DISCLAIMER: The World of Darkness, including the Technocracy, the Virtual Adepts, and the laws of true magick in general is the property of White Wolf. All characters of this story are mine, but the setting is borrowed.
This is my first attempt at a Mage story. More chapters are to follow.
I'm not sure how it started. I suppose a wise man would say that nothing ever starts, come to that. A wise man would say that things just carry on, that there has been no true beginning since Genesis or the Big Bang or whichever theory you happen to patronise. But I'm not a wise man. I'm a foolish man – or at any rate a man who has been acting like a fool for most of his thirty-three years. I want answers – and in this case, I have none.
I'm fairly sure when I noticed that it had started, though. There was a time and a place where I, for the first time, noted that I wasn't the person I thought I was, the person I had always been up to then. Until I learn how to be wise, that will have to suffice. So; it started there and it started then.
Strangely, it didn't start with any of the things in my life that had been terrible or miraculous right from the start, though I only noticed it after things had gotten stranger. It didn't start with Patrick Farson, this shadowy 'father' of mine. It didn't start with Diana Helsing, with Greystone Entertainment, or with Karl Militts and his misguided schemes.
It started my home computer switching on without my help and starting to threaten me.
I had just gotten home from the office, a bit later than I really liked. For some reason, it's always been against my principles to bring my work home with me. My home is my castle, and a castle free of bookkeeping and reports if I have any saying in the matter. With my job, that means I spend most of my time at the office, making sure everything is done before I go home. But never mind that. At least when I'm at home, I'm at peace.
I live in a three-room apartment in the middle of the city. I suppose I could afford something larger, or something in a quieter neighbourhood. But I'm not all that interested in where I live. The place gives me somewhere to sleep and to read, and pretty much everything else I do elsewhere anyway.
I do have a computer, though. I'm not sure why. I'm not one of those guys who swear curses and damnation over the 'infernal machines' at every opportunity – in fact I find them fascinating – but I have plenty of opportunity to handle them at work. Still, I keep one around out of general principle. And it's good for an occasional game of chess.
The computer is standing on a table in my living room, clearly visible from the door, and when I got inside this night, I saw the screen glow green in the darkness. I frowned. I must have left it on after using it the last time. Sloppy. It's not good to keep electric devices running for too long. It could have started a fire.
As I locked the door, turned on the light and walked over to it, I realised that I hadn't even touched the thing for days. Could it have been on for that long, without me realising it? Granted, I had been busy – it was the time of year when we had to get the department's annual report in order, which required a lot of supervision on my part – but it still seemed strange.
The next possibility was a bit scarier. Could someone have broken in, in whichever way? I had no idea why a burglar would switch on the PC (looking for codes, maybe? or perhaps someone thought that I had corporate secrets hidden in it?) but it was the only thing I could think of. And then he might still be there.
Now, I'm a big guy. I've got some sort of weird metabolistic effect going for me that keeps my muscles strong even though I never lift weights or anything like that. But that's not the same thing as being a brawler. I feel sick at the sight of blood. I didn't even get into fights in kindergarten. Even a thief armed with nothing but fists and desperation could probably take me. And one that had a knife, or worse, a gun…
I stood still, even holding my breath. I listened. I did not consider my hearing good enough to hear heartbeats or anything like that, but even so, you usually know when a place has people in it, don't you? I do, at least.
Nothing. My every sense told me that I was alone in my apartment.
I turned the rest of the lights on and quickly walked through each room, checking for things that had gone missing. My TV was still in place, as was my radio. The paintings still hung on the walls. I had some old and valuable volumes in what I somewhat pretentiously styled my "library," and they were still there, too.
My breaking-and-entering theory seemed to be falling to pieces by the second. I shook my head and went back into the living room again, shutting off the computer. Maybe it had just started itself for no particular reason? Like a sort of electronic burp? There was a reason for everything, but not necessarily a simple reason.
I took my clothes off and hung them neatly over the chair in the bedroom. Then I put on the shorts I sleep in, and went to brush my teeth.
When I walked through the living room, the computer was on again, flashing me the green Windows screen. I wrinkled my brown. Hadn't I…? Yes, I most certainly had!
All right, not an electronic burp, then. A malfunction. I would have to call someone about this tomorrow. For now, though, I'd just have to get a bit more extreme. I turned off the computer again, then knelt beside the table and pulled the plug out of the wall. There.
I went to the bathroom, brushed my teeth, and came back to see the screen lit and active once more.
I scratched my head. What was this? How could a computer, or any machine, be running once you had cut off its power source? This whole situation was ridiculous. Still, I felt a spark of interest starting to mix with the annoyance. Perhaps it was because I had spent the whole day going through budgets and calculations and reports. I had wallowed in boredom; a mystery was, in a way, exactly what I wanted right now.
On the other hand, it was two in the morning, and if I was lucky I might get three our four hours of sleep until my alarm clock went off and told me to get back to the treadmill. I wanted a mystery, but I wanted to sleep even more.
Still – I couldn't just leave it running. It went against my whole upbringing. You kept things orderly, my parents had taught me. You kept things orderly, and you put things back when you were done with them. And that included keeping computers switched off when you weren't using them.
Regardless of the computer's opinion in the matter.
I checked the contact. It was still unplugged. The computer seemed to run on ghost-energy. I contemplated getting a screwdriver, opening the plastic shell up and searching for a battery in here. It was the only explanation I could think of for how this might be happening. But why anyone would want to install a battery in a PC was beyond me. It wasn't as if you could move it around easily, now was it?
Driven more by curiosity than anything else, I sat down and opened a few files. Everything seemed normal. I started a game of Bombs and blew myself up, and it was all as it always was. Except for the fact that I was sitting in front of a disconnected computer.
I wondered if I had gone insane. Maybe I was just imagining the computer being on; maybe I was sitting in front of a dark screen, moving the mouse around and clicking at nothing. As answers went, that one was as sensible as I could think of.
Still… shouldn't madness be a bit more, well, interesting? Either more traumatic or more liberating? What sort of inner conflict could possibly be resolved by imagining a computer that wouldn't switch off? If this was my subconscious harassing me, I really couldn't have much imagination…
Besides, I didn't feel insane. The situation was crazy, but I wasn't. As far as I could tell, I was the same as I always had been.
Well, there was a simple way to test it. I was fairly sure that I had, in fact, unplugged the computer. I could see the unconnected wire lying on the floor from where I was sitting. I reached out with a naked foot and touched it. It felt real enough. So if I was imagining something, it would be far easier to imagine a picture on the screen. And if I was in fact only seeing the computer as switched on in my own diseased mind…
… there was no way that I could send someone an email, was there? I grinned to myself, pleased with my reasoning. I'd send Diana, my secretary, a letter about something trivial. Remind her that I wanted a list on manuscripts currently considered for publishing on my desk by noon tomorrow, say. And then, when I found it there after lunch (which I would in any case; Diana never really needed to be reminded of anything), I'd make a casual remark like "So you got my mail?"
If she then said "What mail?" I'd know I was in trouble. And if she didn't…
If she didn't, something very strange was going on.
I clicked on the mailbox icon. Instead of the program starting, though, I suddenly got a message in red printed across the screen.
We see you, Farson.
Peculiar. Aside from everything else, my name is Stromberg, not Farson. I felt a bit shaky – things were getting a bit creepy – but to my surprise, I also felt… exhilarated. I might be facing a stalker who had broken into my apartment and made some serious adaptations to my computer – and that was just the explanation that occurred to me immediately; I didn't doubt that there were others, and worse ones – but at least I wasn't bored anymore.
I did know a Patrick Farson, namely my godfather. Though why someone would think the best way to reach him was here was beyond me. I saw Patrick maybe every six months or so, and our little meetings never lasted longer than an hour, at most.
The writing on the screen faded away. A new line replaced it.
Reality is subjective, Farson.
"Most profound," I mumbled dryly. I was still a bit scared, and I was still a bit excited, but now I was also starting to feel a hint of contempt. I got the impression that whoever was behind this watched far too many bad movies. He wanted to freak me out. Well, maybe he was succeeding, just a little, but I'd be damned if I was going to panic because some idiot who couldn't even get my name right was trying to spook me.
I wrote "Who are you?" on the keyboard, just to see what would happen. In response, the screen showed a new line.
I am who I am.
I winced and wrote: "That is from the Bible. I seriously doubt that you are God."
I am the God in the Machine, Farson.
There it was again. I wrote: "My name is Simon Stromberg. I am not Farson."
There was a brief pause. I wondered, faintly amused, if the program had not been instructed for how to react if the user claimed to have another identity. I had more or less decided that this had to be some kind of conversation program. Those existed, I had gotten the impression of; they were capable of interacting with a user, answering questions and storing received information, but they weren't really AI:s, and they could only react within their parameters.
If so, this was outside of them; the program ignored my claims to Stromberghood.
We will meet soon, Farson, it wrote. Then the computer shut down, all the lights going off and the screen going blank.
I plugged the contact back in and started it up again, but no matter how much I looked, I couldn't find any trace of a new program on the hard drive. And when I switched it off, it stayed switched off, though I waited an hour for it to get back on by itself again.
I suppose I should have gone to the police the next day, but I didn't. First of all, the story was just too crazy for me to tell it to anyone just yet. I was fairly certain that I could keep them from throwing me into a room with soft walls; I'm a junior executive, and I have strings to pull, if I feel the need for that. But at the same time, if word got out that I received melodramatic threats during chat sessions on a switched-off computer, people would get nervous. The President of Greystone Entertainment might decide that he didn't want a nutcase in a high position. I might not get fired – my record was very nearly flawless – but I would certainly be under a significantly more thorough watch, and the next slip would cost me my job.
And second, well…
Thing is, this was my mystery. I didn't want a bunch of detectives running all over it. I wanted to see what would happen, though I had a feeling I might come to regret that curiosity. But really, so what? There were precious few that would miss me, if the worst came to be. My parents, possibly, but they'd get over it.
I wouldn't have felt this way a year ago, I mused as I stood in the elevator on the way up to my office. Oh, I might have been curious, but I would still have wanted someone else to take care of it for me. Why this new itching for doing things myself? Something that came with age, possibly? Maybe that feeling of Can't someone else do it? had just been a lingering trace of juvenile sloth. Still, that theory didn't feel all that likely. Maybe I should see a shrink or something to have it explained to me…
No. I didn't have time to go on some sort of sight-seeing tour through my own mind. That thought felt proper and mature, but it also left a kind of lingering sadness in me. I tried to ignore it and stepped out of the elevator, into a hallway, and then into a corridor.
"Good morning, Mr. Stromberg," one of my co-workers said politely as he passed me, carrying a bundle of papers.
"Good morning, Nicholas," I said absently. I felt a trace of guilt over not adding something more to that. I should have asked him about some aspect of his life that was on his mind at the moment. Not that I cared all that much, but it increased the morale in a team if the director showed an interest. But I was tired, and I had a lot on my mind. Next time, I promised myself. When I wasn't so distracted.
I walked through my secretary's office to get to mine. She was already there – I was a few minutes later than usual, which I also blamed on my wilful computer – and I nodded to her where she sat behind her desk.
"Good morning, Diana."
"Morning, Simon." Diana was one of the few people here who had actually taken me up on my offer to use my first name. That pleased me somewhat. It was also good for morale if I didn't seem like a distant and imposing figure, like a vengeful god of a mountaintop. I was part of the team, that was all. "You're looking tired. Did some lucky girl get to keep you up all night?" She grinned shamelessly.
Secretaries shouldn't be allowed to be like Diana, I had sometimes thought. It enforced popular prejudice. She is the kind of person who, no matter how she dresses, always makes everyone who sees her very aware that she's naked under the clothes, if you know what I mean. She's got long, black hair, big dark eyes, skin in a lovely nut-brown shade and a near-constant, teasing smile.
And she flirts. With pretty much everyone. To the credit of me, who hired her, she is also very good at her work. And you can't talk to her for very long without realising how intelligent she is.
"Work kept me up all night," I said flatly. It wasn't entirely true, but I doubted that I should discuss what had really happened with her. A secretary often becomes a confidant, if only because she's the person you spend the most time with, but there were things I didn't know how to confide in anyone.
Besides, she might decide to call an insane asylum for my own good…
Diana chuckled.
"I'm sure that counts as a waste of natural resources."
"Quite," I mumbled and fled into my office. I was far too aware that I was blushing. People tell me I am far too prudent. I never used to pay any attention to them. Some things were appropriate and some things weren't, and that was just the way it was, as far as I could see.
Now? I'm not sure. I've been forced to re-evaluate so many of my opinions…
I closed the door. I sat down behind my desk. I flipped through the "in" pile to get an impression of what I had to do today. All the while, I made a furious effort not to notice the big, white machine standing, quietly and smugly, on the desk.
After a few minutes, though, I was all out of material things to occupy my attention with. This is the paperless age, after all – in the end, I had to acknowledge the presence of my office computer. I stared darkly at it.
Oh, come on, I told myself. It's not even the same one. What're you so afraid of?
But I already knew. I was afraid of weirdness – of something I had no control over. I mean, if your computer can insult you after having been disconnected from the wall, you have moved far beyond what is so poetically called "the fields we know." And no matter who you were, you had no authority in that place.
But there was more to it than that. The whole thing was also a riddle – and I've always been a sucker for riddles. In the end, it was that thought more than anything else that made me switch on the computer.
I was in equal parts relieved and disappointed when I was logged into my account in the company network. Nothing special here. Well, to work, then. There were reports to be written and presentations to be prepared. Wouldn't do to let the team down, after all.
Only…
Only, my home computer hadn't started acting really weird until I tried to write an email, had it?
I shook my head. This was nonsense. I had work to do, and the last thing I needed was to get obsessed with what was probably just some kind of virus or something.
Still, it wouldn't take long at all to just give it a quick look. I surrendered to my irrational curiosity and opened the email program. The inbox list appeared on the screen just like a hundred times before. A few messages on the top of the pages were blinking, indicating something I hadn't read. I checked through them without much interest. All right, there were those sums I'd asked for, good, good… This was some kind of advertisement, delete that… And this…
… was simply a single line, no sender address, no topic, nothing.
Why don't you ask her out?
I blinked. This looked like some kind of self-help course for shy computer geeks to me, except that it didn't offer anything more than that simple question. No links. No addresses. No information.
Why don't you ask her out?
I closed the program.
A second later, it opened itself up again, going right to the letter this time. I felt a sting of fear mixed with a liberal amount of excitement. Now we're talking!
Why don't you ask her out?
"Who?" I said, feeling a bit amused. If this was a rerun of last night, the cast had changed. The person/program/whatever that had called me Farson had struck me as being filled with clichéd menace. This was just a pretty amiable question, if so a rather strange one.
Beneath the sentence, a picture appeared and came into focus. Diana, behind her desk, working. Like she probably looked this moment – but that thought was too insane even for this situation. That picture could have been taken anytime, really.
I smiled. It certainly did answer my question.
Why don't you ask her out?
"Because she's my secretary," I said patiently. "Okay, so I think she's attractive, but she works for me. Ever heard of sexual harassment?"
There was a pause, just long enough for me to start feeling dumb. Talking to an email! There was mental illness, and then there was plain, simple idiocy. Just because something freaky had happened to me last night it didn't mean that I had to start seeing mysticism in every shadow now.
Then the picture of Diana developed spots of blurriness, as parts of it started changing into something else. I wrinkled my brow. Whoever was behind this was certainly into the show-not-tell approach to answering questions. Now what?
First the desk in front of Diana disappeared, showing her, sitting on her chair, working on a computer that wasn't there anymore. Then she shifted position, in a series of small but noticeable steps with a few seconds between each, adapting a more comfortable position. She was now leaning back, grinning in that naughty way that always made me uncomfortable.
Then her clothes started to erase themselves. I stared for a second as they faded away into a greyish blurr, and then quickly looked away. Blushing furiously, I got up and turned around, looking out the window.
Granted, the Internet had a reputation for being easy to find porn on… but…
I made an effort to pull myself together. All right, so someone had fixed up a picture. That shouldn't be too hard, really, for someone who knew his stuff. You could put Diana's head on someone else's body and place the result in a familiar environment. That was all there was too it.
Except I didn't believe that for a second. Not after last night. No, regardless of the utter stupidity of the thought, I believed that someone had actually managed to send me a picture that had never been taken – a picture of Diana with her clothes off.
Which brought me to a somewhat disturbing dilemma; how to get back to work without looking at it? I was sure that it wasn't appropriate of me to look at that photography, but it was sitting smack on the middle of the screen, and I would have to look at said screen in order to close the window.
Though… could it really hurt that much if I just took a quick look? Just for the few seconds it would take me to erase that letter? No one would have to know, after all…
No! I had to keep myself under control here! There was such a thing as proper behaviour, and I would stick to it if it so meant the death of me!
Well. I might not be able to close the window, but I could probably get the hard-drive into the corner of my eye, and then sidle my way up to it and press "reset" – all the while without looking at the screen. That should take care of things.
I turned around ninety degrees clockwise. I found the big, white box at the edge of my vision. I started sidling. I reached the button. I pushed it.
The computer kept giving off the soft hum computers tend to give off when they are switched on. No sudden "VVOOOooooomm" sound of the fan relaxing. No strange bleeps and beeps as it started everything up again. Just the constant, infuriating "mmmmmmm" of a machine faithfully doing its duty.
I closed my eyes for a second. Great. Another one who didn't know when to quit. I had no doubt that even if I pulled the plug out of the wall, I'd still be faced with an active computer – and a picture it was not proper for me to look at.
The temptation came back, and stronger this time.
It's not like I want to look, I told myself. I just don't have much of a choice. This person, or whatever it is, wants me to see this photography. He won't allow me to start working until I have. I should humour him and look for a few seconds. Then he'll let me delete it and I can get back to what I'm supposed to be doing.
And it's not like I haven't wondered, sometimes, is it…?
I angrily pushed temptation, rationalisation, infatuation and what-have-you out of my mind. I was the youngest person ever to be one of Greystone's directors – that should mean that I was reasonably intelligent. Therefore, there was just no way that I was going to let some nameless, faceless computer wiz make me do something I didn't want to do… okay, okay, something I wanted to do but knew I shouldn't do, just because he had some tricks up his sleeve that might count as paranormal.
I didn't, strictly speaking, have to stay here; I could violate my principles, take a load of work and do it at home. I was in charge around here; as long as I made sure my department kept delivering, I could do whatever I wanted. This infernal machine could stand here in an empty office for as long as it took before it got bored and gave it a rest.
Of course, I had a disobedient computer at home, too…
All right, a café or something, then. Or I could rent a hotel room – God knew I could afford it. I could go somewhere where there were no computers. And sooner or later Mr. Mystery would get tired of the joke and give it up.
Wait. What if he didn't get tired of it for all the rest of the day? Then this incriminating picture would stay on the screen for that long. I could lock the door, but the cleaning crew, at the very least, had the key; they would come in and see it, and consider me to be some kind of pervert. And if someone told Diana, she could very probably sue me. I had studied a bit of corporate law, and I seemed to recall that there would be some grounds for a lawsuit in this case.
The idea of Diana dragging me to court over this seemed a bit strange, though. Would she really? I wasn't sure, but it didn't seem like her style. Teasing me about it for years to come, yes, but…
It didn't matter, though. Someone would know, and I couldn't stand that thought. There had to be another way.
I could always smash the screen. Mr. Mystery could make technology do cartwheels, or so it seemed, but he apparently needed some functional technology to start with. Yes, that seemed like a flawless solution. I could say that I had accidentally pushed it off the desk. Clumsy me. No big deal.
I felt vibrant. Outsmarted you there, didn't I, you dirty-minded little weasel? Just one good shove, and away goes…
A hint out doubt appeared in my mind. Was I seriously considering to damage corporate property rather than to take one lousy look at a fairly harmless picture of a naked woman?
Yes.
Why? The voice was soft, polite, and unyielding. And familiar.
I guess everyone does it sometimes; creates a mental adversary to carry out an inner discussion. You know, at each point, that he's you – you're even aware that you're the one making up his lines. Still, you don't quite feel like he's not a different person. If nothing else, if he's not someone else, why's he so intent on proving you wrong?
Because it's not right for me to look, I said. And if I let anyone else see it, they'll think I've done something that's not right. This is the only way.
Do you really think they'll care? Hell, if a man sees it, he's far more likely to think "wow, Mister Stromberg really knows where to find good stuff," than "what a freak."
Doesn't matter. I don't want to be that way and I don't want to be seen that way. It's not who I am.
Who are you?
Someone who knows what's right and proper.
What's right? What's proper?
I paused. It wasn't that I never questioned myself, but this was getting a bit too far. Where was this coming from? Granted, I was getting close to the age when people traditionally look back on their lives and agonises over if they've lived it in the right way (and then goes on in exactly the same anyway as before, naturally), but even so. Why was I suddenly analysing my basic intentions?
It was this whole thing with the emails and messages and whatnot, I decided. It had shaken me up. The world I had known had been compromised, forcing me to ask some questions about my view of it – so first and foremost I had started asking questions about my view of myself. Very logical. Also sounding a lot like complete nonsense, but very logical nonetheless.
So; what was right and what was proper? I knew myself well enough to know that if I did anything before I had gotten my inner doubt to shut up, I was going to feel grudgy and out of shape the rest of the day. Self-disgust wasn't productive. I had to keep it away.
Respecting other people's privacy is proper, I answered. Overriding your basic instincts is proper. Acting with dignity is proper.
So it's okay to make a fool out of yourself in private, say by smashing a perfectly good screen for no sane reason, but not in front of others? my annoying inner voice asked smugly.
Yes.
It's not what you do, it's what people see.
… yes… I thought hesitantly. I had never looked at it like that before. But of course, everything could be made to look like utter stupidity from the right point of view. That didn't mean that it was.
So why don't you remove the picture yourself? No one would know.
I couldn't think of any way to respond to that. It was perfectly true, I was being inconsistent. Either what mattered the most was what others thought of me, or what mattered the most was what I thought of myself. And I had been acting in a way that implied that the latter was the case.
True, what others thought was important, because it decided how well I was able to function in my position and in my personal life – what little there was of that. But on balance, I had to admit that acting appropriately in an objective sense was more important than if others thought I was acting appropriately.
And there was one option I had overlooked, wasn't there? One that allowed me to behave in a flawless way while taking care of the problem. And, unfortunately, one that would make me look like a proper fool.
I made a long detour around the desk, eyes towards the wall and opened the door.
"Diana, would you please help me with something?" I said, forcing the words to come out calmly and firmly.
Diana looked up and nodded with exaggerated sobriety.
"Indeed I would," she said, mimicking my, perhaps overly correct, pronunciation.
"There's a program running on my computer," I said. "I would like you to close it."
Dianna looked amused. I noticed that I was blushing again.
"Is this one of those military things?" she said. "Like when a new recruit is forced to do pointless stuff just to learn to obey orders?"
"No."
"Thing is," she went on, "I have been working here for six months…"
"This is not pointless," I said. "It would not be… in order… for me or for anyone else to do it. Or to even look at… this program. You're the only one who's entitled to do it."
Diana beamed at me.
"I feel so special!" she said cheerfully.
I felt a headache coming on. I sighed and rubbed my forehead.
"Please just do it. And please keep in mind that it was sent to me. I didn't ask for it, and I certainly didn't manufacture it."
"This I need to see," Diana said, rolling her eyes. She walked into my office and looked at the computer. I braced myself for a scream of rage.
All I got, however, was an amused "Huh!" before she pressed a few keys and closed the mail window. Then she strolled out to me again.
"Mission accomplished," she said, raising her hand in a salute. "Was there anything else you wanted to… ask me?" She smiled innocently and fluttered her eyelashes.
I closed my eyes. My face felt like it was on fire. I wanted to sink through the floor. I hadn't felt this embarrassed since my elementary school bully had managed to pull my pants down in front of an entire corridor full of people. For that, I had rallied up some sympathisers – that particular prank was a bit cruel, even among third-graders – and beaten the living daylights out of him. I swore a solemn oath that I would do the same to this hacking menace if I ever got my hands on him.
"No," I said in a broken voice. "No, that would be all."
"Just saying, someone went through a lot of trouble," Diana said in a desperately controlled voice. Was she laughing? I had a feeling that she was. "With…advertisement and all…"
"Aren't you the least bit embarrassed about this?" I complained, opening my eyes again. She was laughing silently, clasping her hand over her mouth and shaking in helpless mirth.
"Nope," she said. "I've got nothing to be ashamed of." She made a gesture at herself. "I mean, this is pretty good for a lady in her mid-thirties, don't you think? That's healthy food and regular exercise for you… Okay, so maybe it's junk food and sitting in front of a computer all day and I've just got a good metabolism, but never mind that." She widened her eyes in mock outrage. "Don't tell me you had complaints?"
"I didn't look," I said sternly.
"No? You missed something," she said smugly. "Well, how about it? Can you think of any questions you might want to ask me?"
I found to my horror that I could. Ninety-nine percent of me wanted to die from pure shame. The last percent thought that this situation was kind of… interesting. It pointed out, in no uncertain terms, that there was a smart, attractive woman here, and that it might be fun to get to know her outside of the office. It argued that if I did ask that question, things might at worst stay the same, and at best turn very interesting indeed. And it was starting to convert a few other treacherous percents into its way of thinking.
"No," I said firmly before the rebellion could work its way up to my head. "Let's get back to work."
She looked a bit disappointed (or was that just male pride fooling me?) but grinned and shook her head.
"It's your loss, mister."
I went back into my room, feeling rather the same way. Was I the stupidest man alive?
No, I answered myself firmly. I just know how to avoid behaving like a teenager. Isn't it enough that I've got some kind of crush on my secretary? That alone is enough to make me a walking cliché! It's pathetic, really. Just like that horny old general in Beetle Bailey…
That thought worked as a very efficient turnoff and restored most of my equilibrium. I was acting as I should act. I was being true to my ideals. I was, in fact, being a splendid example of how a mature, responsible, sensible man in my position should behave. The appearance of various super-hackers in my life had not ruffled my perfect understanding of what was correct behaviour.
There was, all in all, no reason why I should pay any attention to that little voice in my head that was making clucking noises…
I managed to work efficiently for almost an hour after the whole email incident had been handled. Heaven knew it was needed, what with me having to present the results of my department to the board tomorrow; still, I found it hard to concentrate. Everything seemed so depressingly… mundane. Arguing with artificial intelligences or hacker geniuses or maybe (for all I knew) demons who had gone modern and was now possessing computers was distressing, but it was not boring.
That word made me hesitate as I was adding together a long column of numbers to make sure that the accountant responsible for doing that hadn't messed up. Boring? Since when did that word have any importance to me? You did what you had to do, and you did it well because that was a matter of pride – and beyond that, there was nothing. Boring, interesting… those descriptions had no meaning when it came to work. Work was important because it was work. Period.
This sudden change in my way of thinking disturbed me more than the weird things that had been happening. Why was I questioning things to the left and right? Idiocy! I had always had an inquisitive mind, but there were some things that just were the way they were. I had thought I had accepted that years ago, so why did all these doubts come over and plague me now? Hadn't it been enough to go through adolescent insecurity once?
I buried my head in work again to get it all off my mind. It worked. Until the phone rang.
"Yes?" I said gruffly after having pressed a button.
"There's a Patrick Farson who wants to speak with you," Diana said, completely undisturbed by my grumpiness. "I told him you were busy. He told me, more or less, that no one is ever so busy that they can't speak to him. Do you want me to patch him through?"
Patrick. Patrick would be able to shed some light on this whole thing – by telling me who might want to send him threats, if nothing else. If he felt like sharing that information, that was. He wasn't the most informative of people.
"Yes," I said.
"Aw," Diana said. "And I was so looking forward to telling him to piss off… Okay, here he comes."
The phone line gave off a few clicking sounds, and then Patrick's voice snapped out of the speaker. Patrick's voice sounds almost like my own, but his tone of voice can always be described as 'snapping.' In the literal meaning of the word, even; when he speaks, you actually do get the feeling that he is whipping you with his voice.
I didn't let that bother me, though. I neither liked nor disliked Patrick. He had just always been there, popping into my life on irregular intervals and coming with odd requests. My father never wanted to discuss him, either. Patrick was an old friend of his, and that was all he was willing to say.
"Simon?" Patrick snapped.
"Yes," I said simply.
"We must meet."
I had more or less expected that. Patrick always wanted to meet me in person. I wasn't sure why; he certainly never seemed too happy about seeing me. It was always "you're not getting enough exercise" this and "stop using words like 'nasty,' it sounds childish" that, and while we were on the subject, when was I going to shave off that stupid beard?
But that, too, was part of the ritual. Getting rebuked by Patrick on occasion was just something I had to go through, and there was nothing to do about that. I had stopped caring long ago.
"Where?" I said.
Patrick mentioned a café.
"I'll be there in thirty minutes," I said. The line went dead as soon as I had finished talking.
The place Patrick had picked was a rather simple establishment, small and located some distance away from the city centre. It was, however, very clean, and the chairs and tables were organised in what almost seemed to be a mathematically calculated pattern. I could see why Patrick liked it; it was just his style. And, by all means, I could see some appeal in it myself. There are worse things in life than too much organisation.
Patrick was sitting in the most remote table available, holding on to a cup of black coffee like he was daring it to try to make a break for it. As far as I knew, we were not related, but he looked so much like me that it was almost uncanny. He was pretty tall, and had the kind of musculature built you get from spending time at a gym rather than the kind you get by lots of physical outdoor activity. He had brown hair that he kept flawlessly combed, and a broad face that was handsome in the robust way that few women are attracted by. I imagine most women would be frightened off by the way he glared at the world with those big, grey eyes, anyway. Not that Patrick cared about women. He was the ultimate equal rights activist; he treated everyone, whether male or female, as exactly as hopelessly lacking in all kinds of virtues as the next person.
"You're late," he noted as I sat down next to him.
"Sorry," I said. It was no use pointing out that it might be a question of one or two minutes. Excuses don't really cut it with Patrick. I knew that from childhood.
"And you look like shit," he added. "Are you drinking? Answer truthfully."
"No," I said immediately. I drink on formal occasions only. Anything else would be lowering your capabilities, and thereby your ability to carry out your duties.
"What is it, then?" he snapped. "Answer truthfully."
I was going to say that I had been up late last night, working. Then I would have let him say what he had to say, and then asked him how his life was going – was there anyone he was arguing with, for example? It would have been pretty transparent, I guess, but I'm honest by nature and not very good at withholding information. That said, I had every intention to tell him a lie now. I had the words clear in my head. It was just that somewhere on the way to my mouth, they turned into:
"Last night, my computer started threatening me. I couldn't switch it off. It called me 'Farson.' I was too worried and confused to get much sleep."
I felt surprised, but not as much as I might have. When Patrick spoke to you in that particular tone of voice he had, you just couldn't disobey. He had told me to answer truthfully, so that was what I had done. But I hadn't known that I could not even with all my willpower resist one of his orders.
That, I realised with some shock, was not natural. Not if he could make me tell the truth when I had absolutely no inclination to do it. It was not natural in the same way that disconnected computers delivering melodramatic threats was not natural.
"Oh, yes?" He snorted. "Well, you just let me handle that. It's just some fucking idiot playing around. Tell me if you have any suspicions, ideas or knowledge of who caused what you just told me to happen."
"I don't," I said. "But I'm going to find out. Do you have any ideas of who it can be?"
Patrick shook his head. It was more of a disgusted gesture than an answer to my question.
"Don't you mind that. Tell me…"
It was as if all of today and all of last night had been erased. There were no strange emails or inexplicable messages here. There were no mysteries to solve. The fact that I had overcome myself and humiliated myself in front of Diana rather than to humiliate myself in front of myself had no meaning here. Everything was as it had always been.
I didn't matter. That's what he made me feel. That's what he had always made me feel, I supposed. Patrick made me feel unimportant in roughly the same way as the sky makes you feel unimportant if you think too much about it. The sky is there. It's bigger than you. It can pour rain or hailstone at you, warm you or shade you, or it can kill you with a thunderbolt – all at its convenience. And not only can you not resist it, if you tried to it wouldn't even notice…
That was how Patrick appeared to me. And part of me welcomed it. He would take care of things. All I had to do was to be a good boy and obey, like I always did.
A much larger part of me, however, a part that felt new, roared out a NO!
"No!" I echoed. Suddenly I was angry. This was the most interesting thing that had happened to me in a very long time; he was not going to take that away from me. "You tell me something for a change!"
Patrick frowned. This was not part of our routine. He was supposed to sit here and ask me questions – all right, so maybe it was more a matter of demanding answers – for a while, have me tell him all about what happened with my work. Then he was going to ponder for a moment, and then tell me to do something. It wouldn't be anything very taxing; firing someone, making a suggestion to the board, calling up one of my political or financial contacts and asking a favour of some kind. That was how this worked. And no matter how calm Patrick looked, I had a notion that he was stunned by the very idea that I might oppose the order of things.
I felt a bit stunned myself, beneath the anger. This was not how I was supposed to act; I could feel the wrongness of it in every bone of my body. But that just fuelled the fury even more. Every time, every goddamn time Patrick called me I dropped everything and came to see him. I gave him information that was supposed to be confidential and I did him favours despite the fact that I got absolutely nothing in return. And the one time, the one time I wanted something back from him, he just ignored it!
"Such as?" he said. His voice was slow, almost lazy, but all his hands were tightened into fists on his lap.
"What did you mean when you said that it was some idiot playing around? I didn't even know you could make a computer, or any machine, work like that! I thought I was going out of my mind!"
Patrick winced and slowly relaxed.
"Oh, so that's what's bothering you," he said. "Yes. It is possible to do things like that. I don't know the theory, but it's possible. This is just some moron who's got his hands on a piece of experimental technology. I'll handle it. Now, then…"
"I want to handle it myself," I insisted. I had absolutely no idea what I was doing. I was working on pure instinct – or perhaps I should rather say pure adrenalin. Part of me was staring in horrified disbelief as the rest of me acted like a disrespectful child, but for most parts, I felt angry and excited and…
… curious. Yes, that was it. I felt curious like never before, like I needed answers in the same way I needed oxygen. Patrick knew something, and by God he was going to tell me!
"But you're. Not. Going. To." Every word was calm, quiet and with all the force of a blow from a sledgehammer. I felt myself backing for a moment. I wanted to cover in fear and agree to do anything he said. But the next second, the feeling ebbed away. Whatever power he had over me, this order had not been propelled by it.
"Stop telling me what to do." I hated the tone of my voice; I sounded like a rebellious teenager. But Patrick wasn't my father, and I didn't have to…
Hmm?
"You're my father, aren't you?" I said, dumbstruck.
Patrick's chin didn't drop, because it's a well-disciplined chin that doesn't drop except when its owner wants it to. But he looked a bit ruffled.
"What?" he said.
"You are, aren't you?" I said. "It's so obvious! Why didn't I see it before? You look exactly like me, for God's sake! For that matter, why do you look exactly like me, when I know you're at least thirty years older than I am? Why can you give me orders I can't disobey? Why are you always asking me things? What's this all about?"
I stopped, not because I was out of questions, but because I was out of air. I had plenty more things to ask; they just came bubbling up inside of me, too many to voice. I felt like I had been blind my entire life, but now I could see – only, what I saw didn't make any sense. I had never, never questioned my relationship with Patrick, it had never dawned on me how strange it was. Why on Earth not? Had something been done to me so that I couldn't?
That last idea made me stop in my mental tracks. So it was conspiracy theories now, then? Was I losing my mind, after all? Horrible thought, could Patrick be your normal, average godfather, only now something in my brain had glitched and I started seeing him as someone completely alien?
Patrick showed his teeth in something that completely failed to be a grin when he saw doubt spread all over my face.
"Listen to me," he said softly. "I am not your father. All this strange business has gotten to you. You are not thinking clearly. We will have to talk another time, when you have come to your senses. Now, go back to work."
I didn't want to. I wanted to get answers. I wanted to understand.
But I got up and walked away anyway.