Disclaimers in part 01
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"Certainly the game is rigged. Don't let that stop you. If you don't bet, you can't win."
~~Robert Heinlein -- from The Notebooks of Lazarus Long~~
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WEDNESDAY, JUNE 28, 2000
LONE GUNMAN OFFICES
4:45 P.M.
FROHIKE:
We have a bunch of Area 51 data stored here and there in the offices from research we've done over the years. Maybe there's something in one of those old files that can help us make sense of what Byers found. We always store our most sensitive data in the safes, and the disks are arranged by subject and date of retrieval. Part of the problem is, I don't exactly remember when we got this stuff, and there are years worth of files. Not that it would help all that much right now; Byers and I tore the place apart this morning, and it more or less resembles Langly's bedroom in here.
"Looking for something?" Byers asks me companionably as he strolls into the work area. He sounds as if he'd never been pissed at me. He and Sari must have made up after their spat.
"You remember how we have a bunch of old information on Dreamland? I'm looking for those files."
Byers scrunches his face into a frown. "Yeah, I seem to remember there being quite a bit of it."
"Mind giving me a hand?"
"No, not at all." Byers sits amid the disaster and begins sifting through the various and sundry items around us.
I mop my forehead. The basement is almost cavelike in its coolness most of the time, but it's extremely hot today, and we've been doing a lot. "I could use a beer. Want one, buddy?" I almost say, you're not getting laid, you might as well drink, but I bite my tongue. He's in a good mood right now. I'd like to keep it that way.
He considers it. "Sure, I'll have one."
I head for the kitchen, pop two beers. When I return to the office, I hand one to Byers, who's moved over to my workstation. "Here's one, Frohike," he says, feeding a disk into the drive. He takes the proffered beer. "Ah, thanks. Whacked out data. Goon assassins. And now, it's Miller time."
I chuckle. It's good to have the real Byers back. Contrary to what most people believe, the boy most assuredly does have a sense of humor, and a damn warped one at that. Just avoid anything related to his genitals and you're fine.
Looking at what we've found, though, brings me up short. "This is weird. The disk is marked Dreamland, but most of this looks like black box info, flight telemetry, but with a really weird twist. Where the hell did it come from?" I ask as the files come up.
Byers is musing over the screen in front of us. "I have no idea. Didn't Mulder get a tip from someone at Area 51 a couple years back? I thought he and Scully made a trip out to Nevada to check it out."
"I... you know, I don't have a real clear memory of that, but I think you're right."
"The date on the disk is 8/6/98. Do you remember anything significant happening that August?"
"Not really. Let's take a look-see."
Byers muses over the files. "It's aircraft flight data, to be sure, but it's not like anything I've ever seen before. I mean, tachyon flux? Gravitational displacement? I don't know how the hell we could have this here. We've never had a black box in our possession, and certainly not one that would record this! And I don't know what the hell this analysis is." He blinks. "Let me run through this, and then do a comparison with the stuff I downloaded."
He's caught up in the task for some time, and it's over an hour before he speaks again. "I may have to knock off for a while. I promised Sari I'd go to dinner with her, to make up for last night. She should be here shortly." He shakes his head. "This is really confusing. I've got no idea where this stuff came from. The only thing that makes any sense is the analysis file."
Ah, no wonder he's in a better mood. "That's fine. Go; eat, drink and be merry." I was about to say, 'eat, drink and get laid,' but I'm trying not to piss him off, and that's all it would take.
"I do want to look at this stuff some more. I'm no physicist, but it seems to me there are patterns in each of these data sets that match. What's even stranger is that there's some kind of... temporal anomaly here. God, I sound like a Star Trek script. Why don't you take a look at them?"
"Sure. Temporal anomaly? This I've gotta see."
True to Byers' prediction, the office buzzer rings a few minutes later, and he returns to the computer with Sari in tow.
"Hey, Mel. How's it going?" She looks tired, and her hair is damp. She must have showered before she came over. Maybe I should consider taking a cool one myself. It couldn't hurt.
"Found some fascinating new data relating to our current investigation," I reply. "And you?"
"Spent the day moving files and arranging the new office. Tomorrow I get to spend interviewing people for my staff." She stretches and groans, unconsciously showing off her body through the gauzy skirt and tank top she's wearing. I have no idea how Byers can ignore how hot she looks.
"Oh, right, you got promoted yesterday. Congratulations!" I stand and give her a somewhat sweaty hug, but it doesn't seem to bother her. She's nice and cool.
"Anything that helps give the files context?" she asks.
"Not yet," Byers says, "but we did find this." He pulls up a chair at his desk and motions for her to sit down as he pulls up a file. "What do you make of it?" he asks as she looks at the data.
"Some kind of heavy physics stuff, maybe a set of quantum equations," she says. "I don't understand a whole lot beyond your basic statistical modeling, though."
"This is way beyond me," he says, "and Frohike doesn't follow it either, but I think it may have something to do with superstring theory, gravitational field stuff. There's definitely some odd temporal stuff going on. And this analysis file looks like something I'd write."
"Guess I'm going to be doing some light reading tonight," I inform them. "A little Hawking, some Feynman, and maybe I'll at least have a vague idea of what's being done here."
"Well if it's quantum mechanics, temporal weirdness, and superstrings, I have just the guy for you. Sean O'Casey. He'll be at the consulate party for my folks this Friday night." Sari smiles. "I was going to invite all three of you anyway. Ringo might like a break, and I think you guys would like Sean."
"Sean O'Casey?" Byers says. "Isn't he the up and coming wunderkind in quantum physics these days? Works at CERN?"
Sari laughs. "Yeah, and quite the character."
"But is he... discreet?" I ask. It makes all the difference in the world.
This makes Sari laugh even harder, and she shakes her head at me. "Oh Kali-Ma, no. I'm not sure the word is even in his vocabulary. But he's the best you're going to find anywhere, and as far as things like this go, he doesn't publish anything unless and until he's damned good and sure it's the real McCoy. Everybody says he'll wind up with a Nobel one of these days. I'm pretty confident in him."
"Where did you meet this guy?" I ask her.
"One of his Ph.D. advisors at MIT is a friend of mine. I met Sean at a party a couple of years ago just after he got his Doctorate. He made a rather blatant pass at me. When I didn't go for it, he made a pass at Carlos, his advisor. The guy's incorrigible, but a real sweetheart. We keep in touch through email." She turns to Byers. "If he makes a pass at you, and you're not into that kind of thing, just tell him so. He'll take it somewhere else. But I can practically guarantee he'll have company at the end of the night."
Byers blushes, and chuckles. "I... um..." he says, his voice as close to noncommittal as he can manage.
"Sean's a cutie," Sari teases him.
He gives a longsuffering sigh. "It's not about cute," he replies.
Ain't that the truth. If it was about 'cute,' the boy wouldn't have been so hung up on Mata Hari for so long; he would have fallen for someone else years ago. It's not like he's never seen attractive people before, it's that he's too damned scared of himself to let go for anyone. I have no idea if he's ever been into guys at all, but in the last twelve years, he's only been with Susanne that I know of, and in all that time, he's only had three nights' worth of opportunity. Who the hell knows what happened between them? I only know he got royally screwed by her. It's about time he moved on, and thank God that seems to be happening.
"I don't care what it's about," I counter. "How do we know he isn't going to blow the story for us?"
Sari looks up at me. "Sean's got a healthy mistrust of the government, and it's a wonder he got a position at all, considering how far left his politics are. Makes the Anarcho-Greens look like stone age conservatives."
"Well, we do need help," I concede. "Let's just make sure we're not gonna get screwed in the process." The minute those two are out the door, I'll start a background check on our Dr. O'Casey. Just because he doesn't care for the government doesn't mean we're kindred spirits. If that was all it took, we'd be hooked up with those right wing militias that believe they've been sent to save 'The White Race' from any minority they happen to get their gun sites on. Believe me, we're as eager to get the skinny on those sickos as we are on the government conspirators.
"John," Sari says, "why don't we get out and have dinner while it's still light. You'll be able to keep an eye out for anything untoward while I'm driving."
Byers nods. "I can live with that," he says.
"Have fun kids," I tell them as they head for the door.
Sari turns and sticks her tongue out at me as she closes the door behind her. She shouldn't stick it out unless she intends to use it. Yeah; like she'd ever offer to use it on me. Anyway, I guess it's time to get hacking.
8:20 P.M.
LANGLY:
Pretty quiet in here. They must be down in the cave. "Hey! Where are you losers hiding?" I yell as I pop a beer for myself. Might as well celebrate. I mean, it hasn't been much of a birthday so far. Okay, Mrs. SaintJohn got some brioches for us, and she treated me to a chocolate brownie frapuccino (she asked me what I liked, even), and that was sort of my celebration, plus the waffles this morning. I just wish Deb had been more up for it. She was real bummed; she'd kind of forgotten and that made her upset. Oh yeah, like I'd expect her to remember right now.
"Who're you calling losers?" Frohike yells to me. "And bring me a beer while you're at it."
"Hey, it's my birthday!"
"Your point?"
Well, nice to know that some things in the universe are constant, like Frohike being a dick. I take him a beer. He better be grateful. "Whatcha working on?" He better be doing something about what's up with Deb. They made me lay off, and I only went with it on the condition that they were going to do something about it.
"Come over and have a look. Or was physics a class you slept through?"
"I didn't sleep through all my classes. I played D&D through some of 'em."
He snorts like I'm the bane of his existence. Well, I try. "Here. My eyes need a break."
I hand him his beer.
"How's Miss Deborah?"
"She's hanging. Think she might get out Friday."
"And her parents? How long are they around for?"
"That's the good part. Mrs. SJ has to teach on Monday. She's doing summer school. So they're going back Saturday."
I was worried I was gonna be stuck with them for the rest of my mortal life, which might not be long if Mr. SJ sticks around, but they said today they were leaving Saturday. I offered to take them to the airport. I hope I didn't sound too eager. "Bad part is, her sister's coming up from Raleigh for about ten days. Deb says she's cool, though." Personally, I have my doubts. I've had just about enough of the SJ's, except for Deb. I can never get enough of her, especially right now. "Can you believe, they're making us wait six weeks 'til we can do anything again? What am I gonna do?"
"Same thing you always did," Frohike says real dryly. Prick.
I look at the screen. This is Area 51 stuff I don't recognize. "You think this has to do with Deb taking a bullet?"
"I'm thinking somebody doesn't want us to know something. I'm wondering if this has anything to do with what Byers downloaded."
"This is old stuff?" I really don't remember seeing this. And yes, in spite of my stoner status, I do actually remember tech shit.
"Yeah. The disk is dated 8/6/98. Funny thing is, neither Byers nor I could remember how we got this."
"Don't ask me."
"You'll notice I didn't."
I scroll through. "Heavy duty physics stuff. Maybe I shouldn't have slept through that class. I mean, tachyon flux? Gravitational displacement? What the hell is that all about?"
"Now compare it with Byers' files." I bring up another set of screens. Thank God for 21-inch monitors. When you have as much real estate in front of you as we do, you want a honking big screen.
I look it over, but I don't get that far before we get interrupted. It's Sari and Byers, and they sound happy. They should. They're not gonna be sexually deprived for six weeks, except by choice. They're idiots.
"Happy Birthday, Ringo," Sari leans over and kisses me on the cheek. Nice, but I'd really rather have what me and Deb originally had planned for today. *Sigh.* Let's just say it didn't involve clothes.
"Thanks. Weird stuff here. I mean, yeah, there's some stuff I recognize as aircraft telemetry, but where the hell did we get this? I don't remember this. How are we gonna figure it out? "
"Well, we might be getting some help. I'm going to spend some time tonight studying the analysis section. At least I can figure that out." Byers motions for me to get up. "How're you holding up, Langly?"
"Okay." Not great, not bad. I mean, at least it's not as bad as the days before. Maybe things are getting better. Yeah, right.
"I checked out the young Dr. O'Casey," Frohike says to us.
"O'Casey? You mean like Sean O'Casey? The physics brain boy?" That dude's got some killer research going on.
"One and the same," Frohike says. "Interesting young fellow. Gifted, if a bit intemperate. He doesn't seem to have a preference for either girls or boys, but at least his file didn't say anything about barnyard animals."
"Sean has standards. They can be pretty low when he's stoned, but he does have them," Sari assures us.
Me, I don't care if he gives blow jobs to elephants, though he should have a damn good dentist if he does. All I care is, who the fuck did this to Deb, and how can we nail them.
"You notice the pattern similarities between the data sets in these files?" Byers asks me.
"Some." I haven't gotten that good a look. Give me some time, and I'll find whatever's there. It'd help if Byers would let me sit down again.
"Phone's ringing," Byers announces.
"Answer it, Langly," Frohike's just sipping on his beer, kicking back.
"God, we need a houseboy."
"And you're it." Frohike is such a pain in the ass.
I hit the record button and pick up. "Lone Gunmen, whaddya want?" I mean, really. It's been a long day. At least for me it has. Byers gives me an ugly look. Not the time to go prissy on me, Suit Boy.
"Stay away from the files." At least that's what I think the scrambled voice says. I put it on the speaker.
"Who is this?" I'm not feeling so good all of a sudden. Things were just starting to get better.
"Poor Blondie, it's a shame we had to hurt your girlfriend, but you're so hard headed about this stuff."
I'll kill him. So help me, I will reach through the phone and strangle -- whoever the hell it is. Frohike makes a dash for the call tracing equipment.
"Hey, FCC -- I hope you and your chickie had a pleasant dinner. I didn't know you were into vegetarian Thai. Going all wimp on me? Man, I can't believe you're still not doing her. What's wrong with you, are you clipped or just queer? Go for it! I would." The voice chuckles.
Byers looks like he's gonna faint, and Sari goes dead white.
"Sneezy, you tubby little dwarf," our caller goes on, "you seem to be the most sensible one of the bunch. Maybe you could convince the other stooges that this stuff isn't for you."
"Who are you, and what the hell are you talking about?" Frohike shouts at the speaker.
"You know what I'm talking about. You've got the files; stay out of them. I want them back. You'll hear from me again." The call ends abruptly.
Frohike looks up from the tracer. "Damn, he was out too fast. Not long enough for a trace. Langly, try to raise Mulder. Byers, you and Sari figure out what the hell she's going to do for the night. I don't think going home's an option."
"If you think I'm not gonna go see Deb tomorrow--" he's brain dead.
He turns around and cuts me off. "Listen, Blondie, we'll deal with your love life in the morning. In the meantime, we'd better get some idea of who we're up against, and fast."
Byers looks sick. "You were right, Frohike. Maybe we should have backed out when we had the chance."
Frohike's starting to type. "Nice thought, Byers, but there never was a chance. We're in it up to our ears. Something here smells really fishy. I bet the real story's in this flight data you found. I'm betting this black box data connects the stealth stuff with the U.F.O. files, guys. It must be from Dreamland, otherwise why all the ooga-booga shit? Now we have to find out who they are."
End part 10