Raindrops - episode 2
a short story by Mike K-H
The first episode of Raindrops is here Click on the RSS feed icon at top right to make sure you catch the next episode.
“Pete, you were just too tempting a target, nose in the air, catching flies and snoring away. I thought I’d forgotten to switch the engine off!” Her face was glowing under the tan, and her eyes were wide, sparkling. She played the game the same way as I did, letting us both simmer as long as possible.
“Rubbish! Anyway you snore louder than I do.”
I came back with a couple of cool beers, and we sat sipping quietly, studiously avoiding further physical contact. I saw that she had parked a long way off, downwind of my vehicle. She had treated me just like a game photography target when she first saw my Cruiser, pulling up and viewing the scene through binoculars before deciding to get out and stalk me on foot. With a Ranger covering her, she’d once taken a lucrative close-up of the flies on a sleeping lion’s nose like that - but she hadn’t tipped him out of bed afterwards.
“I should make you walk back alone, but I need to stretch my legs. Let’s go and get your Landy.”
We covered about a kilometre at a steady pace, exchanging general news and gossip as we went, but I didn’t mention Narayan’s challenge. Her Land Rover (like my vehicle, a diesel) was pretty warm inside, but cooled off as we drove back.
“I’ve got something cooking - tell you all about it at Baines’ Baobabs. Just let me shut down and we’ll be off.”
My tools had collected a lot of stats, but hadn’t yet come up with any clues that might help me find either a prophylactic or an antidote. I shut the system down and we drove off at a leisurely pace, passing round the northern edge of the salt pans and heading south to our chosen campsite.
It gets cold at night in the Kalahari, and humans are not the only inhabitants. We put the vehicles together with side awnings touching, chucked sleeping bags in a corner, then lit a fire at each end to discourage hyaenas and other prowlers from entering the space between the vehicles. We slouched lazily on the ground, leaning over to reach anything we needed.
“We’d both be out of a job without today’s technology, but it’s relaxing to abandon it when it doesn’t buy you anything,” I said, rearranging the cooking fire to reduce the last of the unburnt wood to glowing coals before putting a selection of small, juicy bits of meat on the blackened sheet of metal I had balanced on three small rocks.
“Mm-mm. It’s nice to live in a land where just occasionally we don’t feel guilty if we make a real fire, instead of lighting up the skottel braai. I hate having to clean that gas-powered wok before you can pack it away, and you can do a lot more with a real fire, anyway.” Robin placed some small, foil-wrapped potatoes at the edge of the fire and turned the meat. The sun was setting, so I rolled back the awnings. Jupiter and Venus were already visible.
We ate quietly, adding pieces of marinated meat to the grill from time to time, crunching salad and sipping diluted fruit juice or wine as the mood took us. I didn’t even bother to light the kerosene lantern.
“Pete, why do you take your computers into the bush with you? Wouldn’t it be easier to get away from them if you left them at home?”
“I’ve got friends that tried that. Trouble is there are times when you decide not to go back just yet. Do that too often, and even as a freelance you’re out of work. Also, a lot of my intrinsic worth is in the tools I’ve designed. If I get an inspiration, I get very frustrated if I can’t work on it there and then.”
“You don’t have to tell me about those moments. You get downright bloody antisocial when they come on!”
“True. And you’re the only person who not only understands what’s going on, but is prepared to wait quietly until I come back to the real world.”
I kissed her lightly on the forehead and got punched in return. I almost heard the click as the tension ratcheted up another notch.
“Anyway, I don’t actually spend a big fraction of my time playing with my machines. I am what I am because I design powerful tools which do the job for me. Just about the only time I switch off from reality for days on end is when I’m creating a new tool. I’m a bit like a manager of people, delegating jobs to ‘agents’ that I trust, and either checking up now and then, or waiting until they interrupt me. Take this virus I’m chasing: at the moment it’s a personal challenge. No-one has asked me to tackle it yet, but they sure as hell will when Narayan lets it loose. By then, I hope to be close to having an antidote.”
We sat chatting aimlessly, sipping wine and enjoying the isolation. Now and then, one of us crawled away to feed a fire.
I had just rebuilt one fire to my satisfaction when my scalp started to tingle and the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. I sensed something close behind me, breathing almost soundlessly. I turned my head slowly, careful to avoid challenging body language.
In the flickering firelight I saw a face, lips drawn slightly back, eyes wide, and a body tensed for attack. I rolled to one side, away from the fire, and dragged her with me, laughing. The simmering dish boiled over in cheerful ecstasy.
It was quite a while before we separated, cooling rapidly in the night air, and started to prepare for sleep.
“I’m not sharing a double bag. I know I can’t lose my share of the covers completely like I do with duvets and blankets, but it still doesn’t work. When you turn over and drag the bag with you, I’ll dream I’m being rolled up in a carpet.”
She laughed. “At least we can’t fall off the roof from here!”
Just over a year ago, our uninhibited bedroom antics had left us trapped in the tangled remains of a collapsed roof-top tent, hanging halfway up the side of our vehicle. Her sense of humour, coupled with the calm competence that helped us to get out of the situation without further damage to the tent, earned her the niche in my life which she now enjoyed.
We parked our individually-zipped bags side by side, touching, and drifted off to sleep under the stars.
* * *
“Think, man, think!” Someone was shining a light in my eyes, and somewhere in the shadows a big cat was half-purring, half-growling. I woke with the hair standing up on the back of my neck, then calmed down as I saw the full moon. Robin, on her back, was snoring gently. I rolled her over and she sighed and went quiet. I could hear a jackal howling far away, but the night was peaceful.
I dragged myself over to the remains of the fire near our heads and added wood. I was wide awake now, and my mind was racing. I dressed silently, crept into the Cruiser and started up my computer. It was three-thirty.
Three quarters of an hour later, I’d got the bones of an idea designed and was ready to implement it when Robin appeared with a mug of steaming chocolate, put it beside me without a word, and started to walk away. I turned round.
“No! Stay. I’m ready for a break - and thanks. I need something to raise my blood sugar level a bit. It’s still quite chilly and I’m beginning to have a relapse.” I hadn’t heard her get up, see the light on in my vehicle, and start heating water over the now cheerfully blazing fire….
“Could you eat toast if I made some?”
“With peanut butter.”
She slipped quietly out again. I sipped chocolate and started coding (well, building something out of a pile of Lego bricks would be a better analogy, but old terms die hard). By the time the toast arrived I was watching with satisfaction as the white fungus on my representation of the infection withered away, leaving the original ‘coral’ clean and undamaged.
It looked as if I had successfully cleaned my screen saver and got rid of the virus. I tried running it, and it worked. Beautiful Euclidean solids followed complex three-dimensional paths, casting shadows as they went. Sometimes two solids would merge for a while, creating a more complex entity, then they would separate again. I hit a key, and they started to leave a trail which eventually became an ornate turk’s head made of gold and studded with rubies and emeralds.
“Mm-mm. Just what I needed.” She smiled and part of me squeezed her hand. The rest was still lost in another world.
“So far so good. Now let’s see if I can spot the little bugger if I open the gate and let it in again.”
I switched on the satellite modem and connected to the Net for the first time since the invasion. Two minutes later, the connection was closed automatically and a message appeared, flashing steadily. NET VIRUS NARAYAN’S DRY ROT HAS INVADED. DOC SMITH HAS DISABLED YOUR NET CONNECTION AND IS CHECKING FOR DAMAGE. DO NOT RECONNECT UNTIL I TELL YOU IT IS SAFE TO DO SO.
“Looks as if you have succeeded, Pete. Well done!”
“I’m not so sure. That was difficult, but not clever enough for Narayan to challenge me the way he did.”
OK. ALL CLEAN. SHALL I RE-ESTABLISH YOUR NET CONNECTION?
I hit the ENTER key and stood up. “Let’s have breakfast outside while we wait and see.”
The sun, blood-red while it was filtered by the dust haze, was bright now and the air was warming rapidly. We ate and chatted lazily, watching the birds rise on the first thermals of the day. Robin had stocked up, so she didn’t need to leave for Tsodilo Hills until first light tomorrow.
I was debating whether to go with her. It all depended whether I could crack this thing completely by the end of today. I didn’t know what other facets of the virus I had not yet seen, but I was certain that I’d only countered the obvious attack so far.
Encryption and polymorphism had been around for years now. Narayan must have found something more devious. I got up, stretched, and went back into the Cruiser.
“Uh-oh. It’s back. Or it’s told its friends.”
My screen saver was drunk. Instead of the elegant Lissajous figures the flying shapes usually executed, they were crashing into the screen boundary and staggering about before regaining their proper paths. Some instinct made me switch the sound back on, and I was treated to a chorus of the Wiffenpoofs’ Song punctuated by moans of “Ow-w-w!” whenever a shape collided with the screen boundary.
“Gentlemen songsters out on a spree -Ow-w-w-w!
Lord have mercy on such as we…. Ouch!
Ba, ba, ba-aa.”
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