The Fictician

Anopheles-42

Samuel Trader ducked and the pen hit the wall behind him. Julia Delmark grabbed the pages of an article off the table and shoved them into her briefcase.

“You’re as bad as my goddamn husband.” She slammed the case shut. “Worse. Let them have their faith.”

“Don’t you want to know if it was actually schizophrenia?” Samuel smiled as he held out her coat.

“Looking through those damn bug eyes won’t prove that god didn’t talk to her.” Her chair screeched against the kitchen tiles as she pushed it away. “Or are you after the ratings? Do you think they’ll flock to leer at that sensationalist burning at the end? You pig! Some stories shouldn’t be debunked. And no one should go through that kind of snuff film.”

At the door she paused, flashing him a glare, and yelled that she was going bird watching, despite the rain. She slammed the door. But this had happened a dozen times. Samuel fully expected to make up in the living room, the kitchen, and the stairwell before dawn.

Samuel swore, seeing the clock, and ran for his car, coffee in hand. The leather was cold, but the vehicle warmed in seconds, and he told the console to play a reading of Othello as he drove through town. The third act was just beginning when the security gates blocked off his car. He waved the recording off before flashing his Chroncast ID, which saved him from pulling out a lifetime of paperwork.

In his office, he hung up his jacket and booted up his work station. As the machines buzzed to life, he analyzed the readout sent from the microscopic tracer chip that he had set on the manuscript and plugged in the coordinates that had taken him weeks to specify. He glanced at the bug inside the glass cylinder and switched on the power field. The tiny robot stood on six titanium footpads, and its wings slowly unfolded from lying flat against its back. With a glance at the bluish stripes and deflated form, Samuel entered the data confirming the classification of the Anopheles-42. He opened the linking software, and his notebook’s screen went black for a moment. The multifaceted eyes glowed slightly, staring at him, and his screen filled with an image of his office, warped through the glass cylinder of the robot’s housing.

He sent the charge through the device, and the Anopheles vanished.

On Samuel’s screen, William Shakespeare sat hunched over his desk, crafting the wording of Puck’s parting apology. A mosquito circled his face, stared over his shoulder at the document, and alighted on the back of his neck. The silver-gray proboscis sliced through his skin, and the abdomen swelled with blood. The insect sprang back into the air, dodging the absentminded hand slapping the neck and the video blurred as the mosquito spun on disturbing air currents.

A slight smell of ozone gathered in the Elizabethan air and the bug vanished as Samuel Trader pushed the keystroke for recall. The Anopheles-42 popped back into the vacuum-lock in front of his desk. His monitor reflected his office back at him, and he shut off the video link. He had the forms filled out and initialed before the technician arrived. The man in the white coat extracted the Anopheles robot, and Samuel initialed the hours of the timeline accessed.

Samuel typed a code into his notebook, and opened an audio-line to his agent.

“Bob, good news. The tracer on the manuscript worked. No more conspiracy theories on this one. I got visual confirmation and DNA evidence of Mr. Stratford-upon-Avon scripting A Midsummer Night’s Dream.”

“Good. You are a week ahead of schedule. And you’ll get some cred for the confirmation.” His agent spoke with the slow cadence of the multitasking, and Samuel could hear a steady stream of typing in the background.

“Unfortunately,” Bob continued, “I have a hunch George Delmark will dominate the Acrons this year, too. He’s been working on his Nazi documentary for months. Apparently he traced good coordinates to get good footage of weapons labs. Nerve gas. You should see them make Tabun. It’s some crazy stuff. The panel will love it. I hear he destroyed ten mosquitoes trying to get one shot. You have to wonder where the funding comes from. I haven’t heard that he’s done any government work getting DNA samples.”

Samuel massaged his forehead. “Bob, I don’t know what direction I should go in my next project. I’m thinking of taking on Joan of Arc. But most of the fascinating periods of history are less interesting than rumor once you go back to them.”

“Well,” Bob slowed his typing, “I know you love accuracy in your history vids. But you’re right, you have to work to make them interesting. And you need to expand your audience. If you can’t find any interesting untold stories, you could create some. Try the hinge event angle – change something subtle and see what follows from it.”

“Helluvan agent you are. Do you realize how much power we have to generate to send back an Anopheles? We can’t move back anything big enough to effect a change.” Samuel was quiet for a moment, picturing an anachronistic note warning Cesar of treachery. “Anyway, it’s unethical – and Joan of Arc is hardly the assignment to try it.”

“Unethical? Sam, while you’re navigating that little bug around in the past, I’m doing late nights with the latest research. Everyone is interested in the implications of this technology. Homeland Security is shoveling money trying to get a future-surveillance system worked out, but they have to make the process more efficient to be worthwhile. And the legislature is hammering them, of course. The have qualms about privacy, due to some crackpot lobbyists. But Samuel, the research is proving it. For past-observation, there isn’t a damn thing you can do to change the timeline.”

“What about the theory that alternate timestreams arise from the changes?”

“Bogus. No one serious in the field believes that. Remember that. I’d hate for you to utter some embarrassing remarks at a banquet again. I hate dealing with your bad publicity. Last time – shit!” The sound of typing stopped. “Sam, turn on the Newsfeed.”

Samuel, surprised at the excitement in his agent’s tone, brought up a link to the feed. A picture-in-picture reporter stood twenty feet from the broken glass and twisted shards that surrounded the blue sedan impacted into the nose of a tractor trailer. Brief footage of a medical response team wheeling off body bags. On the sidebar, the national correspondent’s mouth was moving, but Samuel heard nothing. His eyes were fixed on the photo of Julia.

“Sam. Sam?”

He realized his agent was talking. “She looks familiar,” he managed.

“She should. This is – was – the wife of the George Delmark. I think this will be your year to sweep the awards for Retro Flicks.”

“You think the only way I’ll win Acrons or Oscars is with Delmark’s stops filming to mourn?” Samuel almost managed to keep the disgust from his tone.

“Hardly. Apparently the two were about to divorce. Read the story. This newscaster just started this segment on the crash. Pick another channel. Any other channel. God, this is great.”

Samuel switched the channel to hear a newscaster reading the story with barely-contained excitement. “Mrs. Delmark, perhaps fearing for her life, had an anonymous source in reserve in the event of her death. The source sent us her tell-all article. The text accuses George Delmark, three-time Acron winning director of selling DNA samples of dead celebrities to unlicensed cloning labs that feed into prostitution rings…”

“Sam,” his agent’s voice nearly squeaked. “Her expose is online. Read it! Apparently his wife was one hell of a writer. Are you listening to this? Breeding people for prostitution rings? This is fantastic! Not a damn soul would vote up his movie while he’s in jail.”

If Samuel had not been in a state of shock, he might have felt more than a twinge of schadenfreude. “I guess there’s a lot of money in that.” The car crash was back on the screen, and he stared hard at the black bodybags.

He remembered Julia showing up at his door in hiking clothes, a laptop case slung across her chest. He could tell she was vexed by her jerky motions, the way she flipped her hair out of her face, but she never explained what George Delmark had done to piss her off. She requested, from Samuel Trader, an interview on ethics. It was never published, despite a long conversation that they decided to continue on a weekly basis, and recently with increased frequency.

“Money? Damn, Sam. His license is gone. He’ll be in jail as soon as they catch him. If they can’t prove anything right away, they’ll hound him until he dies. This violates the past-vision legislation on so many levels.”

Samuel stared at his computer and focused on the solid metal case. He blocked out thoughts of her crushed sedan and wondered what Delmark would do without access to the past. “Bob, to take an operator’s job is cutting an entire dimension out of his life, one that most people don’t have. What will he do with his spare time – watch other people’s movies? I would do anything to keep my job. This is –” He was silent for a long moment. “Do you think that crash was an accident?”

“You think he knew about her article? This publicity is worse than anything she could have blackmailed out of him. His sponsors are going to be rolling in lawsuits from the celebrity’s heirs. And what are they going to do with all the clones? Maybe they can make some retro miniseries unless they were lobotomized.”

Julia’s picture flashed back on the screen, and Samuel clenched his teeth over his lip. “Bob, I told you I just located a Shakespeare sample. I have to process it. You know how much documentation the company wants with each past-access. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Alright. Just wait for the Acrons, Samuel! It will be incredible.”

Samuel dropped the call and pressed the flesh of his palms against his eyes to block the bodybag out. Behind his eyes she was slamming that door with fiery eyes. He mouthed “Julia,” and thought of the plain box holding the multifaceted emerald ring, which was still sandwiched between legal sheets and a folder of objectives in his drawer. He wished he had brought the box home a week ago.

“Delmark.” Samuel suspected that people with that much motive were seldom innocent. Assuming that he would not need a blood sample, he punched the sequence to request use of an Anopheles-42V. Samuel worked quickly, knowing he would need to acquire all footage now in case investigators or Chroncast discovered that there was a connection between him and Julia.

Samuel ran an analysis and tweaked the geography and time coordinates for an hour, but stopped, angry as he again found himself staring off into space and wondering what their life would have been like together. He got up from his chair to lock the door. He waved the window of calculations down and punched the code to open an encrypted file.

The screen filled with Julia’s smile, then panned out. She was standing in front of Samuel, who was seated on the living room carpet. She kissed him as she tied a blindfold around his eyes.

“This is the game, Sam,” she said, tracing his jaw line with her fingertips. “I’ll tell you a story, and you won’t know if I’m telling the truth. That uncertainty is the beauty.” Julia stepped away from him, moving her arms with a rustle of fabric. “I have to take off my shirt.”

“I’m not sure I can morally keep this blindfold on,” he said, grinning.

“Be patient.” She kissed him again, and after she stepped away, she described, in detail, a series of erotic postures.

Samuel, from his desk, watched Julia bounce around the room, still in her bulky sweater and jeans. He watched the play of emotions across her face. Only she could pull off such a deadpan while describing her state of undress, and only she could have sad eyes in the middle of such a game. But a second later he could see that half-smile curling her lips as the blindfolded Samuel grew more desperate about what he was missing. Though his grin dropped when she pulled off his blindfold to reveal herself fully clothed, he had sent a mosquito to the moment the next day. It was when he had first sat at his desk and watched her face through the mosquito’s eyes that he realized he had never loved anyone more.

Samuel closed the video and pressed his palms over his eyes, leaning against his desk. After a long moment, he pulled open the analysis he had been working on, and attacked the data in frenzy until he pulled functional coordinates. Drawing a shuddering breath, he warmed up the machine.

He sent the Anopheles to his last conversation with Julia. He oriented the mosquito-bot and followed her as she stalked from room to room, slamming doors. Staring at her passionate eyes in the video-feed, he cringed at the shallowness of their argument. He had been baiting her – he just wanted to taunt her, to see her eyes flash, to see her dark hair against her face when she tossed her head. He manipulated the controls, and the mosquito swooped through the half open door as she leaned in from the frame, cursing Chroncast. The bot slipped past her and followed her to her car.

Samuel’s fingers were sweaty against the controls, but he adjusted the altitude and made it through the car’s door just before she slammed it shut and turned the key. The Anopheles settled on the headrest of the passenger seat for a maximum view of Julia and a panorama of the surroundings.

Watching Julia, he wanted so badly to make her stop driving. But even if he flew the Anopheles into her face and prevented her leaving for another couple of seconds, he could not change the past. He bit his lip and watched her bangs fall in front of her eyes as she gunned the gas and jerked the stick into first gear.

Julia calmed down once she reached the interstate. Her cranberry lips pursed into a small smile. She flipped on the radio and murmured along with the Beatles. She turned onto the twisty Appalachian road, muttering something about the scarcity of blackbirds.

Samuel saw the truck approaching, the sun glaring off the steel trailer. A speck of shadow dislodged itself from the edge of the windshield. The bug – a mosquito – arced in front of her face. She screamed and clutched at her eyes. The car swerved and he could see the grille of the truck. He jerked the Anopheles out of the time stream, shaking.

He burned the video to a disk, and used an illegal program to delete the record from the computer’s timeline. Proof that he was using the technology to spy on a citizen would get him fired and fined heavily. After Delmark’s crimes, the company might suspend operations and search for violations. While the file transferred, he punched in the code to hear the feeds and personal notes he had missed, determined not to think. A voice from his speakers read the messages without emotion or reflection.

Sender: Chronology Inc. Anopheles Division

Subject: Bulletin

It is against company policy to respond to requests for a Hitler sample. The ten we sold for the morality study were a closed group. Note that any communiqués concerning Hitler and Gandhi in the underground boxing world are strictly prohibited…

Sender: Nigeria

Subject: Need fast cash?

Dear Sir,

I received your name from a mutual acquaintance. I recently inherited a great sum of money, but the password is lost to the past. I need a contract with Chroncast Inc. to recover it. If you provide the cash for the contract, my inheritance would be more than sufficient to reimburse you five times over…

Samuel snapped the command to hear the next message.

Sender: Subcast

Subject: Obituary: George Delmark

Oscar and Acron winning director commits suicide in home at age 46.

Following the death of his wife and the scandal that hit earlier today, an expert in the field of past-voyeurism, Mr. Delmark (The Truth of the Druids, and the more popular Die, Rasputin) took measures to prevent his own demise from being broadcast as next autumn’s moral anecdote. He released a strobe EMP (the latest from Liberty Inc.) to produce a field of static which destroyed all electronics in his house as well as the possibility of his colleagues using a video-bot to spread the footage of his death.

George had committed suicide. Samuel read the news and realized he had been expecting it. He laced his fingers behind his head and leaned back in his chair. Life in only three dimensions seemed far too mundane. He was surprised to realize that despite the suicide, he was jealous of the man. Delmark had been married to Julia for most of three years. Samuel would never have that chance.

The file completed, and he played the disk. Samuel watched isolated the last thirty seconds of the video and played it on loop. By the twentieth, he was convinced that the stripes on the back of the other mosquito marked it as a model of an Anopheles he had never seen before, and that it began the strafing run in front of Julia’s eyes with a full abdomen. When it completed the pass in front of her face, the bot was deflated. A reverse valve? What did it spray? He had never heard of a mosquito used as a weapon.

Samuel played the entire video clip, watching the mosquito to memorize its placement. The other Operator kept his bug staring directly at her face, leaving a blind spot behind its swollen abdomen.

He set up a tracer and sent the Anopheles-42V back to a set of coordinates he had marked while she idled the car at a stoplight. He landed the bot by the passenger window and made it crawl to the blind spot with the painful speed of fingernails growing. He extended the proboscis, and applied the least pressure possible to stick it to the underside of the other bot’s leg, where sensors should not alert the Operator.

Samuel fell asleep in his chair while the computer processed the tracker to determine where in time and space the mosquito originated. He set a tentative range of dates, but the program glitched, and he expanded the search field. He jerked awake to a flashing pop-up on the screen. He stared at the coordinates, but they didn’t make sense in his head. They came from the Chroncast building, but three years in the future. He punched in the suspect coordinates, and downed an energy drink to shake the lead feeling of his eyelids.

The Anopheles popped into the office, and he maneuvered the bug to see the operator. He stared at the screen of his notebook and could not bring himself to touch the controls again. He rubbed his eyes, but the face didn’t change.

On the screen, he saw his own face. They were his fingers that punched Julia’s code, and heard the slow beeping as the connection established. “Julia?” It was his voice. “Hi honey. I just wondered where we should have our anniversary. New Zealand? That could be interesting.” He stood and started pacing. “You’re having lunch with George again? Oh. Yes, it bothers me when my wife eats with her ex husband. Yes, I know. No, that doesn’t make it better. Good bye. I’m still at work. I have to go. No, I’m busy. Bye.”

The man on the screen punched the keyboard and severed the connection. “Bitch. It was too much to hope for,” he muttered. “But you make the funniest face when you die.” He punched another number.

“Bob? The Tabun worked splendidly. If I can use a real-time bot, it should work. No, it shouldn’t be noticed. The crash will kill her, not the nerve gas. Look, no one has forgotten George’s Oscar-winning look into Nazi Germany. And he has plenty of cause. You read the file I hacked from her computer? She knows that I started selling financial codes. But Delmark’s done worse shit. Selling DNA to labs and pimps is going to get him crucified.”

“Yeah, I know. No, I won’t miss her.” He squinted at his computer, and Samuel swiveled the mosquito to see the screen. The video record had been paused on Julia clutching her eyes with the truck approaching. “That bitch used me. She wanted to destroy us both at once and kill the credibility of the industry. Yes, because we were the top. No, no, we don’t have other options. She has to go. I can’t sit in jail. I have too much work to do.”

He paced his office, and Samuel distantly noticed that he looked like he hadn’t slept in days. He rubbed the stubble on his jaw, and glanced around with hollowed eyes. He nodded at something, the headset bobbing precariously.

“Yes, Bob, I said I tried it, didn’t I? No hesitation, no regret. It was just a test, but I know I can do it again. Of course she’s alive right now. You know the research – it doesn’t work to change the past. Yes, I’m getting rid of her before our anniversary.”

Samuel hit the controls to recall the mosquito, and his strained face vanished from the screen. The mosquito popped back into the glass tube and landed, wings shutting down. Samuel sat quietly at his desk for a long time, matching the gray faceted stare from the tube. He deleted the footage from his computer and walked out of his office.

Tags: Fiction, sci fi, short story