Geosynchron (47 page)

Bali Chandler raised his hands up in mock surrender.

"I think I'm missing something important here," he said. "And
believe me, it wouldn't be the first time. But what does Brone have to
do with Len Borda? Why can't we deal with the MultiReal question,
and then tackle Borda-or the other way around?"

"Two months ago, we could have," said the lieutenant executive.
"But now Borda is aware that the Thasselians have access to MultiReal.
He knows that the window of opportunity is short, and he will try to
seize the program before Brone can launch it on the Data Sea."

The Islander scratched his perpetually stubbled chin. "How did he
find out?"

"Krone made sure of it," said Natch.

Everyone stared at the entrepreneur uncomprehendingly.

"You don't know Brone like I do," continued Natch. "He's hoping
that Len Borda comes after him. He's hoping that we do too. Armed
Council officers storming his compound would be the perfect justification for releasing the program on the Data Sea and starting his Revolution of Selfishness. And it would give him the perfect vehicle for getting the word out about it.

"That's why he moved his base of operations from Old Chicago to
the Kordez Thassel Complex. He either believes the program's ready
for release-or that he's almost out of time. So he's hunkering down in
his own building in a public space where he's much more difficult to
get to.

"Now he's got both you and Len Borda in a stalemate. You've been
too preoccupied with outmaneuvering each other to pay attention to
MultiReal. But sooner or later, Borda will go after MultiReal, whether
he needs it to defeat the rebellion or whether the rebellion's been crushed and there's no one to stand in his way. Until then, Brone can
afford to wait for someone to make a move. He can continue polishing
up Possibilities 2.0 and getting it ready for public release."

Chandler buried his face in his hands. "This is all so confusing."

"Let me put it in simpler terms," put in Rey Gonerev. "Krone is
looking for any excuse whatsoever to launch MultiReal on the Data
Sea. Len Borda is looking for any excuse whatsoever to seize MultiReal.
We need to prevent both of those things from happening. We need to
kill or capture Brone, and we need to nullify Borda."

"An insane tyrant on the one hand, a lunatic revolutionary on the
other hand, and us caught in the middle," mumbled Horvil.
"Wonderful."

"Killing Brone won't help," said Natch, shaking his head.

"Why not?" said Gonerev.

"That's the first problem he'd solve. He knows that you wouldn't
hesitate to assassinate him-and even if you would, then Borda
wouldn't. What's to prevent you from just raining missiles down on
the Kordez Thassel Complex? MultiReal's not going to be any protection against that. No, he'll rig up Possibilities 2.0 so that if he dies,
the program will instantly get released on the Data Sea. That's pretty
good assassination insurance."

"What makes you so sure?" said Chandler.

"Because that's what I would do."

"So we come up with some black code to incapacitate him," said
Horvil. "Cut him off from the Data Sea. Quell and I ought to be able
to put together something that could do the trick."

"I can help with that too," said Frederic gruffly.

"Yes, but there's another problem you're not considering," put in
Petrucio Patel. "How are you going to actually hit him with it?"

Horvil had no answer for this.

"He's holed up in the Thassel Complex with forty or fifty of his
devotees. He's got MultiReal. Don't you remember the demo Frederic and I did where we were shooting darts at each other using MultiReal?
There's no telling how long Brone could withstand an invasion of
Council officers if he's dug in to his own building. If he's armed his
devotees with MultiReal too, he could fend off hundreds of Council
officers. Thousands, maybe."

"Well, why can't we arm our side with it too?" asked Jara.
"Magan's got no shortage of officers. We could outfit forty or fifty of
them with MultiReal and send them in. We could outfit whole platoons
with MultiReal."

Petrucio shook his head vehemently. "You're overlooking something, Jara. As soon as Brone sees all those platoons headed for the
Thassel Complex, he can just release Possibilities 2.0 on the Data Sea
and be done with it. That defeats the whole purpose of going after him
in the first place. All it takes is one person to sound the alarm, and once
the alarm's been sounded we've lost."

"I don't think Natch could give someone else access to the program
without Brone knowing about it," said Horvil. "So that idea, I think,
is out."

"Wait a minute!" said Benyamin, leaning forward to interpose himself
into the debate. "I can't believe I didn't think of this earlier. Natch has
that backdoor code that gives him one-of-a-kind access to the MultiReal databases. When our fiefcorp was fighting over the program,
Natch was able to move the databases so we couldn't find them." He
turned to Natch. "Why can't you do that to Brone? Move the program
somewhere else and he won't be able to launch it on the Data Sea.
Problem solved." The young apprentice stretched his hands behind his
head and sat back with a very self-satisfied look on his face.

The entrepreneur shook his head. "You're forgetting about the
black code Brone hit me with in Shenandoah," he said quietly.

Benyamin was incredulous. "You mean ... it's still there?"

Natch's uncomfortable silence and lack of a response was a sufficient answer.

"Well ... what does it do?"

The entrepreneur was evidently growing uneasy with this line of
questioning. He turned to his old hivemate. "Horvil?"

"After talking this over with my fellow bio/logic engineers"-
Horvil clicked his tongue and pointed at Quell and Frederic Patel, who
both nodded in acknowledgment-"and after consulting with a neural
programming specialist"-he indicated Serr Vigal, who also nodded"we've concluded that what Brone installed in Natch is a conduit. It's
like a big pipe that leads directly into your neural cortex and lets
someone pump all kinds of nasty code straight into your skull. Very
difficult to program, and very difficult to obtain. But that's the only
way we can explain everything this black code has been able to do.

"As long as Natch has that conduit running through him, it
doesn't matter where he moves the databases. Brone will be able to
access MultiReal through Natch, if that makes any sense. As long as
Natch has access ... Brone has access."

The entire concept seemed to make Benyamin's skin crawl. "Does
that mean Brone's had access to the program this whole time?"

"No, we think only since Chicago, when Natch gave him core
access."

"You gave him core access? Why the fuck would you do that?"

The old Natch that Magan remembered would have fired back
some caustic remark at the surly apprentice. But the Natch who had
emerged from Chicago and 49th Heaven merely looked at Benyamin
with a look of quiet consternation. "My memories of that day have
been erased," he said. "But I believe I handed him access to MultiReal
because he was torturing me to death."

Silence.

Magan studied the entrepreneur's face carefully. He had been through torture training himself during his days as a Council special
operative-learning both how to take it and how to dispense it. He
had never forgotten what the instructor had said in those sessions: Torture warps the mind in ways that not even biollogics can fully repair. Looking
at Natch now, Magan could see that statement personified.

Horvil clasped his hands together and stretched them up over his
head, an obvious-and unsuccessful-attempt to loosen the tension in
the room once again. "So the long and short of it is ... Natch and
Brone both have access to MultiReal now. And neither one can lock the
other out."

"Isn't there some way to remove Brone's black code?" said Jara.
"With all the brainpower in this room, surely we should be able to
figure out how to do that."

"There is a Council surgical team waiting to operate on Natch
directly after the conclusion of this meeting," said Magan. "But given
the circumstances ..." He let the sentence drift off unfinished.

"That shit's been buried in Natch's OCHREs for months now,"
Horvil elaborated. "We should have made an all-out effort to remove
it right after the demo in Andra Pradesh, but ..." But Natch was too
busy running away from the Council, Horvil was too polite to say. "The
code has had plenty of time to burrow in and get comfortable. It's
going to be a bitch to remove now. And let's not forget that we run
into the same challenge here as everywhere else. Once Brone realizes
he's in imminent danger of losing his conduit ..." The engineer made
a loud popping sound by flicking the side of his cheek. "He pulls the
trigger and releases MultiReal onto the Data Sea."

"Hold on," said Jara. "If this conduit lets Brone stick black code in
Natch's head at will, then how do we know he's not using it to eavesdrop on us? How do we know he's not inflicting some kind of mind
control on Natch?"

"It doesn't quite work that way," said Petrucio. "I seriously doubt
Brone would be able to do that."

"But you wouldn't rule it out?"

Petrucio stroked his mustache for a moment as he considered this
question. "No, not entirely," he said with a grin.

Frederic Patel had mostly been listening to the conversation up to
this point, making the occasional grumble under his breath. But suddenly something inside him cracked. "Is this program really that
important?" he shouted, smacking the table with a clenched fist. "Do
we really need to work so hard to keep MultiReal intact? Just delete the
fucking thing already, Natch, and let's get it over with!"

The entrepreneur gave a knowing smile. "If it were only that easy,"
he said. "I've tried."

Multiple people at the table held their breath. "And ... ?" said
Frederic.

"Quell said this program creates its own rules. He was right. As far
as I can tell, MultiReal can't be disabled. And it can't be deleted. It literally just ... doesn't respond to attempts to erase it."

Quell leaned back in his chair and let out a long, ragged breath.
"And they wonder why we're skeptical of bio/logic technology," he
muttered to Chandler, who responded with a smirk and a nod.

"We continually circle back to the same problem," said Rey Gonerev,
taking control of the discussion again as was her wont. "Krone insists
on releasing MultiReal to the entire world, free and without encumbrances. No amount of logic or reason will convince him otherwise.
Killing him is not an option. So unless the surgery to remove this conduit proves successful, we have to find some way to incapacitate Brone.
Not only do we have to accomplish this before Len Borda grows impatient and attacks the Thassel Complex, we have to do this in a way that
Brone doesn't see coming. But since Brone and his minions all have
access to MultiReal, that's a next to impossible task."

A hush fell on the room as everyone seemed to be silently contemplating the challenges ahead, what was at stake. The potential consequences of failure. Magan's thoughts drifted back to Papizon's chart
and all the dead citizens piled up inside those curves above the red line.

"I knew it would come to this," said Natch in a voice barely above
a whisper.

All turned to look at him.

"The only way to deal with Brone is by using MultiReal," continued the entrepreneur. "And the only one who can use MultiReal
without alerting Brone is me." He sounded preternaturally calm, as if
this was a line of reasoning he had deduced and come to terms with a
long time ago.

"What are you suggesting?" said Rey Gonerev.

"I'm suggesting that I'll need to go in there. Into the Kordez
Thassel Complex. Give me a dartgun with the black code that Quell,
Horvil, and Frederic put together. I'll go in there, find Brone, and disable him. If I catch him by surprise, I can hit him with the black code
before he releases Possibilities 2.0 on the Data Sea. If not, I can still
catch him in a choice cycle loop and stop him from releasing the program that way. Nobody else can do that."