The Traveler (13 page)

The young man simply retrieved the envelope with the cashier's check inside and slid it away from him, giving hope to Niles that he was accepting. He looked at Jason, Sarah, Mendenhall, Rodriguez, and Charlie, and then dipped his dark hair in deference to them. He spoke the first words Niles and Collins had ever heard him speak.

“Thank you for getting me out of the situation I was in.” He half smiled at the five people he had thanked. “But it was a situation I was willing to accept for what I had done. In other words no matter what my fate would have been, it was one that I had chosen.”

“Even though that fate was to be torn limb from limb by wild animals?” Jason said, not liking the way the brilliant computer wunderkind was speaking.

“Yes, even that. That man and men like him killed my brother and many, many more with names just as familiar to me and my family. I'm afraid I decline your offer. I have much more work to do at a place a little closer to home for me.”

“I see,” Niles said. Compton cleared his throat and then looked at Rodriguez. He nodded at the director. “Europa, are you online?” Niles asked.

Everyone in the dusty room saw the largest of the five monitors come to life. The printed response was now a familiar sign to those who had been working on Europa since the death of Pete Golding. It was also one of the main reasons why Morales was needed. Europa had not used her voice algorithm since the day she learned Golding would not be coming home. She had remained totally silent. She always fulfilled her duties, but would never respond in voice, only with written text. The Marilyn Monroe voice had not been heard in the computer sciences division since that day.

“
Online Director Compton.
”

“Visual?” Compton asked.

“Optics available.”

“Identify and authenticate manufacturing certificate.”

“XP 2760, Blue Ice systems, Code-named; Europa, Cray manufacturing certificate number—0005, last of series, platform was discontinued in 2001.”

Niles and the others watched the face of Morales and for the first time he showed that he was listening. Still, he sat silent.

“Europa, query,” Niles said.

“Query.”

“Progress on replacement search, computer sciences division director?”

All eyes went to the screen; even Morales looked up as if only curious.

The room was silent as Europa was dark. Only the flashing cursor showed she was still operational.

“Europa, answer query,” Niles persisted.

Silence and darkness on the screen. Compton looked over at Morales, who sat stoically in his wheelchair.

“Europa, number of qualified candidates?”

“Seventeen qualified candidates.”

“List the seventeen, please,” Niles asked, knowing what was coming.

Silence again. Compton exchanged looks with Virginia and Collins. They were as mystified as he. Still, Europa was dark, just the flashing cursor after Compton's query.

“Europa, list qualified candidates as chosen by computer sciences, please.”

“Xavier Morales.”

All eyes went to the quiet man in the corner. His brows rose but that was the limit of his surprise.

“List the names of other candidates, please.”

Silence and darkness on the screen.

“Europa, separate query, file clearance, Compton, Niles, director, Department 5656. Criminal activity file, United States, query: name person or persons responsible for breaking security protocols for Europa Blue Ice system in the winter of 2012?”

“Xavier Morales, age 25 years 3 months, Los Angeles, California. Duration of criminal activity, seventeen seconds. Trace completed 1/23/2012. No charges filed this date.”

“Does that date sound familiar, Mr. Morales?”

The young man finally used his strong hands to push his chair forward and wheeled around. He was looking up at the large monitor.

“Rumor,” he said under his breath as he continued to look at the black screen in front of him.

“Excuse me?” Henri said, interested in the goings-on of the world's most advanced computing system. Morales didn't look back as he spoke.

“That night I was chasing a rumor when I hooked up with … with…”

“My computer system,” Niles said, falsifying his anger to a degree.

“Yes, I used a little-known Cray algorithm to get through.” He turned to face Compton and the others. “I laid a trap and your system found me.”

“You don't have to bother us with the details of your crime, but needless to say you broke into one of five Blue Ice systems in the world. Europa is the most advanced of those systems.”

“They are real,” Morales said as his verbal tone went into one of wonder at what he was hearing. “They do exist. How many again, this one and four others? Let me guess, the Pentagon,” he thought, biting his lower lip as he saw it through. “The CIA, FBI, and the National Security Agency?”

Silence greeted his educated guess. His face suddenly turned white. “Your system set me up?” he asked.

“No, not Europa on her own, our computer sciences director found you after your little hacking foray and wanted to know if you could do it again. You did three days later, and that was when Europa trapped you. Thus the reason why you are here.”

“And that makes this young man qualified just because he happens to be good at breaking and entering?” Jenks said with a laugh as he pulled a fresh cigar from his shirt pocket, but replaced it when Virginia raised her brows.

“I'm not qualified. No one is. The Blue Ice system is a system designed to learn at advanced rates. It pioneered the memory sheet for processing. The rumor is that there was one Blue Ice out there with an advanced Bubble Memory processor that has yet to be authenticated by anyone. I suspect this system has that Bubble Chip memory. Who designed it?”

“Dr. Pete Golding.”

Morales looked at Niles and his jaw dropped.

“Dr. Golding, the former chair of computer sciences at MIT?” he asked.

“The same,” answered Compton with a look at Charlie Ellenshaw, who sat and listened but his eyes were boring in on Morales.

“I did my dissertation on Dr. Golding and his AI theories my sixth year.”

“Yes, we know.”

“Can I speak to him? I have a million questions to ask,” Morales said.

“I agree with the master chief,” Charlie said, standing up so fast his chair fell over. “This kid isn't qualified to take Pete's place!” He angrily left the dining area and exited the building altogether.

Morales for the first time looked stunned. He turned and watched Ellenshaw as he left. Then he faced Niles once more.

“You'll have to excuse the professor,” Compton said, but did not elaborate on Charlie's anger.

“Pete was killed two months ago,” Jack answered for Niles.

Morales actually looked saddened at the news.

“He was a great man, well advanced in his theories.” He turned his chair and then wheeled away.

“Mr. Morales, Europa has been acting very strangely since the loss of Dr. Golding.”

“She's not using her voice algorithm?” he asked without turning back around. “Refusing to answer certain inquiries?”

“Yes, to both questions,” Niles said.

Morales wheeled around and faced the screen.

“The peccadillos of artificial intelligence, ladies and gentlemen. I theorize that the Blue Ice systems, especially one in which Dr. Golding was continually educating, are very peculiar. They sense change, read change, adapt to change. She would not be happy having someone else's hands on her systems. She's spoiled, you might say.”

“So why would she focus on you and only you?” Compton asked, hoping beyond hope that the young man had an answer.

“I don't know. Why don't we ask her?”

“Be my guest, but she hasn't been advised of your presence and has no knowledge you're here. So don't be surprised if she doesn't answer you.”

The others in the room watched as Morales pushed his chair forward and faced the large monitor.

“Really, no knowledge?” Morales asked with a smile. “Europa, are you online and do you currently have optical capability?”

“Yes,”
she typed out, but was still silent.

“Identify questioner, please,” he asked, watching the screen. They saw the small box atop the monitor as the aperture on the camera lens focused on the man in the wheelchair. There was silence but only for a moment, and then magic happened.

“Xavier Edmund Morales.”

Looks were exchanged between Group members as they heard the simulated voice of Marilyn Monroe as she answered verbally for the first time in two months. Morales turned and looked at the people behind him.

“Hello, Europa, it is very nice to meet you.”

Jenks looked at Virginia and rolled his eyes. “Love at first sight,” he whispered.

“Europa, members of the staff are curious as to why you chose me among all the other qualified candidates?”

Silence.

“Europa, you are instructed to answer my query.”

Morales continued to look at the monitor. He turned and looked at Compton. Then back again.

“Europa, please power down and go off-line for the next twenty-four hours.”

“What are you doing? That system is needed in other places,” Niles said as he struggled to stand and finally making it with Jason's assistance.

“Europa, off-line at sixteen forty-five hours.”

The room fell silent as Morales turned away from the monitor.

“You have a very sick Blue Ice system there.”

Compton looked at Ryan and then slowly sat back down.

“I suspect that she's learning how to grieve.” Morales wheeled to the large dirty window and looked out at the falling sun over the desert. “When dealing with liquid memory bubbles, one has to know that some of those bubbles may become corrupt if the intelligence refuses to accept a certain input.”

“What are you saying?” Sarah asked.

“She is refusing to contemplate that her creator has left the building, so to speak,” he said, and then immediately felt bad for making light of Dr. Golding's death. “We just don't know enough about Blue Ice dynamics and how they will integrate to a liquid bubble memory system. She is highly capable of expansion of that system and she doesn't know how to do it. Dr. Golding wasn't there to explain it to her. This is why I shut her down until someone qualified can go in and expand her liquid systems to accept new data on operations, and one thing Dr. Golding never instructed her on … death of the human species. Oh, she's read about it, but never thought about it … she chose me to do it because she really doesn't trust anyone else. Why? Because I guess she believes I was smart enough. Why, I don't know.”

“Because you were the only person ever to successfully break into a Blue Ice system outside of Europa herself,” Niles said as he took in Morales.

“I suspected as much. Very temperamental, these experimental Cray systems.”

Compton started gathering his paperwork together. “Good, you're hired. Salary is commensurate with a first-year government employee.”

“God, the poor kid's going to be broke the rest of his life,” Jenks said with a laugh.

“Hey, wait a minute, I don't even know what it is you want me for. I mean, what have you people got planned, and more importantly”—he looked at the tattooed face of his rescuer, Ryan—“who in the hell are you people?”

Niles stood with his briefcase with the help of Ryan and Mendenhall.

“Planned?” Niles asked, looking from Morales to the others who were just as curious. Sarah, Jason, Charlie, nor even Will Mendenhall knew what was up. Only the senior management team at the center knew and for the past two months only Anya had knowledge of what was going on. As for the former Israeli Mossad agent, she stood and went to look out of the filthy window deep in thought. Compton shook his head as he took in each new face and even those that were usually in the know. “We are going to attempt to bring home a friend from a very long distance away.”

Morales looked at Niles and the others.

“Now, we need you, Mr. Morales. Do we have you?”

Xavier Morales looked from Compton and then to the large blank screen of the monitor.

“I can make sure my mother is taken care of?”

“We have taken the opportunity to move your mother to a better location, but she remains close to her friends, she is very safe,” Collins said as he advanced and gave Morales a file. “All the information is in there. She's expecting you to call sometime tonight.”

Morales looked at Jack and was amazed at how fast these people worked. He then looked at Compton again.

“Europa will be my responsibility?”

“Yes, complete control of computer sciences and her one hundred and twelve techs.”

Morales smiled and just nodded. “The least I can do is take a look at her.”

“No, it's either in or out. If out, you will never hear from or see us ever again.”

He could see how serious Niles was. Again he nodded. “I'm in.”

Niles smiled and nodded. “Welcome aboard Department 5656.”

“Now, where are we going?” Henri Farbeaux asked as everyone stood to leave.

Collins went to Henri and stood in front of him with the largest, most uncomfortable smile Henri had ever seen on the face of the most stoic man he had ever met.

“Henri, even you wouldn't believe it if I told you.”

“Yes? Well, why don't you give it a try?”

Jack smiled again as he gathered up his own materials. He then looked at Ryan, Sarah, and then finally Mendenhall, knowing they wanted to know just as bad.

“We're going back to Antarctica, Henri.”

Jack turned and left.

“You know I hate the cold,” Henri said as he wanted the others to protest as much as himself. But they were just as stunned.