A few minutes later Tyler follows me and sits on the bed.
"Can't these guys get a life?" Tyler asks. "They're worse than we are. Haven't they heard of cell phones?"
"The charges leave too many trails, too much evidence," I remind him, reading a few lines that I know Tyler will not like. "You really don't want to know what Omar and VaporStrike are saying to one another."
"So long as they're not on Long Island and they're not bothering the Trinity Four, I really don't care," he says.
They are using several of the Egyptian languages, and I have scripted them so far as saying HotKeys has a Ph.D. in computer science, and there is a repeated mention that ShadowStrike has paid him a hundred thousand euros to find their v-spies.
Tyler notes this time, "That kinda puts a price on our heads. Doesn't it?"
That many euros is equivalent to even more dollars. We both believe that all information we have provided to Hodji since Omar turned up in Mexico has been exclusive to us.
"Shall we send USIC a bill for the same amount?" he asks, as I knew he would.
"It is a fat chance you will have of redeeming those funds, and now, stifle your fat complaints," I say. They are chatting again.
Omar0324: Where is HotKeys? Taking a sauna?
VaporStrike: He is running his little programs. Have patience.
Omar0324: He had better be as smart as you promised, because he is surely not swift. I am walking about on an infected foot. You must tell him I don't like his constant wasting of my time.
Tyler aligns himself behind me, sees my script, and says something idiotic like, "Bring it on." I am back to the live chat and I copy and paste, trying to include all the little missing words in English, but my brain is distracted with Miss Cora and much fog. I want a blast from my inhaler, which increases my heart rate and, often, the blood flow to my head. But I left it downstairs and I don't want Tyler to leave right now. I simply plod on.
VaporStrike: I think this time you will be pleased. His program to catch v-spies is quite involved. I do not understand computer language but have seen the program as an RTF. It is two hundred text pages long.
"We need to get our hands on that," I say.
Tyler laughs. "Dream on."
Omar0324: It's about time he did something useful. What has he found?
VaporStrike: It appears he picked up a v-spy on your other log-in, OmarLoggi.
Omar0324: Impossible.
VaporStrike: God knows how USIC collects their persistent v-spies. With the delivery of great riches, I suppose.
Tyler's disgusted laugh sounds like a trumpet blast. I lean instinctively away from the terminal.
Omar0324: If that new log-in is unsafe, how can this old one possibly be safe? It is the very one I used in Colony One. Is he insane?
VaporStrike: USIC has a saying: Dogs do not return to their vomit. Such would apply to log-ins as well, but he wants to be certain.
"We're not USIC," Tyler notes. "We think dogs sometimes do return to their vomit."
It suddenly occurs to me what I am forgetting. I had started to put a patch on the IP address at this terminal when Tyler called me in to help locate an e-mail address for Miss Cora. It entered my head as having been done. I try to remember if I actually finished it. I do not think so. But suddenly, I have no memory. HotKeys could be reading our IP address, and I raise the situation to Tyler.
"Oh ... shit," he confirms, his hand landing on my pock-infested shoulder with a bang. "Exit. Now!"
As I put my fingers back to the keys, he pulls me back with a change of mind. "No, don't touch anything. Those homespun detection programs read activity, not presence—"
"But we created a trail of activity to find them! It is too late."
Our fingers wag helplessly on invisible keypads. We don't know what to do.
Omar0324: We are being watched?
VaporStrike: HotKeys does not believe we are being watched, but he will know more soon.
Omar0324: I would have kept my comments to harmless gossip. I would have encrypted it in some language of the Congo.
VaporStrike: HotKeys really is not expecting anything.
"Stupid," Tyler says anxiously. "If we're stupid, they're stupider. Right?"
I cannot answer. The game of computer chase has always been full of snags and blunders, as technology changes constantly, and without faces and bodily presences, human nature is inclined to taking many more risks. Whether we are blundering worse than they are, I cannot decide. But blundering is something I have accepted of myself in the past. However, I have never been caught so badly as this might turn out. And never without Hodji just a phone call away. We finally see, at the top of the screen,
HotKeys has entered the chat.
HotKeys: I had better be smart because I am not swift? Is that what you said?
Omar0324: My friend, if you are going to play God in your omnipresence, you must play Him in your forgiveness as well.
HotKeys: Your heinous gossip is forgiven. I am a tolerant man. I cannot be in a chat while I am watching a chat. I can, however, watch you and those who are watching you at the same time.
Omar0324: You have picked up a v-spy?
HotKeys: On this log-in, yes.
Tyler curses more, which I am very tired of hearing. It does not help.
I find myself whispering. "Maybe he can detect the activity but not trace it."
"Maybe he wears bloomers to bed and sucks his thumb," Tyler replies.
Omar logs off and is gone. He is afraid to say anything, I sense, and I wonder if VaporStrike will share that fear and abruptly depart also. I see a tiny number at the bottom of the screen change. "Number of guests: 4" now drops to "3." With VaporStrike and HotKeys remaining as visible log-ins, the third party is us.
As VaporStrike and HotKeys idle, I grab the mouse and click EXIT. The number will now change to "2."
Tyler grumbles that it is too late as we head swiftly back to his room, where his hard-drive technology allows us to watch without being numbered. I want to see how savvy these men are. Very few people are even aware of that little number, and those who see it suspect it is a floating chat manager patrolling for profanity. They are speaking in English, which may mean they are too panicked to endure the small complications of their translation programs. Unfortunately, my fear is thrown right into my face.
HotKeys: He just logged off, the idiot. Do you see a little line, "Number of guests: 2" somewhere at the bottom of the window? It just changed from "3."
VaporStrike: That was a v-spy? Often those numbers don't match up.
HotKeys: If he had left it alone, we might have assumed it was a chat manager—which is not even a person. It is a roaming computer program, checking for keywords in English which are considered profane.
VaporStrike: How do you know it wasn't such a program?
HotKeys: Because, my electronically challenged friend ... he logged off as soon as I said there was a v-spy.
VaporStrike: Too ironic, yes. Should we exit?
HotKeys: He is gone. No one is watching us now.
Tyler nudges me but does not brag about our current invisibility to these men, his computers having been patched out years ago.
VaporStrike is idling, but I sense precisely what he is doing. He is trying to remember today's scripts to see what was revealed to us.
VaporStrike: They cannot know about the swans.
HotKeys: Guess again. USIC's computer labs are impossible to penetrate, but I hacked a few of their laptops.
VaporStrike: I knew you would be worth your fee. Where is Omar when I need a witness? How did you do that?
HotKeys: Don't weary me with your silly questions.
Tyler exclaims in horror, "How did he hack a USIC laptop?"
"How did you find their cell phone numbers and hack into their calls in March?" I say to him, just to shut up his chronic speaking. There are always ways. USIC warns against laptops, but guys out in the field like Hodji sometimes have no choice.
<
br /> Like Hodji. The air in the room turns dense as I think of the many e-mails I have sent him today. I tell myself that there are a hundred USIC agents in New York and New Jersey, and they could not be talking about him. But my sudden wheezing fit makes what comes on to the screen seem in slow motion, as if I am in a dream where I cannot run from monsters.
HotKeys: Here is what I just pulled from one laptop. Are you ready?
VaporStrike: I am.
HotKeys: Are you sure?
VaporStrike: Do not dawdle as if you are a small child.
HotKeys: The unread e-mails read as follows:
VS in NJ today ... HERE tonight ... 1 mile from HERE.
VS has Fire. 911911911. Check script. 2 of Trinity 4 wandered into Colony 2 ... C2 very near to C1. New log-in Pasco spotted them ... Scott and Cora seen in C2 ... Cora and Scott are not in danger.
It falls out onto the screen in its entirety, in English, so that it takes over the room. I am seeing in double, then in sixes.
VaporStrike: The v-spy used the word "HERE"? To describe my whereabouts?
HotKeys: You had better run for cover. Run for your life.
VaporStrike: My friend, you do not know me well yet. At times when most men run, it is not yet time to run. HERE? Find me an address and allow me to make good use of myself, being that I'm IN TOWN.
Abruptly, HotKeys exits, which could mean he is off to do his bidding, or perhaps he has been kicked off somehow. I doubt it is that second thing.
"I'm dreaming this," Tyler breathes. "He can't find us."
But he can. It could take ten minutes or all night, depending on how good a hacker he is. I wish so deeply for Nurse Alexa to return that I am afraid I will scream. As for Hodji, I try his busy phone again and wish to leave one more message, telling him he has no right to hear his son's bitter complaints at a time like this.
But his devotion to his ungrateful son is the least of his current frailties, I realize. He does not have wings, and even if I could tell him of this final twist, he would only suffer because of it, because there is no way he could get to us quickly.
"We need to find Roger O'Hare," I say. "We need to find another USIC agent. Maybe Miss Susan from my Trinitron days..."
Tyler stares at me as if I have two noses. "Give me another option. I don't actually like chasing down people to beg them to take information that could cost us our asses, especially when they refuse to thank us."
I have to agree with this. There is always my uncle Ahmer in Pakistan, who would at this time be opening his Internet café for the start of business. He is quick to serve but would have no better chance of reaching Hodji than we would.
"Let's call the police," Tyler suggests.
We look at each other, covered in these hideous, purple speckles that would defy explanation inside a police officer's realm of comprehension.
He laughs, which makes me feel better, and decides, "Nah, let's wait it out. Hodji can't stay on the phone forever with his kid. VaporStrike can't find us that fast."
TWENTY-FOUR
OWEN EBERMAN
SATURDAY, MAY 4, 2002
3:45 P.M.
THE POND
I CHASED RAIN down to this little pond after her dad gave her the bad news. The water was pretty, a serene place even though the clouds overhead were dark. I sat beside her on this flat rock that jutted out over the water. It wasn't raining yet, so I let her cry it out using my jeans as a tear catcher until they were soaked through in one spot. She had made me laugh earlier today, so it was my turn. But I was having aftershocks and couldn't think of anything.
"Where are the goats?" I finally settled on.
She blew her nose into a snotty tissue she found in her cut-offs. "I came out here and fed them when you were out of it. Now? I dunno."
She stayed slumped, studying the wet spot she'd left on my thigh from crying. She finally noted with a sniff, "You're sitting Indian-style."
Not where I wanted this conversation to go. I could never sit Indian-style in high school. Too muscle-bound.
"Well, don't look," I told her.
"That doesn't bother you?"
I sighed, wishing I were a comedian, that I could just peel off the joke I couldn't think of that would make her laugh. "No."
She stared into my eyes incredulously. "You know what? Sometimes I think you don't care whether you live or die."
Yah, yah, yah. She wanted answers to everything, and she wanted them to be what she wanted to hear. I wondered how she'd respond to my sudden thought: I care whether I live or die. But I care more about how I live and how I die. I don't know why out-there thoughts hit me more often than the other three—except that I'd spent a lot more time than they'd ever done thinking about the meaning of life. I was born thinking of the meaning of life, Mom said. I'd talk to her about how fulfilled she'd always felt, basically existing as a charity lawyer, while everyone in town was out making big bucks and trekking on down to Disney with their kids every year. We decided she was happier. One Saturday sophomore year we were talking like that. She reached over, tousled my hair, and said, "Owen, if ever anything goes wrong, you remember I said it: You got enough oil in your lamp." I wished a lot lately that I'd asked her what that meant.
Rain didn't like my silence. "Listen to me! If you ever die, I'll kill you."
Okay, so she wouldn't like my intense answers. I could manipulate her into feeling better. "Well. I always feel better when you quit crying."
She patted my leg, going around the tear spot with her finger. She was thinking of something, and it wasn't what it does to a guy when a girl runs her finger in circles on his thigh. Or maybe she did know. After a long silence, she scooted over the top of my leg and wiggled her butt in between my ankles and my body so that I quickly straightened my legs. She tossed one leg on either side of me and put her arms around my neck. We looked like some seesaw contraption.
I knew she was going to kiss me next, and I put my hand over her mouth. She was trying to explain herself, but I just pressed my palm onto her blather and started talking myself.
"Rain, don't even go there. There's twenty-five good reasons not to go there."
Her eyebrows shot up when I didn't move my hand, and I got on with it.
"First, you're using me. You're upset about your car. And you really want Danny Hall, and I can't do anything about that, but I don't like thinking of myself as the red ribbon. You know how I've always hated red..." She rolled her eyes and made noise, but I clamped down and kept going.
"Second, Miss Haley was making some sense, whether we want to admit to it or not. I'm in worse health than you are. If you swapped spit with me, you would be getting the short end of the stick. I probably have more germs, and you could catch them. That's not a fair deal. Third..."
She was trying to chew on my palm, her lips doing some "screw you, let me talk!" thing, but if the only girl I'd been really good friends with throughout life was going into attack mode, I had a right to say my piece. This thing was not going to happen.
"Third, if you got pregnant, it could kill you. Fourth, if you ever die, I'll kill you. Fifth..."
I let go, because she found the fleshy part of my hand to bite into. She said, "What do you take me for? You think I was after the whole schmear?"
She meant she just wanted to kiss and make out, risk the passing of germs Miss Haley had warned about. I would love to say the thought gave me shudders, like kissing your sister would. It had been easier to keep Rain in the category of sister when I was distracted by three sports and a school full of others. "Remember our deal from eighth grade? We would never go out?"
Her right eyebrow kinked like it did whenever she got annoyed. "We said people who go out also break up and don't speak to each other, and we didn't want to ruin the convenience of living kitty-cornered to each other. It was about T-shirts and socks! What does that matter now—"
"I never borrowed your T-shirts," I stalled. "You borrowed my T-shirts—"
"You've still got half my
Wigwams. I've bought, like, ninety pair over the years. You've bought six. Yet you've got half that didn't wear out, and I've got half. Don't make out like you got the short end of the stick."
"You stole my toothbrush."
"That was my toothbrush. My spare. You stole it from me first. I needed it back."
"What are we arguing about?" I drummed my fingers on her back.
"Elephants."
Sex. She was going to beat the tar out of the subject, and I was defenseless. "Right. You were saying you weren't after the whole schmear."
"Of course not. When did you decide I resemble a ho?"
I flinched warily and let air escape between my clenched teeth. "Never. But somehow I'm having trouble imagining you choosing a jumping-off point. You've been in a reckless mood for three weeks."
I should not have said it. It was half a yes, which was not what I meant to imply. The hardness of this rock was killing my hip joints and wearing out my back, and I'd just had two aftershocks on the way out here. But I was watching her, watching her lips moving in until her nose bumped mine, in awe of how much it would take to turn a seventeen-year-old guy into a no-can-do. I wasn't there yet, no matter how much pain I was in.
But it had always been some crazy comedy hour with me and Rain. We'd had a couple of moments of temptation in the past. We almost broke down one night on my living room couch freshman year—we'd gotten really close. And then she just started cracking up, and neither of us could stop laughing, and I don't even know why. We ended up in a fight about who laughed first and didn't talk for a week. The other time was out back of a house at a party in the fall, and she said, "Um ... you got a booger."
This time, her lips made a slow touchdown, and there she paused, probably imagining the thousand germs that would pass as soon as she pressed harder. It drove me mad. It's like every Dreaded Fifteen I'd intentionally left her out of backed up on me—kind of like I always knew it would. I wrapped my arms around her back, and all I had to do was push her toward me with one finger. Then