Spirits in the Wires (24 page)

The last of the newcomers is Claudette Saint-Martin, a full-figured black woman in a business suit with a delightful French accent. Apparently she was on her way to work when she got the call from Estie and simply had the cab she was in take her to the airport instead of the office where she'd originally been bound.

There's not nearly enough room in the kitchen, so we take what chairs we need and set up command central in the dining room where the computer's waiting for us. The newcomers are startled when Dick seems to appear out of nowhere, but while they're plainly intrigued, they're too polite to ask about him. Holly and Bojo bring in a new round of coffee, tea, and soft drinks as we get settled. There's a lot of cross-conversation, different people talking at once, but somehow everybody gets brought up to date.

An awkward silence follows the revelation that Aaran was responsible for the virus that started all of this, and all heads turn in his direction. I actually feel sorry for him, but Suzi's the one who speaks up for him.

“Okay,” she says. “So he messed up. Didn't any of you ever mess up? And at least he's had the balls to come here to try and make amends.”

I notice that Holly's friends aren't particularly impressed with that. They don't seem too taken with Suzi herself, either, but I don't have to wonder about that. She seems very nice—too nice to be in Aaran's company, and that's the problem. Aaran's not exactly on anybody's favorite people list that I know, though I have to say he's doing a very good job of acting like a normal person today. Maybe he really is sorry about what he's done and genuinely wants to make up for how badly he's messed things up.

Then the conversation turns to the mechanics of how they set up the original Wordwood site and speculations on how they might be able to recapture those original configurations. Estie reaches into her purse and pulls out a stack of floppy disks held together with a rubber band.

“I managed to dig out my copy of the first back-up we did,” she says.

“That's good,” Tip says. “I couldn't find mine. But the thing is, if there
is
an actual spirit in the Wordwood, won't it have evolved since it was first created? I'm not sure there's any point in starting at the beginning again.”

“What we really need to do,” Claudette puts in, “is establish some sort of communication with whomever or whatever is running the show on the other end of that URL.”

“You don't have to play coy,” Estie says. “Not with anybody that's here. We all know we're dealing with the spirit that lives in the Wordwood.”

“But we don't know
what
it is,” Holly says.

Claudette nods. “That's true. But we still have to find some way to contact it.”

“Except basics is still the best place to start,” Raul says. “You strip away all the fancy flash and plug-ins, and everything's still built on that original HTML you guys wrote way back when.”

I listen to them brainstorm, but even with all the research I've been doing lately, they soon get so esoteric that they lose me. After a while I turn to Holly who's sitting beside me, Snippet asleep on her lap.

“Are you following any of this?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “Even though we used my computer to initially set up the site, I was always just one of the content people. Back in those days, all I did was collect the material and pass it on to one of the others to format. I've since learned to do HTML, but I don't really understand it.”

On the other side of Holly, Claudette turns around and grins.

“That's because you never tried,” she says. “And besides—”

“I had you all to do it for me,” Holly finishes.

It's obviously an old joke between them.

I listen awhile longer, then go out onto the fire escape for another smoke. When I return, the conversation's in another lull. Raul and Tip are studying the picture of Jackson Hart on Aaran's laptop. Estie's loading the data from her floppy discs onto Holly's old 386. Everybody else is just sitting around, looking tired.

I try not to let my frustration show, but none of this seems to be getting us anywhere. I want to say, let's just get
on
with it. Hook the damn computer up to the Internet and let's go.

Except I don't know where to go any more than the others do.

That's when Bojo clears his throat.

“I don't know much about computers,” he says, when he's got everybody's attention, “so correct me if I'm heading down the wrong road here. But this virus that got sent to the Wordwood site—does it work the same way that a virus you or I could get would work?”

There's a moment's silence, then Estie shakes her head.

“Not really,” she says. “This is something that only affects computers.”

“The software, to be precise,” Tip adds. “You know, the protocols that tell the hardware how to work and where to look for information. It doesn't physically affect the hardware, except that your operating system doesn't know where to find it anymore—depending on how the virus was set up, of course.”

Bojo nods. “I was just thinking, when someone gets sick among my people, we use herbs and cures … the way your doctors will prescribe antibiotics. So I thought if a computer virus worked in the same way, maybe there might be some sort of an antivirus we could send to the Word-wood site to combat the virus that Hart created to bring it down.”

The computer experts among us exchange glances.

“Maybe,” Estie says slowly. “If we knew
what
the virus was …”

“We'd need to get into Hart's computer,” Claudette says. “But what are the chances of that? The police have probably impounded it by now.”

Raul nods. “Or at least sealed off his apartment because it's a crime scene. We'd never be able to get in.”

“I think I can help with that,” Aaran says.

Everybody turns to look at him.

“I mean, so long as the police really haven't taken it away.”

“I thought you hardly knew him,” I say.

“I don't. But his landlady seems to like me, and if I told her it would help us bring him back, I think she'd let us in.”

I look at Estie. “What do you think?”

“It's hard to say without actually seeing what he's written,” she says. “But I like this a lot better than trying to sort out mystical mumbo jumbo. At least I understand programming languages.”

“So some of us can work on that,” I say, “while the rest of us can work on trying to set up some kind of communication with the spirit that runs the site.”

“And if we can't get it to come to us,” Robert says, speaking up for the first time, “maybe we can go to it.”

His words hang at the table for a long moment, and everybody just looks at him.

“You're talking about a place, right?” Robert asks. “Am I hearing this right? You're saying that this spirit's got its own place, out there in the wires somewhere?”

“I suppose …” Estie says. “I mean, there's the Wordwood site.”

“And that's on the Internet? Or at least it's in some computer connected to the Internet?”

“Well, logically …” Tip begins, but then he laughs. “What am I saying? There's nothing logical about this. You're right. The files that make up the Wordwood site
should
be housed in a computer somewhere. But that's where the site got really strange. Not only did it develop this personality of its own, but it also disappeared from the computers where we were storing it.”

“And took up residence out on the Internet somewhere?” Robert asks.

“I don't see how that's possible,” Claudette says. “It's got to be housed in a physical computer. There's no physical
place
for it in the wires or satellite feeds or however people access the Web.”

“Tell that to the people that have disappeared,” Estie says.

Claudette nods. “Point taken. Not understood, but taken.”

Something starts niggling at the back of my mind. A conversation I had, maybe. I'm not sure what. I start to think out loud, hoping to catch the memory unaware.

“The way I see it,” I say, “is that these spirits might use the Internet as a means of getting from one place to another—travelling pretty much the same as the data we send—but they
exist
somewhere else. And if I had to guess, I'd say it was
between.”

That's not quite it, but I can almost taste myself coming up on that elusive memory.

“I don't follow that,” Estie says.

“Between
is where magic is strongest,” I explain. “The spaces between one thing and another. Not day or night, but dusk or dawn. Not the land on either side of a river, but the bridge that connects them. The boat that will take you from one side to the other.”

“So you're saying that the Wordwood site exists someplace in between the routes we use to connect our computers to the ISPs housing Web sites?”

I nod. And now I've got the memory that had just been out of reach.

“And what's more magical than the spiritworld?” I say. “Just before Saskia disappeared, she was telling me about a conversation she had with … with a friend of ours. It doesn't matter who. But this friend believes that the Wordwood site exists in the spiritworld. Or at least that it can be accessed through the spiritworld. I don't know how I could have forgotten that.”

“The spiritworld,” Ciaudette repeats.

I see Geordie giving me a puzzled look. I want to tell him that Saskia was talking to my shadow, but that's something I don't even want to start to get into with this group. They're all looking at me with varying levels of confusion.

“Not the spiritworld, Master Riddell,” Dick says. He blushes when everyone looks at him, but gamely goes on. “The spiritworld isn't
between.
But the borderlands are.”

Bojo nods. “And the borderlands can take you anywhere—so long as you know what you're looking for.”

“These are actual places?” Estie asks.

“Oh, yeah,” Robert tells her. “You don't get more actual. Some people will even tell you that this world we're living in is just one echo of what you'll find across the borders.”

After telling his own story, Aaran's been sitting quietly through all of the various conversations we've been having around the table. But he leans forward now, his gaze fixed on me.

“And is that a place you can take us?” he asks. “We can go there and get these people back?”

“I can't,” I say. “But I know people who can cross over. The big problem's going to be figuring out
where
to go once we do cross over. You can't begin to imagine how vast the spiritworld is.”

Suzi laughs. “I can't even imagine
it.”

That wakes smiles from many sitting around the table.

“You don't have to go looking for more people to bring into this,” Robert says. “What you're talking about now is pretty much my own take on the problem. I can't see people disappearing into a machine. But if that machine's a gate into the otherworld? Oh, yeah. That's more than possible.” He looks from me to Bojo, to Dick. “And it makes sense, doesn't it?”

“Now wait a minute,” Claudette starts. “I can't believe any of you are taking this fairy-tale nonsense seriously. What we need is a real solution to—”

But Raul puts his hand on her arm.

“Let's hear this out,” he says. “I'm willing to listen to anything that offers up a chance of getting Benny back.” He turns his attention to Robert. “You can do this? You can get us into this place?”

Robert nods. “Like Bojo said. I don't know much about computers either. But I know the spiritworld. I figure between those of us who've got some familiarity with the place, we won't be shooting completely blind.”

He looks to Dick who gives a sad, negative shake of his head.

“Not me,” he says. “I've no sense of direction and I've never gone very far into the borderlands.” He shoots Holly an apologetic look. “Hobs hardly ever do.”

Robert's gaze travels on to Bojo.

“I'd need more to go on than guesswork,” he says. “Christy wasn't exaggerating,” he adds, looking up and down the dining room table. “It's a big place. Anything you've ever imagined, exists somewhere in there. And that goes for everyone who's ever lived—they might die and travel on, but the places and people they imagined stay behind. There are worlds upon worlds upon worlds in there. They're not all hospitable. And they're mostly dangerous. And the borderlands are even more confusing for those who don't know exactly where they're going.”

“I might be able to call up the right door,” Robert says. “Everything's got its own signature, and I've been hearing enough about this place that I figure I can find a piece of music that'll get us close, if not right to where we want to go. Though it's not something I care to work on for too long.”

“Why's that?” Estie asks.

Robert shrugs. “Let's just say that there are all kinds of spirits over there on the other side of the veil separating this world from the otherworld and not all of them have taken a liking to me. They know the sound of my Gibson. They know
my
signature—the way I pull a tune from its strings. I play too long and they'll come sniffing around. And when they come, we'll be in a whole mess of new trouble.”

“You get us close,” Bojo says, “And I'll take us the rest of the way. I don't need music.”

“Just like that,” Claudette says. “We're just going to up and step into Never-Never Land, following you like you're the Pied Piper.”

“You're mixing up your fairy tales,” Holly says.

“You know what I mean.”

“Once we get there,” Tip asks. “Can you bring us back again?”