain all kinds of information that gets correlated in the master computer back home."
"Strikes me you'd use Janis for your computations."
"Nah. Home computer is better, though not self-aware. Janis even helped design it. When you get into fractal mathematics and Chaos theory it goes beyond even my skills. However, I do understand the theories and the computers have been programmed to handle the rest, either by Janis or by sources that I've borrowed software from."
"Borrowed," I said, voice dripping with sarcasm.
Scott held up his hands. "This planet," he replied, "has some very smart people on it. I simply feel it is wrong that they treat knowledge as proprietary. I tap them."
"So your skills..."
"Are real enough, so don't say it. It so happens that one of my skills is managing other people's skills. It's he primary reason my Tech Crews are in such demand."
I laughed. "So you're the office manager."
Scott considered this for a moment. "It's more accurate to call me a permanent contractor. Jim and I have been friends for so long that I can't picture not working with him."
"How did you meet?"
"Professionally," Scott said. "Janis?"
"Yes Scott." That voice would always send shivers down my spine.
"Do we have any beer on board?"
"We do. I'll ask Mats to bring you one."
"Thanks." He returned his attention to me. "How old are you?" he asked.
"Nineteen," I replied. "Why?"
"Then you probably don't remember the first Blue Shift tour. You would have been eight at the time. This was before the band was even signed and we were all teenagers ourselves.
"The band had rented a bus and had this plan to attack every city they could, with press conferences and wild parties and Paul buying drinks for everybody, just like he did in Hollywood."
"You mean Paul and Blue Shift did that?" I asked. Go into any club in L.A. or San Francisco and you'll hear the story of some band buying drinks for the entire audience.
"Yes, they did," Scott continued. "Anyway, at the time cellular phone networks didn't have the reach that now exists, but they wanted to be able to send faxes from the bus and conduct phone interviews. So they made an arrangement with the Ma Bell companies for a satellite link, and I was hired to run it on the bus.
"I soon made the mistake of trying to drink with Jim, but we got into each other's skins. He found out about my hacking and approved and hired me as a consultant. When the tour was noticed as a success, the band got signed and I had a career. Jim doesn't forget his friends, and neither do I."
At that moment Mats appeared with 3 beers. He passed them around and ordered a pizza for the three of us. He then sat down by us and said, "Been shooting the shit, have you?"
"We been shit shooting, all right," Scott shot back.
"Good. We'll be at the bird shortly, so we won't be able to play our usual poker game until after the check."
"How long does a satellite check take?" I asked.
"Only about fifteen minutes," Scott said. "We bring it on board and then hook it up to Janis and then she runs a diagnostic. We then move it elsewhere and put it back."
"So your command center slash data link is down for a few."
"Correct."
"Mats, you lied to me. It isn't necessary to make this a 4-hour trip."
Mats smiled and stroked his beard. "I figured you'd catch on," he said, "what with that funky memory of yours. The only reason we took so long on that last flight is that we needed to talk. You needed to understand why we drafted you in the first place. It used to take that long though, before Scott freed Janis' program. Janis solved the problem of how we're seen from the ground since that time."
I shook my head and ignored the misdirection. "Drafted is a good word."
Mats laughed. "Can't blame me for trying."
"Can't blame me for noticing a comment like that," I replied.
"Doesn't change anything. I simply felt that you should understand my goddaughter's motives for abducting you. Besides, it wasn't a real lie. The only way to absolutely guarantee we weren't spotted is to do the four hour trip. We pick up the bird, re-position, then float up and away and do the long haul. It really messes with the military people."
"That's something I don't get," I said. "Why don't they detect you now?"
"Because Terran defenses are unable to detect a rate of communication that is inherently faster than the speed of light, which is what the satellite uses. The power source is solar and kinetic and would take me weeks to explain, so all they would see is a dead hunk of metal. Eventually they do spot it and think it's a meteor or who knows what. Should Terran defenses ever get up to our speed we'd be in big trouble, but I think we're at least 50 years from there."
I sighed. "I'm also not sure I get the bit about Nicki's motives. I'll grant you that her childhood and teen years were pretty fucked up, but why me?"
"Why you?" Scott asked. "The Coincidental Man has to ask why him?"
"I'm still not used to that," I replied.
"Start trying."
One thing I was getting used to was that look Mats gets in his eyes when he's in communion with Janis. With pizza in hand as well. When he came back to our plane Scott and I both asked, "What's up?"
Mats looked genuinely puzzled. "We weren't expecting any activity today, were we?"
"No," Scott replied. "Nothing above a 2.5 on the Richter scale and those I don't report, just log. Something happened?"
"Earthquake in Greenland, of all places. About a five."
"There are fault lines in Greenland?" I asked.
"There are fault lines everywhere," Scott returned. "Even volcanic activity although the two are often related. But this is strange. Where about was it?"
"Middle of nowhere," Mats said. "Nearest settlement is...seventy five miles away. They may not have even noticed it."
Scott frowned. "How far away are we from the bird?"
"Five minutes."
"If the bird checks out we'd better investigate. Hell, maybe we should investigate anyway. What do you say, shall we go to Greenland?"
Mats just nodded and I said, "Why not? I've always wanted to see some of the rest of the world. Why not start towards the top? And just what flavor is that pizza?"
Mats looked puzzled. "Pizza flavor, of course."