Chapter Fifteen
Plans
Even though the Academy's IHT simulations had been shut down, almost all of the students kept in touch over their multiComs. Speculation ran rampant on whether or not all the Academy faculty members were IHT-generated personalities. Some of the more mathematically inclined students were setting odds on which of the faculty were real and which weren't.
Cameron, Rosa, Sam, and Vee were discussing all the rumors. It was December 28th.
"Remember the reporter from WBN? You know, the one who interviewed Cameron and Rosa," said Vee.
"Meagan Fletcher," said Cameron.
"Yeah, she works for GundTech now, doesn't she?" asked Rosa.
Sam confirmed Rosa's comment.
"Remember what she said about sorting truth from rumor?" asked Vee. "What if we collected all the reports and rumors about the glitches and bugs in the simulations?"
Sam caught on to Vee's idea. "That is brilliant, Vee. We collect all the data in one spot where we can analyze it."
"Exactly," said Vee.
Rosa expanded on the idea. "We'll ask all the students to submit every error they can personally remember and have them rate the reports on how clearly they remember the incident."
"Vee and I will search the news archives for any mention of problems in the public IHT simulations," said Sam.
Vee added, "And we will see if we can access GundTech's monitor logs for confirmation."
"I guess I know what we'll be doing for the next few weeks," said Cameron.
The meeting in Oslo had just been adjourned. During the meeting, Meagan learned the full extent of the problems cropping up in the IHT simulations. Gus was also informed that Professor Ling's project had experienced a single "outbound anomaly," but was on schedule. Meagan, Gwen, and Gus remained seated at the conference room table as the others filtered out.
"That's not too bad, is it?" Meagan directed the comment to Gus. "Bugs are to be expected in new programs, and there doesn't seem to be anything major here. Best yet, problems with the public simulations were limited to programs shutting down because there were to too many users."
"It's a problem we can solve with participation limits," said Gwen. The she gave Gus a probing look. "What's this project you have Ling working on? What's an 'outbound anomaly'?"
Gus remained silent, as if he hadn't heard Gwen's questions. He looked forlorn with his large frame hunched forward, elbows resting on the table, and his fingers pressed together before his face. "What about COMFORT?" he asked finally.
Meagan sent a furtive glance in Gwen's direction. She could see a trace of anger in Gwen's eyes. Or was it concern? Gwen was obviously not accustomed to having her questions ignored by her boss. "Well, there's good news and bad news," Meagan responded in a tone meant to lighten the heavy atmosphere in the room. "First, the good news. COMFORT has stopped its heavy-handed media campaign against technology. Well, it really didn't have much choice in the matter, since most respectable media outlets refused to run their ads."
"That is good news," said Gwen. "Isn't it Gus?" Her eyes were trying to be bright; her mouth was forced into a smile; her voice searched for soothing tones.
"And the bad news?" asked Gus.
Gwen's strained expression collapsed. Again she had been ignored.
"The bad news is, my sources say this Calthern fellow, the Swiss guy who finances the committee, may attempt to shut down the Academy."
Gwen was staggered by the news. "What? How?"
"A friend from WBN said she saw a presentation of a so-called documentary Calthern produced. It's pretty nasty stuff. He says the Academy is an attempt to brainwash the children of the world. He's trying to fan the flames of suspicion and fear of AI. My friend said Calthern heavily uses images of the Nazi youth movement of the 1930s and 40s in his attacks."
"They won't let him… I mean…" Gwen was almost in shock.
"WBN all but bodily threw Calthern's agent from the building, and I suspect all the legitimate media will do the same." She saw Gwen breathe a sigh of relief. "But don't get too complacent. I've done some research into this guy. He's almost as hard to track as you, Gus. But not quite. He initially made his money — a lot of money — during the original tech boom in the 1990's. The guy had an impeccable sense of the market's rhythms. He knew what and when to buy and sell. What this all means is, he has deep pockets — very deep pockets! He'll probably just lease a comNet channel and broadcast the thing twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week."
Gwen was livid. "Can't we stop him from leasing a channel? For God's sake, we practically own the comNet."
"Yes, you do practically own the comNet. You could bring to bear all the awesome force of this corporation on any service provider who might lease a channel to COMFORT. But there's the little issue of freedom of speech," said Meagan. "It was GundTech's, or should I say Gus', high ideals that brought me here. If we attempt any heavy-handed tactics or willfully violate anyone's rights, I will walk away from this without a second thought." The two women glared at each other.
"Thank you, Gwen," Gus said somberly. "You can go now."
"You don't want me to stay?"
"No. Thanks. I want to talk to Meagan privately for a moment."
Gwen rose brusquely and shot a penetrating look at Meagan Fletcher. She then shifted her gaze to the man sitting across the table. Her face softened, and her eyes glistened with moisture as she saw him staring blankly into his now clasped hands. "I will see you tomorrow, then," she said softly before turning to leave.
When the door closed behind Gwen Johanssen, Meagan asked, "What's the matter?"
"Lots of things… nothing… I don't know."
"Talk to me, Gus."
He sat silent.
"Don't you trust me?"
"I'm trusting you with my life, Meagan. But this is personal."
"Is it Gwen? Do you think Gwen is jealous? Of me? Of our relationship? Is Gwen in love with you?"
Gus shook his head, but his words contradicted his gesture, "Well, yes. She does love me." He withdrew one of his hands and placed it on top of Meagan's, looking sadly into her eyes. "This is embarrassingly self-centered and selfish of me. My world… MY world is about to change." Meagan knew now what was weighing so heavily upon this man. "I know I planned to reveal my true self to you so you could inform the world in April, but…" He withdrew his hands, pushed himself back from the table, and stood, looking down at Meagan.
"You're not going to back away from your promise are you?" It was more than professional pride that prompted Meagan's question.
"No, Meagan. I'd never do that. In fact, I want to tell you — I need to tell you everything now. Someone has been trying to hack into GundTech's core files, trying to identify me."
"Has the phantom been back?"
"Not like before, but I think, yes. I mean there is definitely a hacker, and maybe it's the phantom, but maybe it's not. No matter, someone who is clever enough to have gotten as far as you had last summer, plus knowledgeable enough to cover his or her tracks, is trying to find me out. And I don't think some of the mishaps in the Academy simulations are accidental or sloppy programming. Those two Americans seem to be at the center of the mishaps."
"Costas and Rush? They're pretty sharp."
"And curious," said Gus.
"Didn't the network manager say they were trying to access the simulation monitoring reports? Do you think…"
"It's not them. I assure you."
"How can you be sure?"
Gus' spirits seemed to pick up slightly. "To be honest, I've been watching them quite closely."
Meagan's reporter's instinct was piqued. "You do think they're up to something then? Something else?"
"Quite the opposite. I'm impressed with them. In fact, I instructed Johann to give them access to the monitoring files. Maybe their open minds will see something we missed." Gus Villfarelse became somewhat wistful. His thoughts were momentarily diverted, "I'm working on something new, you see. Something with Ling in England…" he trailed off as something dark descended upon his thoughts. "No. They're his target. Somehow he seems to know and is targeting their simulations."
"Whose target? The phantom's? What does he seem to know?"
Gus rambled on without answering, "And Ling reported an outbound anomaly. What if that's him, too? My God! He's gotten behind our firewalls and is in our private network."
"How?"
"I'm not sure."
"Who?"
"I don't know."
"Could this Calthern guy be behind it? He made his money in the tech industry. He would know people who could hack in. Hell, he could buy an army of people to try to break in."
"Maybe. Maybe not..."
"Who else would want to do this to you? Who's close enough and has the working knowledge to hack your system?" Gus shrugged in frustration as Meagan mulled the questions over in her mind. "No one here needs to pry, do they? Surely the management team knows who you are."
"They only know me as the person my family helped me create: Gus Villfarelse. To them, I'm just the man who runs the company, the man through whom the 'boy wonder,' as you call him, funnels his thoughts. I'm just an illusion."
"Gwen!" said Meagan. "Gwen Johanssen!" For the first time that day, Gus smiled. He walked around the table, seated himself next to Meagan, and took her delicate hand in his. "No, it's not Gwen."
"You said she was in love with you. You saw how she reacted when you asked her to leave."
"You need to know one thing about Gwen to understand her."
"And what's that?"
"She's my sister."
– End Chapter Fifteen –
