Changing of the Guard

8

Thorn sighed and stared into space. It looked as if today was going to be one of remedial education. He’d had two visitors so far, and both of them had more or less made him feel stupid — something to which he was not the least bit accustomed.

First, it had been the CIA liaison Marissa Lowe, who had dropped by to check on Jay’s progress with the Turkish thing. The conversation had started off fine, he really liked her, but then he had ventured to say something that, in retrospect, wasn’t particularly bright.

He had mentioned that his gripe with Senator Herumin of New Jersey, who had been blathering on that morning on the news about something to do with computers, was that the man was unable to see the big picture. This was a problem he had run into before, he told her.

Folks didn’t understand that it was something of a curse to be able to see such things, as Thorn himself could. It really wasn’t easy at times.

He was half-joking as he said it, but only half, and she picked it up like an oyster cracker dropped into the middle of a flock of hungry ducks.

“Are you complaining about being smart and fore-sighted, Tommy?”

Surprised, all he could think of to say was, “No.”

She sighed. “Yes, you are.” She shook her head.

“Marissa…”

“Let me tell you a story, Commander. One of my study partners in college got into your business, sort of. He was a brilliant dude, sharp, funny, majored in English lit, became a professor at an Ivy League school, wrote a couple of well-received textbooks, was doing okay. Let’s call him ‘Barry.’ ”

“Okay,” Thorn said, though he wasn’t sure where this was going.

“So, Barry got married, had a couple of kids, a dog, and was living a solid middle-class life. When he was about thirty-five, Barry discovered he had a talent for coming up with video game scenarios. One thing led to another, and the next thing you know, he’s quit his job teaching, moved to Texas — Austin used to be a real hot-bed for that kind of thing — and he started making big bucks coming up with things like Death Eater and Moon Fighters.”

Thorn blinked. He knew those old games, he’d played them in college. He didn’t recall the creator’s name, but he did seem to remember there was something about the guy…

“All of a sudden, within the space of a year, he goes from being a dull young college professor, to a hot, rich computer whiz. He and the old spouse split — he’s way too cool for her — so now he’s on his own. He turns around in a few months and marries a gorgeous high-maintenance trophy wife. He starts buying other toys — big house, fast cars, home theaters. Thinks nothing of dropping a couple hundred bucks on lunch, he’s blowin’ and goin’, partying all night, sleeping half the day, working an hour or two in the afternoon. He’s a golden boy, and can’t do wrong.”

Thorn nodded. He’d met plenty of guys like that.

“We kept in touch, Barry and I. He was basically a nice guy, but he had this one little flaw that used to drive me crazy: He was a whiner.”

She shook her head, frowning. “I’d get a call from him whenever somebody opened a car door in a parking lot and put a scratch in the side of his new Ferrari. Or if the idiots at the game company wanted him to do some little thing that was beneath his talent. His Christmas bonus was only a hundred grand and he was expecting two hundred. And you know what he’d say after he’d lay this on me? ‘Why is my life so much harder than everybody else’s?’ ”

Thorn stared at her.

“I mean, here’s Barry, he’s clearing better than half a million a year, six, seven times what I’m bringing home before taxes. He’s got a sultry young wife who steams up every room she walks into. He’s got a Ferrari, a Viper, a Porsche, and a Rolls in his garage — and room for two more cars. He has a pool and a maid and gardeners and personal trainers coming to his home gym, he’s got every toy he ever wanted. He plays stupid games, and makes more money than the President of the United States.”

Thorn had to smile at that one.

She continued: “I’ve been in third-world countries where the average wage was twenty dollars a month. I know people in this country who would kill for any one of Barry’s perks, and he’s got ’em all, but he’s whining and complaining about how hard his life is.” She let that sink in.

When nothing else was forthcoming, Thorn said, “All right. So he didn’t really have anything to complain about. So?”

“So? Right after he turned thirty-nine, he started having trouble breathing. Turned out he had developed some rare form of emphysema — and he never smoked a single cigarette. Six months later, he couldn’t move without having to wheel around a bottle of oxygen. The game industry had another revolution and the stuff he was writing went into the toilet. He couldn’t come up with any new ideas that worked. He lost his big house, the cars, the hired help. His high-maintenance wife bailed without a backward look. Barry wound up filing for bankruptcy. Moved back in with his parents. So here he is, on his fortieth birthday, and he’s gone from being rich and on top of the world, to he can’t walk to the mailbox without having to stop and rest. He’s broke, he’s alone. And the kicker is — none of it is his fault. He couldn’t control any of it.”

She shook her head again. “The point, Tommy? The point is, now he’s got something to whine about. Now his life is harder than everybody else’s.”

“Yeah.”

“You don’t want to tempt fate, Tommy. You never know but that God might be taking a coffee break and He will hear you complaining and give you something to show you the difference between nice Italian shoes and no feet.”

Thorn smiled and nodded. “Point taken.”

“Good. Maybe there’s hope for you. Listen, I hate to slap your hand and then run, but I have to go. You take care, all right?”

After she had gone, Thorn had thought about what she’d said. She wasn’t an intellectual, but despite the fact that he probably had twenty IQ points on her, she had nailed him dead on. Which made you stop and think.

Then, not five minutes later, Colonel Kent had stopped by, and because that bored deity must still have been hanging around, God had helped Thorn put his foot back into his mouth again. There were a few problems, the colonel had said, but he was working on them.

He had finished his report, and was about to leave. Thorn said, “Don’t worry, Colonel, I know you haven’t had time to bring in your own people yet and get up to cruising speed. I know you have to work with the tools you have, and sometimes they just won’t cut it.”

The ex-Marine blinked and looked at him as if he had just turned into a giant beetle. “No, sir, that’s not valid.”

Thorn shook his head. What had he said? He was just trying to give the guy a way to save face, and now the man was busting his chops? “I’m not sure I take your meaning, Colonel.”

“Sir, with all due respect, a man who blames his tools is a poor workman. You recall that sniper in Colorado a couple years back? Shot sixteen people in the space of a couple of days?”

“I remember.”

“Do you recall how he was stopped?”

Thorn searched his memory. “Shot by a civilian, wasn’t he? A farmer?”

“Yes, sir. Only the civilian was Duane Morris, a retired Marine, a twenty-year man, and a former member of the USMC pistol team. He drove his pickup truck into Denver to collect a relative at the train station, so he was across the street when the killer got out of his car with his assault rifle.

“Soon as he saw the shooter, retired Master Sergeant Morris jumped back into his car and pulled out a Thirty-eight Special snubnose revolver he kept under the seat there. This gun has crappy sights, no more than a groove on the top strap, a two-inch barrel, and is generally thought to be ineffective past across-the-table range by a lot of folks. Outside of five yards, they say, you might as well throw it as shoot it, because you will more likely hit your target that way. It would not be the weapon of choice in a long-range gun duel.

“Sergeant Morris stepped out of his vehicle just as the shooter cranked off his first round, taking a fourteen-year-old-boy in the leg. He snapped that snubby up, and as he did, the killer saw him and swung his rifle around to take him down. Morris aimed and fired before the killer could get off a second round, and his bullet impacted the scum-bag in the forehead, an inch to the left of being centered right between the eyes. Dropped him dead before he hit the pavement.”

Thorn nodded. “Yes. And…?”

“Morris was sixty-four years old, wearing glasses as thick as Coke bottle bottoms, using a tool not designed for the task at hand. The investigating police officers paced off the distance between Morris and the sniper. Fifty-eight yards. That, sir, was one hell of a wide tabletop. Easy with a rifle, not quite as easy with a long-barreled target pistol with a scope, highly unusual with a gun having a pipe just a hair longer than the middle joint of your forefinger. A fluke, a lot of folks said, but it was not. Morris practiced with that little handgun often. He could hit a pie plate at fifty yards all day long. The tool had the capability, and the man using it had the ability to use it properly. That’s what made the difference.”

Thorn nodded. “All right. I see your point.”

“Yes, sir. I hope so. We have the tools. The main limiting factors are the people we set to use them. Properly taught, they can accomplish any job we need accomplished. If I can’t cut a piece of string with the knife I’m holding, then I need to sharpen it, not blame the knife for being dull.”

Once he was gone, Thorn decided that maybe it might be a good time to go to the gym. However, given the way his day was running so far, he might just stab himself in the foot. He shook his head. Well. He certainly hadn’t impressed these folks with his wit and wisdom today, had he? Maybe he’d better cancel his appointments and stay in his office where he wouldn’t say or do anything foolish for the rest of the day.

Jay readied his assault on Hugo Hellbinder’s secret base from behind a fat-boled banana tree. The infrared laser of his silenced.45 HK Mark-23 painted the hapless guard to the left of the entrance with a foreshadowing dot that Jay, with his specialized night-vision gear, could see, but was otherwise invisible to the human eye.

The guard on the left had to go first because he was closest to the alarm. There’d be maybe a second or two to take the other guard out after the first fell. No problem.

The humid night air of the jungle was warm and full of distractions. One of the guards slapped at a mosquito, and the other leaned over to tie his shoe.

Now…

Jay took the shot.

There was a soft whap as the subsonic.45 hit the unfortunate guard on the left, the invisible infrared giving way to hot blood as the guard’s spine shattered. The other guard cried out, “What? Not me!” He started to roll to the side, his animation flexing slightly as he blended into the wall behind him for a second before Jay’s second shot ended his worries.

Sorry, pal. The rules of the game. Spear-carriers get wiped out fast.

He’d lifted the scenario from an old vid he’d played as a teenager, one of his favorite spy games. The weapons, the sounds, even the imagery — including the occasional computer-glitch blending of enemies with the landscape — was just as he’d remembered it.

It should be, after all the time I spent reverse-engineering it.

Sure, he could be using VR to simulate some static mind puzzle, some way of more accurately mirroring the RW activity he was engaged in, but as always, that wouldn’t be nearly as much fun.

He readied himself for the rush to the entrance. There was a camera on the inside of the doorway — it had warned them he was sneaking in on one of his early attempts. A quick shot upward before stepping through the door, and it’d be gone. Then he’d work his way back to the underground bridge, to see if he could fight his way across.

Sooner or later he’d complete the game mission and at that point, the second part of the code would be cracked. In theory.

He retraced his steps perfectly, taking out guards and cameras, not missing a shot. Everything was going well until, abruptly, the scenario froze.

So did Jay.

A doorway opened into the space, right in the middle of the bridge. Time stalled: Bullets hung frozen in the air, a guard tilted at a forty-five-degree angle in the process of falling, his video-game body painted with pixelated blood.

Through the door stepped Saji.

He frowned — she never bothered him at work — particularly when his don’t-call-me was on. She was one of only two people who could. He’d given the codes only to Alex and Saji.

I’ll have to remember to give them to the new guy, he thought, before he wondered what was so important that she would actually use the access codes.

Something wrong? Somebody sick? Or, worse, somebody dead?

There was certainly something. She had that look to her, a determined set to her VR character.

“This is nice,” she said in a voice that meant exactly the opposite. She waved at the frozen blood spray from the back of the guard.

“I’ll put something else on.” Jay started to switch to a more neutral scenario, but she shook her head.

“I’ve got one,” she said, indicating her doorway.

He followed her and stepped into a zen garden. There were rocks, bonsai trees, and a beautiful stream gurgling in the background.

The detail was amazing. A mosquito buzzed by, and was eaten by a bird that swooped down to catch it. Eddies and currents in the stream moved in endless, almost-random patterns. A cool breeze touched his cheek, and the smell of pine needles wafted over him.

She indicated a bench, and he sat on it, a smooth wooden surface that had been there so long that the front edge had been worn smooth.

“Nice VR. This is great — even I don’t usually get this detailed. Where’d you get it?”

She smiled, and his heart stilled for a moment — if she could still smile at him like that, the news couldn’t be that bad.

Unless she’s dying. She did have a doctor’s appointment today.

His stomach lurched.

“I’m glad you like it — it’s mine.”

He almost forgot to be worried. Saji had done this? Where had she been hiding her abilities? The VR they’d worked through during his therapy had never been this sharp. This was good.

“Really?”

She laughed. “Yes really. It’s my meditation spot. I’ve worked on it for years.”

“It’s great,” he said. “Amazing. Really.”

She grinned. “Glad that the top VR jock at Net Force approves!”

Then: “Because I’ve got something to tell you.”

This was it. What could be this important? What could be such serious news that she’d come to work and get him — in VR — and show him her most private meditation?

“Saji? Is everything okay? Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. You might need to take a deep breath, though.”

“Me?”

His face must have shown his confusion, because she smiled, and then took his hand. “Well, yeah. You’re going to be a father.”

He felt an immense sense of relief — she was okay—

And then: Me? A father?

It was like being hit in the head with a hammer.

He realized she was waiting for him to say something — anything.

“Wow,” he said, stunned. “I mean, wow!” he added, putting some excitement into the word. “That’s… that’s… great!” He grinned.

Saji seemed relieved. She grinned back at him.

She took his hand and squeezed it.

“I wanted to wait until you got home, but I just couldn’t. I’m so excited, Jay! We’re going to have a baby!”

He grinned back at her, enjoying her excitement.

He wasn’t completely sure about his own, but he knew he’d rather take this leap with her than anyone else.

A baby. He was going to be a father. Whoa. Talk about unreal scenarios.