Velvet Dogma

chapter 6



"Damn," he mumbled into her mouth.

Then he spun around, his right arm hooking the policeman around his knees. Andy heaved upwards and jerked the man from the board. They both went down in a heap.

Rebecca lunged forward and kicked the downed man, her foot striking the nearest part of the downed cop—his knee. He simultaneously screamed in pain, then growled as he struggled with Andy for position. Rebecca kicked again, this time missing and losing her balance. She fell sideways, her head leading the way. She groaned as the side of her head smacked into the policeman's face. Everything went grey, and her vision blurred, then she felt herself jerked to her feet. Andy threw her arm over his neck and broke into a jog. She stumbled to keep up with him.

"Bec, you okay?"

She mumbled something meant to mean yes, but didn't even understand herself.

He took her weight and dragged her into an alley. Resting her against the wall, he massaged her cheeks, pausing only to use his thumb to open one of her eyelids.

The cobwebs dissolved, leaving only a throbbing pain on the left side of Rebecca's head. She shook her head and pushed his hands away.

"That's not how you felt before," he said, a sparkle in his eye.

"Oh, stop. You sound like a fourteen-year-old."

He shrugged. "Let's go." He took off at a steady run down the alley.

She followed, still a little unsteady but getting better with each step.

A cry went up behind them. She didn't dare turn. It was probably the policeman.

They shot out of the alley onto Wilcox and turned right, running directly into a pair of gravBoarders dressed in silver and black who were lounging against the wall. Andy grabbed one, and spoke into his ear.

"Stat, we need a ride. Copy, then poll P. Rao. Emergency prog Boston Celtics."

The boarders exchanged glances, their sneers shifting to wicked grins.

"Hop on, pops," said the one nearest Andy as he dropped his board and climbed on.

Suddenly it clicked. What she'd taken for jargon had been code. Not just any code, but computer code. With internal and external POD interfaces, the ID, what she'd know as the World Wide Web, had become a live environment that allowed vocal interaction. Where Rebecca had been limited to the parameters and speed of a keyboard and modem, limitations vanished as access was fueled by the speed of dialogue. She'd heard words like 'boon' and 'altruism.' These were probably words that represented lines of code, like the old control and alt functions that could be programmed to do anything from add sums to inserting pages of text. She remembered the woman on the bus sub-vocalizing commands to her POD. She could have been calling the police, checking the weather, or shopping for a blouse.

Rebecca remembered how Kumi had described the PODs."Personal Ocular Devices. Everyone has them these days. Some are external, and look like monocles. They fit into the orbit, resting just in front of the eye where images and information can be both viewed and fired directly down the optic nerve. Some are internal modifications attached directly to the orbit and allowing download from any local node. The more expensive ones can't even be seen."

"And they call them pods? Do you have one?" Rebecca had asked.

"Not me. They made sure I was pod-free when they hired me for this assignment. Not that I oppose them—they just wanted me to be able to interact more easily. The sad thing is that reintroduction is usually accomplished through a POD interface and is frightfully easy, but with the terms of your parole and such it makes the process that much more difficult."

"There's opposition to these PODs?" Rebecca asked.

"Definitely," Kumi said. "The term POD became more than just vernacular when the detractors got a hold of it. Like the Earth Firsters or the Ack Acks, they call anyone who uses PODs 'Pod People.' They say they've been taken over by the Information Database, or the Id as we call it, and have no control over their lives." Kumi rolled her eyes. "There will always be dissenters, I suppose."

Rebecca frowned, her thoughts drawn to an old movie that had terrified her as a child. She could still see Donald Southerland standing with his arm extended, finger pointing, condemning the last human on Earth, an alien squeal erupting from his lungs as the woman who trusted him realized too late her mortal danger. There had been pod people in Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Rebecca was pretty sure that the simulacrum aliens had hatched from those very same pods. She shuddered at the similarity. "I don't know if I'd want one of those anyway," she said.

"Well, hon, you'll never have the choice. As I said, the conditions of your release forbid it. Other than Class One automations like insta-cookers and grav-lifts, you're pretty much restricted from interacting with society on a technological level. You'll see it, and recognize it, but you can't even touch it. And they're serious about this. You scared them good back in your day and they don't want you anywhere close to the ID. If they catch you violating their terms, you'll be locked up forever."

Rebecca frowned, "Then why did they let me go at all?"

"Those same groups who are against the PODs are against the governments. They feel the need to play oversight and watch out for people like you. So in an odd way, you owe them for your freedom."

"Is that who you work for? The Ack Acks? Or the Earth Firsters?"

"No. I'm contracted to the North American Free Trade Congress for the duration of your reintroduction." She'd held up her hands. "But don't let that fool you. They pay the bills, but my loyalty lies with you."

Rebecca doubted that. She might have been locked up for twenty years, but basic human nature couldn't have changed that much. She believed Kumi's motivation about as much as she believed there wasn't a secret motive behind her release.

Reading Rebecca's expression, Kumi added. "No, really. I had my choice who I wanted to sponsor and I chose you. I read about your case in college. I'm a great admirer of yours, actually." Kumi lowered her gaze. "I mean, you took on the world."

More things that Rebecca had tried to forget slinked from dusty corners in her mind, dragging broken limbs into the light. She remembered when they'd finally captured her and brought her in that they were so worried that she'd escape that forty guards had flanked her as she trudged the steps of the courthouse. What had she really done? Shutting down the Pentagon's computers had been frightfully easy. Even simpler was breaching the United Nations' systems. For four years she'd been deep in Warez Underground, chaos hacking and bit-torrent cracking, sometimes for the highest dollar, and sometimes because she felt like it. She'd accepted astronomical sums of money to do things that had been second nature to her, but because the money was so easily obtained, she'd always found a way to pass it among the groups needier than her and her loyalist friends. With the Warez, she'd never had need for money anyway.

Then came the day when she'd become too full of herself. Already surfing the leading edge of the chaos wave, she'd developed a Trojan Horse Exploitation Sniffer Worm that had sought to retrieve all defense related information world-wide. The idea had been to post the gathered information publicly on Usenets and Listservs so the world would know the secrets, but she'd never gotten the chance. Within hours of launching her program, she'd been arrested, accused of violating the Patriot Act, and hurled into a cell with barely a pause for a trial.

Yeah, she took on the world...and lost.

Now that Rebecca knew what to look for, she'd begin watching the POD people, checking for the minute movements of the lower jaw and the throat. She'd seen their eyes and noticed that most held a long stare as if they were only partially paying attention. She couldn't help wonder what it was like. She was only able to imagine that it had to be something like driving down the 405 while watching a DVD movie on the dashboard.

Andy slid behind the smaller boarder, struggled for balance once, then wrapped both arms around the man's waist.

Rebecca followed suit. No sooner had she climbed aboard and latched onto the other gravBoarder, she felt a sudden increase in pressure as she shot forward and then around the corner, flying inches above the ground at terrifying speeds. She locked her hands together and hugged the man's back. Her chin pressed against his shoulder, and she had a clear line of vision to what was in front of them.

Traffic.

Cars jumbled together at a traffic light loomed in front of them. The light changed and she watched as the cars began to inch forward. Andy's boarder shimmied through a gap that snapped shut behind them. Rebecca's boarder shot towards the same spot. She closed one eye, but left the other one open to witness her doom. Miraculously, the car in front moved. Before the car behind it had a chance to slide forward, they sped through the space.

Rebecca risked a look behind her. She shouldn't have. All three policemen were on her trail. They rode their boards like surfers, leaning forward, arms out to the sides, partly to steer, partly to fly, while the boarders rode with an arm outstretched in front of them, their other wrapped around their passengers. She was sure it had to do with the difference in designs.

Her boarder swerved left, then right, then banked on the side of a city bus. Rebecca's eyes widened with the woman's in the seat behind the window on the right when it cracked. Whipping her head around, she saw one of the police boards clip the side of the bus at it tried to mimic her boarder's move. The rider screamed as he sailed over the bus, disappearing into a window display across the street.

Her boarder poured on the speed as they found a straightaway. He pulled alongside Andy, who held his boarder in a death grip.

"You sure know how to show a girl a good time!" she hollered, the wind trying to snatch the words.

Andy grinned through his fear. "Only the best for you, Bec!" Then he looked forward and screamed, "Oh my God!"

She turned and felt her heart leap into her skull. A city bus was headed right towards them. If they didn't do something fast, they'd meet it head on like a June bug on an interstate. But their boarders weren't doing anything to avoid it. They kept cruising straight ahead as the distance dwindled to a suicidal nothing.

She screamed.

And then the two boards separated—the one on the right swerving right onto Melrose West, the one on the left onto Melrose East. An explosion sounded behind them. She didn't dare look, but knew that one of the police boards had met an angry end.

The gravBoard darted in and out of traffic for a few moments longer, then slowed, pulled into an alley, and stopped. The board set down hard to the earth. She let go of the boarder as he stepped off, and flipped his board into his hand. He jerked his head for her to follow as she unlatched a back gate about three houses down. An old house that had survived the Tsunami and the quakes, he rushed to a wooden basement access door, pulled it open and hurried down. Rebecca waited only a moment before she joined him.

He closed the door after her and plodded down the stairs. A dusty sofa sat against one wall, surrounded by an architecture of boxes. He plopped down and rested his board across his legs, holding it like a child would a favorite toy.

She found a box to sit on near the sofa. Blood still thrummed in her ears. Her eyes flicked from motion to motion, super-attenuated by the high-speed chase. "What's your name?"

His bright eyes almost glowed in the gloom. "Pony."

"Thanks for your help out there, Pony."

"P. Rao profiled help. You're Velvet Dogma. Altruism."

"What?"

"Pony's too wired to speak clearly," Andy's said from behind her. "He's on his downward spiral and needs to rest before he gets another hit."

Rebecca turned and stood. Seeing Andy brought a rush to her heart. She wanted to reach out and pull him to her, but something held her back. What was it? Was it because he knew so much about the boarders? She turned back to Pony. Drugs gave him the edge. Drugs and a direct connection between his muscular system and the board—the nexus of the connection on the calf.

"Come upstairs, Bec. You gotta be exhausted." When she didn't move, Andy's smile slipped. "This is one of their safe houses. We're allowed to use it for a few hours. We just can't connect to the ID." He pointed at Pony. "Same for Pony and Scoundrel. They've been with us, so they can't connect until we leave."

"Why is that?"

"Because the police never should have found us. Certainly not through them. Until Panchet figures it out, we're staying put and unconnected." He started up the stairs. "Are you coming?"



After cleaning off the grime of the chase in bathroom —Rebecca spent the first four minutes trying to figure out the faucet—they met in the rather Spartan kitchen. Andy was helping himself to a bowl of oranges. She sat next to him at the table. He placed a sweating glass of water in front of her, which she immediately downed. When she finished, he replaced it with another. She sipped this one. Temporarily sated, she asked one of the questions that had been bothering her. "What's your relationship with the boarders?"

"Relationship?" He grinned humorlessly. "Strange that you would use that word."

"What word would you prefer?"

"What's going on, Bec? Why the sudden change? Have I done something?"

She paused for a long moment. "Coming out of prison was like waking from a coma. I'm brand new to this world. So much has happened, I've yet to even figure out what it all means to me. But you are too easy."

"Too easy?"

"Sure. Too easy to figure out. You meet me at my brothers at the exact moment I get there after twenty years. You snatch his miniVid so you can give it to Panchet, or P. Rao, or whoever he is. You're always one step ahead of whoever is chasing me. And there's that— why am I being chased? Kumi says it's because of my organs, but that doesn't explain the police. Maybe they're after you."

"But I can explain—"

"You'll get your chance." She frowned before continuing. "Then you have this relationship —sorry but I don't know what other word to use—with the boarders, who besides saving my life appear to be no more than hyped-up gangbangers with a death wish."

"They're much more than that," he protested.

"I'm sure they are." Rebecca paused again as she tried to work out the emotions that were boiling within her. "But what I'm not sure about is what you are, or what you want with me." She stopped at that point, her emotions about ready to explode from her. She'd be damned if she'd allow him to see how scared, lonely and out of her element she really felt.

"Panchet, me and David were old friends," he began. "We went to UC Davis together. We worked on a lot of the same projects. We had the same ideals. Like you, Bec, we thought the ID, what has become of the World Wide Web, should be extra-territorial and not subject to any one society's regulations. David and I went one direction, Panchet went another. But the ideas merged in ideology, if not application."

"The boarders? You said they're more than mere gangbangers. Why do they follow him?"

"Because he's their deity."

"Because he has no legs?"

"No. Because he chose to have no legs. Panchet represents the ultimate in choice. He could walk if he wanted to, hell, I wouldn't be surprised if he had a pair of electronic legs in a closet that worked better than yours or mine. No, Panchet prefers the hover life. He chose it, and by doing so earned the respect of the board gangs."

"Is that it?"

"Oh yeah. I almost forgot. He was responsible for unifying the Cheng-Li Gauge Theory with the Irwin-Jones Twin Spin Theory."

She raised an eyebrow.

He clarified. "Panchet invented gravBoard technology."

"Then why is he working in the back of a porn shop? Why isn't he rich beyond all reason?"

"Because he was working for Lasing Industries at the time of his discovery and they took all the credit. Product of work and all that."

"Ahh, one of those."

"Yeah, one of those."

"But how does that explain your 'merged' ideologies?" she asked, her fingers making the double-quote sign as she said merged.

He leaned forward and placed both elbows on the table. He used his hands to accentuate his points. "You see the gravBoarders as gangbangers, going from place to place, guarding their turf or whatever. They wear colors, so they must have turf, right?"

She raised an eyebrow.

"Wrong." He grinned excitedly. "You're in a special position to understand who and what they are. Once you understand, you'll get a kick out of it." He waited to see if she was going to interrupt, then continued when she had nothing to say. "Let's think in terms of 2020 technology so that you can understand the implications. When you were caught chaos hacking your sniffer worm into the Pentagon, it was because the powers that be were able to track you back to your home computer through IP addresses. Right?"

"As good a summary as I've heard."

"The servers you routed through were stationary, some in basements, some in business offices and some cryogenically stored in server facilities. No matter where they were, no matter what layers of security they had, there was one thing they all had in common. They didn't move."

"Yeah."

"So tell me, Rebecca, what would be the benefit of having one of the servers in that chain move constantly?"

"Well, in order to trace a transmission, they'd have to do it prior to the server's IP address changing. Unless there was a pattern of change, once changed —once the server moved—it would render the sender invisible."

"Exactly."

She shook her head. "But I don't see how that relates to the gravBoarders."

He grinned madly. "Rebecca. The gravBoarders are the servers."

She looked long and hard at him, trying to make sense of what he said. If each gravBoarder represented a server, and information was passed through the server, by constantly moving about and accessing WIFI transponders placed at strategic locations throughout the city, the sender would be rendered invisible as their ID address changed and changed and rechanged. By increasing the number of gravBoard servers, the invisibility of the sender increased exponentially. She chuckled to herself. If she'd had that back in the '20s, she never would have been arrested. "And Panchet choreographs this?"

"Ah. You understand that magnitude. Yes, he choreographs it. So far the system has remained undetectable. But with the policemen today came the idea that we'd been burned."

"By one of the boarders?"

"Never. Either you caused it, or some extremely sophisticated surveillance."

She was about to say that she didn't do it, but then she was no longer aware of her own body. Could she have informed the police and didn't know it? "Maybe we were followed to Panchet's. Did anyone check?"

"That's being checked out now."

"What about cameras? If someone knew where to look, they could track us down much faster." She snapped her fingers. "They did know where to look. They followed the transponder on the collar, then reached the area."

Andy didn't look like he bought it. "I don't know. They showed up right beside us. Much too coincidental for my book."

"Do you think they cooperated with the Black Hearts? They can still track me through my organs, right?"

"Yeah. There's a scrambler in the safe house, but out on the street there are certain transponders that track and process the information for the levy owners."

"Then that's my bet. In fact, if the Black Hearts didn't want to act in public, what better way to get to us than through the authorities?"

"We're still not one-hundred percent sure the network isn't compromised."

Rebecca grinned evilly. "Then feed them information. Make it hard, but put out that we're at a different location. Then if someone shows, you can guarantee the net's been blown."

"Panchet's doing that right now."

"Oh." She sat back.

"Give him a few more hours to be sure, then we can go." Andy nodded at the couches that lined each wall of the house. "I don't know about you, but I'm exhausted and could use a few hours shut-eye."

Rebecca agreed, then chose a green couch with an Old World paisley pattern, the fabric worn smooth from thousands of uses. As soon as she lay on it, her body began to shut down. She was past the point of exhaustion. Her eyes slammed shut. The last thing she remembered before she was dragged off to a dreamland free of Black Hearts and gravBoarders was that Andy hadn't answered all of her questions.