Alan Foster - Cyber Way

Gaggii listened silently to Ooljee’s words, standing quite still and relaxed except, Moody noted, for his hands. All of his fingers curled back and upwards, so that he appeared to have a fleshy hook attached to each wrist. When the sergeant had finished, Gaggii responded, displaying more interest than at any time since their arrival.

“I think I can answer most of your questions right here, my friends. How did you finally find me?”

Ooljee glanced at his partner. Moody’s fingers slipped inside his jacket to close around his pistol. But Gaggii gave no indication that he knew, made no sudden moves, just stood and waited.

“We used the Kettrick template, got into the web or whatever it is, and asked it,” Ooljee told him.

It had to be a shock, but remarkably, Gaggii’s expression didn’t change. “I had not thought of that, because I didn’t imagine anyone, least of all the police, could figure out what this was about, much less find their way in. For nonspecialists, my friends, you have done astonishingly well. I have only myself to blame. But then, the web was designed to be used by nonspecialists, so I suppose I shouldn’t compliment you too highly. Its simplicity of operation is exceeded only by its capabilities, of which I am every day in awe. How did you happen upon the secret of the template? I thought that when I destroyed the original and the insurance company’s archival copies, I had left nothing behind.”

“Kettrick had his own file.” Moody spoke from his seat on the couch, watching every twitch of Gaggii’s eyes and fingers. “His wife showed us. That’s where we got our copy.”

“Of course.” Evidently Gaggii was not one to indulge in self-recrimination. “I thought of that possibility, but had only enough time for a rapid, unrevealing search. One can only do so many things so fast. It is when things are rushed that people get hurt.” He moved and Moody started to reach for his gun, stopped himself when he saw that Gaggii was only taking a chair opposite the couch. Ooljee remained standing, alert.

“All I wanted was the sandpainting, or a copy thereof. It took me a long time to track it down. Even then, all was still supposition.”

“You are saying that you didn’t know if there was anything to it, and still you killed the two people?”

“He would not let me have a copy of the painting.” Gaggii spoke quietly, as if that explained everything. “When every other method failed, I tried to get it without disturbing anyone, but burglary was not something at which I was experienced. Mr. Kettrick was in a place where I did not think he would be, as was his servant. I tried to discuss the situation with him but he became abusive and irrational. When he started to call the police, I was forced to react.

“Understand that I would not have minded going to jail for breaking and entering. I tried to explain this to him. But he would have forced me to give up the holomage of the sandpainting, which I was making at the time he interrupted me. Like so many wealthy people, he kept confusing arrogance with power. I regret the death of the servant more.

“Much of my life has been spent seeking this sandpainting.” He was watching Ooljee as he spoke. “You have no idea how seminal it is to the history and culture of the People.”

“I’m starting to get the idea,” the sergeant told him brusquely.

“Then you have progressed. That is gratifying.”

“Boom the oil,” Moody snapped. “What exactly is the damn thing, and where’d it come from?”

“What is it…?” Gaggii smiled, an unexpected inner contentment radiating from his lanky form. “I think it is a database of extraterrestrial origin, which can be accessed with remarkable ease. As to where it is from, I believe it was put here by the Holy People.”

“I don’t think I’ve seen that name advertised under Databases in the usual catalogs,” Moody replied.

“I use it for lack of a better local reference.” Gaggii crossed one leg over the other, at ease, enjoying himself. He’s playing a damn game with us, Moody thought suddenly. Well, let him. He and his partner would have the last move.

“That is the reference our ancestors employed. If I had a better name I would use it, but I have been unable to find out anything about them. It is a subject for future study.”

“We got some idea of what it’s like.” Moody’s fingers caressed the butt of his pistol. “One thing’s for sure: it’s dangerous. People a lot more knowledgeable about this sort of thing than you or I need to be studying it.

“Ah, but there are no people knowledgeable about ‘this sort of thing,’ my friend. So why should I not be the one to study it, or you? True, it may be capable of actions our feeble imaginations cannot grasp, but we will not know that until we reach out to it. As for myself, I have a good imagination. It has already given me one idea worth further examination. As you have discovered for yourselves, once

accessed it can be activated by simple voice command.”

“Anything that can override a police department security system and bum down the building it’s housed in isn’t simple, or safe,” Moody argued.

“I do make time for the news,” Gaggii replied with interest. “I heard about the fire in Ganado, but of course had no reason to connect it to my own work. So that was you two toying with the template. You are lucky all you lost was the building. A system simple to direct is also easy to misdirect. One must progress carefully, in modest increments.”

“We won’t make that mistake again,” Moody assured him. “Nor will you. Maybe you have some idea of what it is, but you still don’t have the vaguest notion of what it’s for.”

Gaggii waxed philosophical. “Perhaps it was emplaced to help the Anasazi and later the Navaho, only the Way was forgotten or deliberately obscured by superstitious medicine men. Or maybe the Anasazi did make use of it. Sometime around 1300 A.D. they simply disappeared. Nobody knows why. Nobody knows where they went. Maybe they used the Way to go someplace where the soil and climate were better. Maybe they went into the web. I do not believe that myself, but when one considers the implications of this discovery, many things suddenly become possible.”

“If you do not think that, what do you think it was put here for?” Ooljee asked him, caught up in contemplation of the mystery.

“I do not think it was put here for any purpose at all. It is just a tool, a device. Like any good tool, it waits to be instructed, to be told what to do.” His smile widened slightly. “Unless information to the contrary presents itself, I see no reason not to assume that the beings who built it just left it here.”

Moody frowned. “Nobody would just ‘leave’ something of this magnitude.”

Gaggii turned to face him. “You apply your values to the immense unknown.” He laughed softly, full of self-contained amusement. “Perhaps they were just passing through and paused only long enough to, say, change a flat tire. We cannot imagine what they came for any more than we can imagine them. It is said that one cannot envision a real alien because a truly alien alien would by its very definition be incomprehensible to us. So might it be with their devices, their tools.

“I think the template design is a tool, the web it accesses a greater one. There may be others lying about whose existence we do not even suspect, devices we cannot see or sense.

“Picture it, my friends. You are traveling in your truck through the high desert. You have a flat and stop to change the tire. In your rush to depart you forget some of your tools; the power jack, the lug seal, perhaps some paper clips and an empty beer can. Accelerating to eighty, you vanish rapidly from the scene without anyone witness to your activities.