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Serendipity / Ch. 19: The Cake

BOOK 1: SERENDIPITY / CH. 19:THE CAKE

WEDNESDAY

Sarah knocked at Kate's door. “Kate, I can't find John. He's not in his office, or anywhere else I can think of, and the computer's not cooperating. I tried mentally shouting for him and got no response.”

“And you've called his wrist unit?”

“He took it off for the experiment. Didn't put it back on when I threw him out.”

“Asked your friendly computer?”

“Yes. It seems to trace him using his wrist unit, which is sloppy programming, I must say.”

“Hmm, so the face recognition is only functional at entry and exit?”

“Or if someone enters without a wrist unit, I guess. It doesn't seem to check to see if they take it off. It does report that some unspecified people left the building at a time that might have been John, but it won't give me evidence that any of them was actually him.”

“And any more unknown people in the building?”

“It won't tell me.”

“I thought you had been given full access.”

“So did I.”

“But it's not telling you things?”

“Exactly.”

“You must be able to look at the security cameras’ pictures?”

“I did before, but something's changed. It says “access denied.”

“Odd. Let me see what it tells me.” Kate tried to access the pictures.

“Security override, access denied,” she read. “That's weird, never had that. Any ideas what it means?”

“Urm, no. I haven't had time to get to grips with all the security stuff on this system. I haven't found any manuals or anything, so I've been exploring myself, but that's slow. How about asking it what it thinks the security status is.”

“What! Listen to this! Security override level 6, intrusion attempt, impersonation attempt, threat detected to staff member, local lockout.”

“Urm, Kate, this sounds scary. Someone threatened a staff member, John is missing, I don't know what local lockout means, do you?”

“Urm, no. Ivan or Horrace might. Or Janet for that matter. Let's call Janet first, she's not as likely to be in the middle of some tangle of wires.”

Kate tried calling Janet and failed. Tried Ivan and failed. Tried Horrace. Found him, sort of. He was indeed in a tangle of wires. “I'll wreck everything on this experiment if I move, Kate, I'm sorry. Can't Ivan help?”

“I can't contact Ivan, or Janet, John's missing and the computer's saying things like intrusion attempt, staff threatened and local lockout, whatever that means.”

“Well, the last one means it won't let anything it considers sensitive near you for some reason. Anyone else there?”

“Sarah's here, no-one else.”

“And it said intrusion attempt, and what else?”

“Intrusion attempt, impersonation attempt, threat detected to staff member.”

“What security level?”

“Six.”

“Something's scared it, Kate, that's a pretty high alert.”

“And three people are missing.”

“Yes, but if it had been a clear kidnapping attempt or something like that it would have gone up to level ten and started gassing people.”

“And if some security service types came and said something like 'We need to talk to you outside, sir'?”

“Well, we'd have them on camera, at least.”

“Camera is off limits for me.”

“That makes me think it's worried about you or Sarah, or some stranger is wandering around near you.”

“In my office?”

“Or listening in somehow?”

“So either the computer has got scared of me or Sarah, and three staff are missing at the same time without letting anyone know, or some scary type people have issued veiled threats and abducted them, bugging my office as they passed by?”

“Urm, yes, something like that. I'll get this lot sorted and call you back as soon as I can get to my terminal, Kate, OK?”

“But which one is more likely?” Kate asked the dead connection, her frustration evident.

Sarah thought of something. “Kate, John's client this afternoon wasn't scared off. Does that have any bearing on anything?”

“Urm, possibly, minor government official.”

“I'm definitely worried enough to try looking for John now, Kate.”

“Go for it dear, but no more than a few seconds, please. I don't want you pushing yourself without Janet around to sort you out again.”

Sarah tried focussing on John. It was very fuzzy. She got a sense of him being in motion, and a rough direction, but didn't pick up any strong emotions from him.

“Good news, bad news, which one first?”

“Good please, I'm worn out.”

“I could sense him, just, and I got a direction too. He's over that way somewhere. He's moving, and I couldn't sense any strong emotions.”

“And the bad news?”

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“I certainly wasn't reading thoughts in detail. I've no idea if I didn't sense emotions because everything's fine or because I can't at this distance. And I don't know what this distance is.”

“So he could be tens of miles away, or just round the corner?”

“Exactly. Now I'm just going to tune into peace for a while. John found it works as an overheat diagnostic.”

“OK Sarah, but please don't leave me for long.”

Sarah focussed on peace. She needed it. While there, she prayed for John, regretting not having done so earlier, and then not having any sense of the heat that John had spoken of she dropped back to normal.

“Kate, while we wait for Horrace to get some sense out of the computer, can I suggest we pray?”

“You're welcome to, Sarah. Please pray for me too. I could do with some peace of mind right now and can't see another way of getting it. If your God is really in the self revelation business then maybe he'll even answer your prayer for me.”

Sarah prayed, “Almighty God, thank you for your promises and your Word, thank you that we can ask you for John, Janet and Ivan to return to us safely and know that you hear. I pray for Kate, that she might know the true peace that comes from trusting you. Help her to find peace now, and to turn to you wholeheartedly. Call her clearly, I beg you, dear Lord, to repent and acknowledge your lordship. Grant her peace, oh Lord, and heal her hurting heart.”

To Sarah's surprise, Kate also prayed, “God, I've denied your existence for years and I don't know if you exist. If you do, then let us be laughing about this in five minutes' time. Please, God, I'm scared and worn out and I want to know for sure.”

“Er, Kate, you know what you've just done?”

“What, challenged God to prove He's real? Is that allowed?”

“I'm not sure. May the Lord answer your prayer whether it's allowed or not!”

At that moment two things happened. Horrace called and there was a knock on the door. Sarah leapt to open it and immediately hugged John, who had knocked. Janet and Ivan were behind him, cowering out of sight and carrying a large cake box between them.

Horrace reported, “Kate, the computer doesn't believe Sarah is who she claims to be. Something about a collapse and a gap in image data, plus an unknown wearer using your wrist unit, Sarah. And after that it has a record of her threatening John, which it considered not an appropriate thing for an engaged couple. And then this maybe-impostor tried to locate John, which it considered linked to the threat, and also to access secure systems. Does that all make sense?”

Sarah relaxed her grip on confused John's body and asked, “How do we tell it to calm down, Horrace?”

“Oh, that's easy, verify yourself to your wrist unit, then it'll stop broadcasting, ‘I'm Sarah's unit but I don't have proof she's wearing me.’ I thought everyone knew that bit of their spec. There was a big debate about it 15 years ago. It's supposed to be an anti-theft feature.”

“Big debate when I was five. Never heard about it.”

“Ah, good point.”

“Thank you, Horrace.”

“Horrace!” shouted Ivan from the doorway. “Come to Kate's office and call the others, will you.”

“OK, Ivan.”

Kate stood up and asked, “John, where have you been? The computer got in a tizzy about threats to staff members, you, Ivan and Janet were missing, Sarah and I were starting to think you'd been kidnapped or arrested for mindreading state secrets or something.”

“Wait a minute and you'll find out, Kate, but what's this about threats to staff members?”

“The paranoid and foolish computer decided that I might possibly have been a body double or something,” Sarah said.

“And then,” Kate added, “she quite rightly offered to thump you in fair return for saying things you shouldn't about her needing some nursing care, but it decided that that wasn't the sort of thing fiancées say and thus she was indeed a body double, and not only that, but a potentially dangerous body double at that.”

Sarah continued, “And of course dangerous body doubles aren't allowed to look at sensitive data like who left the building or how. So all it told us was that there had been a breach of security, threats made to staff, and that this room wasn't secure. Since you'd been talking to a client, we were having visions of you three being bundled into the back of a van on the way to some kind of secret interrogation facility.”

“All because you didn't think to leave a note to Sarah or me telling us you'd be back in a while.”

“But I did, I left Sarah a note on the computer...”

“Which didn't deliver it because I was a dangerous body double.”

“Sarah, can you try to talk some sense into that computer, please. How did it think you'd turned into a double?” Kate asked.

“Well, Horrace did say interrupted video log. It will have been programmed for ethical surveillance and it will turn off its cameras in certain circumstances,” Sarah offered.

“Such as you having your dress removed?”

“I guess so.”

“And I did open the window too. My goodness, what a paranoid computer it is!”

Kate laughed.

Sarah looked at her wrist. “On the subject of ‘your goodness,' Kate, which I'm sure you know is just a euphemism for the Divine Being, It's now four minutes and thirty seconds since you made a certain challenge.”

Kate went white. “I need to sit down.”

Sarah was still holding John's hand. [What challenge?] John asked, puzzled.

[This one {memory} and no teasing!]

[I agree, she needs thinking time, love.]

“Will someone tell me why the entire staff are slowly filling my office?”

Kate asked.

Ivan cleared his throat, “Ladies, gentlemen and assorted riff-raff who refuse either of those appellations, please lend me your ears.” Then, in a foreign accent, “I vont to start a collection. No sorry, wrong speech. I want you that are able to, to cast your minds back twenty-five years. Those who can't can have a sweetie later if they're good.”

Sarah asked, [Is he always like this?]

[When he's in a good mood.]

“Now I know that exact dates are not some people's strong points but the computer remembers all. And we have someone very important to us all here who actually started work here twenty-five years ago today, and in celebration of those long years of dedication and service, we present you this cake. Happy anniversary, Kate! May you have many more years as matriarch of our happy family.”

“Hah! The computer remembers all, does it? Well I remember that I actually started a day earlier than my first contract says, because somehow everyone was so busy, they forgot to ask me to sign it.”

“And she believes we based it on the contract date, but no, we are not a day late. She clearly hasn't seen the cake yet, folks! Ladies, gentlemen and riff-raff, I give you Kate's ID photo from her first day at work!” and with a flourish he removed the lid from the cake box and there, in a masterpiece of 3-D sculpture, was a life-size image of young Kate's head and shoulders on her first day at the Institute. Her features had been painted on accurately and her long hair was made of stranded sugar. It was very lifelike.

“Oooh, you fiend! How did you get access to that picture?”

“It was just sitting there in the records, Kate, no special tricks required.”

“And now you want me to cut up my young self?”

“Well, if you don't, then you don't see what's inside.”

“Not a marshmallow brain again I hope, Ivan.”

“No, Kate. Not even any fake blood this time.”

“And this is why the three of you vanished and caused untold anguish?”

“Er... yes, Kate.”

“Thank you. It's a wonderful gift. But if I remember that photo, I didn't actually have my hair like that in it, nor was that necklace showing. But that's my necklace. What gives? Did you give him more photos, or John, Sarah have you been spying on me?”

John answered, “No spying, Kate, just a big coincidence. The man in the shop recognized your picture. Said he had some pictures of you from university and asked if it was OK if he used them too. Oh, he sent you a note.”

“How would he remember me? That's crazy. I only remember a few people from back then.”

“Then read the note, Kate. Or do you want to cut the cake first? And read it in private?”

“Just tell me his name, John, and I'll see if I remember him.”

“You do Kate, Pete made your cake.”

“Pete! He was going to be an artist. Very artistic cake, but not what he was planning. Do I really have to cut myself in effigy?” Kate was still staring at her image in royal icing.

“Pete said that the outside is self-supporting and will last if you want to keep it. There's actually a join where the hair meets the face. So no, if you don't want to, you can remove the hair and we can scoop out the cake if we're careful.”

“Let's try. I've never seen such artistry. What a waste to eat it. And he churns these out by the dozen a week?”

“Actually, Kate,” Janet answered, “he turns out normal ones by the dozen a day. He's got a clever little robot that does the painting, and he just picks from some standard face shapes to get a reasonable match. I've seen his machine working before. The result is recognisable, but not this good. We went in last week to find out how long it took, and he said we could have had it the same day if we'd wanted one of those, but he begged us to let him do a better one for you, for old times' sake. There was time, so we said OK. We didn't know it'd be this good.”

“Right! Ivan, Horrace, you're the experts at micro manipulation. I want you to very very carefully open this cake along the joins, and if you break it, you're in trouble. I'm going to sit down and read my letter.”