Chapter Nineteen
--Evan--
"Mr. Amenkara, is that you?" a voice asked behind the door as it swung open.
Evan blinked. "No.... it's someone else." He stepped inside the room.
It was a computer lab, he could see. Rows of disordered terminals sat upon makeshift benches and desks around the medium-sized room. Along the far wall, his back facing the tinted school windows, sat a young boy.
Almost tripping over a wayward power cord, Evan stepped closer to the center of the lab, taking in the sight of it all. After a moment he decided to focus his attention on the middle schooler who sat before him.
Their eyes met. The kid was short, with a slender build; he wore a loose t-shirt and shorts, and appeared around the age of twelve or thirteen.
The kid's eyes swiveled back to the scree. "Well, if you're not Mr. Amenkara," he continued, "then what, exactly, are you?"
"I'm nothing in particular," Evan replied. "Just stopping by."
The boy turned back to him curiously. "You're SHS. Didn't they dismiss you? What are you doing here, planting explosives?"
"I could say the same of you," he rejoindered. "Why are you so eager for me to leave? What are doing, hacking into the American Pentagon over there?"
The boy frowned. "No," he said, "They don't have any external access. But I know a guy who has an American cousin whose friend installed a wireless transmitter in a U.S. SIPRnet terminal once, inside the Pentagon. Oh, he's in jail now for the rest of his life, though."
Evan couldn't help but like the kid. "Well, don't mind me; I'm just going to be here for a few minutes." He reasoned that he'd be able to use all the terminals, boxes, and monitors to cover his activities sufficiently, so he could plant a monitor without the boy noticing; he couldn't afford to waste any more time, in any case.
"I will certainly not. By the way, I'm Raphael," the boy informed him.
"My name is Evan," the other replied.
--Ienji--
Finally, Ienji heaved the last box onto the top of the pile. He wasn't used to such strenuous labor, but he had enough muscle mass to handle it.
He walked over and informed Mr. Sayomoru that he'd finished, and that he would be doing some research (he felt he needed to say that before he found himself volunteering for something else).
The librarian smiled and said he understood, and that if Ienji wanted to know how he could help, all he need do was ask him.
Bowing on his way out, Ienji took the stairs to the third floor and took a search terminal near the end of the library. He typed in his query, 'digital world', and pressed enter.
He almost certainly expected to find nothing--he would be broadening his search to include the (pseudo?)science of 'empathy', and parallel worlds, and anything else he could think of. Surprisingly, that initial query did turn up a dozen results. But, it was only a children's cartoon, 'Digital Monsters'; nothing scientific or mature.
Thirty minutes later, Ienji had collected a pile of books on alternate universes and 'spiritual' energies. He didn't know whether either would help him in the least, but he took spent the next two hours taking notes in quiet concentration.
--Evan--
"So," Raphael asked, "What are you doing?"
Evan had already prepared a cover story. "Oh, I lost a notebook around here the other day, and I was hoping I'd be able to find it. It has all my work."
The kid frowned. "Well, I'll keep an eye out for it," he said.
As he said this words, Evan finished the last of the monitor preparations. It would tell him when any potentials or--heaven forbid--forged were near.
Right now it was after school, so there were few kids and not much to go on, but he planned on checking the logs after school tomorrow, Tuesday.
Suddenly, he sensed a pulse. Checking his monitor--he'd set it up to interface through his empathy and thereby convey abstract ideas as processed data, without anyone noticing anything--he saw a red dot.
Turning around, Evan looked once more at Raphael. The kid was a potential.
Instead of setting up a scan on the kid, Evan decided to get to know him. As casually as possible, he took a seat next to the boy.
"Are you having more success with what you do than I with what I did?" he asked.
--Ienji--
Ienji set his notebook in his backpack before returning five out of eight books he had taken off the shelves that had subjects he felt related to what he had experienced, and learned of, in the past few days, and checked out the three remaining books for further study at home.
He thanked the librarian, Mrs. Fujimaka, as he left the Siojaton Public Library out the front door and removed his bicycle from the rack. From there he pedaled through the streets back to the apartment building he and his mother lived in.
Evening passed into night quickly and quietly; he almost felt that things had slown down, with the relative calmness of the night in mind. But some part of him felt that it was not over, and would never be over.
Things, he felt, had only begun to develop.
--Evan--
"Success? I'd say so," the boy replied. "Right now I'm simply devising a scheme to develop a Bayesian network to process data to develop a plan for an ideal online communication server/client and medium."
Evan raised his eyebrows as he examined the kid's screen. Raphael clearly was using a nix, but he didn't recognize it as any particular flavor.
"What O.S.?" he asked, genuinely curious.
"Oh, this is Linux, the 7.8 kernel. It doesn't have any distro in particular. I've installed the dualist system on this PC; you may have heard of it. It allows me to use an optimal filesystem structure while at the same time retaining many of the configurative benefits of older systems," Raphael replied. "But, I will not bore you any more than you would like."
Evan meant to respond, but was distracted by a few lines of the screen. "If I may ask, what do those IP address correspond to?"
Suddenly, the boy hit a complex key sequence, and the lines were gone. "What lines?" he replied plainly.
"Oops. I didn't mean to intrude," Evan replied. "I am just lounging about. I'm getting picked up later, so I have some time to waste."
He moved to leave, but Raphael stopped him. "No, no, it's fine. I like having you around here. It is nice to bring life to this place after school hours."
Evan sat back down. "Okay. I was making certain that you did not mind my presence. I don't want to interrupt your work."
"I have two sisters and three brothers back home," the boy replied. "I have built up a natural immunity to distraction. So it is of no consequence."
--Evan--
"Mr. Amenkara, is that you?" a voice asked behind the door as it swung open.
Evan blinked. "No.... it's someone else." He stepped inside the room.
It was a computer lab, he could see. Rows of disordered terminals sat upon makeshift benches and desks around the medium-sized room. Along the far wall, his back facing the tinted school windows, sat a young boy.
Almost tripping over a wayward power cord, Evan stepped closer to the center of the lab, taking in the sight of it all. After a moment he decided to focus his attention on the middle schooler who sat before him.
Their eyes met. The kid was short, with a slender build; he wore a loose t-shirt and shorts, and appeared around the age of twelve or thirteen.
The kid's eyes swiveled back to the scree. "Well, if you're not Mr. Amenkara," he continued, "then what, exactly, are you?"
"I'm nothing in particular," Evan replied. "Just stopping by."
The boy turned back to him curiously. "You're SHS. Didn't they dismiss you? What are you doing here, planting explosives?"
"I could say the same of you," he rejoindered. "Why are you so eager for me to leave? What are doing, hacking into the American Pentagon over there?"
The boy frowned. "No," he said, "They don't have any external access. But I know a guy who has an American cousin whose friend installed a wireless transmitter in a U.S. SIPRnet terminal once, inside the Pentagon. Oh, he's in jail now for the rest of his life, though."
Evan couldn't help but like the kid. "Well, don't mind me; I'm just going to be here for a few minutes." He reasoned that he'd be able to use all the terminals, boxes, and monitors to cover his activities sufficiently, so he could plant a monitor without the boy noticing; he couldn't afford to waste any more time, in any case.
"I will certainly not. By the way, I'm Raphael," the boy informed him.
"My name is Evan," the other replied.
--Ienji--
Finally, Ienji heaved the last box onto the top of the pile. He wasn't used to such strenuous labor, but he had enough muscle mass to handle it.
He walked over and informed Mr. Sayomoru that he'd finished, and that he would be doing some research (he felt he needed to say that before he found himself volunteering for something else).
The librarian smiled and said he understood, and that if Ienji wanted to know how he could help, all he need do was ask him.
Bowing on his way out, Ienji took the stairs to the third floor and took a search terminal near the end of the library. He typed in his query, 'digital world', and pressed enter.
He almost certainly expected to find nothing--he would be broadening his search to include the (pseudo?)science of 'empathy', and parallel worlds, and anything else he could think of. Surprisingly, that initial query did turn up a dozen results. But, it was only a children's cartoon, 'Digital Monsters'; nothing scientific or mature.
Thirty minutes later, Ienji had collected a pile of books on alternate universes and 'spiritual' energies. He didn't know whether either would help him in the least, but he took spent the next two hours taking notes in quiet concentration.
--Evan--
"So," Raphael asked, "What are you doing?"
Evan had already prepared a cover story. "Oh, I lost a notebook around here the other day, and I was hoping I'd be able to find it. It has all my work."
The kid frowned. "Well, I'll keep an eye out for it," he said.
As he said this words, Evan finished the last of the monitor preparations. It would tell him when any potentials or--heaven forbid--forged were near.
Right now it was after school, so there were few kids and not much to go on, but he planned on checking the logs after school tomorrow, Tuesday.
Suddenly, he sensed a pulse. Checking his monitor--he'd set it up to interface through his empathy and thereby convey abstract ideas as processed data, without anyone noticing anything--he saw a red dot.
Turning around, Evan looked once more at Raphael. The kid was a potential.
Instead of setting up a scan on the kid, Evan decided to get to know him. As casually as possible, he took a seat next to the boy.
"Are you having more success with what you do than I with what I did?" he asked.
--Ienji--
Ienji set his notebook in his backpack before returning five out of eight books he had taken off the shelves that had subjects he felt related to what he had experienced, and learned of, in the past few days, and checked out the three remaining books for further study at home.
He thanked the librarian, Mrs. Fujimaka, as he left the Siojaton Public Library out the front door and removed his bicycle from the rack. From there he pedaled through the streets back to the apartment building he and his mother lived in.
Evening passed into night quickly and quietly; he almost felt that things had slown down, with the relative calmness of the night in mind. But some part of him felt that it was not over, and would never be over.
Things, he felt, had only begun to develop.
--Evan--
"Success? I'd say so," the boy replied. "Right now I'm simply devising a scheme to develop a Bayesian network to process data to develop a plan for an ideal online communication server/client and medium."
Evan raised his eyebrows as he examined the kid's screen. Raphael clearly was using a nix, but he didn't recognize it as any particular flavor.
"What O.S.?" he asked, genuinely curious.
"Oh, this is Linux, the 7.8 kernel. It doesn't have any distro in particular. I've installed the dualist system on this PC; you may have heard of it. It allows me to use an optimal filesystem structure while at the same time retaining many of the configurative benefits of older systems," Raphael replied. "But, I will not bore you any more than you would like."
Evan meant to respond, but was distracted by a few lines of the screen. "If I may ask, what do those IP address correspond to?"
Suddenly, the boy hit a complex key sequence, and the lines were gone. "What lines?" he replied plainly.
"Oops. I didn't mean to intrude," Evan replied. "I am just lounging about. I'm getting picked up later, so I have some time to waste."
He moved to leave, but Raphael stopped him. "No, no, it's fine. I like having you around here. It is nice to bring life to this place after school hours."
Evan sat back down. "Okay. I was making certain that you did not mind my presence. I don't want to interrupt your work."
"I have two sisters and three brothers back home," the boy replied. "I have built up a natural immunity to distraction. So it is of no consequence."