Chapter 16

This chapter is dedicated to San Francisco's Booksmith, ensconced in thestoried Haight-Ashbury neighborhood, just a few doors down from theBen and Jerry's at the exact corner of Haight and Ashbury. The Book-smith folks really know how to run an author event — when I lived inSan Francisco, I used to go down all the time to hear incredible writersspeak (William Gibson was unforgettable). They also produce littlebaseball-card-style trading cards for each author — I have two from myown appearances there.
Booksmith: 1644 Haight St. San Francisco CA 94117 USA +1 415 8638688At first Mom looked shocked, then outraged, and finally she gave upaltogether and just let her jaw hang open as I took her through the inter-rogation, pissing myself, the bag over my head, Darryl. I showed her thenote.
"Why —?"In that single syllable, every recrimination I'd dealt myself in the night,every moment that I'd lacked the bravery to tell the world what it wasreally about, why I was really fighting, what had really inspired theXnet.
I sucked in a breath.
"They told me I'd go to jail if I talked about it. Not just for a few days.
Forever. I was — I was scared."Mom sat with me for a long time, not saying anything. Then, "Whatabout Darryl's father?"She might as well have stuck a knitting needle in my chest. Darryl'sfather. He must have assumed that Darryl was dead, long dead.
And wasn't he? After the DHS has held you illegally for three months,would they ever let you go?
211But Zeb got out. Maybe Darryl would get out. Maybe me and the Xnetcould help get Darryl out.
"I haven't told him," I said.
Now Mom was crying. She didn't cry easily. It was a British thing. Itmade her little hiccoughing sobs much worse to hear.
"You will tell him," she managed. "You will.""I will.""But first we have to tell your father."Dad no longer had any regular time when he came home. Between hisconsulting clients — who had lots of work now that the DHS was shop-ping for data-mining startups on the peninsula — and the long commuteto Berkeley, he might get home any time between 6PM and midnight.
Tonight Mom called him and told him he was coming home right now.
He said something and she just repeated it: right now.
When he got there, we had arranged ourselves in the living room withthe note between us on the coffee table.
It was easier to tell, the second time. The secret was getting lighter. Ididn't embellish, I didn't hide anything. I came clean.
I'd heard of coming clean before but I'd never understood what itmeant until I did it. Holding in the secret had dirtied me, soiled my spir-it. It had made me afraid and ashamed. It had made me into all thethings that Ange said I was.
Dad sat stiff as a ramrod the whole time, his face carved of stone.
When I handed him the note, he read it twice and then set it downcarefully.
He shook his head and stood up and headed for the front door.
"Where are you going?" Mom asked, alarmed.
"I need a walk," was all he managed to gasp, his voice breaking.
We stared awkwardly at each other, Mom and me, and waited for himto come home. I tried to imagine what was going on in his head. He'dbeen such a different man after the bombings and I knew from Mom thatwhat had changed him were the days of thinking I was dead. He'd cometo believe that the terrorists had nearly killed his son and it had madehim crazy.
212Crazy enough to do whatever the DHS asked, to line up like a goodlittle sheep and let them control him, drive him.
Now he knew that it was the DHS that had imprisoned me, the DHSthat had taken San Francisco's children hostage in Gitmo-by-the-Bay. Itmade perfect sense, now that I thought of it. Of course it had been Treas-ure Island where I'd been kept. Where else was a ten-minute boat-ridefrom San Francisco?
When Dad came back, he looked angrier than he ever had in his life.
"You should have told me!" he roared.
Mom interposed herself between him and me. "You're blaming thewrong person," she said. "It wasn't Marcus who did the kidnapping andthe intimidation."He shook his head and stamped. "I'm not blaming Marcus. I know ex-actly who's to blame. Me. Me and the stupid DHS. Get your shoes on,grab your coats.""Where are we going?""To see Darryl's father. Then we're going to Barbara Stratford's place."I knew the name Barbara Stratford from somewhere, but I couldn't re-member where. I thought that maybe she was an old friend of my par-ents, but I couldn't exactly place her.
Meantime, I was headed for Darryl's father's place. I'd never really feltcomfortable around the old man, who'd been a Navy radio operator andran his household like a tight ship. He'd taught Darryl Morse code whenhe was a kid, which I'd always thought was cool. It was one of the ways Iknew that I could trust Zeb's letter. But for every cool thing like Morsecode, Darryl's father had some crazy military discipline that seemed tobe for its own sake, like insisting on hospital corners on the beds andshaving twice a day. It drove Darryl up the wall.
Darryl's mother hadn't liked it much either, and had taken off back toher family in Minnesota when Darryl was ten — Darryl spent his sum-mers and Christmases there.
I was sitting in the back of the car, and I could see the back of Dad'shead as he drove. The muscles in his neck were tense and kept jumpingaround as he ground his jaws.
213Mom kept her hand on his arm, but no one was around to comfort me.
If only I could call Ange. Or Jolu. Or Van. Maybe I would when the daywas done.
"He must have buried his son in his mind," Dad said, as we whippedup through the hairpin curves leading up Twin Peaks to the little cottagethat Darryl and his father shared. The fog was on Twin Peaks, the way itoften was at night in San Francisco, making the headlamps reflect backon is. Each time we swung around a corner, I saw the valleys of the citylaid out below us, bowls of twinkling lights that shifted in the mist.
"Is this the one?""Yes," I said. "This is it." I hadn't been to Darryl's in months, but I'dspent enough time here over the years to recognize it right off.
The three of us stood around the car for a long moment, waiting to seewho would go and ring the doorbell. To my surprise, it was me.
I rang it and we all waited in held-breath silence for a minute. I rang itagain. Darryl's father's car was in the driveway, and we'd seen a lightburning in the living room. I was about to ring a third time when thedoor opened.
"Marcus?" Darryl's father wasn't anything like I remembered him. Un-shaven, in a housecoat and bare feet, with long toenails and red eyes.
He'd gained weight, and a soft extra chin wobbled beneath the firm mil-itary jaw. His thin hair was wispy and disordered.
"Mr Glover," I said. My parents crowded into the door behind me.
"Hello, Ron," my mother said.
"Ron," my father said.
"You too? What's going on?""Can we come in?"His living room looked like one of those news-segments they showabout abandoned kids who spend a month locked in before they're res-cued by the neighbors: frozen meal boxes, empty beer cans and juicebottles, moldy cereal bowls and piles of newspapers. There was a reek ofcat piss and litter crunched underneath our feet. Even without the catpiss, the smell was incredible, like a bus-station toilet.
The couch was made up with a grimy sheet and a couple of greasy pil-lows and the cushions had a dented, much-slept-upon look.
214We all stood there for a long silent moment, embarrassment over-whelming every other emotion. Darryl's father looked like he wanted todie.
Slowly, he moved aside the sheets from the sofa and cleared thestacked, greasy food-trays off of a couple of the chairs, carrying them in-to the kitchen, and, from the sound of it, tossing them on the floor.
We sat gingerly in the places he'd cleared, and then he came back andsat down too.
"I'm sorry," he said vaguely. "I don't really have any coffee to offeryou. I'm having more groceries delivered tomorrow so I'm running low—""Ron," my father said. "Listen to us. We have something to tell you,and it's not going to be easy to hear."He sat like a statue as I talked. He glanced down at the note, read itwithout seeming to understand it, then read it again. He handed it backto me.
He was trembling.
"He's —""Darryl is alive," I said. "Darryl is alive and being held prisoner onTreasure Island."He stuffed his fist in his mouth and made a horrible groaning sound.
"We have a friend," my father said. "She writes for the Bay Guardian.
An investigative reporter."That's where I knew the name from. The free weekly Guardian oftenlost its reporters to bigger daily papers and the Internet, but BarbaraStratford had been there forever. I had a dim memory of having dinnerwith her when I was a kid.
"We're going there now," my mother said. "Will you come with us,Ron? Will you tell her Darryl's story?"He put his face in his hands and breathed deeply. Dad tried to put hishand on his shoulders, but Mr Glover shook it off violently.
"I need to clean myself up," he said. "Give me a minute."Mr Glover came back downstairs a changed man. He'd shaved andgelled his hair back, and had put on a crisp military dress uniform with arow of campaign ribbons on the breast. He stopped at the foot of thestairs and kind of gestured at it.
215"I don't have much clean stuff that's presentable at the moment. Andthis seemed appropriate. You know, if she wanted to take pictures."He and Dad rode up front and I got in the back, behind him. Up close,he smelled a little of beer, like it was coming through his pores.
It was midnight by the time we rolled into Barbara Stratford's drive-way. She lived out of town, down in Mountain View, and as we speddown the 101, none of us said a word. The high-tech buildings alongsidethe highway streamed past us.
This was a different Bay Area to the one I lived in, more like the sub-urban America I sometimes saw on TV. Lots of freeways and subdivi-sions of identical houses, towns where there weren't any homelesspeople pushing shopping carts down the sidewalk — there weren't evensidewalks!
Mom had phoned Barbara Stratford while we were waiting for MrGlover to come downstairs. The journalist had been sleeping, but Momhad been so wound up she forgot to be all British and embarrassed aboutwaking her up. Instead, she just told her, tensely, that she had somethingto talk about and that it had to be in person.
When we rolled up to Barbara Stratford's house, my first thought wasof the Brady Bunch place — a low ranch house with a brick baffle infront of it and a neat, perfectly square lawn. There was a kind of abstracttile pattern on the baffle, and an old-fashioned UHF TV antenna risingfrom behind it. We wandered around to the entrance and saw that therewere lights on inside already.
The writer opened the door before we had a chance to ring the bell.
She was about my parents' age, a tall thin woman with a hawk-like noseand shrewd eyes with a lot of laugh-lines. She was wearing a pair ofjeans that were hip enough to be seen at one of the boutiques on ValenciaStreet, and a loose Indian cotton blouse that hung down to her thighs.
She had small round glasses that flashed in her hallway light.
She smiled a tight little smile at us.
"You brought the whole clan, I see," she said.
Mom nodded. "You'll understand why in a minute," she said. MrGlover stepped from behind Dad.
"And you called in the Navy?""All in good time."216We were introduced one at a time to her. She had a firm handshakeand long fingers.
Her place was furnished in Japanese minimalist style, just a few pre-cisely proportioned, low pieces of furniture, large clay pots of bamboothat brushed the ceiling, and what looked like a large, rusted piece of adiesel engine perched on top of a polished marble plinth. I decided Iliked it. The floors were old wood, sanded and stained, but not filled, soyou could see cracks and pits underneath the varnish. I really liked that,especially as I walked over it in my stocking feet.
"I have coffee on," she said. "Who wants some?"We all put up our hands. I glared defiantly at my parents.
"Right," she said.
She disappeared into another room and came back a moment laterbearing a rough bamboo tray with a half-gallon thermos jug and six cupsof precise design but with rough, sloppy decorations. I liked those too.
"Now," she said, once she'd poured and served. "It's very good to seeyou all again. Marcus, I think the last time I saw you, you were maybeseven years old. As I recall, you were very excited about your new videogames, which you showed me."I didn't remember it at all, but that sounded like what I'd been into atseven. I guessed it was my Sega Dreamcast.
She produced a tape-recorder and a yellow pad and a pen, and twirledthe pen. "I'm here to listen to whatever you tell me, and I can promiseyou that I'll take it all in confidence. But I can't promise that I'll do any-thing with it, or that it's going to get published." The way she said itmade me realize that my Mom had called in a pretty big favor gettingthis lady out of bed, friend or no friend. It must be kind of a pain in theass to be a big-shot investigative reporter. There were probably a millionpeople who would have liked her to take up her cause.
Mom nodded at me. Even though I'd told the story three times thatnight, I found myself tongue-tied. This was different from telling myparents. Different from telling Darryl's father. This — this would start anew move in the game.
I started slowly, and watched Barbara take notes. I drank a whole cupof coffee just explaining what ARGing was and how I got out of school toplay. Mom and Dad and Mr Glover all listened intently to this part. Ipoured myself another cup and drank it on the way to explaining how217we were taken in. By the time I'd run through the whole story, I'ddrained the pot and I needed a piss like a race-horse.
Her bathroom was just as stark as the living-room, with a brown, or-ganic soap that smelled like clean mud. I came back in and found theadults quietly watching me.
Mr Glover told his story next. He didn't have anything to say aboutwhat had happened, but he explained that he was a veteran and that hisson was a good kid. He talked about what it felt like to believe that hisson had died, about how his ex-wife had had a collapse when she foundout and ended up in a hospital. He cried a little, unashamed, the tearsstreaming down his lined face and darkening the collar of his dress-uniform.
When it was all done, Barbara went into a different room and cameback with a bottle of Irish whiskey. "It's a Bushmills 15 year old rum-caskaged blend," she said, setting down four small cups. None for me. "Ithasn't been sold in ten years. I think this is probably an appropriate timeto break it out."She poured them each a small glass of the liquor, then raised hers andsipped at it, draining half the glass. The rest of the adults followed suit.
They drank again, and finished the glasses. She poured them new shots.
"All right," she said. "Here's what I can tell you right now. I believeyou. Not just because I know you, Lillian. The story sounds right, and itties in with other rumors I've heard. But I'm not going to be able to justtake your word for it. I'm going to have to investigate every aspect ofthis, and every element of your lives and stories. I need to know if there'sanything you're not telling me, anything that could be used to discredityou after this comes to light. I need everything. It could take weeks be-fore I'm ready to publish.
"You also need to think about your safety and this Darryl's safety. Ifhe's really an 'un-person' then bringing pressure to bear on the DHScould cause them to move him somewhere much further away. ThinkSyria. They could also do something much worse." She let that hang inthe air. I knew she meant that they might kill him.
"I'm going to take this letter and scan it now. I want pictures of the twoof you, now and later — we can send out a photographer, but I want todocument this as thoroughly as I can tonight, too."I went with her into her office to do the scan. I'd expected a stylish,low-powered computer that fit in with her decor, but instead, her spare-218bedroom/office was crammed with top-of-the-line PCs, big flat-panelmonitors, and a scanner big enough to lay a whole sheet of newsprint on.
She was fast with it all, too. I noted with some approval that she wasrunning ParanoidLinux. This lady took her job seriously.
The computers' fans set up an effective white-noise shield, but even so,I closed the door and moved in close to her.
"Um, Barbara?""Yes?""About what you said, about what might be used to discredit me?""Yes?""What I tell you, you can't be forced to tell anyone else, right?""In theory. Let me put it this way. I've gone to jail twice rather than ratout a source.""OK, OK. Good. Wow. Jail. Wow. OK." I took a deep breath. "You'veheard of Xnet? Of M1k3y?""Yes?""I'm M1k3y.""Oh," she said. She worked the scanner and flipped the note over toget the reverse. She was scanning at some unbelievable resolution, 10,000dots per inch or higher, and on-screen it was like the output of anelectron-tunneling microscope.
"Well, that does put a different complexion on this.""Yeah," I said. "I guess it does.""Your parents don't know.""Nope. And I don't know if I want them to.""That's something you're going to have to work out. I need to thinkabout this. Can you come by my office? I'd like to talk to you about whatthis means, exactly.""Do you have an Xbox Universal? I could bring over an installer.""Yes, I'm sure that can be arranged. When you come by, tell the recep-tionist that you're Mr Brown, to see me. They know what that means. Nonote will be taken of you coming, and all the security camera footage forthe day will be automatically scrubbed and the cameras deactivated untilyou leave.""Wow," I said. "You think like I do."219She smiled and socked me in the shoulder. "Kiddo, I've been at thisgame for a hell of a long time. So far, I've managed to spend more timefree than behind bars. Paranoia is my friend."I was like a zombie the next day in school. I'd totaled about threehours of sleep, and even three cups of the Turk's caffeine mud failed tojump-start my brain. The problem with caffeine is that it's too easy to getacclimated to it, so you have to take higher and higher doses just to getabove normal.
I'd spent the night thinking over what I had to do. It was like runninthough a maze of twisty little passages, all alike, every one leading to thesame dead end. When I went to Barbara, it would be over for me. Thatwas the outcome, no matter how I thought about it.
By the time the school day was over, all I wanted was to go home andcrawl into bed. But I had an appointment at the Bay Guardian, down onthe waterfront. I kept my eyes on my feet as I wobbled out the gate, andas I turned into 24th Street, another pair of feet fell into step with me. Irecognized the shoes and stopped.
"Ange?"She looked like I felt. Sleep-deprived and raccoon-eyed, with sadbrackets in the corners of her mouth.
"Hi there," she said. "Surprise. I gave myself French Leave from school.
I couldn't concentrate anyway.""Um," I said.
"Shut up and give me a hug, you idiot."I did. It felt good. Better than good. It felt like I'd amputated part ofmyself and it had been reattached.
"I love you, Marcus Yallow.""I love you, Angela Carvelli.""OK," she said breaking it off. "I liked your post about why you're notjamming. I can respect it. What have you done about finding a way tojam them without getting caught?""I'm on my way to meet an investigative journalist who's going to pub-lish a story about how I got sent to jail, how I started Xnet, and howDarryl is being illegally held by the DHS at a secret prison on TreasureIsland."220"Oh." She looked around for a moment. "Couldn't you think of any-thing, you know, ambitious?""Want to come?""I am coming, yes. And I would like you to explain this in detail if youdon't mind."After all the re-tellings, this one, told as we walked to Potrero Avenueand down to 15th Street, was the easiest. She held my hand andsqueezed it often.
We took the stairs up to the Bay Guardian's offices two at a time. Myheart was pounding. I got to the reception desk and told the bored girlbehind it, "I'm here to see Barbara Stratford. My name is Mr Green.""I think you mean Mr Brown?""Yeah," I said, and blushed. "Mr Brown."She did something at her computer, then said, "Have a seat. Barbarawill be out in a minute. Can I get you anything?""Coffee," we both said in unison. Another reason to love Ange: wewere addicted to the same drug.
The receptionist — a pretty latina woman only a few years older thanus, dressed in Gap styles so old they were actually kind of hipster-retro— nodded and stepped out and came back with a couple of cups bearingthe newspaper's masthead.
We sipped in silence, watching visitors and reporters come and go.
Finally, Barbara came to get us. She was wearing practically the samething as the night before. It suited her. She quirked an eyebrow at mewhen she saw that I'd brought a date.
"Hello," I said. "Um, this is —""Ms Brown," Ange said, extending a hand. Oh, yeah, right, our identit-ies were supposed to be a secret. "I work with Mr Green." She elbowedme lightly.
"Let's go then," Barbara said, and led us back to a board-room withlong glass walls with their blinds drawn shut. She set down a tray ofWhole Foods organic Oreo clones, a digital recorder, and another yellowpad.
"Do you want to record this too?" she asked.
Hadn't actually thought of that. I could see why it would be useful if Iwanted to dispute what Barbara printed, though. Still, if I couldn't trusther to do right by me, I was doomed anyway.
221"No, that's OK," I said.
"Right, let's go. Young lady, my name is Barbara Stratford and I'm aninvestigative reporter. I gather you know why I'm here, and I'm curiousto know why you're here.""I work with Marcus on the Xnet," she said. "Do you need to know myname?""Not right now, I don't," Barbara said. "You can be anonymous if you'dlike. Marcus, I asked you to tell me this story because I need to knowhow it plays with the story you told me about your friend Darryl and thenote you showed me. I can see how it would be a good adjunct; I couldpitch this as the origin of the Xnet. 'They made an enemy they'll neverforget,' that sort of thing. But to be honest, I'd rather not have to tell thatstory if I don't have to.
"I'd rather have a nice clean tale about the secret prison on our door-step, without having to argue about whether the prisoners there are thesort of people likely to walk out the doors and establish an undergroundmovement bent on destabilizing the federal government. I'm sure youcan understand that."I did. If the Xnet was part of the story, some people would say, see,they need to put guys like that in jail or they'll start a riot.
"This is your show," I said. "I think you need to tell the world aboutDarryl. When you do that, it's going to tell the DHS that I've gone publicand they're going to go after me. Maybe they'll figure out then that I'minvolved with the Xnet. Maybe they'll connect me to M1k3y. I guesswhat I'm saying is, once you publish about Darryl, it's all over for me nomatter what. I've made my peace with that.""As good be hanged for a sheep as a lamb," she said. "Right. Well,that's settled. I want the two of you to tell me everything you can aboutthe founding and operation of the Xnet, and then I want a demonstra-tion. What do you use it for? Who else uses it? How did it spread? Whowrote the software? Everything.""This'll take a while," Ange said.
"I've got a while," Barbara said. She drank some coffee and ate a fakeOreo. "This could be the most important story of the War on Terror. Thiscould be the story that topples the government. When you have a storylike this, you take it very carefully."