Master Wu, page 15
“I need a confidante, not a babysitter. Over the last few months, I have been improving my abilities to defend myself. You need not worry about me.”
Pincet tossed his stylus up in the air and rolled his eyes. The stylus landed at the same time as the palms of his hands slapped the surface of the table. He stood up. “Jayne, what is the point of me even speaking if everything I say is ignored? I don’t care if you are a La Sangsue Sang master. I want you to have protection.”
Jayne puffed out air. She knew there was little point in arguing with Pincet when he had made up his mind. She needed him on her side. “Alright, who?”
She did not notice Rafferty raise his index finger at the same time he raised his eyebrows. Everyone else at the table saw his actions.
They were all staring at him.
Jayne turned her head. She was greeted with a boyish smile.
“Rafferty will go with you,” responded Pincet.
Spike responded quickly. “I will go. I can protect her. I have the training.”
Pincet turned to him. “No, you won’t. As far as I am concerned, you are not the best choice. I do not know you like I know him,” he said, and pointed at Rafferty. “He is more than capable. He will go with Jayne, along with Rose.”
Pincet peered into Jayne’s eyes. “I want you to know that this point is not debatable. I will give you Rose, and you will accept Rafferty.” He paused. “Are we in agreement?”
Jayne nodded and glanced at Spike. She could see that he was not happy. His unhappiness jumped her heart rate up. She smiled inside. She pushed her thoughts aside and addressed the group. “I would like three things to happen. First, I will strive to be accepted by the Omega Group. Second, the Sentinels and the World Police need to find a way into the Consortium. We will never smash them from the outside. We must bleed them from the inside. Third, we must always share everything so that no one is working without the latest information.” The last part was directed at the Sentinels present at the table.
Jayne continued, “The Greenway Group and the Sentinels have worked cooperatively in the past. I hope we can again.”
She turned to Castillo. “The World Police purport to have an open information policy, but somehow, I doubt this is always true. At least I hope it isn’t. Information we share with them must remain confidential. If it cannot, then I recommend we leave them out of the loop.” She glanced up at Pincet. He was nodding his agreement. Jayne knew he had no love for the WP.
Castillo spoke, “I agree. Everything that happens here goes through me. I am the one who would likely be the source of a leak. To avoid that possibility, I have set up a group of carefully screened personnel that will work for me and still know nothing about you. I invite the Greenway Group to investigate each of them. If you are satisfied that they are trustworthy, then, and only then, will I use them.” He paused. “Everyone here knows that the reach of the WP can be very helpful when situations arise. And situations will always arise.” He let further explanations dissipate with the ensuing silence.
Pincet spoke calmly. “By the silence, I assume we agree.” He let his words settle.
The tension seemed to build the longer the silence continued. It was broken by Jun. He grinned and said, “Does anyone know when the snacks are going to arrive? I’m starving.”
The tension dissipated. Spike spoke up, “There is one last bit of business regarding communication. We need to always use multipoint entangled protocols. If I cannot be a front-line participant, then I need to know what is going on. Especially with the Consortium. I know that you will need me soon. I will be ready when you do. I have encountered those bastards before, and I know how to fit in.”
Pincet nodded. “I will keep that in mind. This meeting is adjourned. There are no snacks, but the cafeteria special is supposed to be very tasty.”
He stood, and the others followed.
Spike walked up to Jayne and put his hand on her shoulder. “Have lunch with me?” he asked.
She smiled, and they walked away from the table. Jayne stepped in front of Spike as they passed through the door. He surreptitiously pressed his body against hers.
Neither of them noticed the knowing grin spread across Rose’s face.
CHAPTER 19
Reflection
The Consortium consisted of an inner sanctum with very few connections to the external world. Each member had a single channel out and a single channel in. Their numbers varied over the years, from a minimum of five to a maximum of a dozen. None of the members of the inner sanctum knew who the others were. All meetings were held virtually, using avatars. Even the avatars were randomly chosen to avoid the possibility that a member’s choice of avatar might lead to their discovery as a member.
Any attempt to discover the identities of the other members would result in immediate expulsion. The process of expulsion was simple. It was death. Death, not only of the member but death of anyone who he or she might have given information to. This had only happened once. The result was the demise of an entire company. First, the finances were expropriated, and then all employees were murdered. Three entire buildings were blown to bits in the middle of a normal workday. Anyone not at work that day was hunted down and killed. If a member died of other causes, a purge occurred that destroyed any information that might lead back to the inner sanctum.
The organization’s membership expanded exponentially once it left the inner sanctum. All parts were expendable. If something were discovered and people were arrested, it would have zero effect on the organization as a whole. Meaningful infiltration was almost impossible from the bottom up. New membership only came about when there was a need for more credits. Candidates were selected, investigated, and vetted. There must be consensus for a person to be accepted and even then, there was a trial period before final membership status was awarded.
Jayne returned to Winter’s estate. She sat in the garden. Her thoughts were turning and tossing the salient points of the meeting. Everyone had left with a specific task in mind and a directive to share all the information. She realized she could not adhere to that directive, nor could she restrict herself to focus only on the Omega Group. After a brief meeting with Underhill, she knew that Thurston was still out there. It had been confirmed. The man in prison was Ranovich 91 and not William Thurston. To achieve that little trick, he must have transferred himself to a new body and then, to cover his tracks, transferred the mind of Ranovich back. That would explain a 15-year-old Ranovich inside a 20-year-old body sitting in a super max prison.
She thought of the young man at the arena. Kurt had left her the note. He was young and blond and seemingly intelligent. That was just the kind of person that Thurston would like to be walking around in. She remembered that he had recognized her as Jayne Wu, the GravBall player. If he was ‘not really Kurt,’ then who was he?
She thought back to her impression of the young man at the arena. He did not behave like Thurston would behave. Thurston would not risk himself out in the open. Maybe Kurt was working for Thurston, but he probably did not know who his boss was. There were lots of underworld companies that would place knock-out gas in some cushions and try to kidnap people for a price. The Consortium was filled with them. Jayne blinked her eyes rapidly as a new possibility entered her mind. Maybe it wasn’t Thurston who had sent Kurt. Yes, she had gone there specifically to tempt him. Yes, she had tried to set up a situation to capture him. But what if it wasn’t him? What if it was the Consortium? They might know nothing of Thurston’s and Bancroft’s plans. They knew a great deal about her as Jayne Wu—after all, they had made her their prisoner for several months. They had fitted her head with a thought-dampening helmet. They knew her brain scans. They knew a lot about her physical self. They might have discovered her through their surveillance systems. As far as they were concerned, she was a valuable asset that had cost them a lot of credits. The people that had purchased her had not paid up. Here she was again. Why not grab her and sell her again? They knew she would fetch an exorbitant price on the underworld market, and this time they would vet the purchasers with greater care.
“Crap,” exclaimed Jayne. The realization that her real identity might still be hunted by the Consortium put everything in jeopardy. Her plans had to change. She could no longer focus on the Omega Group. She would have to avoid them until she was sure that her identity was secure. Even the slightest hint that she was not who she purported to be would blow her plans of infiltrating the Omega Group right out of the proverbial water.
Jayne considered informing Pincet of her latest suspicions and then decided against it, at least until she was clear in terms of her actions. She needed some time to consider possibilities. The word possibilities echoed in her head and as the echoes began to fade the bubble formed and she slipped inside. It happened unconsciously. One moment her sense of time was part of the normal world and the next moment it was not. She simply slipped into a bubble. It just happened, like falling asleep and slipping into a dream. Time slowed and all around her were those actions and inactions that might bring about the demise of the Consortium. Jayne pushed, and the morass churned like air being pumped up through a giant tank of liquid sludge. Possibilities popped out as she nudged each to a higher potential. Some merged and gained weight. They bounced farther out of the mass, turned liquid, broke apart, and remerged. Jayne pushed again, inspecting each conglomeration of actions. There were a number of them that twisted and undulated with complexity. Following the myriad of paths in each became impossible. Their complexity was pulling them apart, and no amount of controlling by Jayne could hold any of them together.
Jayne relaxed, and the soup settled to silence and calm as if all the metaphorical air pumped from below suddenly ceased. The exercise seemed, at first glance, to be a waste of effort. The level of complexity resulted in chaos. There was no clear path for Jayne to follow. Nothing linear would allow her to start at the beginning and end at the end. Like the bubble had started, it also ended, fading down to a speck. Time rushed back in. The few seconds in the bubble were not a waste. She did come away with some initial steps. The first one was obvious. She must do something to maintain her identities and use them to her advantage. The Omega Group must continue to think she was Winter Bancroft while the Consortium chased Jayne Wu. She did not want the Consortium to know she was pretending to be Bancroft. They must believe both Jayne and Winter existed as distinct people. It would be a bit of a juggling act, but she was sure she could keep all the balls in the air. The trick was to know how many balls and where any given one might land if she had to drop it.
The next step had to be carefully conceived. She needed to recreate a present and future for Jayne Wu. She would start with a place to live and a job to do. In short, she needed to give herself a normal life, at least one that looked normal from the outside. She was a Master Fixer. She would do what she was good at. There wasn’t a machine on the planet or out in space that she could not repair. She needed to get a job in one of the hubs. Space or biome jobs would take her too far afield. She might have to act as her alter self at a moment’s notice. Once she became herself again, she would need help. She would have to inform Pincet and the Sentinels about what she was doing. She even admitted that she might need protection. Ending up back as a Consortium prisoner or some sort of sex slave for William Thurston were both very scary possibilities.
An idea popped into her head, and it made her smile a wicked smile. She could have Spike as her Jayne protector and Rafferty as her Winter protector. She was attracted to both in different ways, so why not have her different personalities protected by different boys? Jayne stopped herself. These were not boys. These were men. She was a woman and had better start thinking like one when it came to men. She smiled again. The idea was still a good one. Having a protector for each of her personalities would enable her to maintain them more easily. There was only one person she wanted in both situations, and that was Rose. Rose would be her go-between to maintain the identities. Rose would live with her as an aide when she was Winter and a friend when she was Jayne.
Jayne clapped her hands together. It was a great idea with a good start. All she needed to do now was to iron out the details. One detail that needed urgent ironing was Doris Underhill. Jayne had poked the possibilities of taking Underhill into the inner circle of Jayne Wu, but there was always a degree of reticence. She was not sure why. Underhill was not as obvious as one might think. Jayne had continually postponed looking into her history, but she could not put it off any longer. Before she left the underwater facility, Rose had slipped her a handful of one-way entangled chips. They were the kind that allowed Jayne to call out to Rose, but Rose could not call Jayne. Security demanded this. Rose might call Jayne at an inopportune time and jeopardize her identities. Rose wanted to remain in the loop no matter what everyone else did. Jayne slipped one of them in her VID.
The perfectly private connection initiated and locked as soon as Rose answered. “Wu. You little bitch. It is about fracking time. You know I hate being left out. It reminds me of when I was a kid in the Nursery. I was the weird one and nobody wanted to play with me.”
Jayne laughed. “You realize that you are still the weird one. But I want to play with you. I need to get together with you to put my new plan in motion. I want you to come here. When you do, I can explain the details. Are you willing to pretty much live with me?”
“Frack, yeah. I am going crazy in this perfect little apartment, eating a lot of pretend food. I’m sure you noticed how much weight I have put on because I have put on a lot. If I sit around here doing nothing, I will soon explode.”
“You have to do one thing before you can come here. You have to find everything you can about Winter Bancroft’s aide. Her name is Doris Underhill. I want to know if she can be trusted with everything I am and everything I want to achieve.”
“How deep do you want me to look? If I go from birth to now, I will probably have to investigate everyone she has ever spent time with. That could take a while.”
“Rose, you have a great sense of the important. Use your judgment. If something looks odd, then investigate. If not, let it slide. I want to know if I have to keep her or get rid of her.”
“Why are you bothering? If there is the slightest doubt, just fire her ass,” said Rose bluntly.
“She is very useful and resourceful. I would like to keep her if I could.”
“I see. You think I cannot do the job?”
“No. Absolutely not. She had been Winter’s aide for a long time, and she knows all the protocols of the people I have to schmooze.”
“I understand. I am just giving you a hard time. I will need a few hours if she is clean. If not, then it might take me longer. The longer it takes me the less likely she will be trustworthy.”
“I understand. I will call you tomorrow. I hope you will have something for me. I want to move as quickly as possible to implement my plans.”
“Better yet, call me later today. If I am finished by then I will want to tell you. As you may have noticed, I am not the most patient person you have ever met.”
“Great. Later.” Jayne disconnected, then sat quietly and listened to the garden.
CHAPTER 20
Get a Job!
Identity was a citizen’s most prized possession. Identity theft could result in becoming citizenless. You were no longer able to take advantage of society’s support systems. You would be a nonperson. Most nonpersons lived outside of normal society and were usually Wilderlanders. These groups were on the decline. Exceptions were some religious cults preparing for the End of Days. Some of these groups chose to live on the fringes. They were not part of the society, but they were able to leach enough to survive. A person without an identity could only survive by becoming a part of one of these groups.
Jayne spent the rest of the day planning and investigating. The closest HUB was not one she was familiar with. HUB 169 was the HUB that had educated her. It was where all the madness started. She considered the pros and cons of each. The HUB in central SoCal won out. She was less likely to encounter someone she knew. The less she had to explain, the better. She sent out feelers to HUB Central requesting the lists of job postings for fixers. SoCal was a very desirable area of the planet. Jobs were scarcer than perhaps a fixer job on one of the spavator counterweights. But Jayne knew she had a bit of a reputation as someone who could solve problems. She narrowed down the list of SoCal jobs to three possibilities. The jobs held increasing levels of responsibilities. One, in particular, appealed to her. It was the kind of job she had trained for. She would be in charge of a group of analysts that studied ways to improve biome systems to make them more able to self-repair on the long journeys through space. She nearly put her name forward. There was no need for a résumé. Everything she had ever done as a fixer was available to HUB Central. She suddenly reconsidered. The job, although perfect for her skill set, would also require her to leave the planet for extended periods. It would also require a lot of effort. That did not fit her plans. The job she needed must be simple and not require any special skills.
She scanned the list of jobs, and her eyes stopped on a perfect one. The job involved two aspects. She would be in charge of some apprentice fixers and be responsible for maintaining the base of the spavator at the base of HUB 19 in central SoCal. The job was perfect for her particular needs. She would have a great deal of flexibility and independence. She could assign apprentices to do all the time-consuming jobs while she was elsewhere.
Transport needed to be addressed. She knew there would be times when she might need to return to this estate at a moment’s notice. She would talk to Pincet and have him purchase a private PUT transport system so she could travel from one identity to the other without exposing either to prying eyes. She applied. The system would analyze her resume and decide if she was able to do the job. It would then compare all the applicants and choose the best one. Jayne was a high-level Master Fixer. It was doubtful that anyone else with Master Fixer levels of education and experience would apply. She was confident. The job had been open for some time. There were temporary personnel presently doing the job, so she expected to be a shoo-in. She received a message back stating her application was being considered and she would be informed as to the decision shortly.
